Photoplay (Jul-Dec 1947)

Denison was a dizzy metropolis of four thousand people. For a country girl, breaking into school activities was a struggle of titanic perseverance. Her greatest moment in life occurred when these kids elected her their Queen of May, “for grace, for looks, for personality and popularity.” But her original patent of nobility rests on a pan of biscuits. She won a prize and membership in the 4-H clubs. These 4-H clubs constitute the. nobility of redblooded democracy. You can’t get in to them by the simple process of being born; you have to do something essential for mankind, such as raising bulls or biscuits. DONNA came to Los Angeles to visit an aunt and remained to work her way through City College. Her fellow students elected her their campus queen. The newspapers published her picture. Within twenty-four hours three studios were on the telephone requesting her to make tests but Donna graciously declined until she had her diploma in secretarial efficiency. With her performance in “It’s a Wonderful Life” she was enthroned queen for the third time. Peers of the realm paid homage after the premiere. King Gable pressed her hands and bestowed his accolade, “Swell, Donna, you’ve arrived.” William Wyler, the Oscar-studded director of “The Best Years of Our Lives,” made his bow saying, “My name is Wyler; I’m a director and I hope for the privilege of directing you one day.” Donna was moved but not giddied by the starry coronation. You never can top the triumph of your own home town, and no performance can surpass a pan of biscuits that wins a 4-H prize. Donna’s ambition is to have a family of children as fine as her brothers and sisters, and to be as good a mother as her own, to whom each week she types three letters. She and Tony adopted a baby girl. Before they saw her they chose the name Penny Jane. Jane is the name of Donna’s grandmother. Tony’s oldest Hollywood friend, Randy Scott, suggested Penny. Tony liked the name Mary. A penny was tossed and Penny won. The baby cooperated by growing copper colored hair, which she changed to black and now to gold — already she has gone Hollywood. The Owens would like to have a little place in the country and wear sloppy clothes, but in these days of housing shortage beggars can’t be choosers and have to live in palaces. They have traded a beach lot they owned for a shelter with five bedrooms and five baths in Beverly. The house is L-shaped, opening inward on a patio which is an outdoor living room, the other two sides having walls tapestried with flowering vines. Windows of the onestory living room open into it; the twostory wing has glass porches upstairs and down. Donna has no hobbies, belongs to no societies except City College alumnae. She works with intensity. Her husband calls her a perfectionist. She likes lowheeled shoes and slacks and her favorite colors are blue and green. In people, sincerity and naturalness are her only demand. Dorothy McGuire and Ingrid Bergman are her favorite actresses; Jimmy Stewart ranks among men, with Cary Grant runner-up. Plain food is preferred. For a treat she will take a cheeseburger. The Owens do not care for big parties but entertain for a few friends. Their closest are Mr. and Mrs. Randy Scott, director George Sydney and his wife Lillian Burns, the drama coach of Metro Goldwyn-Mayer. Donna says Lillian made possible all dramatic achievement and is virtually her alter ego. Tony says its mutual worship. TONY now is partner in the OrsattiOwen Agency, business representatives for stars and directors. He will probably end up a producer. He says he would rather be a newspaperman than anything, a beachcomber next. He likes to call himself Pop Owen. That’s what he was called by the kids in his horse cavalry unit at Fort Riley. When war broke, passing up the chance of being an officer, he enlisted as a buck because that’s what he felt like doing. He thanks God he did. “I got to know the finest kids in this country, most of them cowhands and farm boys of the west.” When he was discharged from the hospital where he was laid up with a broken foot, the kids chipped nine dollars and five cents out of their pay to buy Pop a present. Pop says that will always be the big moment of his life. Two years ago when producer Carey Wilson read the prizewinning novel “Green Dolphin Street” by Elizabeth Goudge, he was struck by a passage describing the character of Marguerite. It was, he recognized, a perfect delineation of Donna Reed. The passage that designated Donna for the part, reads: “Transparent honesty and purity and serenity that, like clear water flooding over the bed of a stream, washes away uncleanness, and makes fresh and divinely lovely all that is seen through its own transparency.” In “Green Dolphin Street,” all who have seen it agree, Donna will add jewels to her crowns. The End ADVERTISEMENT 2* “She's not a model really— that hag's full of Pepsi-Cola. u