Winner Take All (Warner Bros.) (1932)

ADVANCE SATURDAY OR SUNDAY FEATURE Cagney Amazed to Discover He’s Screen’s Great Lover A New Kind of Man with a New Kind of Love By Jack Cooper Believe it or not—ladies prefer tough guys on the screen; and Jimmy Cagney is the adored one of the sub-debs. In his case, assault and battery pay dividends. When he slapped Joan Blondell, fifty million women sighed in unison— and in envy of Joan. Instead of the boos and hisses which would have greeted such little niceties back in the 90s, the popular opinion of Jimmy Cagney is boiled down into three words: ‘What a Man!’’ If all his roles to date are there will no doubt be a superlative adjective used with it when the publie sees his latest Warner Bros. picture, “Winner Take All,” which comes to the Theatre next and in which he plays the role of a two-fistec, tough-slugging prizefighter. The greatest surprise Jimmy ever had was when his fan mail brought him the realization that he is one of the screen’s most popular lovers. It was a very perplexed James Cagney who lugged out an overflowing box of opened fan mail and said: Women Write Mash Notes “Just read a few of these. If you find any letters from men let me know—because they are few and responsible for this appellation far between. Here I thought I was scaring women out of the thea tres—that is, all except the female lion tamers—and what do I get? = 2 wash: Notesl 255° After reading some of the letters, the verdict of this one-man jury was that James Cagney is America’s fairhaired boy. Almost without exception, his fair correspondents think Jimmy has a corner of the world’s “How to Love” market. Jimmy ran his freckled fingers through his red hair and moaned: “Every time we come to a love scene in a picture, I figure out a lot of business that I can put into it to take the mushy curse off it. I get cold feet every time I have to get amcrous. So I put in all this business of a pass at the jaw, or a push in the face. It gives me something to do with my handg and face and helps me to go through the scene without my knees giving way in the middle of it. Cagney Can’t Figure Women “And now it turns out that it is the kind of love-making the ladies like. I give up. I never could figure them out, anyhow.” “Tt all started when Cagney was making “The Public Enemy.” In order to be true to his character, he had to treat women in a way that no other man has treated a woman on the screen. He used Mae Clarke as a grapefruit squeezer; he smacked Mia Marvin so hard across the face that she says she can still feel it and he walked out on Jean Harlow just when she was getting intimate. It established James Cagney as the Bad Boy of the screen and boosted him up as the King of Hardboiledom. As Wellman discovered at that time, Jimmy has a pair of hands that can do more in the way of acting that the combined bodies of three ordinary actors. He is always using them whether he is acting or not and they tell more than words can convey. Cagney’s Hands Expressive No smart director would ever pass up a chance to make use of such expressive material, so when Jimmy went into the production of “Blonde Pusticity Stories THat Are Sure To Lanp Crazy,” “Taxi” and “Winner Take All,” Director Roy Del Ruth gave full play to Cagney’s hands. So they went to work again slapping Joan Blondell’s face, pushing Loretta Young’s face and manhandling men and women in general. In “Winner Take All,” he has the added advantage of using them in the prize ring. “I. was worried for a while,” Cagney said, “as to how I was going to fit in with the love situation. But after “Blonde Crazy” and “Taxi,” and “The Crowd Roars,” I was relieved of all worry because, as I figured it, the public didn’t necessarily have to see me as a sweet lover. “And here’s the result of it. Thousands of women write in and tell me that I have a new brand of love which is hot stuff on the screen today.” After such letters began coming in quite consistently, Jimmy spent a couple of evenings sneaking into a neighborhood show to see his latest pictures. Perhaps he had missed something when he saw them fer the first time. But he came out of the neighborhood theatre even more puzzled that when he went in. “If I were a woman,” Jimmy said, “and a man treated me that way, I’d sock him in the kisser.” Now he is waiting to see how the female portion of the public takes to his latest picture, “Winner Take All,” in which he plays a _ hardhitting pugilist. There is. more sentiment in this picture than in his others. And judging by the way a Log Angeles preview audience took “Winner Take All,” it has more Cagney punch than even “The Public Enemy” had. But still Jimmy evades the Great Lover technique. “Tf I ever had to do a Romeo and Juliet scene,” Jimmy observed, “T’d cop the prize as the world’s flop. I just can’t “give” in that direction.” Thought Letters a Mistake “But getting back to this fan mail business,” Jimmy went on, “I got to thinking it was a mistake when I received the first few letters. I was inclined to think that they had put the letters into the wrong envelopes—probably got me mixed up with Doug Fairbanks, Jr. or Warren William. Although they had my name on the letters, I still thought it was a mistake.” “Fifty million femmes can’t be wrong,” I ventured. It wasn’t as brilliant a crack as I had intended it to be, but — Jimmy gratefully took it for what it was worth. “That Ieaves me holding the bag now,” Jimmy said. “I have tried so hard to avoid the lover angle because I wasn’t built for it. I was patting myself on the back that I had nicely managed to wiggle out of the hand-kissing category. With a mug like mine I couldn’t afford to try it. “Now the girls are trying to tell me that I am the Great Lover with a New Technic — and it looks as though I will have to live up to it.” CURRENT SATURDAY OR SUNDAY FEATURE High Society Often Takes Up With Pugilistic Champions To meet a prizefighter, a real professional pug, in smart society is not an ordinary occurrence; but it does occur from time to time, and has happened quite often if one looks back into the past. Gene Tunney, of course, who married into the Social Register, is today the most celebrated instance of a rapprochement between the ring and the Register; and Jack Dempsey’s marriage to Hstelle Taylor brought one of the most typical of Queensberry bruisers into artistic and theatrical circles where he soon made himself quite at home. Prizefighters are really, as a class, an adaptable lot. Some of them, naturally, find themselves social misfits when moving in other spheres than that of the squared circle; but many have learned the new tricks and played the new game in amazingly clever style. Cagney Goes Park Avenue This situation, which has occurred so frequently in real life, is presented vividly on the screen in “Winner Take All,’ the new Warner Bros. picture starring James Cagney, which iS ETO Wh sab bhOt 5c seg ee Theatre. In “Winner Take All” Cagney plays the part of a rough and ready scrapper, whose mastery of his dukes has carried him up to the top of the lightweight division. A society woman, bored and blase, becomes interested in him — “takes him up,” as the sayirg goes. As might be expected, sne fascinates the png. and the glamour of society goes to his head, so that he forgets another girl (played by Marian Nixon) who really loves him and understands him. The resulting triangle is played out against a background of roaring crowds and the rough old glove game which is still so strong in its appeal to American manhood. : And it all has a foundation of reality. Going back to a little beyond the contemporary cases of Dempsey and Tunney, one reealls that Philadelphia Jack O’Brien, one of the leading heavyweights of twenty-five years ago, became a pet of the upper circles in the staid Quaker City. He was a protege of Anthony J. Drexel Biddle — “Tony” Biddle to his friends and to the sporting press — who, as an am ‘ateur boxer of distinction, admired O’Brien and gave him the entree to the inner circles. O’Brien held his own there; he was, and is, a quiet and well-mannered man who has read widely and who can talk interestingly about all sorts of things other than punches, clinches and similar activitios, ‘¥2teuse Boxer Became Senator Then there was Marty McCue, who rose from the status of boxer and saloonkeeper to that of New York State Senator. There was Jim Corbett, who was known in his days of glory as “Gentleman Jim,” and who became an actor and a close associate of many leading figures in the business and theatrical worlds. Some two generations ago 7 ohn Morrissey, one of the first’ American fistic champions, was/sent to Congress from New York. He was one of the founding fathers of the Saratoga race track, by the way. In England there is the instance of John Gully, who, after holding the hard-won heavyweight championship, was elected to the first Reformed Parliament as member for Pontefract, Yorkshire, a hundred years ago. There was “Gentleman John” Jackson, also champion in his time, who was not only supreme arbiter of the London Prize Ring, but a chum of the Prince Regen‘ afterward George tire Fuurth, . also of Lord Byron, who referred . him as “my corporeal pastor and master.” Bob Gregson, who fought Gully for the championship, was known as “the Laureate of the Ring.” He actually wrote — well, if not poetry, at least verses. And so one may go further and further back in history ’til one comes to the Roman Gladiators, who used to be petted by aristocratic ladies and even by some of the more unconventional Empresses, to the scandal of the stricter onlookers. Prizefighters in society? Of course; they’ve been wandering into the Four Hundred at intervals through all the centuries; and they will probably continue to do so as long as over-civilized womanhood thrills to the appeal of the primitive masculine. CURRENT SATURDAY OR SUNDAY FEATURE James Cagney Building for Permanent Stardom By Jack Cooper It was a tough climb to the top of the heap, but once there, James Cagney is beginning to take stock. A year and a half ago he was an unknown quantity. A year ago he was a dark horse. saying: ‘‘ Watch him. Their prediction came true. Nine months ago people were He will go far.’’ They watched him. He has reached the pinnacle of moviedom—the goal of screen ambition — Stardom! And now what? If you think James Cagney will be content to rest on his laurels, you just don’t know your Cagniana. He will not be content to just stay there, turning in sterling performances and proving his right to occupy the pedestal to which his ability has elevated him. ‘He wants to defy the laws of gravity. He won’t believe that “everything that goes up must come down.” Page Six To him, stardom is not a mountain peak that has a downgrade on the other side of it. “The actor that reaches the peak of his profession,” Cagney said, “and considers himself settled, is just the man who has given stardom the reputation of impermanence. Hard to Stay on Top “Once at the top, an actor’s struggle really begins. His climb to that point was merely preliminary. Now he finds himself loaded with responsibilities which he had _heretofore considered other people’s business. “If he is given a poor story, or even a good story with a few flaws in it—that’s his worry. It reflects on his standing and his popularity. Faulty direction will hurt him more than it will the director. Bad settings, lighting, camera work and even support are all his worry. “The motion picture star must know the motion picture business from every angle. Besides a thorough technical knowledge of all its workings, he must be able to see himself in relationship to it and his pictures in the proper perspective — both subjectively and objectively. The very qualities that made for his success soon become the cause for his downfall. A good thing must not be overdone. He must develop even more after his arrival than before.” ‘Cagney is sensitively aware of everything that confronts him in his new-found position. He has discovered another pathway to perfection which he feels will help him to maintain his position as a star. It was on the second day of shooting on his latest picture, “Winner Take All,” the Warner Bros. picture now at the Theatre, in which he plays a prizefighting role, that he spoke definitely and enthusiastically of this new road. For four weeks prior to the time when “Winner Take All” went into production, he was placed in the hands of an athletic trainer, and put through the regular routine of diet and exercise that every pugilist must undertake before a fight. Good Physical Condition Vital . After a life of doing as he pleases and eating whatever he wanted, this came as quite a novelty. But after two weeks of it, he found that it had a tremendous effect on his general outlook. “The body, as well as the mind,” he said, “is something with which you can play tricks. I am beginning to see that, with the cultivation of these two, a man can be able to subject them to his own desires and make them carry him where and as far as he wants. “To be utterly capable to the fullest extent of one’s abilities, the star must be fully equipped mentally and physically. Which all goes to explain why I am determined to cultivate them to the fullest extent.” The application of Cagney’s theories are apparent when one works with him on a picture. His knowledge of Art has given him a keen eye with which to detect flaws in sets, costume, composition and the camera. His literary training has given him the ability to detect a false note in dialogue, tempo and general thread of the story and his excellent physical condition enables him to breathe life and virility into his robust characterizations, He is pn sat use, for he of stardom “y