Gold Diggers of 1937 (Warner Bros.) (1936)

Broadway now Richest mine of laughter in the world has provided real treasure for authors, producers and players, since Avery Hopwood wrote the original show. EVERY WARNER BROS. EDITION HAS CREATED A NEW GALAXY OF STARS Romantic story of how the “Gold Diggers” was conceived and how fortune has smiled on all those who have been associated with its eighteen years of sparkling life. By HARRY LEE (Author of “High Company” and “The Little Poor Man”) For hundreds of years definite taboos have been recognized and belief in their powers to revenge violations is almost universal among the people of the stage. For instance, it is considered almost fatal to whistle in a dressing room, and woe betide the visitor who dares go counter to this tradition. There are hundreds of others, and there are almost as many good luck symbols. What to do, and what to avoid doing, to placate the unknown power known as luck is a very definite part of the life of an actor. There are unlucky theatres, and if he ean, the player avoids them. ‘There are lucky and unlucky days for openings, there are auguries in almost everything. And each belief gains followers as it becomes strengthened by years. Argue as one will, the player will quote day and date to prove his fact. Maybe you don’t believe in these things. He does, and ean tell you why. A CTORS are notoriously superstitious folks. ‘Spanish Love,’ *‘Ladies’ Night’? and ‘‘Why Men Leave Home.’’ Avery Hopwood worked with a restless eagerness — as if the fates had given him foreknowledge of the fact that his last entries must be made and his books closed at the end of twenty-five years of working life. David Belasco sent for him. The great man was looking for a play fitted to the brilliant talents of Ina Claire already famous for her work in ““The Follies’’ —‘‘Polly With a Past’’ and other Broadway successes. That day the idea for ‘‘The Gold Diggers’’ came into being. It was to be a simple enough story. Alexander Woollcott once described the plot in a Times review in the following words: ‘‘A rich and monastice uncle betakes himself to the Fascinating Fifties (or whatever they are called now) to rescue his nephew from a gold digger and falls into her clutches himself .. .”’ There were to be a bevy of sirens, of course, but the star of the lot was to be one ‘‘Jerry La Mar.”’ The ‘Gold Diggers’’ opened at the Lyceum in New York Darnton of the ‘‘Evening World’’ hailed it as ‘‘the best entertainment on Broadway.’’ Hope Hampton — since in grand opera, and the wife of Jules Brulator, one of the world’s very rich men — played the part of ‘‘Jerry.”’ | The other gold diggers were Louise Fazenda, Arita Gil STARS OF TO-MORROW — More than 200 beautiful dancing girls in the chorus of “Gold Diggers of 1937” are hoping the luck of the Cold Diggers does not change. MeHugh, Joseph Cawthorn, and Grant Mitehell. Busby Berkeley directed —and the internationally famous dance team, Ramon and Rosita — was featured in the number which set the whole country talking —‘‘Lullaby of Broadway.’’ Everybody who has known the Midas touch of ‘‘The Gold Diggers’’ in its eighteen glittering years has richly