Picture Play Magazine (Mar-Aug 1927)

2.: Match Really Off? why the fire of John Gilbert's wooing did not passiveness. Then decide if Jack will accept defeat in love. Herzog release of "Torrent" she couldn't read the language. Friends told her what an enormous hit she had scored. She answered with a shrug. Yet she wasn't indifferent. It simply wasn't her temperament to become enthusiastic. When Greta Garbo walks across the MetroGoldwyn-Mayer lot, the studio folk, hardened though they are to beauty and charm, pause in whatever they are doing to watch her. She has a lilting walk, her tall, slim figure swaying slightly, her eyes lighting her grave face into a smile when she nods a greeting. Mauritz Stiller left his studio in Sweden to go to Hollywood and pursue his directorial career on American soil. His friendship with Miss Garbo was here renewed and continued. She was seen with him now and then at parties and openings. For the most part, however, she lived a quiet, secluded life. Her name was never even remotely connected with any man other than Stiller. Stiller is tall, heavy set, with a shock of irongray hair that umbrellas above a narrow forehead. His features are large, his face narrow. He, too, speaks broken English, through which glimmers humor, honesty, good-fellowship. . He is an artist with the ability to overcome the characteristics of temperament. He understands Greta Garbo, her moods, her remoteness, the loneliness she seems to feel even when surrounded by people. In his underhanding and in the difference of years between them, the girl apparently realized a peace born of confidence untouched by turbulent emotions. Her phlegmatic nature, however, was soon to turn riotous, for she was cast to play with Jack Gilbert in "The Flesh and the Devil." Neither knew the other very well, but both anticipated the picture. "She is gorgeous !" Jack said, at once. Xow Jack possesses the flare and the sparkle of the Latin, colored with reckless boyishness. He likes attractive women. He is chained to a colossal vanity that has fattened on his remarkable screen success and the flood of praise accorded him. Appreciation gets warm response from him. Women like Jack Gilbert. To those who win his restless eye he_ gives attentiveness. He dances little rtesies uoon m^r>.. it is the little things that cap The ardor of the stars in and the Devil" was the studio. Photo by Ruth Harriet Louise There can be no doubt that John Gilbert is saddened by the unhappy turn taken by what promised to be his great romance. tivate a woman. He has a gift — second nature to him — of modernizing the knight of old. This gallant, protective trait is combined with an arrogance founded on success, and with an assortment of fitful moods. He was a revelation to Greta Garbo. She is slightly taller than Jack. As a rule, this is a disadvantage. A man who is shorter than a woman usually feels conspicuous when with her. A woman taller than a man generally feels the same way and is prone to round shoulders, or inclined to droop at the knees in an effort to lessen the difference in height. But in the case of Jack and Greta, height meant nothing. Almost their first scenes together were duets of impassioned love. One minute they were casual acquaintances. The next. Jack had Greta in his arms, the light of conquest in his eyes. And the camera cranked steadily. How could they remain mere acquaintances after making such scenes, one after another? Players enacting Continued on page 98 "The Flesh talk of the