Call It a Day (Warner Bros.) (1937)

PERSONAL FEATURES SHORT AND LONG Poe BCA ¥ Her Tears Come Easily On Screen—But Not Off Script Calls For It, So Miss de Havilland Cries : All Day At Studio Olivia de Havilland, in a pink nightgown, was toasting her bare feet over an electric heater. It was three o’clock in the afternoon, but she had just climbed out of bed. Ordinarily Olivia gets up at seven o’clock. Today she was working in bed. She had spent most of the day between the sheets in the blue bedroom on Stage Seven at the Warner Bros. studio, where the Cosmopolitan production ‘‘Call It A Day’’ was being filmed. Skippy Came Out of Pound—Into Films Skippy, who plays an important part in the comedydrama “Call It a Day,” now Theatre, is the only canine actor who ever came out of a dog pound. Two years ago, Henry East, who furnishes dogs to picture companies, paid a visit to the Humane Animal Shelter in Los Angeles. In one cage he found a_ bedraggled’ wire haired puppy, took a fancy to him and bought him out “The Cast Is The Things.” Says Mayo The play may be the thing but improper casting hurts the best play in the world, according to Director Archie Mayo. Several months ago, Mayo was assigned to ‘‘Call It A Day,’’ a Cosmopolitan production released by Warner Bros., which comes to the.......... CROREPE ON | ook eo Gee ; ‘Call It A Day,’’ has a tenuous story. It concerns what happens, emotionally, to an English family on the first day of spring. Mayo, who had seen the New York production, knew that the success of the film version depended almost entirely on the cast. After weeks of testing, here’s the magnificent cast Mayo as Havilland and Miss Granville Miss de Havilland’s eyes were swollen, and the tip of her nose was pink. ‘I’ve been erying,’’ Olivia said she didn’t ery very often. She doesn’t feel that she has anything to ery about—what with becoming a film star in the short space of two years. She doesn’t believe she has cried for more than an hour—elapsed time —since she left Saratoga, California, to seek her fortune in Hollywood. She has grown used to success, she said. Now she’s accustomed to seeing her name on the star list, to seeing it on theatre marquees. It doesn't thrill her any more—it frightens her. She feels that she’s gone up too quickly— she isn’t sure that she can measure up to the confidence of her she explained, dabbing at her nose with a powder puff. ‘‘I’ve been crying all day—lying in bed sobbing my heart out. I’m supposed to be heart-broken because an artist stood me up at the reservoir.’’ of bondage. Skippy was a good investment. For the past six months he’s been working steadily in pictures, and he has never protested to Mr. East about the work. Before They Called It A Day sembled: Ian Hunter, Olivia de Havilland, Anita Louise, Frieda Inescort, Alice Brady, Roland Young, Walter Woolf King, Peter Willes,' Bonita Granville, Una O’Connor, Beryl Mercer, Elsa Buchanan, Mary Field and Marcia Ralston. Casting “Call It a Day” was done with infinite care. For instance, twelve persons were tested for the small role of the old maid secretary before Miss Field was chosen. Willes was brought from New York to play the son of Hunter and Miss Inescort. The selection of Hunter, Young, Miss Brady, and Miss de took little thinking on Mayo’s part. He knew from the first test that they would be perfect. He tested Miss Inescort several times before he gave her the part of Hunter’s wife—thought at first she looked too young. She got the role when _ she donned a wig with a grey streak I ite It was a toss up for a time whether a young English girl or Anita Louise would get the part of the girl next door. Mayo considered the other girl because of her accent. But he finally gave the role to Miss Louise because she is the more experienced of the two. Anita Louise Is Filmdom(’s Only Feminine Harpist There is an old song about the girl who took her harp to employers. They know she ean, and keep giving her better and the party but no one would let her play. That has never happened to Anita Louise. She has a harp, but she never takes it to a party. If her hostess happens to have a harp better parts, but that makes no difference. Olivia is one of the hardest working girls in pictures. She’s just twenty years old—the age when most young women are out having a good time for themselves—but she never goes out more than twice a week. And she’s always home before ten. Are the girls who went to school with Olivia envious of her? She doesn’t know. What she does know is that sometimes she envies them. Last fall, before “Call It a Day” went into production, she visited two of her former classmates at Stanford University. “They seemed to be having a great deal more fun than I have,” she said. “They hadn’t a worry in the world. They weren’t afraid of the future because they didn’t even think about it. They seemed to be living from day to day—just as I used to when I was in school.” Olivia said the two. girls wouldn’t believe it when she told them they had more clothes than she has. “They had closets filled with dresses and suits and_ shoes,” Olivia said. “TI never have more than two sports outfits, two evening gowns, a couple of street dresses and an afternoon frock. And I ean’t for the life of me collect more than three or four hats and four pairs of shoes.” It isn’t because she is frugal, but because she hates to shop. Twice a year—once in _ the spring and once in the fall—she goes shopping and buys new outfits. But she never splurges— never buys a lot of things. In “Call It a Day,” Miss de Havilland plays an immature young woman—a girl of her own age. She likes the part, says she feels that it fits her For it, she has developed an English accent—which was easy to do, for her mother is English. In “Call It A Day” yowll see Frieda Inescort and Alice Brady chatting on the stairs of a London apartment house. But you won't see this elaborate arrangement of lights and cameras which made the scene possible. “Call It A Day,” the Cosmopolitan comedydrama adapted from Dedie Smith’s stage play comes to the........ as a Warner Bros. release. Mat No. 2083—20c Theatre, on core eee e Olivia's Hobby Is Collecting Cliches Olivia de Havilland hasn’t been very long in the movies, but she’s a deep student of them. She’s been making a collection of ‘‘tried and true’’ lines that seem to oceur pretty often in pictures. And in stage plays too, for that matter. Here are some of the ‘‘cliches’’ assembled by the youngster who has a leading role in ‘‘Call It A Day,’’ the Cosmopolitan production released by Warner Bros. now at DR oe ees ee oe Theatre: Boy to Girl: “Are you afraid of me?” Girl to Boy: “No, I’m afraid of myself.” the boy she loves is engaged, tells him: “Don’t worry about me—I’ll be all right.” And he replies: “You’ve been swell.” Miss de Havilland says there’s one line in every picture that really can’t be called trite. It’s “I love you.” The man who rushes out of an apartment house to find his quarry escaping yells to the taxi driver: “Follow that car.” The girl who has found out around, Anita will play it. There are only two stars in Hollywood who play harps. One is Anita. The other is Harpo Marx. There is a difference.of opinion as to who is the better harpist. By Harpo’s own admission, however, Anita makes a much prettier pic ture at the harp. In “Call It a Day,’ a Cosmopolitan production released by Warner Bros. which comes to the Theatre on doesn’t play the girl influence Miss harp—she Louise plays under the next door, who, of the first spring day, falls in love with Peter Willes. Miss Louise wasn’t engaged in falling in love with Willes when the tracked her down. She was playing with the interviewer wire-haired terrier who is her pet in the picture. In answer to the interviewer’s first that she was still single. “T haven’t found the “Or maybe uestion, she ann question, sl announced right man yet,” she said. he hasn’t found me.” Miss Louise found a chair and sat in it. “I have to sit down or fall down,” “Pm working in two pictures at once—this and ‘The Go Getter’ and it certainly keeps me stepping.” Miss Louise is still living with her mother. She still sleeps in a white bedroom and her living room is_just as white as it ever was. She still eats by candle light and spends a small fortune on candles every year—can’t stand electricity. Anita hopes to get a trip to England this year. She would like the studio to send her over around coronation time but she didn’t think she’d be that lucky. She was pretty lucky in 1936, she said, what with her role in “Anthony Adverse” which she she announced. Over The Wall Peter Willes, young British actor, believes in the old adage “Love Thy Neighbor” and who wouldn’t — when lovely Anita Louise is the neighbor? They’re both in the comedy drama “Call It A Day’”—the answer to the spring fever problem—now playing at the Theatre. Mat No. 101—10c eoeee eee eee considers her best, and a couple of trips to New York. All in all, she feels she has nothing to complain about, even if she doesn’t get any further than Lake Tahoe for her vacation. Page Fifteen