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About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 26, 1936)
Looking fem Over -' WITH GAIL GARDNER Five Star Motion Picture Editor Gossip From the Studios and Social Centers of Hollywood by Jane Anita Lou lie IN A popular Boulevard cafe the other evening, absorbing sustenance, looking and being looked at, we . saw Mr. and Mrs. Rupert Hughes, Ann Page and Jack Warner, the Warner Baxters and the Charlie Butterworths . . . and they looked as if they didn't have a care in the world. Casting directors say J. Farrcll MacDonald looks exactly like "the ordinary man." Wonder what a composite picture of the ordinary man would look like? Jack Oakie's mother used to introduce Willian Jennings Bryan, in the good old days, to Chau tauqua audiences . . . Galli Curci is building a .iev home in Beverly Hills . . . Clau dette Colbert is shopping fo. new furniture. . For a very young actress, Anita Louise has become a veteran night clubber. It's a poor week when Anita is not dining with some juvenile lead. . . . Her mother, Mrs. Ann Bresford, thinks its good relaxation for Anita after a day's work at the studio. Gloria Swanson's favorite song is "Penthouse Serenade," while Billie Burke favors that nice oldtimer, "Alice Blue Gown." Hard faces . . . white sunlight shining obliquely against dusty pavements . . . feet moving quickly along the Boulevard . . . gold gloves ... color fad ing into a thousand patterns behind the mountains . . . hands clutching after vanished dreams . . . dis illusion . . . that is Hollywood in January. English author, James Hilton, just over from dear old London to adapt "Camille" for the next Greta Garbo picture, is getting his first close-up of "these unusual Americans." He has published nine novels and is in his early thirties, The order has gone out at M-G-M to "build up" Allan Jones, whom Louis B. Mayer believes will be the Clark Gable of the coming year. Jones did some good work in the Marx Brothers comedy and is now slated to carry on in "The Student Prince," which was originally planned for Nelson Eddy. Myrna Loy, always exclusive, has disappeared completely from Hollywood's social life since she built her cabin in the San Bernardino mountains ... a great combination that ... to be in love and to own a cabin in the mountains at the same time. Since Joan Blondell's divorce she has become the popular din ner and dancing partner of all the bachelors in town. Joan, always a good looker, is taking a new fling at life since she gained her marital freedom. Nothing helps so much, in a fling, 'tis said, as a brand-new wardrobe, a slimmer figure and a new style of hair dress all of which Joan has. After Sam Goldwyn gets back from Europe he is going to put "Come and Get It," the Edna Ferber novel, into production. Edna has finished the ending she would like to see in the movie version, She was never satisfied with the ending of her novel. The pulchritudinous Virginia Bruce cops the lead and that's a big break for Vir ginia. Jimmy Gleason withdraws to his workshop when bored with life, to make hobby horses and pogo sticks . . . the David Selznieks (Irene Mayer) are preparing to greet a second heir within a month or two . . . not to mention the Norman Fosters, who will shop for a cradle about mid-summer. That mythical guy, the follow who writes open letters to the editors of newspapers, is to be seen on the screen. In "Exclusive Story," Charles Trowbridge will portray the follow who is unseen but not unknown in every newspajx'r office in the world. The Columbia studios have started on a new cycle .of high-Hwored productions. Richard Dix is doing "Devil's Squadron," Bruce Cabot is work ing in "Money Mad," and Gary Cooxr is taking the lead In "Opera Hat." Cowboys and Indians are back with us at the RKO Radio studios. Three hundred extras aponr in some covered wagon scenes of .Wheeler and Woolsey's current comedy feature, "The Wild West." Ralph Forbes, English actor, is before the cameras this week in a C. C. Burr production called "I'll Name the Murderer." Ray K. Johnson is directing. Wishing to get away from it all, Clark Gable's next holiday will be sont in a lonely valley about a hundred miles from Taos, New Mexico, where trout fishing is said to be excellent. Clark doesn't PAGE FOUR Joan Blondell f ' I it V. i ;:r;" - mAjv mi -.'- Actually they aro Mr. and Mrs. Franchot Tone, but their domestic life is reserved tor themselves and ot the movie fans. Publicly, of course, she's Joan Crawford. s '.-' Marriage and Career? Joan Crawford and G Husband Have Both and Like it Domestic Side of Her Life With Franchot Tone Hidden But on the Screen, They Seek Fame Together By DONNA RISHER FRANCHOT TONE will never be "the man Joan Crawford married." This well-mannered young man with a wistful smile is, and will remain, a personality in his own right, a player of stage and screen distinguished from other players by the fact that he has a good speaking voice and an unnamed quality designated as "something" apart from personality. And his marriage, if he is able ts maintain the independent stand he ha3 taken with his studio, will forever remain a thing apart from his career. To this Joan agrees. In fact, the Tones have already refused to sub mit to "homey" pictures taken together for pub licity purposes. It is their wish to live within their own palatial walls, secure from the eyes of news paper readers. Unless they undergo a change of heart, there will be no pictures of Joan in a morn ing negligee pouring the morning coffee at the breakfast table, with young Tone gazing fondly at her on the other side of the urn. Such intimate glimpses of their happy domes ticity, tho studio reports, are not to be photo graphed, not for a minute. Meanwhile, few movie fans know much about the youthful groom. ANEW YORKER by birth, he comes from a wealthy family and when or if his popularity should wane in Hollywood, he can return to the family circle and enter into the carborundum busi ness an artificial compound of carbon and silicon which his father, Frank J. Tone, heads. This chance to enter business, however, was turned down by young Tone while a student at Cornell. Thiro a desire to express himself in the drama grew within him after he was elected to the presidency of the Cornell Dramatic Club. Upon graduation, he entered stock in Buffalo, leaving the next season for New York, where he received his first real training in the Group Thea ter, the Thentcr GuiH and the New Playwright's Theater in Groenwich Village. In Hollywood he has been cast as a "gentleman" by the movie-working officials. Tone doesn't mind the role, but he does prefer parts which would allow him to "dig in" to ."work inside, mentally," instead of from "v:thov.t." He looks upon his -vork, in "Mutiny of the Bounty" with pleasure because he said it was an inspiration to him to work with Charlie Laughton. He had "more fun." however, in the pictures where he appeared with Joan, such as "Today We Live" and "Dancing Lady." "But if you noticed," he declares, "I always lost her to some other fellow." IF THE time ever comes when Tone and his wife can get a leave at the same time from their studio, they want to visit New York and jointly appear in a stage play. Neither has any compunction of merging their careers, it seems, in the consciousness of the pub lic; it is only their home life that must not be exposed to public view. Both Franchot and Joan have become more or less exclusive during the last three years, taking little part in the social life of Hollywood. Young Tone objects to the movie center, on the ground that everything is either all social or all work. He thinks the atmosphere here is not con ducive to the happy medium of living good con versation and inspiration. His intimates are few and when he is not work ing he is indulging his fondness for music and books. A collector of books in a small way, he has acquired some valuable tomes on the art of acting. Seldom does he go in for sports like so many of the actors in Hollywood.. No strenuous hor3cback riding or golf can lure him away from his own fireside during leisure hours. In fact, he considered the horseback riding he did in "The Lives of a Bengal Lancer" enough to last him a lifetime. ' He is of Irish descent, the French-sounding Franchot comes from his mother's people. say whether he will be lonely in the lonely valley or not. Probably not. Warren Williams rides to the studio in a new portable dressing room. It is equipped with radio, wardrobe racks, phone and a couch. Herbert Mundin has challenged Edward Arnold to a checker duel. The losrr must take the winner and his wife to Palm Springs for a week-end. Donald Woods was born with the name of Ralph Louis Zink in Erandon, Manitoba, Canada. He has appeared in more than 350 stage plays during his career in stock. A Shot at Some Real Fans Who Tell the Stars What to Do ' Arc fo - X mm V fry 12l Bette Davis Leslie Howard Smle Trscy, the daughter of Spencer Tracy, is getting a lesson in lariat throwing from her dad at the left: center Is Stuart Erwin, M-G-M comedian, who doesn't look so funny with his recently arrived daughter, June Dorothea: right, Chester Morris and his small daughter Cynthia tnjoy a swim In the Morris pool at their Beverly Hills Horns. CHARACTERIZED by a bustle of activity, this waning winter season finds motion picture screerfs everywhere in luxuriant bloom. One of the finest is "The Petrified Forest," a gripping tale of love and heroism laid in the color ful Arizona desert, starring Leslie Howard and Bette Davis. It is the sort of pic ture the whole family will discuss when it gets to talking movies at the dinner table, because the story is one that could and often does in these United States happen indiscriminately to most anybody. It is based on a common event seen daily in the newspapers gangsters after pulling off a job, stopping at a service station for gas. There the action begins ano ends. Howard rlavs the part of a dis illusioned, frustrated writer who has been living off tho bounty of a wealthy wife. He decides to regain his self-respect, to find the beauty he thinks he has missed. His search leads him to a service station 15 miles from the Petrified Forest. There he also finds Eette Davis, who as Gabby, an American-French "rirl with a flair for modern art and a longing for love, keeps him interested. Soon the action finds the gangsters, the lovers, a sheriff's posse and whatnot all together and shooting it out. Howard is snot. But you'll like ths ending, or at least yo'u should appreciate it be cause the Warner Brothers, First National scratched their heads for days in worriment, trying to figure out the right fadeout com patible with box' office demands. Breathtaking shots of the desert. EMERGING from the open spaces, we go farther down the street and on a neighboring screen watch "The Widow from Monte Carlo," co-starring Do lores Del Rio and Warren Williams. Since the screen play is an adaptation from the English stage success, "A Present from Margate," it abounds in Duchesses, Lords and His Majesty's men. Dolores plays the part of the Duchess Inez, who ' to escape the boredom of entertaining relatives, . slips out of her home to the Casino for an evening at the gaming tables. There she meets Warren Williams (Major Chepstow). The designing rela tives insist Dolores marry their nephew, Colin Clive (Erick Richmond) of the Diplomatic Service, but Dolores, after being compromised well, write your own ticket. Elaborate sets, beautiful gowns and good jpho tography. The picture is entertaining, but not one to further Miss Del Rio's career or improve her box-office draw. . ACROSS the way the name of Benita Hume looms in front of the theater. Benita is the girl, you remember, who escaped so successfully from the blind anger of Johnny Weismuller cinematically, of course in "Tarzan Escapes," but who does not have such good for tune when she clashes with Edmund Lowe in her latest screen effort, "The Garden Murder Case." Benita, a lovely trained nurse, although under suspicion, helps clear up the baffling deaths of her patients, to the satisfaction of Philo Vance (Eddie Lowe). Philo, by the way, falls in love for the very first time in his long series on the screen. The object of his affection is Virginia Bruce, who gets a chance to show off some lovely new gowns and a brand new blond bob. The offering seems to have been made to order for the thousands of theater goers who follow Philo and his Hawkshaw ad ventures. THAT hard-fisted guy, James Cagney, is still busting his carefree way through six reels of this, his latest, "Ceiling Zero." Ever since "Here Comes the Navy" became a nation-wide hit, Cag ney and his bosses have been praying for another picture just as popular. Luck, it seems, perches on ineir snoulders. tor this new vehicle contains what it takes, it seems, to make Cagney admired. It is a thrilling aviation story about three pals Gagney, Pat O'Brien and Stuart Erwin, in a il.M.. r: J .. u : - . - i r uiiwitoji ii i--iiuouij iu uo or die Sg for each other. There is danger, iuvc, Minure, puiiios ana aeain, not to mention the pretty heart interest in this modern flicker. The smashing finale Cagney in an exciting plane crash with O'Brien in the fadeout hanging Cagney's "washed out" sisrn on l bulletin board. The nipture una mnrl,. to appeal to youth. It moves fast and is intelli gently photographed. Jr. Benita Hume i ' M James Cagney the airport';
