Picturegoer (1921)

34 THE PI CTl J H2 EG OER FEBRUARY 1921 1 joined a touring company. We wandered far and wide— north mada, south to the Latin Republics; and I used to have pretty hard work to convince myself that all the things 1 wanted so much were one da) coming to me. '1 here w.us a birthday in Buenos \ms whioli I ilways remember -my seventeenth spent alone in the solitude of a squalid boarding -house — when 1 just about touched the depths. But I really think that ' Never say die ' will be found engraved on my heart after 1 am dead . foi nol only have 1 always refused to go under in serials, but 1 never will let myself admit defeat in my aims and aspirations." A less plucky, a less vital girl than 1'earl White would have been compelled by force of cireumstani< s to have surrendered. Foi with the advent ol i<iu came another seeming misfortune : 1 'earl lost her speaking voice, as a result of the exacting demands made upon her b) " stork " work. From fellow ■ workers she had he, ird of the " movies," where voire was I he l< the essentials. Remembering that riding, shooting, swimming, and acrobatics were still as tin pie I ■ i hei as eating breakfast, she went to New York, and after one or two discouraging refusals, found some work with the old Powers' people " I was not a suci ess on the si reen in those " Pearl told me, ','and aftei a very short tone 1 went to Lubin's in Philadelphia, where I played with Florence Lawrence. Again, I was told firmly, bul no! gently, thai I w.is ,i failure; however, ' nevei say die' came in hand) tgain, and for a little while I was with Pal In as leading woman for Henry Walthall ["hen 1 played in the old ( rystal Comedies for Universal, when I risked life and limb many a time in the interests of the pie Blinging traditions : and then a greaf moment in mv life a holidaj in l urope, financed out of mv own BavingS, which, after all those strenuous and thrifty years, did nol amount to much mor< than a thousand pounds." ■ Vid '.on went to Europe ae,, on last sumi didn't you ' " 1 quei ic I " Yes and, oh, the difference ' When youi entne fortune is encompassed 111 a soht.uv thousand, and von have nothing hut your own detei mil u k you up in getting well paid work, you watch . >ui ■• • l i an t> li you I So m; tost tup abroad was more of a comii tragedy than anything else, bul it date-, anothei episode in m\ lift for it was after 1 came back, in 1915, that I started serial w irk f"P J'athe ; and it was that year that saw the birth of The Pen Pauline." And here you returned to your ninety-nine-lives-existence again " I soliloquised. Yes ; and really it seemed great fun to be once more in the thick of my old danger-tricks. It was a little hard at first to pull myself together ; for, above all things, serial life demands wonderful physical fitness and the alert vitality of some tense wild creature And I guess that the old days in the Ozarks, wdiich held so much misery, have been responsible for more than I ever dreamed of — al least, they gave me the constitution of some husky little fighting animal. I soon found that 1 needed every scrap of tins strength, for no sooner did I finish one serial, than 1 was in the thick of the next one. hollowing hard upon one another were The Exploit* .-/ Elaine, The Iron Claw, The I-'aUi! Ring, The Laughing Mask, Pearl of the Army, Hotel Kirke, May Blossoms, Sew York Lights. I hi House of Hate, 1 he Lightning Winder, and The Black Secret." Then, in answer to a further question of mine, Pearl descril>ed some of her hairbreadth escapes from death in these serials. How she fought with villains on the narrow girders of unfinished buildings, high above the streets, and dangled from ropes that Severed to the last strand; how she was thrown upstairs by the villain, and downstairs bv his accomplice; how, in one scene, a big china va.se was smashed in pieces against -r head ; how climbing down a 300-foot flag-pole, or btinil . ut loose in a drifting balloon, were but insignil episodes in the day's work. Vnd now I've said farewell to it all," Pearl told me. " No more serial stunts in my young life ; and I've returned mv ninety-eight chances of existence to tin kindly fate which gave them to me. I only need one now. just like any other normal person ! 1 am with I v as a star in straight rive-reel features, and I've already found my work wonderfully fascinating and full -of absorbing interest. M\ first picture to be released was Tht H h U Mil, a crook storv ; then The Tiger's Cub. from George Goodchild's novel, most of which was illy filmed in Alaska; am I now I have just finished work on The 7 htef ad from Henri Bernstein famous pla) Before I left. Pearl W lute took me over her luxurious home bought and furnished with her savings which had had their birth in that cracked old pitcher. I saw her magnificent collection of frocks anfl furs and jewels her jx'ts. he: delightful garden, photograph! of the farm by the sea when she spend hei holidays, and hei "old curiosity shop," which contain*! gifts from heradmircrs all o\ ert he-world Vud so nothing very dreadful hap pened to you, after all.' laughed Pearl .is we said Good b) 1 1 n the step the ev ei gTeeil shadowed v < 1 and ah " < »h but 1 foi L.t to mention one importani point about myself I do w wig in my pictures! EverybodJ asks that, don't they ? Bul as it' made exai tlv hk< mv own hair and as 1 only use it when th lights ,,u extra strong, half fh who know me won' believi it s a \ws' at all ' t odi and see me again and nex time perhaps you will mer W .unci 1 'land ! \1l1i Mali 1 charming picttm 0) Pearl taken at htt I ■ ng Island //■ »« I