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Job Hunting in Hollywood
Ten O’Clock In Th’ Evening – BY LOUISE GALLAGHER
CURFEW hour reigns in Hollywood. By 10 p.m. the brightest cafes have dimmed their lights and taken on such a respectful attitude as to discourage the most earnest of joy seekers. The gay clanking of automobile horns, livley greetings as location busses pass those returning from late work at the studios, have been silenced. Those who walk upon the streets are quiet and subdued. Hollywood Boulevard, well schooled actor, capable of assuming any role on short notice, has been asked to portray Main Street, and has quickly stepped into the part. the “czar” of the movie world is with us and everyone is on their good behavior. Will Hays is overlooking his little colony to see for himself just how it has conducted itself since his last visit in January.
It is rumored that the women’s clubs throughout the country are taking credit to themselves for providing the incentive for the little visit. During the recent biennial of women’s clubs held in Los Angeles, the billboards used to advertise motion pictures that not only caused the ladies to blink but often to completely shut their fearless eyes. They decided then and there that not only did these billboards ruin an otherwise perfect landscape but offended the refined sensibities of thousands of tourists. The result was letters from North, South, East and West, informing the Hays organization that it was high time for them to begin to function.
Will Hayes has never been particularly strong for spectacular billboard advertising and, therefore, when it was learned that he was expected as a guest at Beverly Hotel, extra billboard crews spent a busy 24 hours tearing down all posters of the hectic, frivolous and frothy type. Mr. Hays will spend six days here and the double extra billboard crews will spend a busy 24 hours putting back the “blue” posters. The movie game is great sport. One thing for which all players are grateful to Mr. Hayes is that he looks with an unfriendly eye on snappy, suggestive titles, and a number of pictures throughout the industry have been retitled at his request.
Who wouldn’t resent working in a picture bearing such a name as “The Cafe of Fallen Angels?” This was the working title of James Cruze’s last picture. One girl told me she refused a small part in this cast on account of its title. She was from Peoria, Ill., and her hometown was eagerly watching for the first appearance of their beauty contest winner. “I think they would have boycotted me as well as the picture,” she said, “had I returned home via the celluloid route under such a title. ” The picture has been renamed at the suggestion of those higher up and is going out as “A Drama of the Night.” The producers claim that it is the theaters who do the objectionable exploiting of pictures and that they are the ones whom Hays will ask to make a change in their advertising methods.
Who’s Peter Pan?
Who is going to be “Peter Pan?” It is the question you hear on all sides. Lois Wilson is on her way to England, where she will represent Paramount Pictures and the motion picture industry at the big cinemotographic garden party and will be presented by Lasky to Barrie as a suitable Peter Pan. Gloria Swanson is also on her way across to personally plead her fitness for the part. Lois Wilson’s many admirers here think she would make a charming Peter Pan and add new laurels to her crown if given the part. On the other hand Gloria is so unsuited to the role that cinamaties are wondering if there could be any possible vampish trick that might be worked on Sir Barrie to cause him to so lose interest in his brainchild as to intrust her movie career to Miss Swanson. The best bet here for the much coveted part is Marilyn Miller, and they do say that Mary and Doug had this in mind when they visited England.
Jackie Coogan has also gone abroad. Jackie is very much interested just now in the Near East campaign and will devote the next five months to that work. Jackie, like all other kids, is growing up-you would be surprised to see what a big boy he looks away from the studios and minus make-up. There seems to come a time to all children in the movies when they must quit for a while. Some of them come back, others are never heard of again. What will be Jackie’s fate? No one can tell.
The Children’s Futures.
I played very recently in a picture where the feminine lead was taken by a young girl of 16 who had been quite famous as a child actress, both on the legitimate and in movies. They were staging for her great come-back. She fell flat. She couldn’t act, she was neither pretty nor graceful. Before the picture was half finished the director and supporting cast had lost all interest. “It will be sent to the J aps,” was heard daily on the lot. That is the fate that befalls pictures that fail to go over here on a first preview. They are sold for foreign release and never shown in the states.
The Butterfly Comedies, an independent company that I was in two pictures with, had for their lead a young girl who had won considerable fame as a child actress and had been much in demand at that time by many of the big companies. They lost thousands on the first picture filmed. The only thing that saved it from being shut up forever in its own tin box was the splendid acting of Joe Bonner. Max Asher and Louise Carver, all three actors of long standing on the legitimate stage.
Our director, who was also the stepfather of the young star, lost all interest in his work after the first two or three days. It was the girl’s mother, whose financial backing had made the picture possible, who did what she could to keep up interest. I worked in a picture at Fox Studios that was so silly that it seems a shame to insult the Japs and Chinese by putting it off on them. It was more in keeping with the intelligence of the South Sea islanders.
Science has invaded the dressing room. Make-up, which next to acting, requires all the skill at your command, has now a mechanical ally in a spotlight mirror. Lou Tellegen has introduced this novelty to America. I saw it fastened onto a dressing table on a set where he was playing. This device was presented to Tellegen when he was playing with Sarah Bernhardt and was invented by a French scientist. It is a semi-microscopic reflecting glass with a microscopic lense inserted in a cutout on the bottom. An electric globe is adjusted in back of the mirror in such a way as to throw the spotlight onto the actor’s face. When other lights are turned off, it is wonderfully helpful in showing up every defect in make-up.
It will have to be made in America before it comes within the reach of the majority of the movie colony. Mr. Tellegen keeps his helpful mirror heavily insured against breakage.
I had a funny letter last week from one of my fans don’t that sound biggoty-away up in Providence, R.I. She was very anxious to know how I was getting on in the movies and ended up by telling me that she had observed when she wrote to a beginner in the movies and asked for a photograph, they invariably sent a lovely large one, but after they had arrived and belonged in the class with Norma and Gloria, all they sent was a small one, I sent her a snapshot.
