Picture-Play Magazine (Sep 1926 - Feb 1927)

Over the Teacups 53 home playing tennis. She has had arc lights put over her court and, if it weren't for the fog and the distracting witticisms from the side lines, you might be able to play tennis there at night. "Isn't Montmartre a gorgeous place?" Fanny went on, gazing about. "Simply every one is here on Saturday. Too bad the tourists can't get in. All the tables are reserved so far ahead for Saturdays that there isn't a chance in the world of getting in unless you can convince the waiter that you are a friend of Hedda Hopper's, or Dorothy Cumming's, or some other good customer. But the enthusiasm of a tourist cannot be crushed — there is a mob of them right now hanging around outside waiting to watch the people come out." Anita Stewart was flitting about in a gay red print dress, proclaiming that she was going to Hawaii for a vacation. Every one says she is training to go on the musical-comedy stage soon. May McAvoy insists that she is going to Hawaii for a vacation, too, but I don't suppose she will, for who could resist the lure of staying home and working when it means twenty-five hundred or three thousand a week? "Have you heard about the wholesale invasion of the U. S. S. California by the movie companies ?" Fanny asked. "It's funny —'We're in the Navy Now' is more than just the name of a new Paramount picture — it seems to be the motto of the whole picture business. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer have been making a picture called 'Tell It to the Marines,' and they are supposed to have effected a tie-up with the marines and the navy whereby our national protectors were really just assistants whose duty it was to stand by and wait for a call from M.-G.-M. When the 'Tell It to the Marines' company went down to the U. S. S. California to start shooting, they found John Ford in the midst of making a picture starring George O'Brien, Lloyd Hamilton making a slapstick comedy, and a representative of Famous PlayersLasky hovering in the background . making arrangements for one of their companies to come down and start work. It was pretty hard on the crew ; the gobs couldn't call their decks their own. Every time they started about their day's work, some camera man would yell at them to get out of the way. "Accustomed to keeping everything neat, they simply couldn't understand that when blood was spilled on the deck, it had to be left there until close-ups were made. According to Fanny, Anna Q. Nilsson bought her new home to fit a big Tudor table she had in storage. Photo by M. I. Bo Fanny wishes that it could somehow be contrived for Laura La Plante to play Lorelei Lee in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. " "Incidentally, Bill Russell is in the George O'Brien picture, playing a burly fighter, and he looks marvelous. I crashed into a projection room at the Fox studio the other day just as they were running some of the rushes and, before any one could politely order me out, I saw Bill in two or three thrilling scenes. "Helen Ferguson has finished her latest serial, so she drifts out to the Fox lot every once in a while to see her husband Bill. Players never seem to enjoy visiting studios much, though — it makes them want to get back to work, though why, I've never been able to discover. "Zasu Pitts has promised to take me out to the Von Stroheim studio and introduce me to Fay Wray. She is playing the lead in his new picture — result of one of those rare occasions when a movie company advertised that they were looking for a Continued on page 108