Picture-Play Magazine (Sep 1928 - Feb 1929)

112 Advertising Section Fashions in Etiquette Change Good Form To=day is Different from the Good Form of a Few Years Ago The Very Last Word on the Subject of Correct Behavior is The Book of ETIQUETTE Laura Alston Brown Every Possible Topic dealing with the social relationships in which human beings participate is covered in this comprehensive volume of 244 pages. In all, 176 topics are treated. These include : The Etiquette of Christenings Conduct of the Engaged Girl Conduct of the Engaged Man Entertaining Guests Table Manners Calling Customs Letters of Intro= duction Wording of Invi= tations Accepting or Declin= ing Invitations Funeral Etiquette Courtesy to Servants The Woman who Travels Automobile Etiquette Public Dances Street=car Etiquette The Etiquette of Sport OTHER VOLUMES OF ETIQUETTE—MANY OF THEM NOTHING LIKE AS COMPREHENSIVE AS THIS ONE —ARE SOLD AT FROM $2.50 TO $5. "The Book of Etiquette," by Laura Alston Brown, the most complete, up-to-date and authoritative work of the kind ever issued, is priced at ONE DOLLAR Id an Attractive and Durable Fahrikoid Binding Order from Your Bookseller or from CHELSEA HOUSE Publishers 79 Seventh Avenue, New York Greta — As She Is Continued from page 74 dealing with invitations. Some one asks her if she would like to join a party to go riding. If she would, she says yes. If not, she doesn't plead a headache, a previous engagement, or any of the accepted stalls. She says, "No, I think I wouldn't like to go." Likewise her ideas, thoughts, and opinions are not arrived at by any circuitous route. They are either affirmative or negative and, once formed, inflexible. But although definite in her opinions, she never argues. She has a dry sense of humor that gives added charm to her broken English. Her accent — impossible to imitate — is still very broad. She has acquired enough English to suffice her needs, and one hopes she never acquires enough to eradicate the accent. She reads a great deal in Swedish, mostly plays, of any period, and the study and history of the theater. Her only other recreation, besides driving, and occasionally riding, is swimming. She swims expertly, and is richly tanned from long afternoons in the ocean. So tanned, indeed, that care has to be used in selecting her gowns for the camera, it being necessary tO' choose colors that will photograph darker than her skin. Her naturally blond hair is straight, and so fine and silky that a hairdresser is in constant attendance on the set to keep the wave in order. Off the screen, she does not bother to curl it, scorning curling irons along with such other frivolities as perfume, jewels, or powder. She vises no make-up whatever outside the set. Her skin is as satiny and clear as a baby's, and she is locally famous for the extravagant length of her eyelashes. She is deeply fond of children, and an easy mark for solicitors seeking donations for orphanages. Often she has been seen, on her solitary walks along the beach, pausing to play with the children there— prowling with them among the rocks for limpets, and digging trenches in the sand. She speaks of her sister's baby, whom she used to take out in Stockholm and pretend that it was hers. It was such a pretty baby. And now, she grieves, it wouldn't know her. She worries about her family considerably, and if she does not hear from them at regular intervals, is frantic. Much of her money goes to them and to various relatives. Obviously, it is not spent on herself, for she has no hobbies to indulge, no feminine frivolities to buy. Even her having rooms are plain and severe, only such articles as are essentially for comfort. On those comparatively infrequent days when she is free of the weary melancholy that makes her introspective, she is as sparkling and mischievous as a child. At such times she likes people around her. Recently, having heard of a new spaghetti joint near the studio, she gathered her company, down to the last electrician, and went there for lunch. They sat on high stools, at a grimy counter and behaved hilariously. Greta had great fun and ate an awful lot. Stress has been made of her inaccessibility to interviewers. It is true that she is almost inaccessible. It would be quite within reason were she completely so. She has been misquoted at length, misunderstood at large. Hard-boiled reporters have always deluged her with questions as to her love life — fired their queries at her in their own jargon. And Greta, understanding perhaps a tenth of their meaning, trying to be polite and yet retain her privacy, would get so tangled up in the complexities of the language that, unconsciously, her answers would be quite wrong. She still cannot understand that the public wants to probe her private affairs, or wants to see pictures of her cooking a steak. She consistently avoids publicity and doesn't even read what is written about her. It concerns her so little that, when the publicity department indignantly shows her some unjust criticism, she asks naively, "Did you put it in?" and tries to be properly grateful for their efforts on her behalf. Her magnetism is remarkable. It is not just a freak of the camera. Off the screen she is frequently not recognized, but even then occasions attention. Very tall, more angular than statuesque, with a slouching carriage that should be gauche, but isn't, the chemistry of her appeal is inescapable. In most such cases a surge of great vitality is pointed out as partial explanation. In Garbo this quality is nil. Her very indifference, which comes from her lack of ego, adds to the puzzle. Therefore, the appeal cannot be as entirely physical as has been assumed. There are undoubtedly in her undiscovered areas of spirit, back of the silence, the stoicism, the reserve. Some day — forgive me if I idealize — the right story, the right environment, the right director, will uncover these. And on that day, the movies can lock up their studios and call it a task completed.