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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (April 8, 1939)
Clare Boothe Comedy Is Satiric Fun Satire on Search for Scarlett Is 'Kiss The Boys Goodbye' Clare Boothe of “shooting cats” and “The Women” fame slings some more very sophisticated mud packs on the faces of the fair sex in her latest comedy, “Kiss the Boys Goodbye.” Although the author claims she wrote it as an allegory on Nazis and the Fascist method of govern ment, “Kiss the Boys Goodbye” will be read chiefly because it is a delightfully biting satire on the much touted search for a Scarlett O'Hara in Hollywood. Her heroine, a daughta of the ol South, suh, is Cindy Lou, brought from her be loved Georgia by publicity man Lloyd' Lloyd is the hope that she will not get the job. Hollywood Wise Guy Lloyd is planning for the role to go to a buxom peroxide mamma who will shortly be passe if she doesn't get a good role to bolster her slipping so-called prestige. Lloyd plans to show Missy Cindy Lou, in all her saccharine southern hospitality coyness, to a moronic cinema pro ducer—he has to be a producer, he’s got Z for a middle initial—and by way of contrast (inexperience vs. been-aroundedness) get the job for the fading movie queen. Morals Via Hollywood All this takes place at a New England summer home, where, though far from the unclouded skies of California, now blossom in colorful disarray the morals and manners of Hollywood. Reading “Kiss the Boys Good bye’’ is probably the second best thing to seeing it performed. It is fast, racy fun that will make Americans smile at themselves. Miss Boothe’s declaration that she is poking fun at Hitlerism, Inc. should be disregarded on first reading at least. After the laughs are put aside, read the author's in troduction and decide for your self whether her claim will hold water. Anyway, simple Cindy Lou has the last laugh on her hypocritical hosts and Author Boothe has the last laugh on the public's sucepti bility to “Scarlett fever” and gen eral gullibility for Hollywood pub licity. Harvard university has estab lished a radio workshop to explore new possibilities in the develop ment of broadcasting as an art form. jSEJSJSMSHSMSiilSJSISlSJSJSJSEiSElEEE! [ MORRIS OPTICAL COMPANY OPTOMETRISTS— —OPTICIANS We offer you capable, convenient optical service PROTECT YOUR VISION 1072 Willamette Gi3J3ISIgJ2I313JS13®3i3I3®SISr313JS13I3I3lKj3 The Emerald Reader’s Page Editor: Glenn Hasselrooth Contributors: Joan Jenness Jan Brevet The Pond of Truth By JAN BREVET Gating into the sombre pool, I saw a beautiful form. With a look so strange, and cruel ’Twas as niy heart was tom. And as I further gazed At the resemblance of my own, Too much was I amazed At the clear reflection shown. Looking longer still, The truth was realized then. Against my strength of will, 1 was one of many men. ’Seasoned Timber’ Tells Of Struggle Between Race Prejudice, Tradition Novel by Dorothy Canfield Advances Problems of Anti-Semitism, Democratic Ideals, Modernization of Old Schools One of New England’s greatest living novelists, Dorothy Canfield, has written, in “Seasoned Timber,” a timely and dramatic story of the struggle between race prejudice and democratic tradition. Pier scene is Vermont, and as an old Vermonter, she knows the land and the spirit of its people well enough to put a potential problem of their society into a powerfully moving document of present-day society. Timothy (Joulton Hulme, prin cipal of Clifford academy, who struggles with the meager budget of his school and with the “foot ball” ideas of his New York trus tee, is affectionately called “Old T. C.” by his students. But Tim othy’s 45 years have never seemed old to him until, incredibly enough, he finds himself deeply in love with a young teacher, a girl 20 years his junior. Of his second-youth love, Tim othy's dark-haired Susan knows nothing. Nor does his nephew, Canby Hunter; nor his laconic old friend, Mr. Dewey, town-meeting moderator; nor Aunt Lavinia, who lives in the past. Just as Timothy thinks that his unbegun love af fair is to become hi,s greatest; problem, his half public, half pri vate academy suddenly becomes the focal point of the town elec? tion, the instrument of power and material advantage if the people will have it so. Uproar in Vermont Anti-Semitism raises its head and becomes the issue on which the hot election turns. On the prospect that the school exclude all Jews and women students and become sufficiently “modernized” to cater to the sons of rich city families the scene turns into one of the wildest uproars the little town of Clifford, Windward coun ty. Vermont, has seen in its long and comparatively uneventful ex istence. Dorothy Canfield writes with a calm and unexcited skill that at times seems will become tedious. But the author has a keen sense of balance and weighs her problems with ease and sureness of touch. Her pictures of life in Timothy’s school, her careful eye from which no detail escapes, her keen per ception into human character show more clearly than ever before the Si AIM'S SUNDAY IT'S THE TALK OF AMERICA Wise, Witty! A Nation wide Hit't LeslieHOWARD r« Haxna.tdSka.wi YGMALION Academy Award Winner with Amazing New Stir Wendy HILLER Wilfred LAWSON Marie LOHR AN M-G-M PICTURE Of coarse it's as good as they wy Wrote It W ■ ' - plus - •Z^ADVENIUftESof. ms mm A WARNER BROS. PICTURE Wl th ROSELLfl TOWNE spirit of the New Englanders; for that matter the spirit of all Am ericans. For, though the author might have us believe that hers is a tale of a small community, whose troubles go unnoticed by the outer world, her story is one of drama that people of America may be forced to recognize and cope with. Her climax is carefully prepared for, and the power and intensity of its presentation is a bit of writ ing which Mrs. Canfield, for all the fine writing behind her, may favor ably compare with any she has ever done. . Since its publication March 2, “Seasoned Timber’’ has become one of the leading contenders on I best seller lists. According to fig ! ures at the Co-op, it is one of the most popular spring novels. The author, better known by her full name, Dorothy Canfield Fisher, is a descendant of a New England family who have been in America since the early seven teenth century. But most people do not know the interesting fact that the first Canfields, who came to America in 1636, were not Puri tans, but staunch Church of Eng land people who loved the good things of life. They first settled in Connecticut, and moved a cen tury later to Vermont to escape the Puritans. Throughout all of its 175 years, Arlington, Vermont, where Dorothy Canfield lives, has lacked that traditional austerity of the rural American scene. The Rector Emeritus of the parish was i recently head of the local athletic ! association which provides base ball games on Sunday afternoons. Liberal Heritage Dorothy Canfield's heritage of liberalism is thus well founded in intiquity. Her father and mother were both radical-minded people, great believers in the rights of man—and of woman. The notion that, before the feminist move ment women were always op pressed by their men-folks is dis proved by one of the Canfield old time stories. 1 When the younger branch of the Canfields came riding upon horse back from Connecticut in 1761 with the other first settlers of the town, that Canfield woman who was her great-great-great-etc. grandmother had laid down the law on the sub ject of having the right kind of water for the washing of her fine household linen. Hard water she would not endure. And most Ver mont water is hard. She alighted ! at every brook, took a cake of soap out of the pocket of her riding skirt and washed her handkerchief to see whether the water was soft enough to make a good lather. The reason the Canfield land and home is two miles out of the i village of Arlington is that this practical ancestress found there i one of the few brooks in the region which run through slate instead of limestone. "Here, where we can | have soft water, we'll settle,” she ' decreed. And there her descend | ants still are. Guaranteed Finishing DOTaON’S PHOTO JdiiOP I—. Postmaster Loses SAirts, Receives Book Publishers have received strange requests and publishers have received strange requests, but one received by Harcourt, Brace and company recently af ter publication of James A. Far ley’s “Behind the Ballots” is among the most amusing. The book is very popular among postmasters throughout the country, since a chapter on Far j ley’s term as postmaster general i is included. The strangest order blank ! came in the mail the other day from Ronnie Green, postmaster of Amory, Mississippi, contain ing under the legend Please send. ..me the following books this mes sage : “Shirts too large. Am returning same.” The publishers accepted this as ! one °f the molder forms of error which sometimes creep into en velopes. When, two days later the threatened shirts actually did arrive (opened in the edito rial department for a very hefty appearing manuscript), the pub lishers decided it was the most dumfounding error ever received by them. Mr. Green's odd action may mean, to him, any mail or der house was all right in a pinch. The Show Off Hero! . . . From Hollywood comes this story of Doug Corri gan, soon to appear in the “Flying Irishman.” It seems that Corrigan was invited for dinner abroad the luxurious yacht of William H. Leeds. Cocktails were served but Corrigan asked for ginger ale. The expensive elegance of the yacht afforded a fitting background for the following conversation: Mrs. Leeds: “Do you like ginger ale, Mr. Corrigan?” Corrigan: “No, it makes me belch!” Loaded! . . . Marquee billing in San Francisco: “They Gave Him a Gun”—and "Bingo!” Jitterbugs! . . . The hotter wax es are really taking a melting with aspirants in practically every liv ing organization warming up for the AWS shag contest. The contest ought to be a good deal—that is if the aspirants don’t get shy at the last moment. Radio! . . .Next Monday, the Lux Radio theater will present Errol Flynn, Brian Aherne, C. Aubrey Smith, and Jackie Cooper in a ra dio adaptation of “Lives of a Ben gal Lancer.” It can be heard lo cally over KOIN. Heil! . . . The new phone num ber of RKO’s casting office was HI 8537. Nothing wrong with that except when dialed spells H-I-T L-E-R. The number was imme diately changed. RKO is Jewish owned. Subtle.' . . . Did you happen to listen to the Lucky Strike pro gram the other week when W. C. Fields kept making- references to his son Chester? Get it—Chester Fields on a Lucky Strike program. Pigging! ... By the by giving Her favorite recording not only keeps that light shining in Her eyes but also puts you in good with her sorority sisters. I hope! Hurry . . . Once there were two penguins—a guy from the North Pole and a gal from the South Pole who met, went around to gether, and then parted. Several months later the North Pole pen guin received a cable from his gal friend. It read: “YOU'D BET TER DO SOMETHING. I'M WITH BIRD AT THE SOUTH POLE.” A Georgia Garden Center” has been established on the University j of Georgia campus. fJ ^te^uUSdLiiCIiJlCjehr'lrTr'l. y'-JIr'Ir’R'lr’I-'li-'h -'lr ‘ICl, ■: Clifford Odets, Young Playwright From Bronx, Writes Realistic Drama Success Began With 'Awake and Sing/ Story of Typical Middle-Class Family In New York Tenement District By JOAN JENNESS Clifford Odets, young Broadway playwright, has been keeping the critics and the theater goers guessing with his wide scope of play themes since 1935. He claims to be a realist and writes plays that carry real and definite punches. Odets says that his only business and purpose in this world is to present the truth dramatically, appealingly, and entertainingly to the public. He seems to carry out his plans by | his vivid character portrayals. The 1 humanity of his plays is irresistible : to all who read them. Odet’s first play to gain recog i nition was “Awake and Sing," the story of a middle-class family liv ing in New York’s Bronx. Odets, himself, lived in the Bronx during his childhood so his descriptions | are more or less true to form. The ! theme of “Awake and Sing” cen ters around Bessie and Myron Ber ger, a plodding middle aged cou ple, who sacrificed everything for their two children, Ralph and Hen nie. Bessie is the head of the fam ily and she engineers all of the family business, economic and so cial. Society Problem The Bergers are a problem to society as well as to their friends, because they live from day to day always thinking about some scheme that would make them rich quickly, and yet they are faced with the thought of having their landlord throw them out into the street as he has their neign bors the day before. Each charac ter is a selfish individual with ideas of some day gaining high premims for himself alone. Dozens of plays have been writ ten with the same plot—some com edies and some tragedies- but none has ever caught the real and human theme that Odets presents. “Waiting for Lefty” is the story of the New York City taxi strike in 1934. Odets presents a fast moving series of scenes concerning the various group ideas on the taxi cab driver's question “Shall we wait—or strike now?” ,'Tlie inside stories of the labor leader's unions are revealed and painted a bright red. Edna His Wife Edna, the struggling housewife, who is trying to feed, clothe and educate her two children on her husband’s nominal salary of six dollars a \teek urges her husband Joe to strike now and lead his fel low workers against his company’s hard boiled executives, who lap up the gravy, Joe, a hard working, easy-going chap, can see her point of view, but he is afraid of the consequences. Irving is another cab driver, who is in love with Florrie, but he realizes that even people in love must eat and that two cannot live as cheaply as one even though it might sound logi cal. He wants to strike immediate ly, but Florrie fears for his life, because she is the simple, young thing type wiho reads the bloody side of the news and believes it. Odets expresses each one of the characters' individual ideas, and he contrasts the usual down-trod den average workman with the ‘‘big shots” in the executive posi tions. “Rocket To The Moun” is Odet’s newest play. It was released in January 1938, and so far it has received little favorable criticism. The story centers around a den tist, his wife, an office girl, and a smooth but clever dance director. In other words the same old love triangle with a fourth thrown in just to make it more complicated. Dentist’s Troubles Dr. Stark is a capable dentist who has always done as others want and expect. His wife has all of the social climbing aspects, but Butcher Boy Doesn’t Like Cucumbers A telephone call from a but cher was one of the many con gratulatory messages Mildred Walker, author of "Dr. Norton's Wife," received after recent pub lication of her novel. In Great Falls. Montana, her town, she was honored by felici tations from a local meat dealer (hat went something like this: “That book of yours was all right, but I got a criticism to make. That doctor you got there is supposed to be a hearty kind of a man, and you have him go ing places where they have cu cumber sandwiches. Now, Miss Walker, it would be much more appropriate to have meat sand wiches, or liverworst anyway!" ’New Western Front’ Topical New Book By Stuart Chase Stuart Chase’s “The New West ern Front" explains the various ways in which the United States differs from Europe, and tells why we do not need to go to war. Chase points out that the United States is not like Europe, divided into 27 sovereign nations with ar mies, navies, .spy systems, Maginot lines, tariff walls, diplomatic corps. Any foe of the United States must cross thousands of miles of ocean, to find a nation with almost immeasurable strength and mili tary security, with a sufficiency of food and materials which no other power in the world can match. The author has illumined his argument with an array of facts, and until a real emergency comes he urges that the American people be not stampeded into war. she is afraid to have her husband move his practice to another lo cality even though it would add more prestige to their standing, because she has a fear of being without security. Although she is strong and domineering in most respects she is weak and depend ent when it comes to taking a chance. Odets portrays the wife in this play as the head of the fam ily just as he does in “Awake And Sing." In short, women seem to have the stronger influences. One of his best character por trayals is the one of Willy Wax, the dance director. His part is both funny and pathetic. Odets shows him as the effeminate Hollywood Romeo with little background or education. To people who are fed up with the movie star attitude the idea may be conceived that Willy Wax could easily be one of the extra stars that Odets must have come in contact with on his lecent trips to Hollywood. This play seems to lack the usual amount of interest and spark that is found in Odet's earlier plays. (To be concluded) EASTER CORSAGES Will she wear your flower • Roses • Iris • Narcissi • Gardenias • Orchids • Bouvardia College Flower Shop Phone 3018 Atrosw from Sigma. Chi jtf. In the Wind l - ~ ~ Noel Coward . . . pauses to light a cigaret as he looks askance at the photographer. lie probably looked much the same at some of his recent critics, who liked his current Broadway musical comedy, “Set to Music” because Beatrice I.illie and several other comics kept it moving, but were thumbs down on what was left in the original Coward “wit.” FOB SK11ERS “The Hannes Schneider Ski Technique” by Benno Rybizka is the newest book on this famous skiing method, now taught official ly only in America because of the Nazis’ destruction of the Austrian school. It carries a foreword by Hannes Schneider himself and is copiously illustrated with photo graphs. SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL The seventeenth annual collec tion by Thomas Moult, “The Best Poems of 1938,” contains nearly 100 poems which appeared during the year, collected from English and American periodicals. Zeiss Cameras, Agfa Film DOTSON’S PROF. HAL YOUNG of the U. of O. School of Music TUN FIRST CHRISTIAN CHURCH Invites you to share with them in their Easter Service Sunday, April 9 I)r. S. Earl Childers, Pastor Novels, Plays Biographies Received Co-op Gets Spring Books for Student 'Consumption' «* - Topical novels, current Broad , way plays, and biographies are in j eluded in the many new spring books added to the High Hat li i brary in the University Co-op. Among the plays are Paul Vin cent Carroll’s “The White Steed,” the Stark Young translation of Chekhov’s “The Sea Gull,” Robert Sherwood’s "Abe Lincoln in Illi nois,” and Charles Morgan’s “The Flashing Stream.” In biography, there are Edith Bolling (Mrs. Woodrow) Wilson’s “My Memoir,” the annotated and unexpurgated Reynal and Hitch cock edition of Hitler’s “Mein Kampf,” and Nora Wain’s “Reach ing for the Stars.” Among the newer novels are John Steinbeck’s “Grapes of Wrath,” Mildred Walker’s “Dr. Norton’s Wife,” and Faulkner’s “The Wild Palms.” Various non-fiction works arc George Seldes’s "Lords of the Press," G. W. Seaton’s “What to Do and See in Mexico,” George Fielding Eliot’s "The Ramparts _(Please turn t,o Pape four) THE Unit). fCO-OP’ for ♦ BOOKS . FOUNTAIN ♦ PENS ♦ TENNIS SHOES RACKETS BALLS ^ ZIPPER ♦ NOTEBOOKS ♦ SOCIAL STATION’RY TYPEWRITERS it. pays to buy at flic Unit). TO-OP’ An Afternoon on the Millrace 'T'HAT S liow sparkling, how colorfully new your clothes will look when lauiulered or cleaned by us. ghT PHONE 252 DOMESTIC LAUNDRY & DRY CLEANING ll;; W. 7th Ave. Delivery Serviec Superior Service — We Prove It