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26
Behind the Silver Screen
Intimate observations serious and otherwise — from the side of the movies that few of us are privileged to see.
By Jack Malone Illustrations by Lui Trugo
THE constantly changing scene in -Hollywood is peculiarly evident at the moment. United Studios — long the home of First National, United Artists, Samuel Goldwyn Productions, and other companies — has been sold to Famous Players-Lasky. United Artists has moved quietly to the Pickford-Fairbanks studios, now being enlarged to accommodate the newcomers, and First National has acquired a sixty-acre tract in the San Fernando valley, not far from the Lasky ranch and Universal City. Plans are now being drawn for their new studio. Early summer will see Famous Players-Lasky domiciled in their new home. The fate of the long, low buildings on Vine Street, left vacant by their moving, no one seems to know. Probably the space will be leased to independent producing companies. Whatever the outcome, the landmark will suffer a subtle change.
Thirteen years ago, Cecil De Mille directed his first picture for Lasky. He rented an old barn on the site we have long associated with Paramount productions. In that time, the amalgamation between Jesse Lasky and Famous Players was effected— now history. De Mille has since risen to great heights as a director and departed to Culver City, founding his own studio. Gloria Swanson rose to the dizzy heights of stardom on the Paramount lot, and the studio is redolent with memories of that ill-starred star of stars — Wally Reid. But a complete roster of the Paramount players who emerged from the gray background of the extra list to present fame and fortune would require a column
of print. And a list of players who rose, but have since been forgotten, would be nearly as long.
The old Lasky studio is a storehouse of memories. The corner of Vine and Sunset is one of the busiest crossings in Hollywood. The ground will soon be too valuable for the extensive ramblings of a motion-picture studio.
If some one builds an office building there some day, we hope they commemorate the spot with a tablet saying, "On this ground once stood the home of the Lasky studios." For De Mille's decision to use that old barn
as a place to make pictures, brought the developing industry to Hollywood, and made it the film capital of the world.
With the announcement of eleven new theaters under construction, five of which will be used for legitimate stage productions, Hollywood will cop the title of the theatrical center of the West. As it already has a score of motion-picture theaters, large and small, its inhabitants will have even less time to be bored in leisure moments.
Hollywood's amusement problem for a talk
drove our author to his barber about art.
We were elevated to the dignity of "Answer Man"
the other day, when some one asked us how Hollywood can support so much entertainment. Aside from the theaters, this person pertinently pointed out, we have a dozen beach clubs, eight polo clubs, twenty-nine swimming pools, a hundred and three tennis courts, eighteen bowling greens, Heaven only knows how many golf courses, seven thousand eight hundred and ninety-two miles of bridle paths, a place