Radio stars (May 1933)

RADIO STARS Ed Wynn Hollywood's newest sensation buxom, startling Mae West. What's she like? Let the latest MODERN SCREEN tell you the real story behind this amazing woman! Few of the plays she has written are more glamorous than the story she herself has lived. Read this enthralling feature this month in MODERN SCREEN — and enjoy the other absorbing articles in what our editor sincerely believes to be the greatest issue of MODERN SCREEN ever published! A tall order, yes, but just cast your eye over some of the contents: NOEL COWARD, noted English writer, and author of the smash hit, "Cavalcade," tells what he thinks of this great picture. NINA WILCOX PUTNAM gives The Real Reason for Katharine Hepburn's Amazing Behavior." (And she ought to know. She knew Katharine's mother.) FAITH BALDWIN writes "If You Want To Be Like Kay Francis." And what girl doesn't? DONALD HENDERSON CLARK offers the finest study of Jimmy Durante ever written: "When His Nose Was a Handicap." PRINCESS LAURE MUR AT, great, great grandniece of Napoleon, writes: "Hollywood Dares To Break the Rules." ALSO: "Unknown Loves of Hollywood" . . . "Three Vital Moments in Clark Gable's Life" . . . "Alexander Kirkland's Secret" . . . "Hunted Men of Hollywood." MODERN SCREEN is the first magazine to reveal why Katharine Hepburn loves to shock and amaze Hollywood Don't miss "The Real Rea son for Katharine Hepburn's Amazing Behavior" in the current issue. Many other fascinating features in the May issue, of course, including MODERN SCREEN'S brand new "Hollywood Charm Section," a magazine within a magazine, replete with tips on beauty and spring styles — from the beauty and style capitol of the worldl MODERN SCREEN is simply overflowing with the latest and most interesting news/ gossip, and pictures of your favorite stars. Read a copy this month and see if you don't agree that it's the biggest magazine value you can buy for 10 cents! The Screen Magazine With the Largest Guaranteed Circulation Offers You Its GREATEST ISSUE! Don't miss the May MODERN SCREEN IO At Kresge Stores, Kress Stores, and Newsstands. (Continued from page 7) tear him down, to bury him with the forgotten stars of yesterday who had outstayed their welcome among the bright lights. THAT very night, Ed Wynn went away from all his friends and all his advisors and had a talk with himself. Why was this new show a flop? Was it possible that the knowledge he had gained during thirty years on the stage should abruptly desert him ? Had the depression made it impossible for any show to succeed? Didn't people want to laugh? Or was he himself out of step with the world? Walking the streets, sitting in railway waiting rooms and on park benches — but always alone — he got an answer. When he had it, he went back to the theatre where his show was flopping and met his friends with their fresh suggestions. "Leave me alone," he begged them. "From now on, I'm writing this show. I'm making the changes. We're going in to Broadway. If she's a turkey, I want it to be all my responsibility." Discreetly and kindly, you see, he was telling those friends to go back to New York. And that's just what they did, with much shaking of heads. And the word spread afresh like prairie fire, "Ed Wynn is through !" On the road, Ed went to work on "The Laugh Parade." With a few loyal helpers, he rewrote and remade that whole show. Into it he put everything he had learned in thirty years of showmanship. Every sure-fire situation, all the crackling odds and ends of wit that he knew would click. Writing and re-writing, he went days without more than three hours of sleep a night. In the end, he found himself carrying almost the whole production. He was on the stage almost all the time. Soon, weariness was dragging at his muscles and jerking at his nerves, but he worked on. And so the show rolled into New York for the opening that would make or break its boss. THAT opening night was a nightmare. Hardly anyone of importance attended. Even the critics sent their understudies. They had heard enough from the road reports to know that "The Laugh Parade" was a flop. Besides, everyone said that Ed Wynn was all washed up as a comic. But Ed Wynn fooled them. That opening night, his mother had a seat in the first row. His mother is bent under the weight of many years but she is still an inveterate moviegoer. Almost her only vice is telling her friends and relatives the story of a picture she has just seen, telling it at kngth and in all its details. She has the habit of saying, between developments in her tale, "and so . . ." That opening night, to kid his mother, Ed Wynn inserted into a long-winded