We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.
Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.
WHAT is going on here? There isn't any use beating around the bush; we mean that romance which has kept Radio Row on its cocked ear for the past twelve months. That amusing, but exasperating tete-a-tete which has been going on between Lily Pons and Andre Kostelanetz!
It is because of romances like this one that reporters have that worried look. There is not a radio or newspaper reporter in town that hasn't taken a fling at getting the real lowdown — and not one of them has succeeded! The gentlemen of the press on the West Coast are equally annoyed.
No pictures, no interviews, no nothing. The diminutive romancers — and we all know they are romancing — just won't talk!
That is, they won't talk about each other. Mr. Kostelanetz is very happy to talk about the psychology of rehearsing, about his affiliation with Greta Stueckgold, Nino Martini, Rosa Ponselle and a host of others, but just one word about Lily Pons and the famous little maestro hits the temperamental ceiling.
Why? What is there about their known love that Lily and Andre shield so carefully from even their closest friends? It is the nearest thing to a real mystery in this 1936 radio world. It has everybody guessing and nobody really knowing.
*'I think their romance is so cute," a publicity girl at the Columbia Broadcasting studio remarked to me. "Andre is so dignified and sincere and serious, and Lily is so small and witty and gav. Personally," she went on, "I believe
By LOUIS UN DERWOOD
they are both having a swell time keeping their story from all these prying newspaper boys."
Which is all very well, but there are some things that even two people as careful as Lily and Andre cannot keep from you, readers. Some very remarkable things that even a reporter, interviewing Mr. Kostelanetz on the psychology of rehearsal, couldn't help but notice.
Let's approach this romance much as we would a mystery. You, reader, are given a series of facts concerning the romance of Lily and Andre. We'll call them observations. These observations build almost a complete picture.
If you can read between lines, if you are a clever detective, if you are onto the games that people in love play, then, before this story is ended, you should have a very good idea — as I have — of the Lily Pons-Andre Kostelanetz romance!
Let's first of all go back to the beginning, and see if we can discover the foundation upon which their romance was built. A little about their pasts, the reasons Lily and Andre took to each other so naturally, and, of course, so quietly.
Clue number one. Before Andre Kostelanetz ever met Lily Pons he knew all about her and knew further that he was going to like her!
It has always been Andre's working formula
to find out all he can about the temperament of
the stars he works with before he meets them.
This way he can build his programs around the stars to
bring out the best in them.
So, a little over a year ago, Andre Kostelanetz was finding out all he could about Lily Pons. She was scheduled for his program and he had to know her reaction, her attitude toward popular music, her personal likes and dislikes.
First of all, he found out that she had very little of what is known to the operatic world as "temperament." That pleased Andre. She would be easy to work with. She had a sense of humor. "Swell," undoubtedly thought Andre, "I believe I have, too." He found out that whenever she got in a tight spot her amazing presence of mind pulled her out. That would be wonderful — radio is full of these "tight spots."
So far, so good. But what was her objective in entering radio? What did she want to do? She must have a philosophy. Everybody that Andre likes must have a philosophy. She had one. It was, to quote Andre: "To popularize operatic music for those who think it is too high brow and to win over the musical intellectuals to the merits of so-called jazz tunes."
Splendid. That, in so many words, or rather in Lily's words, is exactly what Andre was striving for. Andre was certain he was going to like Lily Pons. It was going to be fun working with her. He knew he was going to like her better than anyone he had ever worked with before.
Love had started the game with the bases loaded and nobody out because the ideas, {Continued on page 74)
11