Screenland (Nov 1945-Oct 1946)

time-bomb, and to use my voice. During the course of that five months, I acted out every script in the MGM files. I went over a scene, over it and over it, until I was ready to drop from exhaustion. And sometimes did. Then went over it again." The majority of stars on, and some off, the MGM lot have similar tales to tell — all with the "she-made-me-what-Iam-today" refrain. Miss Burns, by the way, dislikes the word, "coach" — says it is, when applied to her, a misnomer. Explaining this seemingly anachronistic statement, she said: "The way I work with people is, I imagine, a rather strange way. For instance, I long ago came to the conclusion that by the time an actor comes to a studio, it is too late to have a 'school.' Since I do not believe you can take people in the heady throes of signing their first contracts and treat them as students, I make it very clear to them that I am NOT giving them 'dramatic lessons,' that they are NOT pupils but, however young and inexperienced, are professionals working toward a development of personality and acting ability. "As an example of the usual procedure, when Van Johnson first started with me, we would take a script and, scene by scene, break it down, discuss it, analyze it, familiarize ourselves with every locality in the story, with the very rooms of the house in which the scenes were to be played. Then, beginning with a discussion of the character Van was to play, we went on to discuss his relationship to the other characters, and their relationship to him and what you might expect his, and their reactions to be, in such and such situations and circumstances— until Van knew the chap he was to portray as well as he knew himself and would not feel and, therefore, would not appear to be 'acting.' "As with Van, each and every girl and boy who comes to me is worked with individually. The only lime two or more work together is for a test. One of the benefits an actor derives from working alone, rather than in a class, is that he does not run the risk of acquiring stock mannerisms, gestures, speech effects, a shared bag of tricks. We do not, in other words, want six Lana Turners and six Van Johnsons but only one, one highly developed one, of each." Since development of personality is not a static thing but can and should go on through all of life, the players, long after they are stars, salted and seasoned, return again and again, with script after script, to Miss Burns. As for Mr. Sidney: When you consider that, at the age of 29, this young man numbers "As Thousands Cheer," "Bathing Beauty," "Ziegfeld Follies," "Anchors Aweigh," "Harvey Girls," "Holiday in Mexico" among his directorial triumphs, you know very well why he is the gleam in an actor's eye. Quite a gleam he is, too, for there's six feet, 210 pounds of Mr. Sidney. Dark and handsome, with an extremely amiable face, a rich and ready laugh, a relaxed manner, you sense in him at once, however, the competence, the what-it-takes touch that gave you that on-the-beam, every foot of it, tops in entertainment, "Anchors Aweigh." "George," Walter Pidgeon remarked of him recently, "is closer to John Ford than any director I have ever met." Since actors, from extras to — well, to Mr. Pidgeon — all but genuflect when they speak of John Ford, Mr. Sidney's place in the Hollywood sun is, you may safely assume, both large and luminous. Lillian went to dramatic schools in New York and Paris; worked for a short time in stock: was once "sent for" by the late great David Belasco but finally, after a long illness brought on, he believes, by her sense of frustration, found compensation, and found it richly, in helping others become what she had hop^d to be. Mr. Sidney, one of the third generation in a theatrical family, is purely a product of show business. His grandfathers, on both sides, were producers. His mother was one of musical comedy's famed Mooney sisters. His father. Louis K. Sidney, produced pictures at MGM and stage shows at the Capitol Theater in New York. George Sidney was an uncle. Carried on the stage as a tenmonths-old infant, Mr. Sidney says he has not been far from the theater in the 29 intervening years. At the age of seven, he made his screen debut with the late Tom Mix. Three years later, he appeared in a stage revue, doing an impersonation of George Washington in the classic crossing-the-Delaware pose. On this occasion, affected by the applause of the audience, George fell from the boat into the papier-mache waves. The applause redoubled. Claiming that he "practically never went to school after the third grade" but sat "all day, and every clay, in a theater," the facts are that George never graduated from high school; then, sidestepping the family plans for college, got himself a "wonderful job and flat feet" as a messenger boy at MGM. Thereafter, George worked, successively, step-up by step-up — (would-be directors, please note) — as an office boy; a secretary in the production department; in the cutting room; in the sound department; became a test director, a director of second units and finally, after working for almost 15 years at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, became — well, became a gleam in an actor's eye; a fine and full-fledged director and of sufficient stature to be compared, and at his age, to the epic Ford. If ever there was a "marriage of true minds" with the plus of mutual tastes and interests, it is the marriage of Lillian and George Sidney. Not only are they in love, and very obviously in love, with each other but they are in love, mutually in love, with the theater. With, especially, motion pictures. With their jobs in motion pictures. It is, in addition, they tell you happily, the "greatest luck" that they are in the same studio and work together, on many occasions, hand in glove. The job they did, for instance, on Esther Williams: When Esther was first sent to Miss Burns she had little confidence in herself, having been told, at two or three other studios, that she didn't have "personality," didn't have this, that, the other. But — functioning as something between, presumably, a psychiatrist and a hypodermic needle—Miss Burns went to work on, and with, Esther. SCREENLAND RITA DAIGLE WALTER THORNTON Pin-Up Girl, Uses Glover's LOVELIER HAIR FOR YOU! Famous models and screen stars agree — an overnight application of Glover's 3-Way Medicinal Treatment does wonders for your hair ! Prove it this easy way. You'll be delighted with the sparkling highlights, the soft lustre . . . the freshened beauty and radiance of your hair ! Keep it that way with all three famous Glover's preparations — Glover's otiginal Mange Medicine— GLO-VER Beauty Shampoo — Glover's Imperial Hair Dress. Ask today for the regular sizes at any Drug Store or Drug Counter ! 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