Variety (January 1953)

9 Wednesday? January 7» 1953 You Don’t Need Talent, It’s That Inner Demon By MAX LIEBMAN After my own fashion, I want to play Hamlet. I hurry to assure you that I have no wish to crowd Maurice Evans or Laurence Olivier. My Hamlet strides no stage. My Hamlet is a repressed desire, if the phrase is still per- mitted in this world of transitory jar- gon. I suppose what I really want to play is Svengali, but so does every- body, more or less, and I owe it to myself to maintain a pose of individ- uality. Some years ago I produced a revue at Camp Tamiment, Pa„ where I. spent many summers as ja director. It seemed worthy ; of Broadway, and there I took it, with an unknown youngster named Danny Kaye among its players. Kaye’s success was, of ■ _. . course, immediate, and I was per- Max lip ma mjtted to take bows as his discoverer. By the time Tamiment delivered Betty Garrett, Anita Alvarez, Mata and Hari, choreographer Jerome Robbins and other talents to the theatre, I had come to be looked on as a gentleman of exceptional discernment. I won't kid you, I revelled in the reputation. Anybody who cared to take the time out to reflect, couldn’t very well escape the conclusion that these talents would have reached exactly the same goal without the chance lift from me. Talent, like water, seeks its own level. But you’d hardly expect me to say ,§o. For ly-*eventh PffiilETY Anniversary RADIO-TELEVISION Those Without Burden of Talent Ever since then I’ve yearned.,,, jo bring to a Broadway success a player without talent' -V There’s a‘ game worth the candle. It’s been done. One of the most-celebrated stars of our theatre was totally without talent, according to our historians. This was Maxine Elliott, who even had her own. theatre named after her, now playing television pro- grams, . ~ ~ - - - The late critic, Alexander Woollcott, once wrote an appreciation-of Miss Elliott, defending her against the charge of being a bad actress. She was nothing of the kind* he insisted; she was a non-actress. That was intended as high praise: It was Woollcott’s contention that Miss Elliott was sufficient to her task without the burden of talent. She had a greater something, for which “inner demon” is as good a name as any. Mention Maxine Elliott to a man who was romantic and full of juice at the turn of the century, and his old eye will light up and his step quicken. You can bet he isn’t remembering her talent. There is a dancer around town regarded as peerless in his field. Actually the boy can’t dance. He is totally un- responsive to music. He dances ahead of, behfhd, against the beat, and though he is sending the orchestra conductor to an early grave, he never fails to wow the audience. This dancer is, moreover, a joy to watch. There is a frenzy in his unorthodox caperings that is highly, infectious, a qual- ity that not only excuses his lack of talent, but would actually render talent intrusive. I’ve always wanted to sit in the orchestra pit and study the conductor’s face during the applause of the boy’s dance. And Take Eddie Stanky Baseball is beyond the purview of these iriusings, but it offers an example of what I mean in Eddie Stanky, the St. Louis Cardinals* manager. Branch Rickey, once Stanky’s employer, said of him: “Eddie can’t hit, he can’t run and he’s no great shakes as a fielder. He’s the most valuable player on the team.” There’s a boy charged to the hat with the inner demon I mentioned. Wow and then you’ll find your attention riveted on a chorus girl who appears to be doing nothing in particular toattract it. She is doing exactly what the other girls are doing, maybe ndt as. well as some. But like Miss Elliott, there’s a girl with a chance to have a theatre named after her. . * •When they were newcomers in the theatre, both Tallulah Bankhead and Katharine Hepburn were frequently brushed off as untalented. Miss Bankhead took her bruised feelings to England and got them rapidly un- bruised by becoming the darling of that city of extraor-. dinary talents. Miss • Bankhead’s London opening nights produced queues blocks long. Not a soul in that long line ever suggested Tallulah was a great actress, or cared. But by gum o they were-going to get into that theatre if they had to take the building apart, stone by stone. I first beheld Miss Hepburn m a play called “The War- rior’s Husband.” As a man of the theatre, I was appalled to see so inept a performer in a major role. But I’d have fought the man who suggested that she be removed in favor of. an abler one, I came away from Miss Hepburn’s performance consid- erably shaken, my respect for talent jolted. Here I was, a man of exacting standards, hoarse from cheering an actress who had few of the qualities I insisted on. Moreover, I went back to later performances and cheered louder. Both Miss Bankhead and Miss Hepburn have betrayed the promise of their apprenticeship by becoming great actresses, I wouldn’t care if the talent—pardon, non-talent —I sponsored got better. But whoever it is, she, or lie, must begin with none. .‘ Yes, sir, I’ve got to play Hamlet. Choo-Choo Blues Fellow got on train at Buffalo and instructed the porter ; i must be sworn in tomorrow morning as a Legislator, . tl Albany, It is very important that t get off there . Even I m asleep and in my pajamas, don't fail to put me off m/ien me arrive in Albany .” The porter promised he’d see to it that it would be done. The next thing the Legislator v found himself in Grand Central Station, "N.Y. City. He was burning: he rushed up and down •land Central Station in his pajamas, yelling nnd swear - V l ;j \ a t the top of his voice. The potter saw him and hid c/itna a post. Another porter walked over to the hiding 7 oner and asked:, “WhQt’s the matter with that man run - Vl & ln his pajamas — boy, is he inad!* 9 ff Yeh, but nothing ° m l>ared to the man I put off at Albany.” Bill Hardey . Audience Participation =By HARRY HERSHF1ELD Harry Hershfleld The Sage’s warning: “If you witness a gunfight, get In to it, so you won’t be shot as a bystander.” If you keep ‘‘knocking off” audiences, then what have you got? With the beginning of Man’s functioning began “audience par- ticipation,” though it’s not yet settled whether the snake was entertaining Adam and Eve or vice versa. When gladiator Spartucus raised his arm to the Roman throng and cried: “We who are about to die, salute you,” he never dreamed that many actors to follow, would also “die” on stage, screens, radio and television, without bothering to salute the audience. There’s no “Roman Holiday” as en- joyed by the modern throng, in on the “kill” when the comic gets no laughs and the legit no applause. No living like seeing a v comic “die”-^- especially if you think you work much harder for your money. Many a flop show has a cast outnumbering the audience, yet the minority decision counts. Its own Supreme Court, with its own rules. There is no such thing as one-man’s opinion, if he can be heard above the rest. One must also remember the one of the noveau riche giving a musicale, where Mischa Mishinnah was to be the soloist. Before the start of the event, the host warned his guests: “He’s a great violinist and I want you to appre- ciate him.” Then came the genius fiddler. After two hours, sawing off Opus 42, Pizzicato Number 9, he. was approached by one of the guests, who put it on the line: “Your playing is rotten!” The host hearing it, and em- barrassed, turned to the violinist and cried: “Please pay no attention to him—he doesn’t know what he’s talking about—he only repeats what other people say.” Very few artists or comics would play or crack jokes “for their own amazement” (as they themselves say), even if heavily paid for it. Soloists no -like-it solo, “Audience participation” at all costs. I have seen the time when a “heckle” was welcome, as a show of life in the place, “Give them bread and circuses,” insisted the ancient dic- tators. Knowing the mob would be throwing the bread at each other after they’ve had their fill, to keep them-, selves entertained when the acts began to pall. Only the young can go the. distance. Exemplified by the father who was taking his young boy to see a film, that had for its main scene, an arena with lions attacking the. gladiators, The father knowing about the exciting scene, told the boy:- “I don’t want you t<5 get worried when they show the lions jumping on the gladiators and biting them—remember, it ain’t real, it’s only a picture.” When the prescribed scene came on and the lions started to do their stuff, the little boy yelled: “Papa, look at that little lion over there—that little lion.” “Don’t get excited my child—I told you it’s only a picture.” “Papa, please look at that little lion—he ain’t getting any!” Prof. Gessner In the Beginning There Was the Image By PROF. ROBERT GESSNER (Chairman, Department of Motion Pictures, N. Y, University) Contrary to Biblical scriveners, it was The Image front the moment we entered the track. Those early bookmakers claimed it was The Word. They claimed also it was a seven-day event, but from where we sit the race to create a-better world is still on. But this is no quarrel with theologians. Nor aii attempt to give TV a respectable 1 an- cestry dating beyond Adam and Eve. The magic that causes cuff customers to stare for hours into that pale-blue larnp^ needs no genealogical bragga- docio^ , Television, for my eyes, is just tak- ing an image from one place to an- other. It’s a new transmission sys- tem, done with electrpnics instead of celluloid or canvas qr a sculptor’s stone. That the image can be seen instantly and simultaneously by mil- lions is a 20th Century wonder and an advertiser’s de- light. In .the good old days the image had to be carted around in cans with the aid of trucks, trains or bicycles to certain. spots once known as theatres or nickleodeons. Or in those golden times the good citizens carted them- selves in cars or on horse or foot to churches, galleries and museums. Now the image comes down the chimney like a real Santa Claus. The image is the one universal language which we’ve agreed-upon in our. 1,000,000-year lease on this spherical property which the astronomers, for some naive reason or other, call Earth. In all that time we’ve tried all possible combinations Of vowels, consonants, diphthongs, and smoke signals—and we still can’t understand Vishinsky, and he doesn’t want to understand us. But Stalin has seen the image of the mushroom over Hiroshima, and he Under- stands. It is no idle coincidence that the first recorded work of art—the very first attempt to convey an idea and an emotion—was an image chiselled onto the wall of a cave over 25,000 years ago. * That primitive hunter, who had the good sense to come in out of the rainy days in the Pyrenees, created his impression of an animal in motion by giving it four front legs and four rear ones. It was known in Alta Mira primitive art circles as “the running boar”—a tag still used to describe some of the product emerging from the studio caves of Alta Hollywood. Writers LaGuardia and Vanderbilt “Audience participation” takes in many things in our complex existence. Varied approaches regarding the rights of assembled groups, claiming certain inalienable rights. Such as the time Mayor LaGuardia, in genuine anger, turned over the City of New York , to the radicals for a day, to study the town and then let them see if they could make suggestions to satisfy their wild notions. In an hour they handed in a complaint: “New York City didn’t have one public square big enough for large riots.” When Commodore Vanderbilt propounded his “The public be damned,” he didn’t take into consideration that the public could do a little “damning” itself. A lot of people together doesn’t make them any brighter, but the group certainly has “nuisance value,” In theatres, radio arid television studios (where they are invited yet) they can wear out their welcome, and there’s nothing you can do about it till the event is over. And each one becomes an individual critic, not only during the Show, but more so on the way out. “Audience participa- tion” doesn’t end with the end of the performance. The song is ended but the malady lingers on. As the fellow who boasted that his film t was seen by 1,000,000 people the first week. To which a listener replied: “That’s an awful lot of people to go around knocking the picture.” Inviting public reaction, often to one’s sorrow, is beau- tifully exemplified in the npissive received by a gent: “Hear you are running around with my wife”—and the recipient’s reply: “Your circular letter received.” Or, critical reaction in the case of the group in the lounge of a theatre, after the first act, where the “pan” is mightier than the sword. They pulled no punches: “Did you ever see such a stinkeroo of a show—isn’t this the worst thing yet—is there no sense of feeling, no pity?” Finally one of the crabbers turned to a patron who had not uttered a complaint and asked: “What is your opinion, sir, of this offering?” “I’ll tell you. I’m in here on a pass and I hate, to knock. But if it gets any worse, I’M going to rush to the boxoffice and buy a ticket—and then, believe me, you’ll hear something!” There is no doubt that the “free shows” have put whips in the hands of their audiences. The latter even decide which programs they’d like to beat up, by staying a Way from them. We all have witnessed sponsor’s henchmen, in front of television studios, trying to lure pedestrians into the place. As said about a certain show: “You not only have to give the people passes, but carfare also.” Then again, “audience participation” has a problem within itself. The “free-list” group in the television studio and the “cost-nothing” groups at home, watching the pro- gram, who know that most of the laughter and applause in the studio is “souped-up.” America is now divided be- tween audiences who hate each other, because of the nuisance they are both guilty of, in this growing, synthetic approval of mediocre programs. Even whistling comes into your home, blit you can’t fool the dog in your house* who knows the real-thing when he hears it. And that sustained applause demanded of the studio audience, forced to beat their palms off because the program has a little extra time on its hands, before signing off. To many lonely, excitement-craving souls, “audience participation” shows have been a boon. Knowing that any moment, he or she, might be called out from the group, to face the mike or camera, for sudden fame or fortune. Most however, finish up in their flash at opportunity, like In teaching the techniques of screen writing, both for celluloid and electronics, the prime difficulty has been to free the imagination of youth caught in the double vise of the written word and the spoken word. The student who has become overtrained in the literate makes for a poor visual writer if he* thinks that the fine phrase or the noble line makes an image. Heavy college literature courses have curiously handicapped many a potential screen writer. This, is a very serious problem, because never before in all arts and crafts has there been a greater need and demand for image-makers. We once thought of ^ the motion picture industry hungrily consuming stdries ^ like so many yards of spaghetti, the camera swallowing celluloid at the rate of 9D feet per minute, 2,000 feet to the reel. But this rate of consumption is an unsalted pea* nut compared to the potential In TV. Not only Is it stag- gering, it is frightening. Already the big void in TV is stories and writers, a situation based on the 1948 freeze with stations counted only by the dozen. It is estimated that in due time there will be 2,000 stations. What will this mean in program- ming? If each of these 2,000 antennae operates on an average of a 12-hour daily schedule there will be 24,000 hours of shows day in and day out, each hour to be dif- ferent. Granting that 50% will be serviced by four net- works, this will leave 11,996 hours of daily shows, day in and day out. If the country is serviced by five net- works this will leave 11,995 hours of daily shows. • . V Frightening Thought The prospect of seeing 5,000 or 10,000 semi-amateur imitators of Milton Berle and Cooking Is Fun—is appall- ing. Imitation and standardization will not only kill TV, but it will deaden America: Mediocrity on such a mass scale could stifle all of us; Then TV becomes a potential monster, a Trojan horse in our midst which can betray us, lead us back into .airconditioned, atomic-heated caves. What can be done? Time is shortening, the freeze is lifted, the antennae are.rising. Obviously it ? s too gigantic a task—the training of .talent, program and story talent— for the few college courses in. the country and for the busy networks. Perhaps we can combine forces, perhaps the Ford Foundation can help before the Federals step in. There is fresh and original talent buried all over Amer- ica—a precious national. asset. Let’s mine the ore. It’s a challenge for MP.and TV industries as well as colleges. In the beginning there was the image, but let it not be said, that in the end all that was left was only the image. the woman who studied the encyclopedia for months, figuring she iriight be called one day from the audience, to be asked the winning question. It happened one eve- ning. She was called from the group arid on to the stage. Her months of studying the encyclopedia was now on trial. His first query and her answer clinched it; “What is your name?” “Do you mind repeating the question?” The audience applauded her cageyness—one of their own was not going to be caught off guard. The mob always works as a team. All for one and one for all. But haven’t yet heard of anybody dividing the loot won in those “giveway” programs. In our courts it is always announced: “The People vs—” In entertainment, it’s “The People v$. The People,” in allowing themselves to ruin much of the very fun meant for thffm. Yet, like wandering bedouins, they travel in large groups from one studio to another, mostly the Same people, elbowing each other for advantage. Makes one think of the fellow walking up and down the corridor of a courtroom. He was asked by a passing friend: “What are you doing here?” “I’m a witness.” “In whaL trial?” “I don’t know:—but you can't tell what case# ’ are liable to come up.”