Picture Play Magazine (Mar-Jul 1929)

23 of TK em? Landis were once cream in the fans' coffee, but why this article sought them out for an answer and here them as they are to-day. Richard Mook can crowd a lifetime on the stage into three or four years in the movies. When you consider how small a percentage of hits fall to the lot of any actor and take into consideration the fact that, in addition to seeing you so often, the public sees you in so many rotten pictures — well, really, I think the public is pretty patient and long-suffering. "Going back to the question of wearing oneself out with the public — you appear in so few plays that you can give thought to their selection. If I give a reasonably good performance and put honest effort into it, it stands to reason that the people who come to see me in this play will continue to come to see me in other plays." "And the screen?" "To be trite, the talkies, or squawkies, or what you will, are opening up a new field to us. I hope to be able to make a couple of pictures each year, either in the summer, or here in the East while I am appearing on the stage at night." "I no longer sigh for the vast rewards that accompany screen contracts. Right now, if I had a suite at the Ritz or the Ambassador, I should be worrying for fear the time would come when I should no longer be able to afford it. I live modestly and know that by exercising a reasonable amount of intelligence I can go on that way." The well-modulated tones stopped and I looked at him. Don't pity Bert Lytell, and the fact that he may have passed his zenith. He has intelligence, coupled with ability, and it is extremely unlikely that you will ever read of him in a home for aged actors. You'll be seeing him, either on the stage or screen, or both, come. for a long time to Cullen Landis. Here is one of the strangest anomalies who has ever walked the face of the earth. Though still youthful, he has crowded a lifetime of experience into the few years of his existence. A lifetime of bitterness and disillusionment. Differing from Mr. Lytell, who admits that he wore himself out with the public, this likable chap is no longer seen on the screen for no other reason than that he dared be true to himself, and had the courage to live his life according to the dictates of his desires. Studio executives outside of business hours didn't interest him. Prizefighters, taxi drivers, men who had seen life in the rough, did. They formed his associates. His employers resented it, felt it a slap Photo by White Though a hit Landis asks to in vaudeville, Cullen be remembered to his movie fans. Photo by Spurr Bert Lytell is a success in the face. Cullen went blithely on his way. They were paying for his talent ; his talent was what they got. His companionship and his friendship were his own to give as he saw fit. He found among the lower classes a loyalty to friends and associates and a regard for the given word, which1 was totally lacking in the men of affairs with whom he was associated. The promises made by these were manifold and glowing. It was a case of "Trust me, my boy, and you'll not regret it." Between promises and fulfillment lies a deep and rocky chasm. Somewhere in the depths of this is buried Cullen Landis' faith in human nature. At the end of a year, instead of the bonus he had been promised by one company, he got the merry ha-ha. There was no swallowing the hurt and keeping going, somehow. There is no logic in him. He can't work for people he doesn't respect. His code is "Stand on your merits, if you have any, and reap the reward to which you're entitled. If you have no merits, you take the consequences, but be true to yourself at all costs." Sensing this, there was a gradual effort on the part of his employers to wean the public away from him, so that when his contract was not renewed he wouldn't be missed. [Continued on page 98] as a stage star.