Screenland (Sept 1922–Feb 1923)

20 Santschi, Art Acord and Ho<>| Gibson arc some of the brawny buckaroos who have tamed that last frontier — the Wild West of Block 41, Lots A to Z, Hollywood Tallgrass tract. But Universal maintains other, if less bloodcurdling, departments besides scalping parties and cattle raids. In that speckled stage, Priscilla Dean, .queen of crook drama, grapples with underworld villains. Marie Prevost pranks with the goldfishes in a nearby fountain. Gladys Walton, Frank Mayo, William Desmond and Herbert Rawlinson are other favorites of the celluloid sagas who perform for your edification on these premises. A low range of oak-clad hills, spanned by a twenty minutes by car or less by auto, separate Universal City from the Hollywood of shop and shirt fronts. H OW would you like to have a picture like the one on the preceding page? A framed 11x14 photograph to hang on your own wall? Here is a way to get one: C a h u e n g a Pass pierces these hills and through it winds the white ribbon of highway — Camino el Real — the road of kings, a part of the scenic network of C a 1 i f o r n i a's motor lanes. This is the road that borders Universal, its white surface streaked by continual traffic. The checkered patch in the upper left of our photograph is a glimpse of a San Fernando Valley peach orchard. Beside it winds a sand strip, shaded by willow thickets. This, if you please, is the Los Angeles River — a thread of indifferent moisture except when swollen by winter rains. Universal is known among picture folk as a university whose alumni are scattered throughout studioland. It is distinctly not a nest of neophytes. The reason so many great actors, directors and scenarists have sprung from here is because Universal is one of the oldest studio groups still in violent eruption. Study the , "sets" scattered about the "back lot" in the center of our view. A diagonal row of scantlings is all that you can see of some, but they support many intricately designed "fronts," which, when properly illuminated, have given gorgeous screen , effects. In the veiy center of the group of buildings is an auto park containing long files of machines, radiating a comfortable degree of prosp?rity thereabouts. More hospitality to visitors is shown at Universal than at most other studios. To many California newcomers it is the Write an essay about Hollywood. In 500 words, or less, tell the Essay Editor just what you think a "close-up" of Hollywood looks like. Imagine yourself on Hollywood Boulevard. It is noontime. Are the stars going past on the way to lunch? Are they in make-up? What sort of cars do they drive? Who is with them? In what sort of places do they eat? Do they attract as much notice in Hollywood as they would in your city? Describe the stores, the cafes, the shops and homes and studio fronts as you have always imagined them. Again, it is night and the boulevard twinkles with headlights. What c'oes Hollywood look like at night? Do you hear jazz floating from ballrooms? Corks popping? The shriek of innocent victims? Some of ycu will be humorous in your conception of Hollywood. So this contest is to be divided into two groups — one for serious essays, another for humorous ones. Be sure to mention, at the top of your contribution, whether yours is to be entered in "humorous essays" or "serious essays." And by no means forget to attach your name and address. Keep your essay under 500 words. The contest will end on July 15, so that at least two of the best essays can be published in the September "Screenland." The prizes? There will be six of them — three framed 11x14 photographs of Hollywood from the air for the funniest essays, and three for the best serious ones. And Five Cents a Word will be paid to the authors of the ones chosen for publication. Remember, at least two essays will be published. So this contest gives you a chance to win a money prize as well as to win one of these unusual aerial photographs, handsomely framed. Write your essay now and send it to "Essay Editor,5' "Screenland," Screenland Building, Hollywood, California. one glimpse "behind the scenes" that is possible to them. Universal employs the usual barbed-wire entanglements and bolt-studded barricades but it does not support a battalion of armed guards and machine gun nests for curious Iowans. Sightseeing busses invade the premises daily and if you are related to Will Hays you may step aground and look the place over with the assurance that if apprehended your life sentence will be suspended by the neck until dead. The crater-like splotch in the upper right is not Vesuvius. It is a water reservoir. Bootleggers have bombed it by plane but so far have not succeeded in restraining the flow of limpid C02 stubbornly demanded by some movie people, the same as others, you know. Rich though it may be in scenic resource, Universal City is not the only locale used by the numerous units working there. The directors and their location hunters range far and wide in search of "atmosphere" that has not been "done to death." Picturegoers are becoming more critical and they do not want to see Robinson Crusoe herding his goats in the same corral where Alkali Algernon was hung. So, although a picture may be begun here, it will contain scenes taken at perhaps a half dozen other places scattered throughout the state, with interiors built and photographed in those big stages. Some profane souls hugely enjoy seeing Kit Carson guiding an emigrant train past a row of telephone poles. It is more difficult than a novice fia/i realize to keep incongrous elements out of scenes, when every period of the world's history is embraced in the photoplay. In spite of the great care that picturemakers have learned to use in avoiding the irrelevant and ridiculous in serious '• work, tomato cans and auto tracks still play occasional havoc in South Sea drama. Sometimes it is a mistaken calculation of camera lines. Again, a troupe immersed in enthusiasm' for their task fail to detect blunder-jnaking details that the more observant fans will invariably notice and raucuosly indicate in the hushed playhouse. So much for this unique village of the films. The pilot will now circle the lot and reach a 1500-foot altitude so we can cross the range of hills and return to the flying field. Next month we will take in the United and R-C studios, one of the largest and busiest groups in movieland.