Screenland (May–Oct 1927)

78 You've Got to "Well, you aren't particularly well read even if you do dust off 'Resurrection' and 'Anna Karcnina' conscientiously. You play no musical instrument — not even a ukelclc. Your dancing is nothing to brag about because you're a little heavy amidships. You can't cook at all. And your double chin is quite pronounced. To be frank, I think you're a little selfish. You like to have everything your own way. If you want to marry a super-man, I think you ought to go out and learn a few things. What do you think you have now to interest a man such as you describe?" I can't forget the look in Dora's eyes. But I don't believe playing the "heavy" friend did a bit of good. That girl, like so many of us, places too high a premium on the few fast fading feminine charms which nature wreathed us with at birth. Life is not a complex affair at all. It's relatively simple. You get out of it just what you put in. And that applies to marriage, courtship, clerking in a store, going on the stage or winning a place on the screen. Before you can get you have to be willing to give — prodigally. Ethel Barrymore, I think it was, has advised: "If you want to go on the stage, learn to sing and dance." Maybe that sounds stupid to you. You'll say: "I don't want to go into opera or musical comedy. I want to play deep, dramatic roles — like Greta Garbo and Lya de Putti do." But it makes no difference. Before you can act — but that is the wrong word to use — before you can create an illusion, before you can portray a deep, dramatic character you must be free. Your voice, your torso, your limbs, your eyes, your head, all must be free from that terrible band of selfconsciousness, that awful constriction that sends many a talented Bernhardt back to measuring off ribbon in the variety store. And the only way to free yourself is by taking intensive training in the best place your means and environment will afford. If you want to go on the screen one of the surest ways is to get on the stage first. Nine out of every ten motion picture players of any prominence have had a stage career or stage training as a starter. Of course, we have all heard of girls who have been seen on the street, in school, at the railroad station by various directors and producers, and immediately have been engaged for stellar roles. That has happened, is happening and will happen again. But it can't come to many of us. Nevertheless all of you who are pretty and prepossessing, who have real ability, have a greater chance to succeed on the screen than ever before. Cecil De Mille or Jesse Lasky may not see you on the street and invite you to star in their next picture but regardless of that, if you are willing to go through the necessary training, the flaming road to glory can be climbed by you as it has been by great artists in the past. Eleanor Boardman, to my mind, is a real artist. The reason for it is her simplicity. She is the person she is portraying. Long ago she threw herself, as Eleanor Boardman, away. When you see her in "Tell it to the Marines" she is a nurse. When you watch her in "Bardelys the Magnificent" she is Bardelys' beloved. And she didn't achieve these transitions over night. She is one of the most intelligent women on the screen to-day, I think, and she has turned this intelligence, through years of unceasing study, into intensive training. And now you see her as she is — at the height of her career, SCREENLAND Knoiv Your Onions beloved by millions and by her own King Vidor. You, too, can be an Eleanor Boardman. Further, you can strive to be a Bernhardt or a Duse or a Rachel. America has a fine primitive spirit, which if turned into proper dramatic channels, is capable in this age of turning out a greater emotional actress than the world has ever seen. Because our country is fresh, primitive, untouched by the dying influence of an outworn civilization. This generation has the greatest chance — the first chance of any preceding. Previously we have been too busy — discovering, colonizing, fighting Indians, settling our own internal disorders, building cities, manufactures, automobiles, skyscrapers — to give much time or thought or money or heart to the upbuilding of our American stage. Photograph by Elmer Fryer (( Did you thin\ this was Phyllis Haver? Well you will soon \now her as Roxy Hart in "Chicago". But just now, with such men as Eugene O'Neill freshening our drama; with such women as Eva Le Gallienne and Katherine Cornell building up the prestige of our theatre; with Merian Cooper, Ernest Schoedsack and Karl Brown producing a new sort of films: with Eleanor Boardman and Dolores Del Rio showing what true screen students can do — why shouldn't America take her place and utilize and amplify her talents until she produces the greatest dramatic artist the world has ever seen. And it may be that you will be that artist. How can you do it? That's simple. If you have a will to do it, the rest is easy. It takes mill, mill, mill, — wor\, wor\, wor\ — and then more mill. What's that? Talent? Oh, well I'll tell you, if you haven't any talent, after you have been studying, rehearsing, practising, dancing, singing, exercising, fencing, walking and posturing from ten to sixteen hours a day for many months, you'll suddenly notice that your determination has given out. And then all you'll have to do will be to pack your new wardrobe trunk and go back home and marry the boy friend. You'll still play a major role — leading the younger matrons in your country club set. Continued from page 39 But if your will endures — and you permit neither heartache, heartbreak, languor, weariness, friendships, follies nor passions to conquer you — then you can be sure you're on the flaming road to glory. And as Mrs. Leslie Carter can tell you, there is no sound on this earthly sphere so eternally satisfying as to. stand, in the wings of the theatre on the opening' night of your successful play and listen to the wave upon wave of frenzied applause that drifts in to you across the footlights. If I wanted to be a screen success, there is just one place I would go — and that's to Yale. Now don't get frightened and say you can't afford it. The course at Yale costs one-half of what you will pay in New York at any dramatic school of repute. Besides living expenses at New Haven, Connecticut, are naturally somewhat lower than in New York. But that's not the reason I would go to Yale. I would go there because Yale is the theater. What's that you say, You don't intend to go to any school? Well, that's fine if you can procure a first class engagement without any dramatic preparation. But as a sophisticated little friend of mine says, a tiny ingenue who has worn out many pairs of the highest heels trudging up and down Broadway seeking an engagement: "There are only two ways to get on screen or stage: First and surest, go to the best school of the drama you can find, work like a fiend for a year and then don't kick if you have to spend another twelve months walking Broadway looking for a job; and second, and not so sure, marry a producer." But this is not an entirely satisfactory route for he may want to cast you as the lead in a purely maternal play. At Yale you have 'your own theater to work in, a theater specially designed and built for this purpose. You don't only learn to act at the Yale School of Fine Arts. You learn what is much better — the whole science of the theater; its history, organization and maintenance; the different forms of drama; you write your own plays, act in them and produce them; in addition, you are taught history of stage design, practice and theory of stage design, stage lighting; history of costume and practice of costume design; dramatic criticism; pageantry; and the technique of the drama. It is the finest, fullest training for the screen or stage that any person can find in the United States. Professor George Pierce Baker who guides the destinies of Yale's dramatic students has for years been acknowledged one of the foremost dramatic eductors in America. Furthermore, he is one of the few whose teachings are respected by the producers of New York City. From the moment you enter this Fine Aits class which you do by the stage entrance of this theatre, until you leave it at the end of the course, your entire work takes place actually in the theatre. You live, move, and breathe — only in this theatre. Students have become so enthusiastic over their work under Professor Baker that sometimes they refuse to leave the building and often the theatre lights have to be turned out before they can make up their minds to stop work and go home. The cost of this course is only $200. In some instances, for special fitness and unusual talent, scholarships can be arranged. For information address the Secretary of the Department of Drama, School of Fine Arts, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut.