Havana Widows (Warner Bros.) (1933)

Clurrent Features Scene From Strand Hit Looks like the “Havana Widows’ will even steal your drink if you don’t look out. Glenda Farrell is seen here in an episode from the picture of the same name, now playing at the.................... Theatre. Joan Blondell, Allen Jenkins, Frank McHugh, and Guy Kibbee are some of the stars in the cast. Mat No. 8 Price 10c Joan Blondell Is Heroine Even To Her Hairdresser Star of “Havana Widows” Called Most Natural And Most Genuine Person in Hollywood ORKING on the ‘‘no-man-a-hero-to-his-valet’’ assumption, the motorman of these paragraphs approached Miss Ruth Pursley, hair-dresser to Miss Joan Blondell, on a First National set during the production of ‘‘Havana Widows,’’ a hilarious comedy drama now showing at the Te ee Theatre. Miss Blondell was working in a typical Blondell scene, full of action and smart chatter, and the popular Blondell mannerisms. Glenda Farrell was in it, too, and Allen Jenkins, Guy Kibbee, Lyle Talbot, Ruth Donnelly and Frank McHugh. It shouldn’t be difficult to imagine what sort of scene it was—even to picturing Frank drunk, and trying to open a bottle on the door handle of the room in which Miss Blondell and Miss Farrell, in negligee, were seeking a little peace and quiet. The blonde Miss Pursely was sitting beside the only vacant seat on the set, off to one side. Within five minutes, she was talking about dressing Miss Blondell’s hair, and how she liked her. The last statement seemed unusual enough to warrant some elaboration. Asked for her reason for liking her, she. said: ‘‘Honey, I don’t have to. When I like ’em, I like ’em, and I don’t have to have reasons.’’ In any other society in the world, you can shy a little when anyone calls you ‘‘honey.’’ On a motion picture set, the appellation is practically universal. Tough electricians yell at equally tough set men, ‘‘ Dolling, would yuh mind shiftin’ dem chairs’’? It’s the idiom of the art. But by degrees, the reasons were forthcoming, The hairdresser was an observant young woman. She had known Joan for a matter of three or four years, in the intimate way a hairdresser knows an actress—which is to say, for some sixteen or seventeen hours a day for an average of forty weeks a year. ‘‘No one else can get away with what she does,’’ said Miss Pursely, admiringly. ‘‘Gee, she could walk into Buckingham Palace, and they’d like her just as we do. She could go down to Main Street, too, and they’d love her. She’s the most natural person in the world. She does exactly as she pleases, and what she does always pleases everyone else. I suppose it’s because she’s so unselfish. ‘‘T’ye worked for a lot of actresses, Francis, Chatterton, Diet rich, MacDonald, Bennett; but I’ve never seen anyone like Joan.’’ This admiring statement was suddenly and strangely corroborated. Ray Enright, director, walked by. He had just asked Joan to do something, and Joan had complied without a murmur. This caused Mr. Enright to murmer: ‘‘T wish they were all like Joan Blondell.’’ ‘You bet, she’s regular,’’ Pursely went on. This was getting a bit tiresome. ‘‘Tsn’t there anything about her you don’t like?’’, she was asked. The hairdresser must have been thinking of something else. She didn’t answer for moment. Then the question, which had been loafing in her unconscious, jumped up into her conscious thought. ‘“What? Oh, I guess so, if you want little things. I could kill her for putting her hands on her hair like that all the time, just after I’ve fixed it. ‘cAnd she eats too many hamburgers. Say, if she really took time to eat, she’d get big, really big. She never eats a regular meal. She just eats between meals, but that’s just about all the time. I guess you could say I didn’t like that about her. ‘*But that’s not really important, is it? I don’t suppose, with Joan, it would make any difference if she did get fat. People would like her just the same. Everyone likes her. George is crazy about her.’’ ‘““George’’? ‘‘George Barnes, her husband. I guess you could call them the happiest married couple in Hollywood. I do, anyhow. I’ve been to her home several times. Joan has whoever she likes—she doesn’t just invite people who can do her good to her house. And she treats ’em all alike—the heads of studios, stars—and people like me. I’d like to be just like her.’’ Even a hairdresser to whom an actress is heroine can’t say more than that. Miss Farrell at the Joan Blondell Won Toehold On Stage With Her Big Toe Star of “Havana Widows’ Attracted Attention of Producer by Parking Sore Toe on His Desk is now on the sereen of the Theatre in J. Blondell, First National’s hottest little dynamo, who ‘‘Havana Widows,’’ actually got her toe hold on the ladder of theatrical fame, with a toe. right foot, gave her her start. Yes sir, a little big toe of her To it, Joan eredits the toehold on her career, both literally and figuratively. Her career started when Joan was very young. In fact, at the age of four months she was introduced to audiences when her theatrical parents carried her on the stage of the Globe Theatre as the daughter of Peggy Astaire in “The Greatest Lover.” The years sped by and after her schooling days Joan.plunged into the theatrical work. She played=tank towns in China with repertory companies, split weeks in Australia, one-night stands in Germany. Then came the moment of the toe incident. Joan was on Broadway. She was broke, very broke. She needed work badly and when she heard that Al Woods, the producer, was signing people for a new show she hurried to his office. She couldn’t hurry there fast enough to seek work. The sore toe delayed Joan. She finally arrived at the office and was told to wait in the outer office. The toe continued to hurt — Joan continued to wait. The toe won and Joan took off her shoe, then her stocking. She felt relieved and propped her foot on the desk. When Woods rushed from his office with the intention of hurrying through the outer office to the street, he stopped short at the sight of a blonde girl with a bare foot sticking high over the ink stand. “What’s the idea?” he asked in astonishment. Brazen Attitude Won “Sore toe. It hurts,’ came the brief answer. “Let me take a look at it,’ de clared the busy producer. “Hmmm— it is pretty bad,” he said as he examined it, going on to treat the sore toe himself. The girl’s brazen, frank attitude struck Woods’ fancy and thus did Joan win the role of the stuttering show girl in the Chicago company of “The Trial of Mary Dugan.” That proved to be the turning point of her career — her “toehold” on the ladder up which she has climbed to stardom After Joan finished in “The Trial of Mary Dugan” came parts in “Maggie The Magnificent” and “Penny Arcade.” She was playing in the latter when it was bought by Warner Bros. for the screen and Joan was brought to Hollywood for the movie version, the picture being released under the title, “Sinner’s Holiday.” Another player in the Broadway production, “Penny Areade,”’ also came west for the screen version and found success— a young Broadway player named James Cagney. And all this accounts for the reason Joan has transposed the expression “toe that mark” to “mark that toe’—and she means the big toe of her right foot. She ras risen from leading parts to stellar roles, her latest being in “Havana Widows,” an uproarious comedy by Earl Baldwin. Others in the cast include Glenda Farrell, Guy Kibbee, Lyle Talbot, Allen Jenkins, Frank McHugh and Ruth Donnelly. Roy Enright directed. Film Stars Discuss Topic Of Occasional Stage Work Because of Different Techniques Stage Can Not Teach Screen Stars Acting, Says Frank McHugh T was a sort of symposiac gathering of players on a First National set during the production of ‘‘Havana Widows,’’ a comedy drama now starring Joan Blondell and Glenda Theatre. The conversation turned on the statement by Helen Hayes to the effect that all ex-stage players now working in motion pictures ought to return, every so often, to their old Alma Mater, the stage. Lyle Talbot had just finished a highly successful run on the local stage in ‘‘One Sunday Afternoon,’’ so he was enthusiastic ally in agreement. ‘‘It gives you a real feel of your ability again—something you’ve probably lost if you’ve been around Hollywood long,’’ he said. ‘*Yes, and we owe it to the stage, too, just as Helen says,’’ chimed in Glenda Farrell, who came from the stage, and has been begging for a chance to return to Broadway to do one of the half dozen plays that are waiting for her there. ‘‘It gave us our start. It’s our Alma Mater and we ought to go back to it occasionally.’? GLENDA FARRELL Who laughs Mat No. 14 Price 5c Joan Blondell wasn’t so altruistic, but she was heartily in agreement. ‘¢T like to work on the stage,’’ she said. ‘‘After all, if you’re an actor or an actress, where else can you get the ‘‘kick’’ out of your job that you can get from working before an audience? Certainly not in pictures.’’ Joan was emphatic. Only Frank McHugh had remained silent. Frank began his work on the stage sometime ago—before any of the others, in fact—working with his father in barnstorming one night bits, in vaudeville, and, finally, on the New York stage. Everyone waited, of course, to hear what he would say to the dictum of Miss Hayes. ‘‘Tt’s a lot of poppycock,’’ he said at last. ‘‘But, Frank—’’ began some of the others, but he cut them short. | **Lot of Poppycock!”’ | ‘It’s a lot of poppycock,’’ he repeated. I’ve got an old uncle who always used to say that ‘cows off yonder have longer horns’. He was right. You’re all seeing the stage through the rosy glow of the ‘good old days’. The good old days! Why, they’re right in your lap! The good old days on the stage never existed. You think it was your cradle and your school and your dear old mother, do you? Well, it wasn’t. It took the last ounce of your time and strength. It made you play week after week in plays you didn’t like. When you got a good one, it died on you, and you were probably out of work for weeks, maybe years. ‘“Broadway? Where does Broadway get the idea that it constitutes the theatre anyway? How many people have played on Broadway for longer than a year or two? Maybe a handful. I spent fifteen years working up to the place where I could play three years on Broadway. But not because it was my cradle or teacher. I wanted to play on Broadway because it paid me more money. I play in pictures now for the same reason, ‘‘What can you learn from the stage any more? Picture and stage acting are two entirely different things. You might as well hope to learn how to play golf by practising tennis.’? ‘Mercenary old Frank,’’ pouted Glenda. — “Not at all,’’ said Stanley Logan, dialogue director on the picture, and former stage director of many hits. ‘«Frank’s absolutely right. I stayed with the stage—we all did—until it practically folded up on us. Why should we go back? They’re two different things, pictures and the stage, and this is the day of pictures. The day of the commercial theatre is done. The art theatre is another matter. The art of the theatre is as old as civilization, and will certainly last. But the commercial Broadway theatre, or London theatre is another thing. Here’s Charlie Cochrane telling Basil Dean the same thing.’’ Logan produced a copy of the London Observer and read from an article in which Mr. Cochrane did, indeed, advise Mr. Dean to that effect. “<¢The acting technique and the dramatic form of each are poles apart. I can see no other than a superficial relation between the stage and the screen,’ ’’ he read. What effect this pronunicamento by one of London’s greatest stage producers had on the four actors in First National’s comedy drama ‘*Havana Widows,’’ unhappily, no one will ever know. For just then they were called back into the scene to do another. shot, and the symposium was, for the time being, at any rate, at an. end. The four players, together with other members of the cast, including Guy Kibbee, Allen Jenkins and Ruth Donnelly, went back to clowning before the camera for ‘‘Havana Widows,’’ one of the most hilarious comedies ever screened. Ray Enright directed the picture from a screen play by Earl Baldwin. FREE WEEKLY NEWS SERVICE Are you getting your copy of the weekly news service presented by Warner Bros.? If not, you are missing out on a crack service which is offered you free of charge. This bulletin presents the latest news from the Warner . Bros.-First National studios, dealing with pictures in production —Hollywood previews—and about everything you should know about the coming product. It is called “WHAT’S HAPPENING ON THE WARNER-FIRST NATIONAL LOT.” This service is available t> you without charge. 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