Stars & Films of 1937 (1937)

considerable moneyto produce. Thecritics raved about it. But it hadn’t theappeal to all audiences. I must make the best pictures I can — and yet make them for the largest audience I can in order to justify my business existence. That is no easy task. Hollywood watches this carefully. It has got so lately that the only people who do not object to being ridiculed are the Americans. In fact, the only villain we dare show to-day is a white American, over 21 years of age, and with a completely fictitious name that no one, anywhere, can claim is his. • • • And we have not only English and American audiences to satisfy. Foreign countries have suddenly realized a great propaganda value in the films and resent the danger of the world’s becoming completely Americanised through the Hollywood motion picture. It isn’t to Italy’s liking to see the beautiful Venetian girls sporting Jean Harlow platinum bobs. Nor is it pleasant for them to see American films representing their nationals as villains or gangsters. Sinclair Lewis’s book “It Can’t Happen Here’’ was shelved. It might offend nations governed by dictators. Mexico raged furiously against Hollywood cowboy pictures which always made the villain a Mexican. This had to be stopped and was. Certain Balkan countries objected to their countrymen being portrayed as spies. This was immediately done away with. The Chinese Government has raised protests against the constant showing of the nationals as back country bandits with long drooping moustaches. Time and again I have heard audiences bitterly criticising films for turning historical figures into “glamour boys” and “glamour girls.” I, too, deplore this unhappy way of presenting history. But, again, history in itself may not be dramatically sound Our forefathers who made history were not thinking of us motion-picture producers at the time. If the heroine of a true historical event happened to have been ugly, I cannot portray her faithfully. The audiences prefer to see Merle Oberon in the role instead of some homely actress, although the latter might be more authentic. I am not trying to say that I know what the public wants. No producer can honestly say that. I do say, however, that after a score of years of experience I do know what the public has rejected. And I must follow that rule of audience rejection. I grant that there are things wrong with the motion-picture industry. After all, it is still only 25 years old. When you consider that the stage has 3,000 years of experience and background on its side, then we have done pretty well in only a quarter of a century. This section of the Queen Mary was reconstructed for the Goldwyn production of “ Dodsworth.” WALTER HUSTON and RUTH CHATTERTON are in the foreground.