Picture-Play Magazine (Mar-Aug 1927)

Moral — Don't Win a Beauty Contest! 85 Miss Maes studied the situation. She didn't want to make one picture and then go out looking for work at a strange typewriter. She was perfectly satisfied as she was. She had no idea she could set the world on fire as an actress. What she eventually said was this : "Yes. I'll be glad to have the part. But will you please hold my present position open for me? I expect I'll want to come back when I've finished acting." And that's what Simone Maes does to-day. She takes a role — and she's had some very good ones, too — but she doesn't content herself later with sitting around waiting for another to come. She pounds her typewriter in the meantime. She is not a beauty-contest winner. Such strange things seem to open the way to screen work for some persons ! Betty Bronson was selected by Sir James Barrie to play Peter Pan largely because she had legs shaped like a boy's. Mickey Daniels won a place in Hal Roach comedies because of the amazing way he could eat pie. Alberta V aughn got her start by winning a "funny-face" contest. Marie Prevost scored her first real hit by fleeing from a goat while clad in little more than an undershirt. This was in a Mack Sennett comedy. Priscilla Dean did get her chance in pictures by winning a beauty contest, but this resulted from a strange quirk of fate, as Miss Dean makes no boast of being a beauty. She arrived in Hollywood from New York in 1916, intent on getting work in comedies. She hit the long, hard trail from studio to studio in search of employment, but the gates were closed. She got nothing — not even work as an extra. She was good looking, dressed neatly, but was not a beaut} in any sense of the word. Her funds dwindled to nineteen dollars, and her room rent was due. She was at the end of her string. Just then a motor-car "except that I was getting desperate. I went downtown and bought yards and yards of marquisette, the cheapest material I could find. It cost ten cents a yard. From it I modeled a costume and a hat to match. I thought it looked pretty fine for the occasion. But when I got to the track I found that Edna Goodrich, the beautiful wife of Nat agency held a beauty contest at a Los Angeles race track where the entrants were to drive the company's cars and the winner was to be given a sixmonth contract with one of the film companies. Priscilla decided to enter, gambling virtually her last cent on winning. "I don't know why," Alberta Vaughn won a ' 'funny -face" competition. Winning a contest really did give Gertrude Olmsted her first opportunity. Goodwin, was there, in an exquisite costume. And Norma Talmadge. Dorothy Dalton, Vera Steadman, and Mabel Normand — all in expensive, tailored clothes, with hats and shoes to match. And my heart sank. But I would not back out. I couldn't ! All my money was at stake, and possibly a contract. "They gave me a little sedan to drive. I knew almost nothing about a car. The grand stand was packed, a band was playing, and I had never seen so much finery in all my life. Frankly, I was sick when the parade began — back and forth, around the track. My cheap dress and homemade hat made me miserable. And I had the smallest car in the lot. "I got a little applause, but the others were receiving ovations. I wished I hadn't come. I bowed and smiled as nicely as I could when I passed the grand stand, but it must have been a wan smile. I knew that I didn't belong there — in a beauty contest. "I found myself again passing before the great crowd. I saw the people looking at me. And then — my hat blew off ! Rain had fallen the night before. I stopped and got out in the mud after my poor little bonnet. Utterly ruined it was, but I put it back on my head. Muddy water dripped down onto my face. I got mud in my hair. I got mud on my fingers and left a splotch wherever I touched my dress. I wanted to cry. "But what do you suppose happened? That big-hearted crowd, sympathizing with my plight, let out a roar that fairly shook the rafters — 'The girl in the sedan!' they yelled. 'The girl in the sedan!' "As the crowd was to act as judge, I thereby won first prize. In a beauty contest ! When the winner of the second prize was called for, the crowd once more shouted — 'The girl in the sedan ! The girl in the sedan !' "I won first, second, and third prizes, competing against those really beautiful girls. And the screen contract came with it." Sally Rand believes that Dorothy Dwan, one of the prettiest girls in picthe notoriety of winning tures, won a beauty contest in Sedalia, Missouri, but a contest helps a little. Continued on page 106 Claire Windsor disapproves of beauty parades, and has never entered one.