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About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 8, 1959)
flamboyant gambler for monumental stakes. Here are some examples: He was the first to try sound dialogue ("The Jazz Singer"). He inaugurated movies with 'bad-guy heroes ("Little Caesar"). He introduced realistic themes based on headlines ("Public Enemy," "I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang") . He started the cycle of biographical films ("House of Rothschild"). He was the first to touch previously untouchable subjects (the Depression, "Grapes of Wrath"; lynching, "The Ox Bow Incident"; anti-semitism, "Gentle man's Agreement"; and mental illness, "The Snake Pit").' He pioneered shooting in authentic lo cales ("Prince of Foxes" was filmed in Italy, "Snows of Kilimanjaro" in Africa). In 1953, when television was flexing the executioner's ax over Hollywood's neck, Zanuck startled the entertainment world with a new wide-screen process called Cinemascope, driving millions of fans back into theaters. But in that Paris hotel room Zanuck was wrestling with the odds on his biggest gamble of all. "The Roots of Heaven" is the third film he's .made as an independent producer since breaking with 20th Century-Fox in 1956, and it's the costliest he's ever been associated with. . He also took a big chance on the cast. Neither Errol Flynn, Trevor Howard, nor Miss Greco is likely to start a box-office stampede, but Zanuck insists, "They're perfect for the story." Then, again demanding "authentic lo- -cale," Zanuck shipped the entire cast and crew to a torrid part of the Dark Con tinent where no movie had ever been attempted before the stifling jungles of French Equatorial Africa. There his troubles really began. - At noon, the temperature hovered at .125 degrees in the shade with no shade. By midnight, it dropped to as low as 95. Within weeks, everyone in the company, except raw-boned director John Huston, became ill some so severely that they had to be rushed back to France. There were nearly 1,000 sick calls, and at one point the situation became so desperate that the company doctor warned Zanuck he could no longer be responsible for the health of the cast and crew unless they were moved out. Zanuck hired trucks and airplanes and hurriedly shipped everyone 1,200 miles north. Nevertheless, malaria, diarrhea, ' and heat exhaustion were still common. But the gamble paid off. By some mon umental scrambling, the location scenes were finished just 12 hours before Africa's rainy season began, and Miss Greco re covered in time to shoot the wrap-up scenes in Paris, one day before Zanuck had to relinquish his studio space. poRTUNATELY, Zanuck has always thrived ' on such excitement. It wasn't poverty that prompted his love of adventure. He was born 56 years ago in Wahoo, Neb., into a fairly well-to-do family. His grandfather got rich build ing railroads, and his father ran a grain elevator and a hotel. But young Darryl was something of a juvenile delinquent. When his mother made a brief trip to California for her health, she enrolled Darryl in a military academy. He attended classes occasionally, but mostly played hooky to sneak down and watch them make movies. Eventually he got a job as an extra at 50 cents a day playing an Indian maiden! When his mother discov ered this escapade, she shipped him back to Nebraska. He wasn't any better there. When he was 14, he quit school, lied about his age, enlisted in the Sixth Nebraska Infantry, and was sent to the Mexican border. It wasn't his size, either, that gave him the courage to test fate. A giant with ideas, Zanuck has always been something of a shrimp physically. When he went to France as a private with the A.E.F., he saw action for nearly a year at the front lines as a messenger. He was too small for fighting. Ironically, it was Zanuck's overseas quest for adventure that led back to Hol lywood. Some of his letters home were printed in the local newspaper and en couraged him, after the armistice, to try writing. By 1924 he had sold so many scenarios to Warner Brothers that they hired him to write scripts for their great est star Rin Tin Tin. Zanuck turned out an average of a story a week for a year. By 1927 he had learned the business so well that the Warner brothers made him executive producer at a mild salary boost from $150 a week to $5,000 and the "boy wonder" (he was 25) was on his way. In 1928 came "The Jazz Singer" and the revolution in Hollywood. For relaxation, Zanuck finds golf or fishing too tame. He needs excitement and goes out of his way to get it. He has hunted Kodiak -bears in Alaska, lions in Africa, but so far his only injury has been a head injury suffered while playing polo. Zanuck is married to Virginia Fox, who gave up a screen career when she be- . came his wife. They have three children, Darrylin, Susan (now Mrs. Andre Ha kim), and Richard, who is following his father as a motion-picture producer. Old photo shows Al Jolson and Zanuck, who John Huston directed Zanuck $4-rnill!on helped make first talkie, "The Jan Singer." gamble, "The Roots of Heaven, in Africa. FamilM Weekly, February . 1959 25 BREAK THE CHAIN LAXATIVE HABIT Millions find gentle, safe relief with Kellogg's A 11-Bran and milk For irregularity caused by lack of bulk Wouldn't you like to rid your self of harsh laxative drugs and find a safe, gentle way to natu ral regularity? You can, you know, because there is a way, a delicious way, the Kellogg's All-Bran way. And every year more and more people discover that this good cereal food can do for them what laxativedrugs nevercould. Actually, there's a good rea son why Kellogg's All-Bran works when laxative drugs don't. You see, one of the com mon, causes of irregularity is lack of bulk in the diet. 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SLEEP-EZE Tablets help you fall asleep fast keep you sleeping soundly all night. "Effective as barbitu rate pilla and more restful," leading medical journal re ports. "Well within the' safe medication zone", says Coronet Magazine. The SLEEP-EZE formula con tains no barbiturates or other toxic, habit-forming drugs. That's why you wake rested and refreshed, eager to be up and doing. Get SLEEP-EZE Tablets today at any drug counter. No prescription needed. Money back guarantee. Don't lie awake again tonight ! Just take SleeD'Eze ana close your eyes next fhino I J&sm I APOnifa Mvt Minn vaji bMiu Family Weekly, February S, 1959
