Pictures and the Picturegoer (Jan-Dec 1925)

SEPTEMBER 1925 Pictures jnd P<ct\jreOoer 19 Saturday Ni Where do the stars go after they have drawn their Pay Checks? Evenings in Hollywood are a problem sometimes. Even in Hollywood, Land of the Free — and Easy — there is nowhere to go but out. With money to lavish on gorgeous and costly amusements — opera boxes, night clubs, casinos of chance, bals masque and the races, the motion picture millionaires find themselves living in a tree-embowered country town, governed by retired Iowa farmers where, if they dance beyond one o'clock in the Biltmore ballroom, the Mayor sends around a couple of cops to put out the lights and tell them to go home to bed. One of the most popular cafes in Hollywood has a huge sign grimly confronting all who enter, " Patrons Are earnestly Requested Not to Embarrass the Management by Bringing Liquor." Evening dress is the exception instead of the rule at amusement places. Solomon and all the Mrs. Solomons never possessed greater glory of attire than the screen sheiks and shebas, but there is no place suitable to wear tall silk hats and diamond tiaras. Still our little town has its simple and harmless pleasures. Though most of the acacia and palm-lined streets are dark at nine o-clock p.m. and the majority of screen folk spend their evenings discussing real estate or listening to what Br'er Fox said to ol' Mis' Peter Porcupine over the radio, still up on the Boulevard there is a brave display of wattage and even an electric sign or two. At the doorway of the Far East Chop Suey Parlour, a chink in mandarin garb pounds a tom-tom, through the open casements of a restaurant comes the snarl of jazz and the lisp of dancing feet, the searchlight above Sid Grauman's Egyptian Theatre reveals a turbanned and brightly robed Arab figure pacing back and forth across the roof parapet. All the cafes and restaurants in Hollywood make bids for movie patronage. The stars who sit about their tables are an unofficial but indispensable part of the entertainment, and one cf the duties of the waiters is to point out Monte Blue. Clara Bow and other screen celebrities to tourists from the Middle West. If the waiters don't happen to know the stars by sight they point them out just the same. The Club Petruska (Little Clown) was not named after Charlie Chaplin, though it owes its present prosperity to him. In .spite of its walls covered with Russian peasant scenes in bright colour, its cabaret and orchestra, it was sparsely filled in the evening until the memorable occasion when an oil millionaire dining with Mildred Harris made gome slighting remark to Char lie sitting at tin next table and the comedian proved he could wield something stronger than a custard pie by knocking him into the orchestra. C'rom that moment the Club Petruska was a success. It is a favourite resort of the present sheik of Hollywood night life, Jack Dempsey, who displays his handsome new Greek model nose there nightly at a table for two reserved especially for him, the other one of the two being usually Estelle Taylor. Apache dancers amuse the diners, but after the tourists have hungrily taken in every detail of Mae Murray's marvellous coiffure and Pola Negri's wondrous gown and paid their bills and departed at the dissipated hour of one a.m., the real entertainment begins. Ford Sterling sings a song in a mellow tenor; catching up her gorgeous shawl, Helen Ferguson does a Spanish dance, the Above : Ramon Novarro enjoys flie "festas" in the Montmartre. Left: So does little Flora Le Breton. orchestra endeavours to inject a little sin into the syncopation, and the morning stars dance together. The oldest of Hollywood cafes is the Montmartre, whose proprietor, Eddie Brandstetter, knows all the stars in the movie firmament by their first names. For years its entrance has been surrounded every noon by rapt pilgrims who watch their screen favourites descend from their cars with whispered but audible comments • . '""There's Viola Dana — my dear, mat dress she's got on couldn't have cost a cent over forty dollars ! There's that new foreign chap — What's His Name ! I don't see that he's such a much, do you? Looks like a barber. Who's that with Elliott Dexter? Do vou suppose that's her own hair or a wig? Unholy colour, that's all I've got to say " On Wednesday night there is a fiesta at the Montmartre with confetti and favours and a dancing contest behind the layers of gold and purple gauze that unroll between the dancing floor and the diners. One of the orchestra boys is a composer and has written a song to Corinne Griffith — they play that whenever Corinne is present. Ramon