Photoplay (May 1921)

About Marriage EDI TOR S NOTE:— In the December issue of Photoplay Magazine, there appeared an interview with Cecil B. deMille under the title of "What Does Marriage Mean?" (Extracts from this first article appear elsewhere.) Since its publication, Mr. deMille has received thousands of letters, some condemnatory, some soothing, some harsh in their denunciation of deMille's theories; others in accord with his opinions. But all of them want ed more! Wanted advice: wanted to know just what course to pursue in "my case" — which, of course, is always different from all the rest. In this interview, Mr. deMille goes a step farther. He does an even more daring thing: he discusses the woman's side of the jjrohlem! And his expressions on this question are, it anything, a shade more startling and searching than on any other. Out of these beliefs grew his matrimonial dramas. It is characteristic of the man's mental fibre tliat he read those first. It seemed quite natural to him that my article expounding his theory of the principle of personal liberty in marriage should have caused more commotion than any other motion picture article of the \'ear. "It hits 'em," he said, decisively. "It's applicable to everyone— and they're squirming to see if they ha\ e the courage to tr> it — or the courage to refuse to tr> it." And he chuckled. "However, it is the first time," he said, lighting his pipe and settling back in his big chair so that I settled back in mine, "that I have ever mentioned my family or my personal life, in a good many years before the public. It seemed to me only fair that people should know what 'manner of man I am' in my own relation to the thing I talk so much about in my pictures — marriage. I wanted them to know I was neither a vaporizing old bachelor nor a muchdi\'orced c^'nic, speaking from the shallows of inexperience, but a man with eighteen years of happy married life behind him — and, God willing, eighteen more ahead. "I should like to answer most of those thousands of letters personalh'. Since I cannot, I can at least answer many of their requests by giving you the answers to the queries that come oftenest and the thouglits most worth while and most uni\ ersall\expressed. "Mrs. deMille herself made one point which answers at once the most general question. She said, ' It seems to me you should let everyone know that of course you accord me the same pri\ ileges of personal liberty that you ask for yourself.' "0\er and over again people ha\e written, 'How would you like it if your wife turned the tables, and went out without telling you where she was going?' or 'Would you be fair enough to gi\e your wife the rights you take yourself?' "Of course, of course! It never occurred to me that such a question could arise. I never ask my wife where she has been. I know she has been only where she should be, and I consider it none of my busine.'^s. If I come home in the evening .late from Work and she is out, I often smoke a pipe, wait a bit in the hope of seeing her before I retire, then go to bed. If she cares to talk to me about it the next day, or thinks it might interest me — well and good. If not — also well and good. "Naturally a man trusts his wife. If he doesn't he'd better get another wife. He can insure that by choosing the right sort of wife in the beginning. After that he need give the matter no more thought." As he paused to re-light his pipe, I thought of Mrs. Cecil deMille, whom I do not know personally, and of the impressions I had received in moments of casual study about the studio, at important club meetings, and the things I had heard of her from people I believed in. A small, grace ful, erect woman, with a broad, braxe brow, interested eyes, and a sweet, happy mouth softening a rather austere, aristocratic face. A woman gi\ ing forth a deep serenity, very sure 'of herself, yet gracious and jileasant and keenh* humorous. A woman of reserves, of depths, of accomplishments. Mrs. deMille's husband went on earnestly, "Mj' contention is that marriage must eventually be founded upon personal liberty. By personal liberty I do not mean the abuse of it. The present great fault with marriage — and di\ orce statistics pro\-e there /,v a great fault— is the sense of personal possession in which it results. Husbands and wives gain a sense that they own each other. That is fatal — fatal. "It is not proper here to discuss the dual or single standard of sex moralit>'. After all, it is more or less a matter of geography. But the fact remains that no matter how willing a man ma\ be to accord his wife complete freedom, men and "After all, only good women matter. TKe degree of badness in a bad woman IS interestmg. but it doesn t really matter .... Good women know that men are only children, to be guided, taught', diverted, cajoled. " Wallace Reid and Wanda Hawley.