Screenland (Nov 1949-Oct 1950)

Harry James is watching June Haver's reaction to a number his band is rehearsing for the 20th Century-Fox musical, "I'll Get By," in which both star. loving young people. After a few cans of beer he would lose his inhibitions and sing for them. They especially applauded his impersonations of opera singers. His friends kept urging him to take singing lessons. So one day, without telling anyone, he went over to Boyle Heights to take a singing lesson for twenty-five cents. "The teacher needed lessons worse than I did," he says grimly. "By the time I finished the lesson my throat was so sore I couldn't talk for days. If that's singing, I said, I want no part of it." On a dare he sang for a scholarship try-out judged by a Hollywood voice teacher, George Walker. He didn't make the finals, but the voice teacher was impressed with his untrained voice and gave him a personal scholarship. When the boys at the plane plant kidded him about singing at his job he joined a big choral group at the Los Angeles Evening High School. For the first time he began to take his singing seriously and not kid around with it. That led to another .scholarship, then to the American Music Theatre which gave operas in English at Pasadena and L.A. High. The war necessitated increased production of plane parts and Howard was sent on the road by his aircraft corporation to visit small factories throughout the country and help them in their machinery change-over. Everywhere he went he continued liis voice training. He sang at the Mississippi Valley Festival and won. Later at the Chicago Musical Festival, which he also won. Back in California again, he joined up witli the National Concert Agency, and auditioned for Oscar Hammerstein who was looking for a rei)lacement for the lead in "Carousel." He was so piea.sed with Howard's voice and personality, not to mention his physical attributes, that he awarded him the role — which, in turn, led to his getting the part of Curley in the New York company of "Oklahoma." But "Oklahoma" had already been running a number of years so there was no great excitement on Broadway when Howard took over the part. He sang "Oklahoma" for a year and a half, and readily agreed to travel with the company to London in 1947. The company played London a year — and while there Howard made his first movie, "The Small Voice," in which he played a gang leader. Then came Hollywood knocking at his door. His biggest thrill in London was meeting Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier. They came back stage one night to visit with him after his performance, and later invited him to spend a Sunday at their beautiful old place in Alesbury. The Saturday night before Howard went pub crawling. "Saturday night was my night to howl," he says. He got in quite late. Barely had his eyes closed before the alarm went off. He only had time for a quick orange juice before he had to catch the eight o'clock train. "Larry greeted mc with one of his special concoctions," says Howard. "I wasn't used to special concoctions. I didn't say more than five words. The Oliviers must have thought they were entertaining a prize jerk." To make matters worse he dropped the glass right out of his hands and it spilled over both legs of his pants. .Vivien and Larry took him in the bathroom and started scrubbing him — Vivien took one leg and Larry the other. "If only the gang could see me now," sighed Howard. Howard came to after lunch, and he and the Oliviers became very close friends. He never visited them on an empty stomach again, and he had a completely wary attitude toward those "special gin jobs" of Larry's. The studio has big plans for Howard. When "Annie Get Your Gun" was finished, MGM rushed him into "The Pagan Love Song" with lovely Esther Williams. 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