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THE SUNDAY OREGOXIAN, PORTLAND, DECEMBER 31, 1923
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What Makes a Beautiful Girl?
The Third of a Series of Articles in Which Mr. Zieg-
feld Gives Expert Opinion and Advice on Just
What Beauty . Is, and How You Can Tell
Who Has It and Who Hasnt.
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BY FliQRENZ ZIBGFELD, JI,
AjaSEICANS, mora than any otlief
nationality, have a passion tor
Blenderness.
herefof girls who would win beauty
Iprlfses abroag woulij never take first
rises Jjj a, (Spotest here; they would ha
considered tQQ fat. The Venua da MIJa
would sever ba accepted fof a beauty
chorua nowadays; phe would ba too tall,
toe fat, too-well, she wovld be Ineligible
for lot Pf reaions.
fhasi ar tha measurements that I
weuJi fjya. for a typical Zestei show
girl ol today. They are not given as ft
standard that must be adhered to, but
merely aa a suggestion of what are con-:
eidered about the right measurements.
Height Fiva feet, five and a half
Inches.
Weight One hundred and twenty
Jounds.
Foot Size five.
The height should be about seven and
cne-half times the length of the head.
The head should be four times the
length of the nose.
When the arms are hanging straight
at the sides, they should be three-fifths
the length of thejbody.
Quite naturalljf, I do not Insist that
the girls whom 1 accept for one of my
productions shall exactly meet these re
quirements. I haven't an Idea whether
they do or not, except as they seem to
xne to be well proportioned.
Almost Criminal to Be Fat.
Nowadays it's almost a crime to be too
fat. Aa I have said, Americana have a
passion for slenderness. Other nations
don't share this feeling. I have heard
that recently, when an American-made
motion picture was taken to Germany,
the exhibitors featured one of the minor
characters in their advertising, because
she was bigger and fatter than the star,
whom they considered far too thin.
History tells us that the women of
ether days did all they could to assure
plumpness. The Empress Theodora was
accustomed to spend days in warm baths,
followed by days in bed.
In many countries today, it is what Is
called the vital type of woman that is
accepted as the most beautiful that is,
the woman of soft contours, who is rather
plump, slow moving, languorous.
Bnt in the United States we insist that
If a woman expects to be considered
beautiful, she must be slender. : One
would think that the modern chorus
girl, between performances and rehears
als, and the activity of her everyday life,
would have no difficulty in keeping thin.
Yet there are no more ardent devotees of
horseback riding, swimming and other
forms of vigorous exercise than these
girls. They are tremendously interested
la keeping their figures; they have to be!
"How do you keep thin?" "Are you
dieting?" "Want to go riding before
breakfast tomorrow morning?" It's no
infrequent thing to hear , such remarks
when they chat off stage.
Nobody realizes more keenly than does
the chorus girl that beauty must be
cared for if it is to last. The chorus girl
who loses her beauty is likely to loss her
BEAUTY'S YARDSTICK jW" fjf J I lJ
Tie eyes sftonW 6e fie lenfi of XMmVK
info wo eqaal parts. . Jm 'V1 tf f VJT "X W stoCv "
Aline drawn through the middla ri E , V ' -
of the eyes and one drawn U f ; N Jll w"
through the bottom of the nose " A . .Wl -
sftonZd fvtfe ffte ace into jf fa --i.
thirds. I;?!? N .V
The month should be one and f k "'X 'VlTi j f
one-half times as long as the f j J v X - r V.? f l-V
The face should be four times as ' - C' . C VV X ?V
: 1 r t I rAwv4. t s y F
SkH llM 111 Greenwich
' ' 1 n flift, 1 iJ VUIaje Follies
. " 3jA ' 'V V .1 4 1 1 keeps her
( VvTn"''" frvA''f 11 figure what it
. V f - I Ti- X mil me&
'0t0mmm - 4 : s v v ;4Ab; llll
Jon. And these girls have to look out for
the future not always because they
need to support themselves, but because
they like being on the stage, and would
hate to give up their profession. There
fore they see to it that they stay slender,
for the sake of the future as well as be
cause of the present.
And oh, how most of them scorn a fat
woman! She is looked upon as a lazy
thing who hasn't strength of character
enough to get thin. Their feeling for
her is rather like that of the workers in
the beehive for the drone. They work
at being beautiful and she doesn't,
you see.
Three Types of Beautiful Figures.
In giving the measurements which I
set down a moment ago, as I said then,
I was considering the average girl.
But there are three distinct types of
beauties in a revue nowadays the
ponies, the girls of medium height, and
the show girls.
The ponies are the little girls, who do
most of the dancing. There is an entire
ballet of them in this year's "Follies."
Many a well-known musical star has
come from the ranks of these "littlest
girls" the American public is partial to
the petite and pretty girl who has talent
and charm.
The girls of medium height are used
in nearly all the numbers they are the
backbone of the chorus. I have given
you approximate measurements for them
THESE MEASUREMENTS ADDED MAKE A SUM OF BEAUTY
HeightFive feet 5J-J inches. The height should be times the
length of the head.
The head should be four times the length of the nose.
The arms should be three-fifths the length of the body.
Weight One hundred and twenty pounds. v
Foot Size 5. "
because I consider them . the average
American girl, representatives in size aa
well as in facial beauty of the best that
America offers in the way of beautiful
womanhood.
The show girls are taller, though of
course not excessively tall. Five feet
eight Is the limit. Theirs is the dignified,
type of beauty. The same general pro
portions are right for them as for the
average girl.
In Which Class Are Yon?
Now, many women would be better
looking If they sat down and thought
themselves over carefully, deciding to
which of these three types they belong.
They certainly will fit into one of the
three, Many a woman is not stunning
simply because her looks and carriage
are misfits. She is really a showgirl and
she walks like a pony. She tries to be
cunning, as only a small, woman can be,
instead of claiming for herself the more
gracious ways of beauty. Or perhaps
she's one of those who belong in the sec
yond class, and tries to fit her looks into
the ways of "those who are in the third.
Moreover, many a woman is colorless
simply because she doesn't make any
effort to find out just what is the proper
accent for her beauty. She goes along
like a man with his eyes shut; and then
looks at the girls she sees on the stage
and wishes she were as beautiful as they
are.
The woman who doesn't know where
she belongs, ought to losa no time in find-
ing out. If she's the small, delicate,
quick moving type she can adopt the
ways of the ponies she can be as much
of a sprite as she likes. The world ex
pects it of her.
If she's the average type, she can take
a little from both of the other classes,
depending largely on her other charac
teristics to determine the side on which
the balance shall lie. If she is the dark,'
langorous sort of girl, the showgirl's
charm is for her; if she's blonde, viva
cious, bubbling over with fun, she's the
pony type.
The Carriage Makes the Girl.
It is most Important for a woman to
classify her beauty, because her way of
carrying herself is sure to have much to
do with proclaiming to the world that she
is beautiful. We have all known girls
who really were good looking, but
weren't so recognized by their friends be
cause they walked in a lacksadalsical,
stoop-shouldered fashion, held them
selves badly, made no effort to seem
beautiful. -
Then perhaps they fell In love. In
stantly they were transformed. They
straightened up, held their shoulders
tack and their heads up, looked ilka
something. And people exclaimed, "How
good looking Soandso has become!"
Now, I insist that the girls who ara
given places in one of my revues shall ba
as beautifully straight as the stem of tha
American beauty rose whose name wa
have taken for them. They must carry
themselves aa if they knew that they
were beautiful. They must no hunch
their shoulders up, or let their bodies
collapse in the middle, emulating tha
"debutante slouch" that a few years ago
swept across tha country like a scourge.
How You Can Get It.
I know of no better way to acquire this
carriage than by taking dancing lessons.
Not ballroom dancing, but tha sort of
aesthetic dancing that is taught nowa
days in schools of the better type. Danc
ing of this sort works wonders. Of course,
one reason for this is that it develops
perfect balance, which is at the bottom
of all beautiful standing and walking.
It gives perfect control of the arms and
legs, so that a girl can stand gracefully
with her arms hanging at her sides, re
laxed and yet beautifully straight
Vigorous phyisical exercise will not
assure you of standing well; it is likely
to make for hardness rather than grace,
unless it ia balanced against dancing. A
certain amount of it Is absolutely neces
sary, but it must have dancing as its
complement
The girl who carries herself well ia
free from self-consciousness; her body
Is so well trained that she can forget it
in thought of what she is doing. It is
u&ually the woman who stands badly who
Is awkward. No matter how pretty a
girl's features and figure are, if when she
first comes to see me she stands awk
wardly, and shuffles when she walks
across my office, I can see that she is
temperamentally out of proportion, and
am likely to select another girl who is
perhaps not quite so pretty, but whose
carriage is better. I know that the first
girl's defects could be overcome by train
ing, but have not the time to train
beauty.
Try Observation. J
One of the best ways to cultivate
beauty is to watch beautiful women. I
Dave seen charming little country girls
who were pretty, but no more than that,
become beautiful after a few months in
New York.
That was because they had had the
opportunity to watch really beautiful
women, and to take notes on what beauty
is Often distinctive beauty lies in the
turn of the head, the movement of the
body. It is elusive, but it Is the thing
that makes one woman stand out while
others pass unnoticed. The girl who.
wants to go on the stage should go to
the theater Just as often as she possibly
can, and study the stage's beautiful
women as she would study a, book.
She should pick out those whose type
she is, and watch them carefully. Then
she can adapt what she likes best about
them to her own needs. I do not mean
that she should imitate tham merely
that she should learn from them. Car
riage, posture, the manner In which they
I it and stand these things are all Important.-and
the stage offers every wom
an an opportunity to learn from living
j -I
The danger of learning in this way is
that a girl may let her new-found knowl
edge make her artificial. Then she be
comes awkward, and no matter how
beautiful her figure may be, if she han
dles it awkwardly she is not even pretty.
But if she can pick out another wom
an's best points and then use them to her
own advantage, she'll get results that
will astonish her!
Wild Animals Trapped Alive.
A remarkable article illustrated with
very unique photographs appears in the
December Wide World Magazine under
the caption of "Trapping Wild Animals
Alive " It is written by Major Jack Allen
and the feats he describes are calculated
to make the ordinary big-game hunter
blink with amazement. "From first to
last" says Major Allen, "I never use a
gun except in the utmost extremity of
self-defense." The only equipment he
uses consists of lassoes, lengths of chain
and bare hands! With these bloodless
instruments Captain Allen has captured
such formidable beasts as jaguars,
leopards and tigers. He has had many
narrow escapes, from death and his ex
periences make very thrilling reading.
Major Allen says the strength of the
tiger is practically equai to that of the
lion, while he has the reputation, among
hunters, of being far more courageous.
Therefore the process of capturing a tiger
alive involves a considerable degree of
risk, but on no occasion has Captain Allen
met with a mishap. -
The Misleading Placard.
A restaurant keeper who apparently
had a weakness for the "high-falutin"
placed In his shop window a placard in
scribed thus:
MOLLUSCOUS BIVALVES
In Every Style.
A couple of young men, manifestly
from "up country,", were observed stand
ing In front of the window, engaged in
spelling out the sign.
"What's them, Harry?" ona asked the
other.
"I dunno," said Harry.
"Let's go up the street a bit and see if
we kin find an eyester saloon. I feel
Ilka eatin" some eyesters," said the other.