Two Seconds (Warner Bros.) (1932)

PLANT THESE LIVE FEATURES Advwvanee Edward G. Robinson Dreads Interviews Because He Hates To Talk About Himself By Herbert Morton Edward G. Robinson doesn’t care about dentists or surgeons any more than the average man does. But he’d much rather have a flock of teeth extracted or submit to a major operation ‘than undergo that terrifying ordeal known as ‘being interviewed.’ Sounds funny, doesn’t it? “Tittle Caesar’—the hard-boiled editor of “Five Star Final” — a shrinking violet! It seems like a paradox. It probably is. Robinson’s own explanation of his feeling is disarmingly straightforward and simple: “T hate to talk about myself!” He offers this with his characteristic smile. For the fraction of a second you are tempted to wonder whether it is a pose. But you presently catch an unmistakable ring of sincerity on his voice. You realize he was never more in earnest his dislike of the than jn voicing denly realizes that he forgot to put on his trousers. “T know there are plenty of actors who can rattle off the story of their lives, or turn loose some other line of stuff that the interviewers. eat up. Sometimes I wish I could do it. -It must be a gift. No doubt most of the people whose business it is to get interviews have put me down ag the most. churlish man they have ever met; because I can’t do about’ Edward G. And all the time I’m struggling with a part I don’t understand and doing it very badly. That’s the worst experience an actor can have.” a monologue: Robinson. ~ All of which is true—as far as it goes. Undoubtedly Robinson is at a disadvantage when he’s talking about Robinson. But that’s only one side of it. Leave Edward G. Robinson out of the conversation—this is just a friendly tip to aspiring interviewers —turn talk into impersonal Current Edward G. Robinson Actually Experienced The Thoughts Of Man He Portrays In “Two Seconds’ Edward G. Robinson, star of First National’s “Two Seconds,” NOW abe Thess eene* wk Theatre, had a real-life experience which closely paralleled the experiences of John Allen, the man he portrays in his latest hit. Robinson “died” of drowning. It happened when he was attending school at the Townsend Harris Hall, a preparatory high school for the College of the City of New York. The boys in the preparatory school | were permitted to use the college gymnasium at certain hours of the day. intent on learning to swim that he Robinson, however, was so frequently overstayed his time. The him in the pool one afternoon, de physical instructor, seeing cided to impress upon his mind the Robinson had just expelled his breath and was in official regulations. urgent need of a new supply of oxygen when his heels were grabbed and his head pulled under water. Con Never before would he talk about it. The sensation of death was so acute and left such an obsession on his mind that he could not bear even to refer to it. That obsession has never left him. To this day he states that he has a distinet and decided dread of water. “The panic does not seem to come in that form. ‘Duck my head under water went on Robinson,’ and I have an abject and unreasoning fear, a subconscious emotion over which I have no control. I have tried many times to rid myself of the obsession, but that same terrible feeling that took possession of me when I was drowning in the swimming tank takes hold of me whenever I feel the swirl of water around my body. “Tt was not long ago that I tried | to force myself to go into the surf. with some friends at the beach, but I couldn’t let go of the. life lines. IT was laughed at a good deal. Here was the hero of ‘Little Caesar,’ who scorned bullets and laughed at death, afraid to let go of the life ropes in a comparatively. calm sea and on a perfectly safe beach.” | sequently he inhaled a great quantity een wae led to describe the first person singular pronoun. In a less genuinely modest man, his modesty would seem like an affectation. To get him to talk about himself is like conducting a crossHe will answer quesBut you can see that he is suffering examination.” tions with amazing fortitude. physically as well.as mentally, as you try to get at.the real Edward G. Robinsen, his feeling, habits, likes, dislikes and so forth. He appears to feel that it is something like indecent exposure to talk about hizself. “Tt’s like undressing in public,” ‘he explained with a smile, as we gat on the set of “Two Seconds,” First National picture in which he Wiles besseen att they cei. vel oj AZaye Ws ag 2c ne res Lae “The modern psychologists have a word for well, I always feel like an exhibitionist after I get through with an it—‘exhibitionism’— interview. “Pm sorry for the people who I must be a tough subject for them. Id like to be able to help them but I don’t When they start firing questions at me about myself, £ get tongue-tied. I feel like an actor out in the middle of the stage in front of a packed house, who sud have to interview me. know how. Page Four give Robinson. his head. Before you know it you’ll find yourself enthralled, listening to the acute, sensitive mind of an amazingly intelligent man; a man. who has done a vast amount of individual thinking on many subjects; a man with an incisive, direct manner of speech, who can become interesting and eloquent if you’ll only let him forget himself. He doesn’t play a single instrument, but music is his favorite recreation. He is a discriminating lover of painting. As might be expected, he is a penetrating and merciless analyst of plays. One of his favorite plays in his own theatrical experience was “The Brothers Karamazov,” based on Dostoevsky’s celebrated: novel, and produced by the Theatre Guild several years ago. For the present, Robinson is engrossed in the role of John Allen, the steel worker who is the _ protagonist of “Two Seconds.” He regards Allen as the most interesting character, he has been called upon to portray since “The Brothers Karamazov.” “He’s different from anything I’ve ever done on the screen,” he remarked. ‘“He’s not as spectacular or as sensational as “Little Caesar” or the editor in “Five Star Final.” But I think you’ll remember him as long, or longer. He’ll get hold of you just as he got hold of me” of water. “The shock was so great,” said Mr. Robinson, “that I lost my bearT had a terrible feeling of fran ings. suffocation and struggled tically for breath without being able to reach the surface. The physical instructor had swum to the | side of the tank without realizing Phat vk He seemed to think that I was the afterwards was actually drowning. voluntarily stayin...” under water. I understood that it was not until I had ceased to struggle that he realized something was wrong. When Robinson was taken out of the pool, no pulse could be felt for the moment. “T experienced the sensation of death at that time just as much as though I had never wakened up,” declared Robinson. “I was dead as far as my mental processes were I felt death creeping mind told me that My conscious concerned. upon me; my the end had come. self was completely obliterated. If they had not resorted to artificial means to restore life, I could have felt no more than I did.” Robinson relates his actual experience when drowning for the first time since the event happened. thoughts that passed through his mind when drowning because of a controversy which arose over his part in “Two Seconds.” In this a man executed in the electric chair reviews his entire past life history in the two-second interim from the time he receives the first jolt of volts, and the extinction of life. “There igs no question in my own mind but that a man in the electric chair, can crowd the experience of a lifetime into the few moments in which he is confronted by death. “Of course we know that the time it takes to bring about death in such a case is comparatively short. But the brain of a man in the electrie chair is not reacting normally. It is contorted and twisted by the thought that this is the end of everything. The acuteness of such stimuli unquestionably makes it possible for the brain to conjure a man’s entire past life in panorama, just as it did when I was drowning. The period of unconsciousness when I was drowning, although it could not have been more than a few moments, seemed indeterminable. I could not say that it semed like an hour or a day or a year. It was indefinite. “The conception of the man in the motion picture in which the most important events of his life pass before his eyes in the two seconds it takes to render him unconscious in the death chair is, in my mind, not only plausible,‘ but very probable.”