Silver Screen (Nov 1930-Oct 1931)

!! November 1930 63 She sat up all night in a day coach, afraid to spend her money on a Pullman. In New York she found the theatre — even before she looked for a place to sleep. The director noticed her — who wouldn't? — gave her a chance to do a few kicks and pirouettes and engaged her. Three weeks of endless rehearsals during which time she eked out an existence on ■what was left of her thirty dollars and the company left town on a tour. Most of the booking consisted of split weeks. Five days later she and her room-mate were fired ! They had missed the train on which the company left town and although they caught the next train and arrived in ample time for the first appearance, they found their places had been filled. The girls wept copiously on each other's shoulders and the management of the "Perfect Fool" was forced to pay their transportation back to New York. Claire hit town in the morning, heard of an opening in the chorus of "Little Jesse James," applied for it and faced her first New York audience that same night. A chorus girl's salary isn't luxurious, no matter what the story books say. Claire needed more money. So she started working in night clubs — the Casa Lopez — Texas Guinan's. At one time she was working simultaneously in three night clubs after her evening performance at the theatre. "I don't know now how I did it," she said quite simply. "At the time it seemed quite matter of fact because I knew I had to. Often it was four o'clock in the morning before I had a chance to go on and do my number. I'd get home as soon as I could and get to bed, but I had to be up around noon again so I could get my dancing lesson in before the night performance. The matinee days were the worst for they meant tw'o performances at the theatre, three at the night clubs and dancing lesson besides." About this time John Murray Anderson saw her, sent for her and offered her a part in the last of the Music Box Revues. She did a specialty dance. But when the show closed its New York run and went on tour, Claire was missing. She had achieved the first of her three ambitions. She was Paris bound. A French theatrical agent had arranged a number for her in one of the big revues in Paris. One night the great Mistinguette was ill. Claire went on in her place. She was a riot and her star began to ascend in the theatrical sky. Instead of sitting back and relaxing after that Claire worked and studied the harder — not only dancing but languages — anything that might be of help to her. She had perfected her dancing. She now started perfecting herself. It was while she was playing in Paris that Ziegfeld saw her. Claire came home with a three year contract as premiere danseuse of the Follies. And that was when the second of her Cinderella dreams was realized for she met the Prince — and married him. He hadn't a kingdom — he hadn't even a title — but he had everything that really mattered in Claire's life and he was a prince among men. For the first time someone really loved her. His name was Clifford 'Warren Smith and he came from one of the Back Bay families of Boston — an aristocracy more impregnable than any royalty abroad. He had never had to work in his life and he wanted to take Claire away with him to make up for all the years of sordid drudgery she had put in before she met him. But Claire still had that third ambition to achieve. So she went on dancing. Arthur Hopkins saw her and asked if she would like to play the feminine lead in the London production of "Burlesque" — the part that Barbara Stanwyck played in New York and that Nancy Carroll played in the movies. 'Would she? So presently Mr. and Mrs. Clifford 'Warren Smith departed for London and Mrs. Smith played Bonnie for six months while Mr. Smith applauded and beamed with pride. But there was still that sign on Broadway that she had set herself to earn. So when "Burlesque" closed, Claire and Clifford came back. Al 'Woods sent for her and offered her a part in "Scarlet Pages." "Is there any singing or dancing in it?" demanded Claire. She now had a desire to show people that could act as well as dance. "Not a single kick, sweetheart," Al answered and for the next few months she appeared six nights and two matinees a week as the girl on trial for patricide. The engagement ended with a nervous breakdown for Claire. She had been on the stage for years but she had spent most of the time dancing. 'When she got a dramatic part she didn't know how to act it — she could only live it. And night after night she went into actual hysterics on the stage. When she recovered Fox signed her for pictures and she is making her debut in their nretentious film of prison life — "Up The River." "The things that have happened to me don't seem real any more," she said dreamily. "■When I go home at night and my husband meets me and we sit there together, it seems as though all those old horrors must have happened to someone else. Yet I suppose they have left their marks on me — in my" character. I don't regret anything I've ever gone through. Everything is grist for the mill and if hardships don't teach you' anything else, they teach you tolerance and forbearance. And how to take the bitter with the sweet." "Are you happy now?" I asked suddenly. There was no particular reason for the question except that once you come to know her, nothing on earth seems quite so important as that Claire should be happy. "Happy?" she echoed while her eyes misted, "happier than I ever dreamed I could be. "We've been married two years and are more in love today than we've ever been. I've met my prince, I've been to Paris and I've at last got a start towards that electric sign — only now with the movies, I suppose it will have to be a twenty-four sheet poster" instead." The sign and the twenty-four sheet poster with her name in letters as high as herself seem to me relatively unimportant. But always I'll remember her as the girl who danced languorously in a night club with feathers waving about her — who looked as though she belonged in moonlit gardens — and who later married the prince and lived happily forever after. '1 LOVE AND HISSES Silver Screen is your magazine— we want to voice your opinions as well as our own bo, we re offermg prizes for the three best letters every month about plays and players Letters will be judged purely on merit. So, tell us what you think about pictures, the stars you love and the stars you hate. 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