Picture Play Magazine (Mar-Jul 1929)

Tke Strangest Inter>?ie\tf 49 liam A. Brady. A lot of other movie folks have family tie-ups with the footlights. That goes for directors as well as stars. Lloyd Bacon, who megaphoned and microphoned Al Jolson in 'The Singing Fool,' is the son of Frank Bacon, and Bryan Foy, who is directing all those talkies like 'The Home-towners' and 'Oueen of the Night Clubs,' is the late Eddie Foy's little boy. And " "Yes, yes," I broke in, "but what about you? Tell me about your ancestors." "Mine?" he exclaimed. "Why should I boast of mine when Lya de Putti never even mentions that her mother was a Hungarian countess and her father an Italian count?" I began to be really annoyed. No man has a right to be at the Algonquin, without talking about himself. So I decided to give him an argument. "Hold on," I protested, "that's all right about De Putti, but what about Gloria Swanson? She's not ashamed to admit she's a marquise." The Oracle shook his head. "Indeed she's not," he conceded, "why, last Christmas she sent me a greeting card, and maybe you won't believe it, but it had the De la Falaise crest — or perhaps it was the De la Coudray — on the top in gold embossing. I shook my finger at Gloria the next time I saw* her, for she's got the wrong slant. All of us are fonder of the actress than the marquise —at least I am." Things were getting to an awful pass. Flere was a man to be interviewed, and he side-stepped all the stock questions. However, I decided to try one more. "How did you get into pictures?" I asked, uncertain whether he had won a beauty contest, or had played in the "Follies." "Well, I declare, I don't remember," was the answer. "You see, I've so much to keep straight about other people's careers that I've rather lost track of my own. For instance, only yesterday Fannie Brice was telling me that she got in through the news reels. That is, she was playing in a vaudeville house in Chicago, when a Pathe camera man invited her up on the roof to smile into his lens. When she saw the film, she decided that that was a 'beezness.' "When she said news reels, it reminded me that Nils Asther started the same way. He got into celluloid by winning a ski race in Sweden. Mauritz Stiller, the director, happened to glimpse the result and looked him up. "In fact," The Oracle continued, "people get in pictures in all sorts of ways. Margaret Livingston came to Los Angeles on a sight-seeing trip, but stayed to be a star. And Barry Norton journeyed up frOrn the Argentine to see Firpo, his countryman, fight. He just never went back, that was all." "Listen, mister," I put in, "I've come here to interview Nils Asther faced a movie camera the first time after winning a ski Sweden. in The Oracle will have no pets about his house after the harrowing experience of caring for Louise Dresser's pet frog. you. If you've forgotten how you got into the picture game, at least tell me what you did before that." "If I did, you wouldn't believe me — any more than you'd believe that Ernst Lubitsch once danced in Max Reinhardt's ballet corps in Berlin, or that Georgie Stone was a waiter in the Lambs Club, or that Anna Q. Nilsson was a governess in Brooklyn, or that Charles Delaney used to do mind reading on the vaudeville stage. "Life's a strange proposition, all right, when a fellow like Harold Lloyd could start out selling popcorn, and finish up owning a home that cost I don't know how many million dollars. And I'm telling you something else that's no comedy gag. Harry Langdon has been in the movies a long time. He started at the bottom of the ladder, and did a lot of climbing on it as the assistant janitor at the Doheny Theater in Council Bluffs, Iowa." The Oracle was off full steam on another track. He might have been talking yet of stars who were selfstarters, if I hadn't interrupted him. "You haven't told me much for an interview, but maybe if you would say a few words about your hobbies, I might get a good story after all. Do you play golf, or are you fond of dancing?" "Dancing?" he rejoined. "Nobody in the world could teach me. Audrey Ferris has twenty-seven silver cups for dancing, but even she couldn't show me the first thing about it. I guess I'm too old for nonsense like that." I yielded, with a sigh of discouragement. "That lets that out. But if we can't talk about hobbies, at least we can talk about books. Everybody in the movies reads " "Yes, everybody in the movies reads," mused the old man, "two books, Freud and Schopenhauer. But that's not bad, if it gives you something to talk about all the rest of your life. Maybe you'll be pleased to know that there's one boy out there in Hollywood who hasn't read them. That's David Butler, the director. No pose about Dave. He says he reads nothing but the sports page of the newspaper. The rest of the time he plays with his dog." Here's where I saw an opening. "I suppose you have a wonderful collection of pets yourself," I ventured. "Pets?" he answered. "No domestic care like that for me ! The last time Louise Dresser went on location she left her pet bullfrog at my house — and never again ! Twin babies couldn't have been more trouble." By this time, The Oracle had reached for the check and had paid it. [Continued on page 115]