Screen Mirror (Jun 1930 - Mar 1931)

m true lo ikeN avy T ...declares Paramount’s dynamic star, who has just made her third maritime picture . . . • Of course, I’m true to the navy. 1 • love every sailor in the service and every ship of the fleets and every rippie in the sea. For, selfishly speaking, the sea has had a strange part to play in my career. My very first picture was a story of sailormen and the vasty deep. It was “Down to the Sea in Ships,” and in it I played the part of a stowaway. “IT,” the picture that established me on the screen more than any other I have ever appeared in, also dealt in part with the sea. Remember how it ended, with Tony Moreno and myself in the water beside the yacht, with William Austin above us on deck heaving life preservers at us? And then, of course, there was “The Fleet’s In.” We had a fine time making that one. But not nearly so much fun as during the filming of my most recent picture, “True to the Navy.” It was my first appearance before the cameras in more than a half-year, you know, for I was ill for a long time, and could not work. bow It was great to be back at the studio again! Everyone was so nice to me. They seemed glad to see me, to have me back with them. And was I happy? On the first day of the picture Director Frank Tuttle; Fredric March, the leading man, and all the others in the company had a little party for me. They gave me the most magnificent bouquet of roses I have ever seen. I’ll tell you a secret. I think that Fredric March is one of the very nicest boys in Hollywood; so quiet, so courteous, so gentlemanly, and a really great actor. Mark my guess that he will be one of the most popular stars of the screen within less than a year. Fredric March and I worked together in my very first all-talking picture, you know: “The Wild Party.” I know his work as an actor pretty well. We had the greatest group of comedians on “True to the Navy” any film producer could want. Harry Green, for one. Then there were Eddie Dunn, Eddie Fetherston, Harry Sweet, Rex Bell, Johnny Sinclair, Charlie Sullivan, Ray Cooke, Jed Prouty, and Sam Hardy. Imagine that gang together on the set all day long, and you will have some idea of the laughs we had. I guess I gave them the biggest laugh of all. I am a soda clerk in “True to the Navy,” and to prepare myself for the part I had to learn to mix chocolate sundaes and banana splits and vanilla ice cream sodas just like they do in regular stores. I mixed those boys some of the weirdest dishes ever con cocted while I was learning the tricks of the trade, and it is a wonder that they all were not sick. I gave them their big laugh the day I tried to mix my first malted milk. I put too much ice cream in it, I guess, along with the milk and the flavoring, and the first thing I knew the mixing machine had jammed up and wouldn’t turn. So I tried to help it along a bit. I took a spoon and began to stir the mixture, and some way or other the shaker thing became loosened. The first thing I knew milk and ice cream and chocolate syrup were being showered all over the set, and my crew of helpful advisors came in for their share of the bath. But — what I started to talk about was being true to the navy . . . and the sea. I’m not kidding when I say that I love the ocean. Many a time I’ve walked the beach, on a stormy day, with the breakers making icy steam around my feet, and the fog clouds twisting around my head . . . and I loved it. After a hard day at the studio, and after giving a performance you fear wasn’t good . . . then you hike down to the sea, walk up and down on the wet sand, let the waves lull your nervous mind . . . and the sea wind clear your thoughts. That’s when I love the sea. And the boys who ship to foreign places . . . they’re lucky. Sometimes I want to slip on man’s clothing, and ship out myself ... to Africa, or Borneo, or Hong Kong. Sure enough, I don’t know what I’d do when I got there. I’m afraid they’d find me a rather helpless deck hand. But that isn’t the point. The real thing is that every time I see a ship and all her sailors pulling out . . flags waving . . . gobs gesticulating in the rigging . . . why, something yanks away at my heart . . . and I want to go along. That’s me, Clara Bow — true to the . and the whole seven seas. n^w