Steamboat Bill, Jr. (United Artists) (1928)

During Run _ MRS. BUSTER KEATON BERNHARDT TAUGHT IS HAPPILY WED BUSTER KEATON MY IDEA OF HAPPINESS By Buster Keaton (Star of "Steamboat Bill Jr.,” which reaches the_ next-) Distant fields are always supposed to be the greenest, and the world in general is usually credited with wishing for something it hasn’t got, but in my own case, I am happier now than I would be under any other circum¬ stances or in any other clime. Briefly, my idea of happiness is this: to have a happy, healthy family, tried anjiUxue friends, and to be engaged in w(^ like this. I am grateful beyond words that I have them all. It has taken me years, however, to make my idea of happiness come true, and there were many, many times that I thought I would never reach my goal. For from the day of my birth and up until about a decade ago, I feared I never would have a home. The reason was because I never stayed in one place long enough to call it home. My parents were show peo¬ ple; I was a member of their act prac¬ tically since babyhood, and we roamed the world. I wonder if the average person, born and reared in a real home atmosphere, realizes how much traveling show peo¬ ple secretly yearn for a chance to settle down? Jumping from city to city, country to country,—that sounds exciting and adventurous. It is—for a ^hile, but just spend the first twenty years of your life doing it, and see how glad you’ll be to acquire a per¬ manent postoffice address. To have a home and a family was always my ambition, and I realized the first part of it when I quit vaudeville and entered motion pictures. A few years later I met THE girl. My wife thought enough of a home to abandon a very promising career in pictures. Perhaps you’ve heard of Natalie Tal- madge. Now there are two little Keatons, and of course, like all mothers and fathers, we think they’re the finest boys in the world. So, with (pardon me for boasting) tl^ finest wife, the finest sons, the fili¬ al friends and the finest work—help¬ ing keep the world in a cheerful mood —I am the most contented man in the world. And that’s my idea of happiness. BUSTER KEATON WAS ANXIOUS TO FIGHT Did you know that one of Buster’s boyhood ambitions was to be a profes¬ sional prize-fighter? While touring the world as a member of his parents’ vaudeville act, “The Three Keatons,” Buster met all the great and near great in fistiana. John L. Sullivan, James J. Corbett, Tom Sharkey, James J. Jeff¬ ries and other stars of the prize ring patted little Buster on the head and predicted he would be famous some day. The youth outgrew his professional pugilistic ambitions, and became in¬ stead an amateur boxer of note. He is still an enthusiast and numbers among fiis thousands of friends practically all t fie ring champions of today. When he is not making a picture he rarely '-misses a championship bout. Buster’s latest picture, “Steamboat Bill Jr.,” which arrives at the. Theatre next ... shows his proficiency with his fists. Advance Or BUSTER KEATON Jr. STEAMBOAT BILLER" BL-1—One Col. Scene WINDSTORM FILMED IN KEATON COMEDY When a terrific wind storm leveled a populous town on the banks of the Sacramento River, across from the California state capital, and uprooted trees, blew steamboats and other craft from their moorings, everybody was happy. It was all part of a motion picture comedy, “Steamboat Bill Jr.,” in which Buster Keaton and Ernest Torrence star under the Joseph M. Schenck banner for United Artists. The town required several weeks to build, and up until the day of the storm the thriving community enjoyed a peaceful existence. When the hurri¬ cane had subsided all that was left of the several acres of buildings was debris. The storm lasted all day. Scores of wind machines and steel cables at tached to tractors out of camera range were the chief instruments of destruc¬ tion. Buildings toppled into the river as if struck by a giant unseen hand. Clouds of dust were visible for miles around. Thousands of people journeyed to the scene of the excitement to wit¬ ness the synthetic holocaust. Keaton’s made-to-order town in “Steamboat Bill Jr.” which comes to the . next . was the most expensive set ever constructed for a comedy and thrill on the screen was so complete that there was nothing left to salvage. Supporting Keaton in the cast are Ernest Torrence, the famous portrayer of villainous roles who is playing his first comedy role; Marion Byron, 17- year-old leading lady; Tom McGuire and Tom Lewis. Charles “Chuck” Reisner directed the spectacular laugh feature of river life. Buster Keaton, who is soon to be seen in “Steamboat, Bill, Jr.,” once feared that he would have no perma¬ nent home. That was in the days be¬ fore he met his one and only, Natalie Talmadge. Buster, who travelled around the country with his mother and father as an act, “The Three Keatons,” slept in one town, ate breakfast in an¬ other, etc. Buster Keaton’s wife, Natalie Tal¬ madge Keaton, always accompanies her famous husband when he goes on loca¬ tion with his company, and during the filming of the comedian’s United Art- icfc -f AO flit* A “Qf/aomKAot "Rill T r* iSLO ICdLUI C, O LCcllIlUUctL JD1I1 J 1., which reaches the .Thea¬ tre next . while they were at Sacramento, Calif., making steamboating scenes, someone asked Mrs. Keaton for her happy matri¬ monial recipe. “Because we are two romantics; we like the same things, laugh at the same jokes, love family life, and have in common our sons, Joe and Bob,” replied Mrs. Keaton, who gave up a screen career to star domestically. She is con¬ tent to let Norma and Constance up¬ hold the honor of the Talmadge family on the screen. Natalie Keaton tells how Norma used to take her to the old Vitagraph studir in Brooklyn and permit her to sit or the sidelines and watch the stars of that period. She confesses that sh< “fell in love” several times, but that the actors she adored didn’t know any¬ thing about it. “I had a schoolgirl ‘crush’ on Tony Moreno, and then I thought that Fran¬ cis Bushman was my ideal; and then I scrapped both of them for dashing Maurice Costello—‘Dimples,’ every¬ body called him in those days,” laughed Natalie, as Buster, sitting beside her on the set, exclaimed, “Ah, ha, now it’s all coming out 1” “Yes,” she continued, “those were the heroes of my kid days. The comedian of those days—it was two or three years before the war—were not as subtle as Buster. They went in for slapstick, not character touches. John Bunny was in his heyday. He was getting, I think, $200 a week. That made him look like an emperor to us. “Regarding Buster. Well, the late Harry Houdini owned a tent show in partnership with Joe and Myra Keaton. A cyclone blew down the tent, and Buster arrived in the world that night. “He had a pretty rough passage as a youngster. He started his stage career as a tot, and later was what one might call the ‘juvenile lead’ in a vaudeville act, ‘The Three Keatons’. Then the new industry of the movies caught him up; but he wasn’t exactly world-famous or wealthy when the war came, and Buster went overseas as a private in the American Army. “Then he came into the pictures again, and achieved stardom. Also, we met. “I was working as assistant to the studio manager when our romance started. We sort of thought we liked one another. Buster was shy. He blushed when he first asked me out to dinner. But, having asked me once, he asked me a lot more times, in quick succession—in case, he told me after¬ wards when we knew one another bet¬ ter, he got out of practice and lost his nerve. “When I left Hollywood to join Constance in the East, Buster got agi¬ tated. A steady stream of letters and telegrams came. And then, came Bus¬ ter himself. It was a forlorn Buster, walking with the aid of crutches—he had been injured in a film. “Obviously, he had to be comforted. Obviously, also, we couldn’t separate again. In fact, we decided then and there that we couldn’t separate again for all the rest of our lives; and in the spring of 1921 we were married at Norma’s country home. “Steamboat Bill, Jr.,” the Buster Keaton comedy for United Artists which will have its premiere at the .. Theatre . is undoubtedly Buster’s funniest comedy. Keaton, like most humorists, has a serious side. He is, for instance, quite serious about the bringing-up of his two children. In writing about it, he said: “The theatre educated me. By meet¬ ing great people like Bernhardt, by hearing her recite beautiful bits of poetry. Because I was a child and because she loved children, she would explain to me in simple words the meaning of the story. I studied geo¬ graphy by traveling all over the world. At about twelve years of age, I could draw a map and put almost everything in it that should be put in it. A child of the theatre is really to be envied because he learns by playing. “I decided that when my two young¬ sters should reach the age of reason, which is four years old, in my estima¬ tion, that they, too, would learn, as I had learned, constantly and through pleasure as well as through the usual kindergarten experiences. In ‘Battling Butler,’ I had a boxing expert come to our house for three months to teach me how to box. At the end of three months, both of those boys of mine had some scientific knowledge of box¬ ing. You couldn’t have paid them to leave me while I was taking a lesson. “When we made ‘The General,’ which by the way is the name of the engine, they became so steeped in Civil War history that they were fighting over the different uniforms worn by the members of the cast. They hung around that engine that we had made, which is an exact reproduction of the original of ‘The General’ now on view in the North Carolina and St. Louis Railroad station in Nashville, Tenn., until they knew every screw and wheel in it. From this picture, in fact from every picture that they have watched in the making, they have learned the power of details. They know the labor that it takes before pleasure is achieved.” Buster Keaton is Steamboat Bill, Jr. in his latest comedy, which will head the bill at . For this picture, Buster put his “iron face” into training for a month. Ex¬ actly four weeks before he went on the set as Steamboat Bill, Jr., Keaton gave up smiling—for he does smile in private life—often a wide, generous grin that changes the entire expression of his face. Keaton generally takes three weeks before shooting starts on a picture to train his face by keeping it absolutely expressionless. The extra week for Steamboat Bill, Jr. may have been be¬ cause of Ernest Torrence, who was co- starred with him. Torrence loves, to “break up” anyone who acts with him. To “break up” in picture parlance is to make people laugh when they don’t want to. However, Buster came before the camera with his frozen expression and not once during the picture was Tor¬ rence able to “break him up.” The frozen face never m elted. _ “We found married life the best fun possible. We don’t go about much; we are great ‘homebodies’. Buster rides, rows, swims, golfs, plays tennis, base¬ ball, handball and football. I like swimming and golf.