Screenland (May-Oct 1934)

70 ScREENLa > almost the last Hollywood couple to perform this fascinating trick of pulling an infant out of a plug hat, or finding one under a yucca plant. Mr. and Mrs. Fredric March, Miss Miriam Hopkins and many more have adopted successfully. In fact, so novel and interesting is the achievement of offspring in the old-fashioned way that such crown princes as Richard Arlen, Jr., become nine-day wonders, and are interviewed by scores of reporters before they can even say "ga-ga." The fact remains that "Nat" and "Googie" are going to adopt a darling little baby, preferably one good at thinking up jokes. Item Two : By the time you read this (assuming of course that you do read it), Burns and Allen will be charging around Europe on their first extended tour of the Older World. It is also their first genuine holiday in years. Personally, I think collecting the pay check they do would be the world's dandiest vacation, but I may be commercial. They plan to explore Gibraltar, the French and Italian Rivieras, and Italy. Then they will plunge headlong through the Balkans into Soviet Russia. Of this, more anon. Item Three: Miss Allen's brother will positively NOT accompany them on their trotting of the globe. They seem to feel that Grade alone will be about all Moscow can stand, this summer. Furthermore, I note a slight weariness with the fellow, both on the part of his creators and some portion of the listening public. It is probable that he will retire, gag by gag, into private life, and you can take this as coming straight from the paddock. So much for the "news." Personally, I feel that "Nat" and "Googie," as man and woman, are far more diverting than the mere fact that they are assuming the burdens of foster-parenthood. Let's look closely. As I've said, I found the Burns and Allen apartment, high above the bright green of Central Park. I find that actors in the money always take apartments overlooking Central Park. Perhaps it cheers them to think"' that they have avoided the necessity of sleeping in it. My date was for High Noon. My noon was not quite high enough, so a male voice from a bedroom urged patience. I looked about the living room. A mountain of lilacs, which at that time were blooming frantically on every Gotham street-corner. A radio giving off a soothing High Noon sort of waltz. And on a large table a working library of four small books. Two were "Boners" and "More Boners" — popular collections of journalistic bulls. One volume chastely titled "Wisecracks," which seemed to be a sort of modern Joe Miller. The fourth was a book of Ogden Nash's verse. No doubt these are diligently thumbed for germs of ideas, and then carpentered into screen and radio jokes by the comical little couple. It must always be remembered that Burns and Allen's jokes are diligently built up, gadget by gadget, like garages or Fords. Mr. Burns then made his appearance, freshly shaven and informally dressed, and looking very professorial in glasses. Then, from another door popped "Googie," four and a half feet of cuteness in black satin pajamas. Mr. B. ignited a long brown cigarro, and offered one to me. "A White Owl, no doubt." I said, that being the brand which is ballyhooed by the team's air hour. "Oh, no," said Mr. Burns, breezily. "It's "Nat" and "Googie" Continued from page 16 a Bobby Burns panatela, in fact." "Foul traitor!" I accused. "Nix," said Mr. B. "They're made by the same firm." "Ah," I said. "It's a funny thing," went on the comedian. "A lot of radio actors complain of sponsor-trouble, which is something like shooting pains in the back and spots before the eyes, only worse. Here we've been broadcasting nearly three years, with no sponsor trouble at all. Why, we've never even seen our sponsors !" "Maybe that's why," I innuendoed. Answers Hollywood's call! Elizabeth Allan returns from a trip abroad to assume an important role in "David Copper field" and other film assignments. I drew these two nice little people away from the roaring air waves, coaxing the conversation back to the days when they were hard-working vaudeville actors, who kicked about dressing-rooms, groused about hotels — members of a now-vanished race. For then I was a Burns and Allen fan, and they were delighted to labor mightily for a few hundred a week, facing, every Monday, a fresh gang of blase people out front who double-dared a comic to make them laugh. And Burns and Allen forgot the big hotel suite and the big radio and screen contracts — and reminiscent, far-away smiles lighted up their faces. "You know," said Mr. B., "when Gracie and I first teamed up, I was the funny man. I had the answers, and all Gracie had was the questions. It didn't take us long to find out that the questions got more laughs than the answers. So now Gracie has the answers, and everything is fine." Gracie was remembering, too. "Those were funny days. Some good and some bad. I guess the toughest week we ever played was the one when we had to follow those pretty little Hilton girls, the Siamese twins, on a bill. Imagine trying to follow those lovely little freaks, with all the customers sobbing. We died!" Then Nat chimed in. "Or the midgets. Those weeks were tough, too. They insisted on cooking goulash and all kinds of Hungarian messes in their dressing-rooms, and smelling up the whole theatre. It was terrific." Believe me, there was an honestly touching tone to these young-old troupers' voices as they talked of their vagabond days. But were they mourning their passing? In your hat they were ! For Burns and Allen, after the lean years, have reached those of plenty. They are playing big gold harps in the Actors' Heaven of Financial Security. Soon they would sail away on a stately ship — first class, and all that. They asked about Russia, when they found I had been twice to the strange Red country. I told them of the bright red water that Hows from the hotel taps, and the dance band at the Metropole in Moscow that plays ancient American jazz, and of the fountain there into which one can fall if one is in the mood for falling into fountains. They ate it up. Gee — who wouldn't give her new red boots to spend a few days in Moscow with Mr. Burns and Miss Allen? Colossal is too timid a word for it. The talk leaped backward 7,000 miles, to Hollywood. Maybe you've seen their latest picture, "Many Happy Returns," by now. It's an epoch-maker for Burns and Allen. For the first time in their long career they don't tell these long jerry-built jokes, but play straight dialogue -and -situation comedy, just as written by the studio author-gang. "I hope it goes over," says Burns. "Up to now we've always taken the dialogue and put it into our words. Burns and Allen, and no jokes! It certainly seemed funny." I hoped, silently, that it WOULD be funny. And the future, for these case-hardened vets who switched with the changing times? How can it be otherwise than as golden and giddy as the present? They've got two years to go under a fine Paramount contract. They don't want to be starred. "We think it's smarter to sneak into a picture and try to steal it," says the Gracie, slyly. You sense immediately that she is the One. There's a mighty mess of horsesense in that pretty head of hers. Radio? Their popularity holds up. They can talk into microphones until George has to be carried into the studio, and Gracie's high giggle turns bass. They like living in Hollywood, which is somewhat unusual for eastern thespians of any type. Parties ? "Who goes to parties ?" says Burns. "Everybody goes to the fights on Friday, but nobody sees the fights because everybody is waving at each other. It's terrific." Lucky pair, "Nat" and "Googie." No fear of those two going Hollywood. They've eaten at too many railroad-station beaneries to lose the common touch — and their sense of humor. So off they go, hand in hand. Nice folks. Regular. And I still say that the sight of the season will be Gracie Allen (without her brother) standing in the shadow of the Kremlin Wall ! Good luck, troupers ! Don't take any wooden roubles !