Screenland (May-Oct 1931)

130 The Bond Bonfire Introducing a new red-head named Lillian Bond. Watch her! By Myrene Wentworth 1ILLIAN BOND is the name. Frankly in Hollywood on wickedness bent. Theda Bara, in her A vampiest days, never breathed a sigh as sirenical as Lillian hopes to heave by way of scorching the sound screen. Lady Hamilton ; Mme. Du Barry ; Camille — yes, and Cleopatra, Salome, and all the rest of the bygone ladies of lure, never aspired to the ambitions voiced by this fiery lass from England who burned up Broadway last season and who is now out to start bigger and better motion picture bonfires of emotion. "What we need is a little incense »r atmosphere," we sugge^tcu as Lilian started confidii./ her secret anises in captivity. in history books trappings usually ie explained. I were women of • khey gained through e no modern sisters ' different today, the ,< so changed, a woman n diose of history play. My experii ed the ambitions ..iiei w^s fourteen years . al school. It was in St. Vincent's , London that I first began reading of women figured so tremendously in the making of world . , , whose conquests meant kingdoms, wars; whose sacrifices cost thrones, nations. From the very beginning such women fascinated me. As I read I lived their lives, I studied them, absorbed the glamour, the romance and the glory. The tragedies, too, were gripping in magic interest. They made me want to act their lives, wicked as wickedness could be, but authentic, real, convincing. "Yes, I went on the stage while I was still at school studying oratory. Salome ? Hide my blushes ! I played in a Dick Whittington pantomime. Everyone in England at some time or other plays in pantomime when they are at school age or even younger. Proud mothers put children into the little plays when they are barely able to walk. It's just English tradition, I guess. I went because I wanted to go on the stage and it was the only way I knew to break the ice without running away from home. My mother had been an actress as a child and You had better be keeping an eye on this girl. Lillian Bond is the name; hair, red; eyes, alluring; ambition — unlimited! shared my ambitions. Later I went into the 'Piccadilly Revels.' That's a cabaret but not the cabaret as you know it in this country. There it is considered quite a thing. This gave me a chance to try the musical revue stage and it was there I remained until I came to the United States several years ago. We recalled that Miss Bond was recently brought to Hollywood by Metro-GoldwynMayer to repeat the vamp role she created on the stage in "Stepping Out," now being made into a talkie with Reginald Denny and Charlotte Greenwood. "No, that wasn't my first 'vamping' experience," she said. "I don't know how I really happened to get my first opportunity for that kind of part unless someone with a clairvoyant mind knew the ambitions I was carrying around while singing and dancing ingenue roles. Anyway, I was given the part of the native girl in 'Luana' in New York and all my friends burst into gales of laughter. (Catchline: They laughed when I told them I could play the Luana.) I put so much energy into that characterization that the part was built up and built up until it established me as a siren. "I never want to play a straight role of any kind again. I prefer what I call character roles. Commercially, I guess a vamp by any other name is just as vampish. But no two sirens are alike and, as everyone knows, the only difference in ingenues are their ages and degrees of blondness. A man or woman who plays straight parts limits his or her professional life. You can go so far and there you are. When you are too old to be a leading man or leading lady your career is ended unless you hang on and grab whatever crumbs are scattered your way in bits and minor characters. "Personally, I admit a weakness that surges in every feminine bosom. I want to be as beautiful as possible. I want my characterizations to be gorgeously exotic, bizarre and laden with tons of lure. Those were the glorious creatures who made history who sighed with their Alexanders the Great for more worlds to conquer. I ought to have a chance with only one world to work out on !"