Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 5 April 1939 — Page 15

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 5, 1930

By JAMES THRASHER

MOVIES

T - yas is that no one has approached Governor Townsend with a petition that he proclaim April 7-14 “Jeanette MacDonald Week” in Indiana. This despite the fact that the car-rot-topped coloratura will visit the State, in person and canned for cinema projection, within the coming seven days. While Waiting around, hoping against vain hope for a proclamation, it might be remarked that Miss MacDonald will be on . Loew's screen, beginning Friday, in “Broadway Serenade.” And on the following Wednesday evening, as many ardent admirers as can crowd into Bloomington’s high school will hear the movie soprano in her first recital in this vicinity. Disappointed ticket seekers can make up their minds right now to prepare for the long trek to Evansville on Monday night or Ft. Wayne the following Friday, for the only other MacDonald appearances in the state. That is, of course, unless they get in touch immediately with Eddie Davidson of the Bloomington Junior Chamber of Commerce, B who says he has a few tickets still available. Mr. Thrasher Manager Ward Farrer of Loew's, meanwhile, is preparing to show “Broadway Serenade” to the local customers some 34 times, which ought to keep everyone happy.

® & = ® ® = Ir is interesting to note that Miss MacDonald, who admits having concert tour.

seen 31 summers come and go, is making her first American Yet, thanks to her 10 years in the talkies, she doubtless is one of the country’s best known and best loved singers. Furthermore, she is asking a price for this mitial series ef 20 concerts for which you probably could hire a Metropolitan Opera quartet for the season and have enough left over to buy yourself a couple of first-class outfielders. Miss MacDonald is one of a few present-day singers who have gained fame almost wholly by the so-called “canned music” route. Jessica Dragonette of radio is another. Both these singers have waited until they were established firmly in their familiar medium before branching into the concert field. The movie prima donna has grown up in Hollywood, vocally and otherwise. Paramount found her costarring in the Broadway musical, “Angela.” And when she signed her first movie contract, Angela, unlike Sinclair Lewis’ heroine of the same name, was not 22.

Began as Dancer With Wayburn

EFORE “Angela,” Miss MacDonald had an up-and-down career on Broadway. She began as a dancer in Ned Wayburn revues, getting her first job through her sister Blossom, also a dancer. Later she played bits, did some understudying and modeled fur coats during the summer season, of all times. When her first contract with Paramount was up, Miss MacDonald toured Europe as a singer, so the present game isn't entirely new to her. She signed with M-G-M in 1934, and has been there ever since. It was that studio which teamed her with Nelson Eddy. The box-office grosses on their costarring films probably convinced Miss MacDonald that she could name her own price for personal appearances—and collect. In “Broadway Serenade,” Miss MacDonald is cast in one of her rather infrequent screen roles without Mr. Eddy’s romantic support. Her leading man is Lew Ayres, who fits gracefully into the musical picture. After all, Mr. Ayres did hold down a job with Henry Halstead's orchestra and Ray West's band in Los Angeles’ Cocoanut Grove. He's still a pianist, doubles on hanjo and guitar, and does a little acting on the side.

It's Stunt, but It's Timely

OO} May 11, if all goes well, a locomotive of the 1860s will chug into the Union Station, hauling three old wooden coaches of the Union Pacific Line and stopping an hour or two for public inspection. There will be plenty of room up by the engine (also around the Union Pacific streamliner, which will accompany it). For inside the antique coaches will be seated some real, live movie actors. Among them are almost certain to be Lynne Overman, Brian Donlevy, possibly Akim Tamiroff and Ray Milland, and certainly Sheila Darcy, Judith Allen, Evelyn Luckey, Producer Hal Roach’s daughter (nobody seems certain of her first name right now), and the old silent-picture star, Julia Faye. If the informed and skeptical reader hasn’t already guessed that this is a publicity stunt, it is—for Cecil B. DeMille’s epic of the iron horse, “Union Pacific.” Quite a timely stunt, ton. For it was on May 10, 70 years ago, that they drove the golden spike to complete the Union Pacific Railroad. So we'll only be a day late. The picture itself is going to show here the week of May 5 or May 12, at the Indiana. And the wood-burning locomotive will be stopping off on its trip home from a swing through the East— Hollywood clear to Boston, and return. Leaving Hollywood April 24, the train’s first stop will be at Omaha. It will arrive there for the picture's world premiere on April 28, and Omaha has planned a three-day celebration that should make the Dodge City jamboree look like a minor league

county fair.

Tall Hats and Whiskers Everywhere

ROOF that Omaha takes its premieres seriously is found in the fact that the City Council has appropriated $30.000 for the celebration. So far, not a taxpayer has fired a single shot. Several “Whisker Clubs” have been formed, and returning travelers from the Nebraska metropolis say that already the city looks as if it were entertaining a Smith Bros. convention. The boys are wearing tall beaver hats, too. And when the Civic Committee ordered 25.000 dresses of a late 1860s style from Chicago, Omaha’s maids and matrons snapped them up in three days. (No profit to anybody, though; cost price of $1.46 to all) By premiere time, you won't know the new place. For in five of Omaha’s downtown blocks, store fronts are being covered with wooden facades of pioneer vintage; the cement sidewalks are getting a plank covering, and the hitching post is replacing the No Parking sign. Whether or not Buck Benny ever rides again, Omaha is going to leap to the saddle en masse to glorify Mr. DeMille’s glorification of the Union Pacific.

Hire Hall for Swing Fans’ Who Can Take It Calmly

NEW YORK, April 5 (U. P)—Theyre having jam sessions at cocktail time these Friday afternoons because Paul Smith and Ernest Anderson, a couple of swing enthusiasts, took their landlords’ advice ard hired a hall. . Here you see real swing fans, not the wild-eyed jitterbug type that blow their tops when an Artie Shaw or a Benny Goodman gives out with a particularly hot OR a uietly through 25-minute sets wiile the oem of swing musicians play, UNITED ARTISTS they applaud at the proper times

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Charming Fay Bainter . . . “has merry sense of humor.”

HOLLYWOOD

She Believes Bei

__' THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

By MARIAN YOUNG NEA Service HS rwoon April 5.—Hollywood, too, has found that charm pays. The old time picture star who threw a fit of temperament and tossed bits of scenery around the set on the slightest provocation is no more. Her modern successor obviously believes that the ability to get along with people is every bit as important to her career as beauty, brains and talent. Generally speaking, the top ranking stars are a pretty considerate, unexpectedly natural and thoroughly charming collection of goodlooking women. Many of them are the kind of genuinely charming individuals who actually go out of their way to help others without expecting undying gratitude or wanting public recognition of their good deeds. Among these Fay Bainter is outstanding. = ” ® = ” t J

A ISS BAINTER'S brand of charm is that simple, nongushy variety which makes everybody not only comfortable but pretty glad to be alive. She knows how to put others at their ease. She seems always to know exactly what to say or, better yet, what not to say, to dispel another's self-consciousness. Yet she never makes you feel that she is putting on a charm act, getting you to talk because the charm books advise every person to let every other person talk about himself. A conversation with her is what a conversation should be—an exchange of ideas. Then, too, Miss Bainter has a wholesome, merry sense of humor— just sharp-edged enough not to be saccharine sweet but at the same Jie never cutting or even remotely cruel. Practical jokes are her pet

» s ” ” » 2

«“¥J’M sure that kindliness is the fundamental principle of natural charm,” the smiling, iron gray-haired Miss Bainter told me. “And that good manners are important outward manifestations of it. “The charming people I know never intentionally hurt anyone’s feelings, and they do not think it smart to be rude. They aren’t sticklers for etiquette as such, but they do behave well enough so that a hostess is glad she invited them. . “I'm sure, too,” Fay Bainter continued, “that a tendency to spread malicious gossip precludes charm. We might as well admit that everybody enjoys hearing a little low-down,’ but damaging gossip is something else again. “Also, that miserable quality, quaintly known as ‘two-faced,’ certainly is missing in anyone whose charm springs from a kindly heart. «] prefer an utterly rude, uncouth woman who is 100 per cent unpleasant 100 per cent of the time to the woman whose suave, synthetically charming exterior covers a venomous heart and tongue." The latter may be more fun at a party. But heaven help you when the party is over and your back is turned!”

#” ” 2 2 ” ”

ISS BAINTER'S voice is one of her most charming qualities. She speaks softly, quietly, but there is depth and richness in the underlying tones. She enunciates clearly, smoothly, pronounces words beautifully, yet never appears to be pronouncing them affectedly. You get an impression that she learned to use her voice and to speak well when she was a little girl, instead of all of a sudden, somewhere along the line. Fay Bainter’s dramatic career began and continued for many years on the New York stage. Since “Quality Street,” her first motion picture, she’s been eminently successful in maiure roles, including the part of Bette Davis’ aunt in “Jezebel.” Both Miss Bainter and Miss Davis received the Motion Picture

BILL SEEKS BAN ON

By PAUL HARRISON | pA KE STAGE NAMES

overalls. .

Avocado sandwiches on soy bean bread, with passion fruit_jellyroll. . . . The 5-and-10 drinkeries jammed. . .. Within a half-block radius of the Vine St. Brown Derby are 36 other restaurants where you can get a full meal for 15 cents or a steak for $2.50. . . . In the business section of Hollywood Boulevard are 267 shops including 22 for hats, 19 shoe stores and 35 dress emporiums—nearly all of them catering to a penny-wise ciientele. Farther out on Heartbreak Lane are mortuaries like colonial mansions and colonial mansions like mortuaries. No great movie names live anywhere along it now. Fo % ANDLADIES in Hollywood often specify: “No pets, children or actors.” Sign in a jewelry store window: “Wear a fraternity pin; sign of distinction.” Standins ride in second-hand Rolls Royces, but many ,of the stars drive flivvers. English accents, overheard everywhere, used by aspiring actresses from Des Mcines and Lancaster, Pa. British girls try to talk like Americans. Photographers’ shops located in every block. Upstairs offices seem to be oc- | cupied exclusively by beauty op-

and they understand what they are listening to. The reason swing lovers have the privilege, at $1 a throw, of attending these sessions in a midtown hotel is because Mr. Smith, an art director for an advertising agency, and Mr. Anderson, a magazine promotion manager, got tired of being asked to leave their respective apartments by the managements. “I was asked to leave two places and Anderson one,” Mr. Smith explained today. “So about two months ago we decided to hold weekly sessions in a hotel and open them to the public. «And we'd been going around to various places to hear our favorite musicians play so we thought it would be nice for a change if they would come to us.” Between 15 and 20 men, including Fats Waller, Meade Lux Lewis, Bobby Hackett, Joe Marsala, Eddie Condon, Pee-Wee Russell and Jimmy Dorsey, appear during the sessions. They are all good friends of Mr. Smith and Mr. Anderson, but they are all paid union scale. “We don’t want any jitterbugs or the college crowd,” Mr. Smith said. “The people who come now are fine. They understand it and sit quietly and listen and they don't want to dance.”

CROWN RESTS IN CASE

The crown presented to Jeanette MacDonald as a symbol of her election as Queen of Motion Pictures, now vests in a glass case on the wall of her dressing room. The case, set in a gold frame, was especially constiucted to house the trophy.

HOTEL NARRISON ® TAPROON

. ++ AFTER THE SHOW! For the, Finest

BIRTHDAY NEARS

Times Special NEW YORK, April 5—TIt is estimated that 9000 theaters throughout the world will be playing United Artists pictures when the studio celebrates its 20th birthday April 17. Among the firm’s releases showing at that time will be “Made for Each Other,” with James Stewart and Carol Lombard; Samuel! Goldwyn’s production of “Wuthering Heights,” featuring Merle Oberon, Laurence Oliver and David Niven: “Prison Without Bars,” which introduces Alexander Korda’s new ‘“‘discovery,” Corinne Luchaire; the John Ford production, “Stagecoach”; “King of the Turf,” starring Adolphe Menjou, and Hal Roach’s “Zenobia,” with Oliver Hardy, Billie Burke, Alice Brady and Harry Langdon.

MARY PICKFORD'S NIECE IS ROBBED

HOLLYWOOD, April 5—Gwynne Pickford, 21-year-old niece of Mary Pickford, reported to police today the theft of $12,000 worth of furs and jewelry from her home. She and her servant were away. Neighbors noticed the front door smashed open and called police. Miss Pickford said eight fur coats, a silver fox neckpiece and jewelry were missing. .

FY We) ron

erators’ schools and easy-credit dentists. The majority of buildings on the boulevard are only one story. Forty years ago Hoilywood Blvd. was a road through a lemon grove. One of the first city ordinances prohibited more than 2000 sheep being driven along it at cone time. Prior to that, 160 acres of land sold for $1.25 an acre, although fortunes in Spanish gold are supposed to be buried in it. Professional treasure hunters have looked for a fabulous cache near the Hollywood Bowl, but little of value ever has been found. Professional golddiggers, prospecting in the cafes and cocktail lounges, have done much better. . 0» ” 2 HE most notorious bandit of early California, Tiburcio Basquez, was shot and captured on what is now Hollywood Boulevard, and hundreds of movie scenes have been shot there since. The largest set in picture history was built on the boulevard by D. W. Griffith, for “Intolerance.” But there never has been a film studio anywhere along its five-mile length. : Less than 10 years ago a small

OLLYWOOD, April 5.—All around the town: Women wearing fur

coats but no hats or stockings. . look like caricatures of Shirley Temple. . . . _ . Horseback riders in wild west costumes, but mounted on English saddles. . . . Extra girls wearing dark glasses on cloudy days. . . . The Negro shoeshiner who wears full evening dress. . . . . Out-of-work actors wearing movie makeup because, by appearing to be employed, they can get a little more credit from their creditors. . ..

BOSTON, April 5 charge that . . Children clad and curled to |fourth-rate actors

Shirley Temple wearing

(U. P)—A “phoney third and and actresses” were using fictitious names in Hollywood and spreading communistic

— —

Fay Bainter’s Career Is Proof Charm Pays in Hollywood; ng Kind Is as Important as Beauty or Talent

2 8 = »

As important to the success of Fay Bainter’s screen career as her beauty, brains and talent was the ability to get along with people.

PAGE 15

WHAT, WHEN, WHERE

APOLLO

Three Smart Girls Grow Up.” with Deanna Durbin, Helen Parrish and Nan Grey, at 12:49, 3:54, 6:59

and 10:04. “Beauty for the Asking, cille Ball and Patric nowles, 11:41, 2:46, 5:51 and 8:56. CIRCLE

John Boles, Joe Rines and orchestra, Rossie and June Mann, dance team, and others. on stage at 12:50, 3:40, 6:35 and 9:25. “Winner Take AN,” with Tony Gloria Stuart. Henry Armetta and oe Summerville, on Y3Srsen at 11:20 2:10, 5, 7:50 and

INDIANA

“Midnight,” with Claudette Colbert, Don Ameche, John Barrymore. Francis Lederer and Mary Astor, at 41, 3:46, 6:51 and 9:56. “King of Chinatown,” with Anna May Wong and Akim Tamiroff, at 11:44, 2:49, 5:54 and 8:59

LOEW’S

and Loose.” with Rosaline Robert Montgomery, RegRalph Morgan, at 7:15 and 10.00.

with Luat

“Fast Russell, inald Owen and 0, 1:45. 4:30,

ford, Mary Howard. and Buddy Ebsen, at and 8:45.

Academy’s award for the expert handling of their parts in this film. All of which is further proof that talent doesn’t preclude charm-—the nicest kind of charm, (Copyright, 1939)

propaganda was made today by Rep. Francis X. Coyne, Rep. Coyne asserted that names were not a requisite for acting ability and cited a list which he compiled and which included James

GEORGE MURPHY “WOMEN MEN MARRY” Edgar Bergen Charlie McCarthy “LETTER OF INTRODUCTION”

Cagney, Clark Gable, Pat O’Brien, TRY A WANT AD IN THE TIMES. Bette Davis and Shirley Temple. THEY BRING QUICK RESULTS.

LITTLE OLD LADY ONCE STAGE STAR

HOLLYWOOD, April 5.—Police learned today that a little old lady who was so indignant about being taken to the hospital after she fainted in a Holiywood store, is Frankie Bailey, once famous as the “girl with the million-dollar legs.” Miss Bailey was a Broadway star with Weber and Fields. She lost a foriune and now, at 80 years of age, she lives on a pension. “Rest? My legs are still good enough to carry me. Where's my nat. Let me out of here. I'm going home.”

Gola-Easter Week ST Starts Friday! ~~ GINGER FRED

ROGERS ASTAIRE The Story ol VERNO

creek crossed the boulevard near Cahuenga, and all during the heydey of Western pictures that corner was the haunt of movie cowboys. The intersection was called “the water hole.” The men would stand there all day in costume, waiting for calls and whittling on the telephone poles. They almost cut down two of them. Today, with all jobs obtained through Central Casting, extras stay at their telephones and have no special gathering places. The bank at the Cahuenga corner is the best place in town to see stars on Wednesday afternoons— pay day. Hollywood Hotel is about the only old landmark remaining. Rudolph Valentino's first wife, Jean Acker, still rents the bridal suite there once a year on the anniversary of her niarriage. Grauman’s Chinese Theater, with celebrities’ footprints in the forecourt and wax figures in the gilded lobby, is a more recent but famous landmark. Lon Chaney’s bench is still at Hollywood and Vine. As an extra, he used to stand there and thumb rides toward Universal City. When he became a star, he'd drive by every morning and load his car with waiting e tras. He had a bench built for tna, and it still is maintained by Loon Chaney Jr.

REPORT TRIANGLE LEADS TO FILM BAN

MONTREAL, April 5 (U. P).— The Gazette said today it had been advised that the motion picture version of Emily Bronte’s “Wuther-

ing Heights” had been banned in Quebec province by the Quebec - Board of Film Censors. The censors, it was understood, objected to the triangular situation in which the heroine loves one man but marries another for his wealth and social position, and then drives her former fiance into the arms of her sister.

wt - NOW CIEE

Wallace Beery—Lionel B. Jackie Cooper °° ASURE TSLAND”

Don Ameche “THREE MUSKETEERS”

—Merle Oberon Y AND LADY” Care

she WO! r Was their strong eoough

FOR HAPPY EASTER—A GRAND MOVIE!

This is Jeanette. MacDonald's first picture since 22 million fans voted her FIRST in a nation-wide newspaper poll—and it’s the best of her, career! Not since M-G-M gave you “The Great Ziegfeld”, has the screen combined such heart-throbs; such hit songs; such dazzling spectacle.

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i with gorgeos 2

lacDONALD.

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LEW AYRES-IAN HUNTER: FRANK MORGAN

A ROBERT Z. LEONARD PRODUCTION Screen Play by Charles Lederer .

autiful Jeanette 9 a

EAST SIDE

155_E. RVOLL “Bt 15 ER gate ER oR BRA ON “3 MORE 3 Ri rhe 9:30 Ad Ted! A jute Revival KES opeve—Olive Oyle icky Mone eR: Penge “SEE HOW THEY ARE MADE"

EMERSON 4630 E. 16th 15¢

5:45 to 6.

1—“DUKE OF WEST POINT” 2—Claudette Colbert “ZAZA” 3—Jan Garber and Orchestra 4—Popeve “MUTINY AIN'T NICE”

LL LEE rge Raft—Dorothy Lamour

Geo “SPAWN “NEXT TIME I MARRY”

OF THE NORTH" MA

Paramount 5 AtrkaUiidns

1—D. Lamour 1 n 4 t-Anne Shirte x Eh 5350 52 gob, Paige "FLYING G-MER" at 810% 1—Fox News. Toor Comedy. SOUTH SIDE

New Garfield done.

Adolphe THANKS FOR EVERTTHING' SANDERS “‘afimis, Sm “KENTUCKY’ ____ “DOWN ON THE FARM” ___ NORTH SIDE

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Fiction’s Suavest Rogue, Played by

WILLIAM

With IDA LUPINO