Hollywood Hotel (Warner Bros.) (1937)

Stars to Publish Handbook On Play-Acting One of Hollywood’s most unusual literary undertakings is now underway and the surprising thing is that nobody thought of it sooner. Taking into consideration the interest in Amateur Theatres and the suppressed desire of countless thousands to become actors, a group of Warner Bros. stars are compiling a handbook on acting. Every phase of acting will be covered and original playlets will be included. Judging by the projected scope of the work it seems likely to attain “Anthony Adverse” or “Gone With the Wind” proportions. Dick Powell is the leader, and he will contribute chapters on singing and voice culture. Paul Muni, Leslie Howard, Kay Francis, Bette Davis and others will write on the various phases of the drama, and the comedy chapters will be handled by Hugh Herbert, Mabel Todd, Allen Jenkins, Hugh O’Connell, Frank McHugh and others who earn their living making people laugh. Each player. contributing will draw on his own experiences to illustrate points and will reveal his own acting secrets. An incorporated company is now being formed to handle the writing end. IT’S AN ILL WIND— Frances Langford, the blues singer, used to be a soprano in a Lakeland, Fla., church choir until acute tonsilitis made an operation necessary. With her tonsils out, she became a contralto, went on the air, and gained nation-wide fame. She is currently in Warner Bros.’ “Hollywood Hotel” at the Strand Theatre. HAS HOLLOW HEELS Dick Powell takes no chances. He wears a special pair of shoes whenever he goes on a long motor trip. The heels are hollow and each contains a sizable fold of bills. If set afoot by accident or robbery, he wants to be provided with money. That’s what we call foresight! Dick will be seen next week at the Strand Theatre starring in “Hollywood Hotel,’ a gigantic Warner Bros. musical comedy. HUGH’S PUNNY EXCUSE Hugh Herbert, late for camera call one morning in Warner Bros. “Hollywood Hotel,” the filmusical that opens next week at the Strand Theatre, gave as his excuse that he’d been “sitting up all night with a sick kid.” He didn’t win much sympathy, though, for Director Busby Berkeley knows that Hughie raises goats. FISHERMAN JOAN Dick Powell was all set to accompany a party of friends on a fishing expedition off the Malibu coast one recent Sunday, but the “Hollywood Hotel” company went on location instead and he had to cancel the trip. But it worked out all right. His wife, Joan Blondell, took his place and came back with the $25 pool for catching the biggest fish. It went for supper. Mat 208—30c THEY’RE THE TOPS — Dick Powell, Rosemary Lane (center) and Louella Parsons (originator of the Hollywood Hotel air show) head the cast of the year’s biggest musical film, ‘“‘Hollywood Hotel,’ now showing at the Strand. Benny Goodman and his Swing Band are featured. Press and Program Fillers Allyn Joslyn, featured in Warner Bros. “Hollywood Hotel,” has a background of 36 stage plays—all Broadway productions. He never went on tour nor played in stock. Hollywood oddity: Cellophane cubes represent ice in glasses in the Orchid Room set of “Hollywood Hotel.” Libby Taylor, famed as the colored maid who played in Mae West pictures to whom La West cracked the remembered line, “Beulah, peel me a grape,” is in Warner Bros., filmusical ‘“Hollywood Hotel,” as maid to Lola Lane, a tempestuous movie star. Dick Powell reads biographies. He has a comprehensive collection at his Beverly Hills home and a standing order with a Hollywood bookdealer brings him the newest as fast as published. Glenda Farrell saves old hats, has .enough to stock a store, but never wears them after the mode changes. Says experience of her “noverty years,” when hats were hard to get, makes it impossible for her to discard one now. Ted Healy, once a newspaper cartoonist, sketched Dick Powell, Lola Lane, Rosemary Lane, Glenda Farrell, Hugh Herbert, Benny Goodman, and others of his fellow principals in Warner Bros.’ “Hollywood Hotel.” He got up an album including all cast members. 32 Tablet, Briel Dick Powell, making his twentyfourth starring picture in Warner Bros. “Hollywood Hotel,” has danced with a different screen sweetheart in each picture and says no two have the same step. Gene Krupa, ace drummer of Benny Goodman’s dance orchestra, which is appearing in Warner Bros.’ “Hollywood Hotel,” made his first appearance as a bandsman seven years ago, substituting one night a week in a three-piece orchestra at a Wisconsin summer resort where he was jerking sodas. Ted Healy’s stand-in in Warner Bros. “Hollywood Hotel” is Lynn Hayes, son of Grace Hayes, noted actress. He’s also a radio writer. Mabel Todd, playing a comedy role in Warner Bros. ‘Hollywood Hotel,” carries around with her a tiny pocket radio which she tunes in between takes. Aerial is coiled in a jacket pocket. Ground wire she clips to a finger ring. Dick Powell averages five pounds loss in weight while at work in a picture, gains it all back in two days of sleep when work is done. Rosemary Lane, splitting femme honors in Warner Bros.’ “Hollywood Hotel,” with sister Lola, demands nine hours sleep a night. If she doesn’t get it, she sleeps between camera calls and during luncheon the following day. How the Movie Stars Are Kiss-Proofed If you are one of those men or women inclined to worry about the tell tale marks of a kiss, you might be interested in this... The secret of how those cinema sweethearts kiss their handsome heroes without leaving the slightest stain of lipstick on him is out. The girls are kiss-proofed with special makeup before they go into their clinch. All screen actresses who play in kissing scenes resort to such trickery, unless the giveaway rouge stain is part of the plot. Pere Westmore revealed the secret as he prepared Rosemary Lane for some lip service with Dick Powell during the shooting of “Hollywood Hotel,” Warner Bros.’ forthcoming filmusical. Miss Lane’s lips first were cleaned with cream. Then the cream was rubbed off with eau de cologne to obtain a greaseless surface. New color was applied, and the excess blotted off with clean tissue. What remained was dusted with talcum powder and the corners of the lips were blotted with cotton. “Guaranteed to kiss but not tell,” Westmore declared. He may have something there. DICK WORKS OUT Badminton at 6:30 A. M. was Dick Powell’s prescription for keeping in trim while working in Warner Bros. “Hollywood Hotel.” His opponent was Russ Saunders, assistant director of the company and former All-American football back. They played at Powell’s Beverly Hills estate for three quarters of an hour before going to the studio. Who said that these movie actors have a soft life! TED CUPID'S STOOGE Since opening his new florist shop in the Beverly Hills Hotel, Comedian Ted Healy says he has become a stooge for Cupid. “All the boys ask me what to give their girls,” he said. “But I don’t sell poison ivy, so I tell ’em—and sell ’em— orchids!” Ted is to be seen currently in Warner Bros.’ “Hollywood Hotel” at the Strand Theatre. HERE’S NEW ANGLE Allyn Joslyn, Warner Bros, featured player in “Hollywood Hotel,” which comes to the Strand Theatre next Friday, appeared in thirtysix Broadway stage plays before coming to the screen. But unlike most Broadwayites, he doesn’t turn up his nose at Hollywood. “It’s hard to understand, though, after Broadway. It’s so sensible.” EVEN THE OWLS DO IT Hugh Herbert, Warner Bros. comedy star now in “Hollywood Hotel,” at the Strand Theatre, received the oddest of his fan gifts recently from a mechanical genius named John F. X. O’Rourke, of Salt Lake City, Utah. It is a large horned owl, stuffed and so wired that when a button is pressed it croaks “Woo-woo!” — just like Hugh Herbert himself does.