The Photo-Play Journal (Jul 1919-Feb 1921)

■*— ? October, 1 920 of Ann May. Even the "still" camera can't reproduce her because she's never still. She's a will-o'-the-wisp type, a capricious, shrugging, blinking and grimacing witch. If you could make a composite photograph of Dorothy Gish, Constance Talmadge, Norma Talmadge and Irene Bordoni, you might gain an out-of-focus close-up of Mile. May. She undoubtedly has the French strain. Her arch smile of lips and eyes is reminiscent of the beloved Gaby Deslys. I said so. "Ah, Gaby — poor Gaby," she sighed. "No one gave her credit for a soul until she died. They thought she was just a butterfly. And then she passed on and left all her wonderful jewels to found a home for girls in Paris. Wasn't that wonderful? Maybe when I die they'll find I'm not all butterfly, too." Deviltry again sparkled in her eyes. At least, la belle Ann has something as essential as a soul. She has a sense of humor. Dot Gish taught her to make up for the screen, and she becomes fiercely defiant whenever Jerry or Mr. Chet or Charles suggest changes in that particular style of make-up. Perhaps she is right. There certainly is a resemblance in the personalities of the two Little Disturbers. I thought Dorothy Gish had the most acrobatic eyebrows I ever observed. But I believe Miss May's can leap higher and execute a quicker back flop. She assured me she was in pictures to stay. Nothing could swerve her. "People never will believe you are in earnest if they think you don't have to work to live. Well, I have to work. I couldn't live the kind of a life some girls do — teas and bridges and dansants — you know. Neither do I have to work to keep from starving. If I did, I wouldn't choose pictures for a vocation. I'd do something that insured a steady income. Most girls go into pictures because of their vanity. I did. And, believe me, my pride certainly took a tumble when I saw how rotten I was. Say, Venus couldn't get by if she didn't have a good cameraman and didn't work her head off. I'm lucky to have such wonderful instructors. Charles is marvelous — positively marvelous. You don't know what pains he takes with me. He's willing to teach me all the tricks he's learned in his seven years' experience. Not every star would do that, take it from me they wouldn't. And Jerry — why, Jerry is going to be right on the top with Mr. Griffith and Mr. Ince some day. As for Mr. Chet — " But it would take a book to do credit to Miss May's description of "Mr. Chet." She intends to write a book, too, and put him in it. She thinks O. Henry would have done better had he lived long enough to meet the gentleman behind the camera who is responsible for making her beautiful. I'm sure I don't know how he could make her any other way. "You don't know what a cameraman is," she informed me with a bit of pity for my ignorance. "Look at what Mr. Bitzer does for Mr. Griffith. I had a little experience before I came with Mr. Ray, but I never speak of it. No one would ever recognize me if they saw me, so I'm safe. Mr. Chet makes me laugh so I become quite natural before the camera, and that's everything. I used to be thinking how someone else would do a scene instead of doing as I thought it should be done." Perhaps even those unaccustomed to a life of ease, such as Miss May enjoyed before she entered»pictures, would not be willing to go through a day's program of work such as she orders for herself. She arises at six o'clock for riding lessons for it is very important that a picture actress be able to ride well when the occasion demands. At nine o'clock she is made up and on the set. Work for the day finishes about five. Then are run the "rushes" consisting of scenes photographed that day. Miss May always remains to see them in order to review her work and determine just what her mistakes are. At seven she has dinner. At eight-thirty she goes to Denishawn for dancing instruction from Ted Shawn. At ten-thirty she is home, ready for cold cream and bed. Whenever there is a day's vacation away from the studio she visits the photographer, the couturiere, the hairdresser and the thousand and one others who make claims on a star's time. And then — there are interviewers to receive, and a great many of them are paying their respects to little Ann May, for she has registered an unqualified hit. I venture to say she has brought to the screen the most distinctive personality and promising talent of any newcomer during this year. You'll agree that a girl combining the charms of an American miss and a Parisian mademoiselle is unusual. And who ever heard of a butterfly with a soul? Away from the studio, where the glamor of being a motion picture actress surrounds her, Ann May is the simplest and most charming of girls. She is an omnivorous reader. "You'll always see Ann with a book under her arm, like some little school girl, taking a stroll from a girl's seminary, her friends will tell you. And the books are never French novels. Mort likely than not, you will find something by Emerson, or Sir Oliver Lodge's newest work tucked under her arm, to be opened and read whenever the little star has time to peep between the pages. And when she is in the East, visiting her relatives, a couple of thousand miles away from Hollywood and CooperHewitts, Ann May is again metamorphosed. This time she is a demure home-like little girl, who spends most of her time around what should be the family hearth in a Riverside Drive apartment. Of course, New York means shopping, and shopping is bound to take up a great deal of time with any girl, especially a motion picture actress. And Ann May finds almost as much pleasure in choosing frocks, hats and negligees as she does in obeying the director's instructions before the camera. Indeed, on her last trip to New York, Miss May saw little of New York save Fifth Avenue and the Drive, for, between her family and the shops, she was kept so busy that she had to fly about to attend to her social obligations before returning to the coast. Back on the lot, however, a new Ann May appears. Now she is the vivacious little woman loved and respected by all Hollywood. If Ann May were really French, as French as she was supposed to be in "Paris Green," one might call her spirituelle, in the French sense, combining the spirituality of youth and beauty with the soulfulness of a sincere artist and actress.