Possessed (Warner Bros.) (1947)

Actor Abhors Stage, Film Eating Roles “T,”’ said Raymond Massey as he sat down at the breakfast table on the set of Warner Bros.’ “Possessed,” the Joan CrawfordVan Heflin starrer now at the Strand, “hate eating scenes!” He looked down at the plate in front of him and continued: “T probably hate them with more fervor than any other actor in the business, and all because of a picture I did many years ago at the old ‘U.’ It was cold roast beef. Cold roast beef for 12 straight days. Some of the scenes required as many as 13 takes. My stomach must have thought I’d signed on as garbage can to a prime roast beef house. “After that, I recall a_ picture with Eddie Robinson where for four days I ate nothing but cheese. Eddie averaged 10 chocolate eclairs during the same period. There was another chap at the next table who was supposed to be eating sherbet. He was allergic to the eggs in sherbet, so they fixed him up with cold mashed potatoes, over which crushed strawberries had been poured. Only the diabolic mind of a prop man could dream up such dishes as are served on sets. “Only once in my career, can I recall beating the rap. I beat it steadily for two years during the stage run of ‘The Shining Hour.’ I had to eat a full meal at each performance. During that two years I didn’t have a single dinner in a restaurant. I ordered the very best’ meals served on the stage. “Sometime, if you care to listen, I’l] tell you about cigar smoking scenes. I never smoke ’em by choice.” Massey and Geraldine Brooks head a large and capable cast of featured players in the film. Still Sailor Van Heflin, currently starring with Joan Crawford in Warners’ “Possessed,” currently at the Strand, is small boat shopping. Van, who knows his deep-water sailing, first shipped out of Long Beach when a high school boy and still holds a third mate’s ticket for commercial vessels. « Still No. 667-517 VAN HEFLIN, co-starred with Joan Crawford in Warner Bros.’ “Possessed” at the Strand, plays the role of a confirmed bachelor who refuses to be caught in the web of marriage. Supporting the stars are Raymond Massey and Geraldine Brooks. MAT No. LE Still No. 667-46 JOAN CRAWFORD in her role of unrequited love, is co-starred with Van Heflin in Warner Bros.’ “Possessed” at the Strand. Raymond Massey and Geraldine Brooks head a large supporting cast in other important roles. MAT No. 1H Joan Crawford Calls Self Own Worst Set. Joan Crawford picked up a stitch on the socks she was knitting, told “Tonic,” her French poodle pup, to get off the day bed, and said, “No, I don’t believe it takes a genius to be a good mother and actress,’’—all at the same time. The actress was between scenes of ‘Possessed’ on the Warner Bros. lot. It is her second film since she gave her Academy Award winning performance in “Mildred Pierce,” followed by “Humoresque.” Joan has Van Heflin as her leading man, and co-starrer in the current film now at the Strand. “T’ll admit,” said Joan, after muttering over two more dropped stitches, “‘that I’ve been lucky. I didn’t have to make any pictures for two years. During that time I was able to get Christinia and Christopher pretty well established in a routine.” The youngsters are both in school now and there is a capable nurse to watch over them between school hours and the time their mother returns from work at the studio. “There are times,” continued Joan, “‘when it takes all my ingenuity to keep on schedule. I have a 50 minute drive between my home in Brentwood and the studio. That means when I’m working I have to rise at five in the morning to be on the set in time. “The four hours between five and nine give me time for a hurried check on the children, a light breakfast and a glance at the front page of the morning paper. The balance of the time is devoted to the drive to the studio, and sessions with the hairdresser, make-up, wardrobew4 37 Joan is seldom able to make a luncheon date. This time goes to a hurried lunch and a complete renewal of her make-up for the afternoon’s shooting. “IT know it sounds hectic,” concluded the star. “But once you make yourself stick to the routine you have established, it isn’t bad. Ask any G.I. who has had a sergeant to help him—and I guess I’m my own worst topkick,” confessed Miss Crawford. Tough Sledding for Cupid In ‘Possessed’, Strand Film Several Popular Movies Play On Same Theme Unrequited love is having another inning at Warner Bros. Studio where cupid is, figuratively, shooting his arrows into the air and never finding them at all. Or almost never. Joan Crawford loves. costarrer Van Heflin in “Possessed,” the Warners’ drama now playing at the Strand, and that love, when not returned by Van, is the cause of all the lady’s many troubles throughout the whole picture. She never succeeds in winning more than passing attention from him. Bette’s Love “Deception” is the story of Bette Davis’s great love for Paul Henreid, a concert cellist, and of Claude Rains’ unreturned love for her. These lead to a tremendous climax of clashing temperaments, at which all three of these players are most expert. But Bette can’t marry Henreid and “live happily ever after” when the story is done. Neither ean Mr. Rains continue to pursue Bette. The story of “Pursued,” a Warner Bros.’ release, is a mixture of psychological repressions and repercussions which, throughout most of the story, prevents the culmination of any romance between Teresa Wright and Robert Mitchum. A happy ending, if there is one, is at least long delayed. Three Together The three pictures named were all filmed at Warner Bros. simultaneously. But the inability of that studio’s stars to walk away together into the sunset at the end of a picture, indicating that true love has solved all their problems, also has been featured in several other recently completed pictures. “Humoresque,” in which Miss Crawford and John Garfield are co-starred, is the story of a great and passionate love affair between two people so different in nature that the audience instinctively knows they can never be happy together. Ann Sheridan shared a similarly unfortunate fate, as far as love is concerned, in the picture “Nora Prentiss.” In this she had some reels of happiness with Kent Smith, but in that again, every audience will understand the shadow that hangs over their lives. Bogie and Barbara It is something like that, too, which prevents Humphrey Bogart and Barbara Stanwyck from becoming ideally happy even though they play man and wife in “The Two Mrs. Carrolls.” Here again, future audiences are put “in the know” early enough to avoid disappointment when the apparent love story turns to tragic melodrama. These unusual twists to what otherwise might have been typical love stories are expected to keep audiences bemused with other pictures, such as “Never Say Goodbye,” “The Big Sleep” and ‘The Time, the Place and the Girl,’ in which Cupid has much better luck. Still No. 667-511 VAN HEFLIN, who spent an entire afternoon on the Warner set refusing to marry Joan Crawford despite her tears and entreaties, is co-starred with the lovely lady in Warner Bros.’ ‘Possessed,’ now playing at the Strand Theatre. MAT No. 2A Mimics On Camera Crew Upset Van Heflin’s Love A cool customer is Mr. Van Heflin. While “Possessed,” the Warner Bros. film coming to the Strand on Friday, was being filmed, he spent entire afternoons refusing to marry Joan Crawford in spite of the lady’s tears and entreaties. Miss Crawford was as intense as Van Heflin was cool. That, of course, had been arranged for them by the writers who prepared the script and by Director Curtis Bernhardt who translated it onto film. Joan was very lovely to look at in her simple shirtwaist and skirt, her big, tear-filled eyes and her vibrantly low voice. Van Heflin looked rather good himself in his shirt sleeves and a sleeveless sweater. His detached, disinterested attitude as he listened to Miss Crawford’s declaration that she loved him and lost all pride, seemed to be exactly the effect that Director Bernhardt wanted. He was playing the piano at the beginning of the scene and Joan sat on the piano bench with him, closer than was really necessary. When he finally stopped playing and got up to cross the room, Joan followed him. All the dialogue during the several rehearsals was pitched in a low key but the camera crew, the electricians and even the grips on the set had memorized it by the time Director Bernhardt ordered the first “take.” “I wish you’d marry me, David,” said the assistant cameraman to the sound boom boy (whose name isn’t David). “Louise,” said the boom boy in reply, “it wouldn’t be fair, leaving it like this. We’d better not see each other for a while.” “Tt hurts so. Just your saying that,” the cameraman went on before he was silenced by a look from Bernhardt. Raymond Massey laughed heartily at the take off. He heads the large supporting : cast which also includes Geraldine Brooks, Moroni Olsen, Stanley Ridges and Don MceGuire. After several hours of rehearsals and takes, sans kibitzing, the director was finally satisfied that the tone of the film would be set with this scene. He was right but all hands agreed that Van Heflin must be quite a man to continue to brush off the lovely Miss Crawford for an entire afternoon, even in the interests of a motion picture plot. MAT No. 1B Raymond Massey Back to College Van Heflin, co-starring in “Possessed” with Joan Crawford, recently returned to his alma mater, the University of Oklahoma, where he _ lectured several classes in dramatics.