Picture Play Magazine (Mar-Aug 1926)

08 Hollywood High Lights The pick of the news from the place where the film stars live and work. By Edwin and Elza Schallert FROM all indications, Erich von Stroheim's new production, "The Wedding March," will just be another "Merry Go Round," made in the way that he thinks it should have been filmed in the first place. You remember, of course, the sensational way in which he was replaced, a few years ago, by Rupert Julian at the Universal studios during the making of that romantic war picture that brought Mary Philbin into prominence. It must have been an irksome thorn in his side for Von to have witnessed his handiwork and ideas thus carried on by another, but he evidently is going to have his revenge at last. Supervision has always been Von's great bete noire — the cause to him of grief, embarrassment, moodiness, and temperament. But now he is turning loose with the joy of a new-found independence. "The Wedding March" is the story of a decadent Russian nobleman and his love for a heroine of lily-white innocence, with the background of the war. Von Stroheim himself plays the moribund aristocrat, and it is not unlikely that Mary Brian will be seen as the girl. The plot embodies an exceptional spiritual note, although it must be said that nearly all the Von Stroheim pictures do this, sordid though they may appear on the surface. Von loves to mess around with cynical and sardonic details, but his heroines are seldom anything but perfect in their adherence to the most circumspect Pollyanna and Cinderella traditions. Even his most flapperish and frivolous heroine, the little Irish-American girl of "The Merry Widow," is in essence angelic. A Transformed Filmdom. Filmdom is nothing if not a place of topsy-turvy contrasts this year. The studio where Von Stroheim, who is by many still regarded as an archsatanist, is working, is the same in which Norma Shearer, one of the most ideal and untarnished of the new heroine types, originally attracted attention. And when a recent studio transfer is completed, Pola Negri, dynamo of emotion, will probably inherit the bungalow of Colleen Moore, lightest and airiest of comediennes. That is, we suppose Pola will get this bungalow, because it is the newest and the nicest at that studio. Dick Barthelmess, who said once that he would never, never work in California, has come West again, and is enthusiastic. The only thing that worries him is that he might become bored with the pep that goes into picture making. And since he has made this surprising discovery that there is pep in the languorous atmosphere cf the Coast, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce is probabily going to send out a bulletin about it, just to make Florida feel a little less exuberant. The Wampas Show. The Wampas show, with the presentation of the new Baby Stars — oh, we forgot, they're not Baby Stars any more, but Wampas Stars of 1926 — was one of the big, recent, public events of the film colony. It was given at the new Shriner Auditorium, which holds more than six thousand people, and with Sid Grauman, the film impresario extraordinaire, staging it, the presentation was one of the best that the publicity agents have ever given. There is much more ceremony to these affairs than there used to be. Colleen Moore acted as hostess to the stars, on this occasion, and was dressed in her Alice-blue gown from "Irene." Colleen enjoyed the honor of being hostess because she had won a silver cup, during the previous season, for having shown the greatest progress of any of the girls selected by the Wampas during the three preceding years. Eleanor Boardman was the victor in the competition this season, but as she was in New York at the time of the show, that little breath of Erin, Sally O'Neil, received the trophy for her. Of course, Sally will have to deliver it to Eleanor when she returns home. Who knows, though, maybe Sail}' will receive a cup herself one of these years What if the flappers wore Oxford bags? Kathleen Key, assuming the approved college manner, shows how they would look. The girls among the new Wampas stars who won the most applause were Dolores Costello, who appears to be one of the most popular of the new favorites, and who is a perfectly exquisite type ; Dolores del Rio, the Mexican beauty and society girl who recently came into the movies at the solicitation of Edwin Carewe ; and little Miss O'Neil, who swept down to the footlights with a snappy Irish walk that defies description or imitation. She wore a green dress, to add the proper Erinish note to her presence. The hit of the evening was the game of badminton, as it is sometimes called, in which Douglas Fairbanks took part. We have told you about this game once before, but we may as well mention again that it is played something like tennis, except that it is about three times faster than tennis. Doug played with such remarkable speed that his opponents were absolutely routed, and this, despite the fact that they were doing their level best to return every lightning stroke of his that drove the light ball, with feathers attached, flying across the net. Clyde Cook, the comedy star, and Ann Pennington stopped the show with their dancing, and except for the fact that there was a terrible mob at the affair, and a fight between some young neckers in the ballroom after the show, it was a lovely evening.