Screenland (Nov 1930-Apr 1931)

112 SCREEN LAND Two Grand Picture Stealers (Mitzi Green) Continued from page 00 Hajos was all excited over the advent of the child, and Joe paid her the gracious compliment of naming his only daughter after her. Mitzi's father and mother have done a musical comedy act in vaudeville for years. Mitzi can't remember when she first went on the stage. "When I first put my face in an act," she explained seriously, "I must have been about three years old. But I was six or seven before I really did anything. "When I was three, I went to Los Angeles with my mother and father. Gus Edwards had his kid act on the same bill. Just for fun, he put me up on the school fence and paid me twenty-five cents a week. He docked me two cents, too, if I missed a performance. "The first time I remember really doing anything, though, was when I was about six. Papa and mama were playing at Brighton Beach. Moran and Mack, the 'Two Black Crows,' were on the same bill. I used to watch them. An actors' benefit was given down at Freeport that same week and I begged papa to let me do something. 'What can you do?' he asked me. 'I think I can do the "Two Black Crows," ' I told him." Mitzi and her father' worked up an act in about five minutes and put it on. There happened to be a vaudeville scout in the audience who spotted the child and made an engagement for her to meet a 4 booker the next day. Joe and Mitzi went into New York but it wasn't Mitzi who was nervous. Her father got so excited that the child had to cue him. But Mitzi's poise and ability got her a booking at once over the Interstate Circuit. She was billed as 'Little Mitzi, the Child Mimic' Later, she was headlined on the Orpheum Circuit. Her impersonations were an entire success and she became known as a second Elsie Janis. A year and a half ago she reached Los Angeles, still playing in vaudeville. Paramount's casting director got a glimpse of her and she was put in the film, "The Marriage Playground," with Mary Brian and Fredric March. Which she promptly stole. When the picture was released, the world found out what a riot Mitzi is ! And Paramount upset precedence and signed her to a five year contract, I am told — the first time a child has ever been given a contract by that organization. Mitzi's latest picture is "Tom Sawyer," in which she plays Becky Thatcher. She loved her work in this because she was allowed to wear a curly golden wig, and everybody will understand what that means to a straight haired child. Little Mitzi likes roast beef, potatoes, spinach, and chewing gum. Also, mystery stories with plenty of good murders. She doesn't care for candy, boys who play too rough, permanent waves or dolled-up finger-nails. She likes the freckles on her face and won't have anything done about it. She prefers Hollywood to New York where she was born, but likes Detroit pretty well, too. It was in Detroit she celebrated her tenth birthday. It snowed and she loved it. She doesn't get any snow since she moved to Hollywood. They had a party on the stage for her, with punch and three big birthday cakes. Cake was distributed to the audience and all the girls on the stage, including Mitzi, danced — not with tears in their eyes, but with cake in their mouths. Mitzi hates arithmetic. Loves English. Likes to file her pretty nails. She wants her brother Harry, aged sixteen, to be her manager when he grows up. She also wants to be allowed to act in all kinds of roles. And she is begging to be allowed to answer her fan mail herself. She gets a lot. Mostly from girls and boys of her age. All of it seems to come from children of cultivated parents. They tell her about their lessons and the games they play. All of them seem to want to get into the movies. And every one, without exception, begs her to correspond with them. At the Paramount, scores of people flocked back stage, hoping to get a glimpse of Mitzi. "Everybody is so good to me," Mitzi explained, "I want to thank them. "Nancy Carroll is my favorite actress," she ended, "and when I grow up I hope my boy friend will be just like Chevalier!" ~. AllSOn SkipWOrtll Continued from page 01 the screen. I still think it's a mistake. But my agent called me up just before I came here to rehearse and told me he had a couple of screen offers for me again. "But that screen technique ! You can never comprehend how the camera picks up a change of mood. You have to keep not only your eyes but your mind on the ball every minute. The camera shows you as you really are. You can't kid your audience. I nearly died when I saw myself for the first time on the screen. Nobody really ever knows how he looks to other people. 1 f you want to find out, have a screen test. It tells the truth in the most brutal way. Instead of calling a spade a spade, the camera jolly well calls it a shovel ! "Screen people are tremendously generous. Your producers give you lovely clothes, wonderful dressing rooms, skilled hairdressers, lots of money and plenty of praise. Of the nine months during which I made six pictures, I never heard a director give an actor or an actress a disagreeable word. And when you think of the director's terrible responsibility — of all those machines, lights, voices, and actions — when you think of trying to get all those different elements, both artistic and mechanical, to blend, it's a miracle a talking picture ever gets into the can. "And then the settings. I could talk all day about those. They make nature look like a five-cent cigar. A built up peach orchard looks a thousand times more beautiful than a real peach orchard. "I was born in London, but nobody over there would know whom you're talking about if you said 'Alison Skipworth.' What I've done, I've done here in America. I came over here as a prima donna. Made my hit with Americans, under an Amer ican director, playing side by side with Americans. So you can understand why I look on this country as my spiritual home. "The ideal thing, of course, and it's what every actor dreams of — is playing six months in Hollywood and six months in New York. But that would mean some pretty hurried trips. "For instance, I started to motor from California back to New York. Bought a car out there, learned to run it, and loved it. But when I got as far as Wyanoke, Oklahoma, I got a hurry call from my agent to get back in New York in time to rehearse for 'Marseilles.' I left my automobile, took a plane, landed in New York at noon, and started rehearsing that same afternoon." % \ v ' Helen Cohan, daughter of the famous George M., on the lawn of her new Hollywood home. Helen made her movie debut in "Lightnin."