Screenland (Nov 1942-Apr 1943)

Whaf Bing and Bob Did To Me Continued from page 22 Those shoe-button eyes of Hope's ! I have a teddy bear at home, one I've had since I was six. Its eyes came out and my mother took two black buttons out of a pair of my baby shoes and stuck them in, I swear it looks just like Hope! Or Bing will come on the set and announce, 'I'm on Dottie's side today ! Thereafter, and for the rest of the day, Bing and I gang up on Hope. The next day, Bob and I are allied against Bing. Comes the third day, and Bing and Bob are in cahoots against me. And if you don't think that combine makes a little Spartan Girl out of Mrs. Lamour's Dottie you don't know Hope and Crosby as I know them ! Then there's the horse-play. I'd like to make some screaming little crack about Bob having to have some horse-play on the sets, he certainly doesn't at the tracks. But we'll skip it. What I mean, for one of the sequences in "The Road To Singapore," the property man kept a tin can of soapy water handy in which I washed dishes. One prankish day, just after the lunch call sounded, Bing picked up a handful of the soap suds and threw it at Hope. Hope picked up a handful and threw it at me. I picked up the whole pail and chased the pair of them all over the lot, and through the commissary where out-of-town guests came to the reasonable conclusion that we were crazy. We have driven two directors crazy. Dave Butler, who is guiding Hope and me through "They've Got Me Covered," and poor, dear Victor Shertsinger. Dave has reached the point where he just sits down, before the day's work begins, and tells the crew, 'Let them get it over with before we start !' One day I told Dave that Bing was coming to visit us on the set and he said, 'Don't tell me that. I can't take it!' The 'takes' we have ruined ! But now, with the war, that is a thing of the past. Now I've got B. Hope and B. Crosby just where I want them. They are forced to ration their shenanigans — for the duration, at least. Then, if they wanted to go to a football game in the middle of a picture — and they always want to go to a football game — they'd take off. We stopped work at noon and, simply, they went. But — they did more work in that half day than six other actors would do in a week. And it is that little but very significant 'but' that is the point and punch, the moral and the merit, of my story. For Bing and Bob could, as I said, have made a nervous wreck of me. They could have given me a reputation in the business for being a scene-spoiler and a lines-goer-upper, a Grade A noodle-pate, what with the tricks they pull and the bland expression of them, leaving me holding the bag. But seriously, if I am any kind of a trouper, I have them to thank for it. (And I am writing this very seriously. In fact, I may as well tell you now that it's going to be a sentimental story, a tear-in-the-eye piece, and heaven help me when they read it!) Anyway, and at the risk of seeming immodest, I do believe that I could step into an animal act, toss off Shakespearean repertoire or walk the wire without the riffle of an eyelash — thanks to my training with them. Furthermore, if I know anything about the business, I give them seventy-five per cent of the credit. That I have not 'gone Hollywood,' squandered my money, made the several kinds of fool of myself that wiser girls than I have done, is thanks to their precepts and example. If I have weeded out of me any latent desire to hog the camera, any of the little jealousies or lack of generosity to others to which we are all prone at times, they are the gardeners. If I take my work seriously, and I do, yet manage to maintain a sense of humor about myself, and I believe I do, it is thanks to those two clowns who are the wisest and soundest men I know. I worked with Bing on the air while I was making my first picture, the betterforgotten "Jungle Princess." I remember how he was, how steadying he was, and reassuring, so that I wouldn't be nervous. That's the principal paradox of Bing 'n' Bob. They should make ycu nervous, heaven knows, the antics they pull. But they never do. They are too sure of what they are doing, and where they are going, so they take you along with them. And they are essentially kind people. I remember that first broadcast with Bing so well. How he let me do the songs I wanted to do. He l.asn't changed. He determined, long ago, that he wouldn't let this town get him, and he never has. He always gives the other fellow a break. So does Bob. They believe that if everybody in a picture is good, the. picture is that much better. They make it clear to you, by their example, that this is a highly co-operative business ; that you are a link in the chain and had better be a good workmanlike link, but that you are by no means the whole chain. Very tonic, this realization. They are good business men and ace showmen and they also want to help people. They use their heads as well as their hearts. So that their equilibrium as human beings is. well nigh as perfect as their equilibrium as performers. Oh, they have taught me a lot, those two zanies ! A thing called timing, for instance. I used to be so doggone slow they'd have to drag it out of me. You can't be slow with Bob catching the fast express. You can't be slow with Bing, either. Because he's so slow the picture would turn into a serial ! Alfred Hitchcock, Hollywood's master of sus pense, picked Teresa Wright, above, to pla; the lead in his new picture, "Shadow of c Doubt," after seeing her performances "Mrs. Miniver" and "Pride of the Yankees' They've helped me with lines. They've | taken endless time giving me differem readings of a line with which I was having trouble. (That is, of course, when ] get a chance to get a line in with them!); Or they'll think up whole new lines fou me, as they do for themselves, when thej | see a chance for improvement. And the thing called trouping ! There i: no question but what they are serioush I trying to steal scenes from each other. Eacl forces the other to be at his top and eacl has a foe worthy of the other's steel. Bins in his way, is just as clever as Bob. Bine' is droll. The difference between the two ii a difference in pace. Bing is slow and Bolj is fast. The slower Bing goes, the faster; Bob goes, and the other way around. But often, Bing comes up with one that top: Bob. As when, in our latest film, "Roac To Morocco," there was a shot of Bol being sold into slavery for $200. Then was Hope, on the slave block, flexing hi: biceps, flashing his teeth, giving with the torso in order to demonstrate his soundnes: of limb and wind, and his manly beauty Young Screen Star Teresa Wright Chosen Bv 60