Employees' Entrance (Warner Bros.) (1933)

FEATURE STORIES Starred in New Film Advance Feature Loretta Y oung ModestlySays She Owes Success to Luck 6@ @ /'S all a matter of luck!”’ And with this short but sweeping statement Loretta Young summarizes her entire motion picture career. It sounds like modesty, and it is modesty. But if you question Loretta on the subject she will supply data to back up her contention. She merely avoids discussion of what has made her so consistently popular and why, after four years of steady acting, she has completed her twenty-fifth production with “Employees’ Entrance,” a First National picture which comes to the Ba Se eee » aS a top-rank featured player without any sign of waning power or appeal. The fact is that her fan mail and boxoffice draw has been growing from picture to picture. Loretta, however, not being able to see herself as others see her, does not discuss this phase of the subject. She still prefers to call it luck. “Take for instance the first day I came to work in pictures,” Loretta went on to illustrate. “I’m not referring to the time when I was four years old and played in a picture with Fanny Ward. What I refer to is the real beginning of my present career, when Director Mervyn LeRoy called at my house and wanted my sister Polly Ann for a scene only to discover that she was out of town. I was sent down to the studio as a substitute for Polly Ann — and here I am.” ‘‘Just Pure Luck’’ Loretta Young, more charming than ever, is starred in “Employees’ Entrance,” the new Warner Bros. drama opening at the Theatre on ______.____________--___.._________._..... Her role, that of a department store worker, matches any of the finest characterizations the screen has offered. Warren William is also starred, with Alice White prominent in the supporting cast. ‘Cut No.6 Cut 30c Mat roc Pun“StudioPropDepartment Can Do Anything” No Joke Prop Men Never Turned a Hair When Order Came _To Dr-sntie Set in ““Employees’ Entrance” O is delivered when a studio executive grandly exclaims: “Our prop department can do anything.’’ There was a lot of truth in that line, although it always brought a big laugh from the audience. It may be a laugh to the general public, but it isn’t to the property department—because its business consists of actually doing anything, and everything. Whether it is aspirin tablets for a headache, or elephants for a jungle scene, all that a director has to do is phone or write the order to the prop department and — presto — the prop department begins wail ing, worrying and knashing teeth. But the aspirin and elephants are retta worked in starred Colleen Moore. It so “happened” that Colleen took an instant liking to Loretta — so much so that the star went to the studio executives and “sold” Loretta to them. NE of the big laugh lines in a recent satire on Hollywood electric refrigerators and ice refrigerators of every size and deseription, and there was roll after roll of. linoleum running from the gaudy to the conservative pattern. | Thousands of Items | The particular p*ure witch —Z0| “Jt’s all a matter of good fortune,” says charming Loretta. Cut No.15 Cutrsc Mat 5c “It was just pure luck from _beginning to end,” Loretta commented on this situation without trying to advance any reason why Colleen Moore should have liked her or why the executives should be “sold” on her. “Then there was the break that came when I played my first big fead,?—-uroiia wees ume -“Ewa” one of forty-eight girls who took tests for the part opposite Lon Chaney Any one of the other forty-seven would have done just as well, if in “Laugh, Clown, Laugh.” not better — and yet I got it. In “Employees’ Entrance” “IT must have been born with a silver spoon in my mouth.” Then came the year 1929 when Loretta and her sister, Sally Blane, were both selected as Wampas Baby Stars. It was a big thrill and a big honor for Loretta, yet she thought that it was just because her sister was elected that attention was also drawn to her. “One of my secret wishes, which I never had the nerve to voice to anyone, was to play opposite John Barrymore,” she continued. “And as luck would have it, I awoke one day to find that I was cast to play opposite him in “The Man From Blankleys.” No Ups and Downs There were no ups and downs in Loretta Young’s career. Her chart shows a progressive upward movement, and the fourteen year old girl _who came out to substitute for her sister in a Colleen Moore pieture grew up to be a mature young lady with ever-increasing acting ability. Recognition of this ability was what gave Loretta the leading part in First National’s production of “Life Begins,” which made such a tremendous hit just a few short months ago. Yet Loretta still insists that it was “just her luck” to have drawn a very fine script. j And so it goes, with Loretta now having Warren William, Wallace Ford and Alice White weaving plot and romance around her in “Employees’ Entrance,” and still other pictures lined up for her for future production. If you really want to be analytical, work, ability, and that very definite “something” are responsible for Loretta Young’s rise. Yet Loretta still prefers to call it Luck. In “Employees? Entrance” Loretta plays opposite Warren William in a gripping...romance of department — store workers, taken ffrOmmvne >ay_ by David Boehm. Others in the cast besides Wallace Ford and Alice Wirds, wiv awakes ker seduce do the screen after an absence of two years, are Allen Jenkins, Ruth Donnelly, Hale Hamilton and Albert Gran. The play was adapted by Robert Presnell and directed by Roy Del Ruth. { at Strand always délivered as per schedule. Such a man’s-sized job — or rather a prop-department’s sized job — was wished on the “supply anything” department at Warner Bros. Studio when Director Roy Del Ruth started on the production of “HEmployees’ Entrance,” an all star picture with Warren William and Loretta Young, Alice White and Wallace Ford in the leading roles, which opens at the Theatre ON eee i ee The technical and set building department had already drawn up its plans and were busy building the sets, the largest of which was an entire floor of a department store occupying 30,000 square feet of floor space. An Immense Set Although part of the set was taken up by the credit and administration offices, the job of filling 30,000 square feet of floor space with what the well stocked department store contains, was enough to make the prop men send out for aspirin tablets for a large sized headache. As soon as the set was finished, truck after truck rolled up to the stage door, and men began unload Ce Se Se panying swivel chairs. Then came the furniture for the offices. There were oak desks and mahogany desks, with their accomThere were typewriters, typewriter desks and chairs, dictaphones, inter-office buzzers, letter trays and waste baskets. There were desk blotters and penwipers and paper knives — and there were even stacks of correspondence and business-like files to fill the letter trays and filing cabinets. Not a detail was missing. There were even samples of materials, toys, dresses, safety pins and whatever else a department store deals in, to fill the office of Warren William, who plays the part of the store’s general manager. But all of this was just routine work for the prop department. But what they took especial pride in is one corner of the set which contains the department store’s “Model Home.” It is a little Colonial type house, built on the furniture department floor to show the customers what the House Beautiful should contain. | Work of Art | The living room turned out to be a credit to any high-powered interior decorator. On the mantelpiece over Loretta Young, Warren William and Wallace Ford in a scene from “Employees’ Entrance,” which opens at the Strand Friday. It’s a romance of department store workers taken from the play by David Boehm. Alice White is also seen in the cast. Cut No.4 Cut 4sc Mat rsc : Eee sn asesesseesneneenennerareraannaeranenaannnnnannnnennnnnnnnnnnennnnene every housewife dreams about .. .|of them, have to be rented or bor-| Several hundred persons appear in Without jarring the Colonial note,|rowed, but the bulk of it came right |the cast of “Employees’ Entrance,” the fireplace were just the right sort of antiques and knick-knacks. The walls were tastefully decorated with prints and miniatures, and the furniture and furnishings looked as though a lifetime had been spent in picking the right things. The kitchen was something that ing enough goods to start a big time merchant out on a prosperous business. There were chairs, beds and davenports of every size and description. There were Monterey sets, and plush upholstered sets. There were rugs of every description. There were Page Eight everything had the labor-saving|out of the prop department’s immense touch. There was an electric dish washer and toaster and coffee urn — and even the egg-beater was run by simple pressure on an electric switch. But where does all this furniture and furnishings come from? Perhaps some items, though very few warehouse, Of all the reams of copy written about studio prop departments, there has never been a more accurate description and analysis than the playwright’s famous line: “Our prop department can do anything!” which is a story of a dynamic, ruthless department store head, played by Warren William. The picture marks the return of Miss White to the screen after an absence of two years. “Employees’ Entrance” was adapted from the play of David Boehm by Robert Presnell.