My Reputation(Warner Bros.) (1946)

As Business Man, Howe Makes A-1 Photographer One of the war’s more curious casualties occurred in Hollywood when James Wong Howe, Chinese photographer, recently placed on sale a Japanese motion picture which he says is the biggest mistake he ever made. It is a full length feature picture, entitled “Hori’s X Alibi,” a father and son drama. “Unfortunately for me,” laments Howe, “I spent a small fortune on it.” The famous photographer produced the picture independently here in 1930, but because of a miscalculation he couldn’t release it, and ever since then he has kept a print in storage. “T have just received another bill for storage and it’s the last one I intend to pay,” the cameraman declared. “If anybody is foolish enough, I’ll sell it to him cheap. Otherwise we’re going to have a film burning.” When Howe showed the film to Curtis Bernhardt, who directed the Barbara Stanwyck starring film, Warners’ “My Star Plays Real Life Benefactress To Young Actress During the filming of Warner Bros.’ new screen drama, “My Reputation,” currently at the Strand, Barbara Stanwyck was dancing with George Brent on a crowded hotel ballroom floor. The director called, “Cut!” At that point, one of those between-scene dramas began which sometimes rival those that reach the screen. Crystal chandeliers hung overhead, the extras made a smartly dressed, formal crowd; and to one side the orchestra rested, following Director Curtis Bernhardt’s order. The crowd stood around idly as the electricians fiddled with the lights on the catwalks overhead. The orchestra tootled a bit and then for its own amusement, during the pause, broke into a jivey tune. Two of the kids started to jitter. The crowd gathered around. Miss Stanwyck and Brent stopped in their leisurely walk off the floor and joined the onlookers. For a moment Barbara Stanwyck ceased to be the star. That position had been taken over by the girl dancer. She was a redhead, about seventeen. The crowds stood around admiring her as her trim legs flashed on the up beat. ““She’s swell,” said Miss Stanwyck, applauding. “It’s one performance you didn’t have anything to do with,” kidded Brent. Barbara smiled. “Why that cat-who-ate-thecanary smile?” asked George. “Nothing,” she answered. They were passing Bernhardt, the director, and he said, “Is that the girl, Barbara?” She nodded, and then Brent learned why Barbara had smiled. The girl was Helen Anderson, and she had been completely cured of infantile paralysis at the Los Angeles Orthopedic hospital, one of Miss Stanwyck’s unpublicized charities. Now the star befriends her by asking directors to give her work. ‘Besides Barbara Stanwyck, the cast of “My Reputation” features George Brent in the male lead, Lucile Watson, Eve Arden, John Ridgely and Warner Anderson. The film was adapted from Clare Jaynes’ popular novel, “Instruct My Sorrows.” Reputation,” now at the Strand, with a view to dubbing in Chinese, Bernhardt rejected the idea as impractical. “When I decided to make the picture in Japanese rather than Chinese,” explains Howe, who directed the photography for “My Reputation,” “I had two things in mind: that Japan had more than two thousand theatres, China less than four hundred. “T went ahead and filmed the picture with local Japanese. It turned out very well, but when it came to releasing the picture I learned that only twelve of Japan’s theatres were wired for sound. China had more than sixty.” “T finally sold the master print to a Japanese business man, who exhibited it in Japan, and on the strength of it the American Japanese who played the lead became a star over there. “The picture paid off by teaching me an important lesson. As a business man I’m a first class photographer!” Still BS 119 Mat No. 109—15c IN "MY REPUTATION,” Warners’ new romantic drama at the Strand, Barbara Stanwyck portrays a young widow who must fight for her happiness against a lifetime of convention. Actor In Strand Film Got Start At Pasadena Theatre The idea of a motion picture career first appealed to John Ridgely, currently to be seen in support of Barbara Stanwyck in Warners’ “My Reputation” at the Strand, when he was only a junior at Stanford University. As soon as he had finished college — he was graduated with the class of ’31— heheaded south, but not for Hollywood. His destination was Pasadena. Ridgely knew his chances of crashing directly into films were virtually nil. He went, therefore, to the Pasadena Community Playhouse, where scores of now prominent film players got their start. He stayed there for six years, doing anything and everything that was offered him, before Irving Kumin, Warner Bros.’ assistant casting director and unofficial talent scout, spotted him in the role of Private Didier in the dramatization: of Humphrey Cobb’s novel, Mat 112—15c John Ridgely Friendly Trio Still MR 39 John Ridgely, George Brent and Barbara Stanwyck make a gay threesome in one of the lighter moments from Warner Bros.' newest drama of romance, Mat No. 206—30c "My Reputation," which is currently playing at the Strand Theatre. Tables Turn As Farmers Top Star Dog-Fanciers There was a time when Hollywood stars were known for their lavish expenditures, but the past ten years have produced a type of poor man who is topping them in a traditional Hollywood luxury. It is in the matter of dogs. “One of the commonest sights nowadays is to see an old flivver come rattling up with a guy who wants to spend $100 on an obedience course for his dog,” Jack Gorton, famous film dog trainer, said recently. Gorton, who supplied the two pointers who are currently to be seen in the Barbara Stanwyck starring film, Warners’ “My Reputation” at the Strand, says the situation has become so bad that one of the trainers in the business was forced to give up picture work because he can’t afford to pass up the big money. By contrast, the stars have drastically cut down on _ the amount of money they’re spending on dogs, he added. Gorton thinks one of the reasons, aside from high income taxes, is the vogue for small dogs. Stanwyck Admits ‘Other Man’s’ Attentions Barbara Stanwyck, currently starring in Warners’ new film drama, “My Reputation,”’ at the Strand, recently had to confess to her husband, Robert Taylor, that she was accepting the romantic attentions of another young man. The young man in quesCooper, who started sending the actress flowers during a recent illness and subsequently followed through with a box of gardenias a day. Bobby plays Miss Stanwyck’s son in ‘‘My Reputation.” Also featured in the cast are George Brent, Lucile Watson and Eve Arden. tion is one Bobby aged fourteen, “Paths of Glory.” Kumen gave Ridgely a chance in Mervyn Leroy’s “They Won’t Forget.” The part was comparatively unimportant but it served to give the talented young actor a start. An uncle, Laurence Rea, was a well known musical comedy star of London and New York but that seems to be the only trace of dramatics in John’s family tree until he was bitten with the desire to act. “There aren’t as many police dog's, Danes, and collies as there used to be,” he explained, ‘‘and for some reason people don’t feel that small dogs need training.” As an example of stars giving up big dogs, Gorton cited Miss Stanwyck. She and her husband, Robert Taylor, used to have fourteen hunting dogs on their ranch. When Taylor went into the Navy, the actress moved to Beverly Hills and now she has only two of the hunters left, plus a mutt who wandered in off the street one day. “A lot of the stars got rid of their big dogs at the start of the war when the meat shortage set in,” Gorton declared. “But the aircraft, shipyard, and other workers who moved in later found there was plenty of horse meat so they didn’t hesitate to buy big: dog's. “Then a lot of them, especially those who came from farms, found themselves with more cash than they were accustomed to—and what better way than to spend it on a dog? That’s the way I figure it.” Actress Emotes With Such Vigor That Car Crashes During the filming of Warners’ newest hit drama, “My Reputation,” now at the Strand, star Barbara Stanwyck resisted with such vigor the cinematic advances o f Jerome Cowan that the automobilein which they were riding got out of hand, _ rolled off an incline, and narrowly missed crushing George Brent and two other persons who were watching the Mat 102—15c George Brent cameras turn. Miss Stanwyck’s struggle was so. fierce that Cowan relaxed his foot on the brake, and the car rolled forward. Brent and a script clerk and a hair dresser jumped out of the way as the car came crashing down. The chairs in which they had been sitting were crushed. ‘My Reputation’ Actress ‘Retires’ To Find New Fame Lucile Watson, who played Bette Davis’ mother in “Watch On The Rhine,‘ and rocketed to new film eminence as a result of that picture, said recently that she finds the whole thing very ironic. Miss Watson, today one of the most sought after actresses in Hollywood, can be seen currently as Barbara Stanwyck’s mother in Warners’ ‘“My Reputation” at the Strand. “Tt all goes to show you never can tell when you’re retired,” she declared. Miss Watson went on to explain that she retired as an actress twenty vVears ae’ o when she was forty three. Old timers in the theatre will remember that she was a celebrated beauty on the London and Mat 106—1 5c Lucile Watson New York stage. Then she disappeared and lived obscurely in France for a whole decade, emerging only after the death of her husband ten years ago. It was the start of her second career which now, in her sixty-third year, has reached an unexpected pinnacle. “But my heart,” says Miss Watson, “is still on Broadway.” She declared that she would stay in Hollywood only long enough to get a play lined up in New York city, although H ollywood might prove tempting if it “typed” her, a much maligned practice of which she approves. “My biggest delight as an actress,” she explains, “is in making people laugh. Not only that, I’m best at it. The sort of thing I did in ‘Watch On The Rhine’ on stage and screen is a good example. I’m afraid the current vogue, however, may be to have me play the aristocratic lady of the conventional type. I wouldn’t like that.” Meanwhile, she is delighted to have found new success at the age of sixty-three. “Retirement,” she concludes, “is a bad idea. A career that goes on indefinitely is much better. And best of all is the discovery that age need not put an end to it.” 7 Mat 110—I15c Warner Anderson