Judge — March 30, 1918 — page 7: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

My Movie Self By Benyasun De Casseres HERE was a mighty glare on the sea and the air hung limply in space like an old gray ghost; but the claret lemonade was good, and the band, sta- tioned in the foyer of the hotel, was playing one of those Vienna waltzes that eat up care and put into the empty goblet of our brains the fizz and beady wink of cham- pagne. The portico was empty except for me, as all the guests were inside gathered around the bandstand. A “movie” actor’s life, unlike the policemen in “The Pirates of Penzance,” is a happy one; but even he needs a vacation, and this was mine. I let myself go to the strains of the waltz and the cold trickle of the lemonade through my vitals, when I was astonished to see a curious phantom made of prisms, diaphanous and glowing, walk out of the sea, and take a seat in the empty rocker on the other side of my table. “T am your Movie Self,” this being said to me com- placently, finishing my claret lemonade in a gulp. “You have been before the machine so many years that you, like all the vets of the film, have begotten another self, made up of light, air and ? “And claret lemonade?” I asked sarcastically, fish- Draion by Muex Sass Prte Sasso AC “Pardon me, sir, but would you mind parking your feet somewhere else?” Drawn by Rooxey Tuosrsox Romantic Ruth receives a photo of the soldier who got her sweater. ing with the straws for the maraschino cherry at the bottom of the glass. “Ah! we’re always thirsty—we screen ghosts. Like human, like ghost, you know,” he re- plied, winking fantastically at me. “You know,” he continued, lighting the cig- arette which he had politely lifted from my mouth, “you give us ghosts some queer jolts. We have really got to do what you fellows ‘fake’ in the studios, although a film ghost made of electric lights has an easier time than those made in the open air. “That day, for instance, you went through the clouds on 2 donkey with an umbrella open over your head—well, I had really to do that stunt. Now, your film ghost has a soul, sir, and I am getting old like yourself. May I ask you hereafter to cut out all the rough stuff, all the high jinks, slapstick, and can-can work. It’s wearing on me, and killing me. Go in for the parlor, counting room, society ‘movie’ stuff. You are killing me, and when I die—as I surely will— in one of those wild escapades in the air or under express trains, you will become a real ghost.” Saying which, my Movie Ego reached over the table, grasped my gold-headed stick, just pre- sented to me by the general director of my con- cern for my famous “leap” from the Woolworth Tower, and disappeared into the sticky, limpy haze hanging over the sea. The next day I was assigned, at my own request, to rural grandpa parts, for I advise no “movie” actor to disobey a warning from his Film Self. Most of these war devices which were adopted to “keep the farmer going”’ certainly do keep him going—toward the city.