Screenland (Nov 1939–Apr 1940)

2 Little Maids from School Continued from page 25 sweet. He'd drive me down to rehearsals in the middle of winter, when it was colder than anything', and wait for me there. We'd be having hot drinks and sandwiches inside, but I could never coax him in. He's not a very sociable person. He'd curl up in the car with blankets and go to sleep and never once complain. Which I think was pretty swell for a man who detested the whole idea. I understand how he felt. The way he was brought up, he was taught that show people were vulgar and cheap. He didn't realize that times have changed. Then so often he'd say, 'It's such a hard life, honey. I don't want you to do it.' You can see it wasn't easy to go against a person like that. But I had to. "It came to a showdown during the PanAmerican Exposition. There was a great to-do in the papers about hostesses. The leading photographer was choosing girls and sending their photographs to McClelland Barclay to be judged. I thought I'd like to do that. We were talking about it one evening, and Dad broke out with one of those 'no-daughter-of-mine' speeches. It made me a little unhappy, and it made mother a little mad, and she said we'd show him. So I had my picture taken, and I was chosen. Dad never said much more after that. He finally sort of got used to it, bless his heart," said Linda, with the indulgence of a fond mother for a beloved and erring child. Indeed, Mr. Roy would have had a job on his hands to stop two women determined to let no grass grow under their feet. By the time she was fourteen, Linda and her mother had called on six talent scouts. The procedure was always the same. "How old are you?" "Well — I'm fourteen." "Sorry, too young. Come back in three or four years." When Ivan Kahn, Twentieth Century's scout, came to town, Linda said : "Let's skip it, mother. They won't touch you till you're seventeen or eighteen." "Oh, come on," urged her mother, "take a chance." Mr. Kahn agreed to send her photographs to the coast. Cut to six weeks later. A February afternoon. Linda was doing her homework when a Western Union messenger appeared. "Hm," she thought, "Bill can't take me tonight." Bill was working his way through school, and had recently been obliged to break a couple of movie dates. The wire read : "How would you like to go to Hollywood to make screen test. If satisfactory, could you arrange to leave Friday night." Linda gave it a double-take and yelled for her mother, who arrived pell-mell to save her child from heaven knew what peril. After having had two or three fits in the dining room, they dashed outdoors. It was Dad's day off. He was cleaning the car in the driveway. A couple of the kids were there too. Linda thrust the wire at him. "Look, pop, we're going to Hollywood." The kids started a war dance. Dad, who never lets himself get excited, looked the yellow blank over. He didn't crack a muscle. At last he said, "Well— we'll think about it." "Think about it, nothing," retorted Mom. "We're going!" Linda's wardrobe consisted mostly of calico dresses. The other candidates, boarding train at El Paso, wore silver fox and orchids. The little girl from Dallas didn't let that worry her. Thrill after thrill was in store. Pictures were taken at the Los Angeles terminal. They were rushed to the studio to meet — "I'll give you three guesses ! Tyrone Power ! Sure 'nough ! Can you imagine!" For three weeks she made silent tests. For six weeks she toiled with a dramatic coach, trying simultaneously to acquire a stage presence and get rid of a Texas drawl. The verdict was shattering, if familiar. "Too young. We'll bring you out again when you're seventeen." She cried and cried in Mr. Kahn's office. Her mother cried too. She thinks it's funny now, but she didn't then. "Why can't you make me older?" she wailed. "You make lots of people younger." On the train going home, though, she started getting mad. A fighting light glimmered under the tear-swollen lids. She turned to her mother. "I'll come out here for another studio some day, and I'll just show them. You wait and see." Meantime Brenda had been steering a less turbulent course. She too had always wanted to go on the stage, though it wasn't her mother who planted the seed. She Geraldine Fitzgerald, who's been vacationing in Ireland, is back in Hollywood again, all set to appear opposite Laurence Olivier in "Disraeli." doesn't know what did. As far back as she can remember, she just wanted to. Her goal was the legitimate theatre. "Nearly everybody would like to be in the movies," she says, "but I was being very sensible. I knew they were practically impossible to break into. I never dreamed it could happen to me." She had an endowment policy for her education — enough to take her through two years of college or one year at the Pasadena Community Playhouse. She talked it over with her mother, and again decided to do the sensible thing. One year at the Playhouse might get her nowhere. Two years at college was bound to give her some scholastic and cultural training. She could take dramatic courses. More important still, she could during that period live the normal life of a girl of her age. She had fun at college, she joined a sorority, she made friends, she met a boy named Owen Ward whom she hopes to marry some day. She worked hard too, and when the time was . up, she felt that it couldn't have been better spent. Then she mapped out the next two years. Her best chance for employment, she figured out, lay in the field of commercial photography. She looked up some names in the phone book, took her photographs down, and found she'd been right. There was plenty of work for her. In a year she'd have enough money to go to New York. Then she'd try out for summer stock. Fate intervened in the shape of an agent who met her at the home of friends, and proposed to take her to a couple of the studios. Skeptical Brenda shrugged and said, "Why not? It'll be a lark, anyway." Having read of the opportunities given young players like Arleen Whelan and Marjorie Weaver by Twentieth Century, she suggested going there. The same Ivan Kahn who had brought Linda up from Dallas interviewed Brenda, and took her to see Tom Moore, Alice Joyce's ex-husband, now a studio coach. She read for him, and he told her he thought she was all right. "Doesn't mean a thing," she assured herself. "I've read all about how they try to let you down easy." And by the time two phoneless weeks had passed, she was sure she'd been right. Then Mr. Moore called. "I've been wondering why you haven't come in." "Nobody asked me to." "Well, come along. I'll take you to see Mr. Schreiber, our casting director." Brenda insists that Mr. Schreiber was feeling great that day. He liked her photographs and ordered a test. She studied with Mr. Moore for three or four days and when she finished her test scene, the crew applauded. Mr. Schreiber told her they were going to give her a contract. As she recalls it, "I couldn't stop grinning. I like to smile anyway, but this time I just about popped open. I sent mother, who was in Kansas City, a wire full of whoopee and I got all the kids out to the house to celebrate." But Brenda, like Linda, had her cryingjag. She could take just so much with equanimity. There was more to follow. One clay Mr. Zanuck sent for her. "I'm pretty sure you're our Fern, and I want to test you for it." The test happened to be a crying scene, and Brenda couldn't stop crying. She buried her face in her handkerchief, which was no good anyway, because she'd torn it to shreds. Finally they had to send for Owen, who took her by the arm, walked her round for blocks and blocks, and talked her into sense again. We left Linda drying her tears and setting her lips in resolution. The chance to make good that resolution came with Jesse Lasky's "Gateway to Hollywood" contest. It was held in Dallas on a day when Linda had two final exams to take. The tryouts started at nine. Tired and nervous, she didn't reach the auditorium till four thirty. It soon became obvious that the race was neck-and-neck between her and a girl who had had it all her own way before Linda arrived. The other girl lost. In Hollywood again, she couldn't decide whether or not to be mad at Fox. A sweet disposition, plus the practical feeling that two strings are better than one, sent her to see Mr. Schreiber. He was astonished to note how she'd grown. He was interested to hear that she had a six-weeks Gateway contract. He told her to get in touch with him if it wasn't renewed. On the day of its expiration she phoned, and was given a stock contract. Her god out of the machine was Gregory Ratoff. One glance at her led to another, longer and harder. Then: "I want to test this girl for my picture." "She hasn't had much experience." "Experience, bah ! You know Ratoff." He didn't feel quite so grand when the test was made, being heard to mutter, "A thousand dollars and for what?" In the projection room he liked it better. "But the first week we worked," says Linda, "I did everything wrong, and Ratoff began tearing his hair. Oh, not actually. For a man so temperamental, I was surprised he could keep so calm. He never blew up or screamed, just walked off the set. I felt sorry for him. I tried awfully hard to learn. And sure 'nough, after the 76 SCREENLAND