Judge — July 9, 1921 — page 26: what you’re looking at

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

NEW MOVES IN THE nie Picking N California, they say, the removal of the tariff has left a crop of lemons rotting on the ground. The question is brought up: Is a tariff on celluloid going to be necessary to keep our American crop of peaches from dying on the screen? Will free trade in films bring on a cloudburst of low-priced Pola Negris and all the rest, and drive our home-grown, country-raised, milk-fed and cream-complexioned Marys and Elsies and Constances and Marguerites and Lilians and Elaines and Anitas and Normas and Dorises and Dorothys clean off the market? No fear. It seems to be quite as true of film stars as of others—that a new one is born every minute. In Snohomish, Washington, there is said to be a tall, angular woman who is deaf, dumb, blind, and absorbed in poultry- culture. So far as is known, she is the only member of her sex in America who has neither wanted, or tried, to “get into pictures.” At the doors of 4,361 booking agencies in the country and California sit 4,361,923 black, blond, rufus, brunette and brindle maidens, waiting for “parts” that will show how much better they are than Na- zimova or Mary Miles Minter. The task of looking over this perpetual peach crop falls to a strange and callous generation of .star-starters called casting- directors. Of all forms of motion-picture life, the casting-director is easily the most envied, and worthy of pity. A filet mignon, properly prepared, is a most delectable repast. Two filet mignons, or filets mignon, or filets mignons, are more than enough. Three f. m’s. are far too many, and four would leave any but the most robust diner in a state of ex- panded collapse. So with beautiful, near-beautiful, un- beautiful and too-beautiful maidens. One would delight the eye and make the average cardiac motor accelerate and thump. But too many are more than enough, and when so many yearly are cast before a casting- director, he is apt only to sigh and shuffle softly away. Peaches for t By Myron M. STEARNS Which is one reason why the embryo Marys and Normas and Priscillas are so few in number; the searchers become discour- aged, or confused, before they find them. You are, let us assume, a splashing blonde, willing to give up the gay life of a stenographer or hair-dresser and offer your- self, in the name of Art, to the Movies, to be embraced into a fade-out by a beautiful hero at several hundred dollars a week, or more if the business manager insists: You present yourself at the studio entrance of your favorite star. The casting-director is too busy to see you, and besides, we’re not casting today, any- how. It makes no difference whether or not you’re beautiful as the dawn or gifted as Aphrodite and all the rest—you’re not wanted, today. Besides, the right way to get a hearing is to have photographs made, and register at a booking office. Pictures Worth Watching: SCRAP IRON A pleasing Charles Ray drama of humor and prize-fights and pathos, with touches of novelty. SENTIMENTAL TOMMY gentle film version of a charming yy a great author. wa¥ Bown Eas Griffith's way of making a famous melo- drama still more famous. THROUGH THE BACK DOOR Mary Pickford’s last pleasantly im- possible movie, of the little Belgian refugee whose mother is a rich American lady. DECEPTION & boldly artistic portrayal of Henry the th as a real person—quite shocking, sure. PASSION A fascinating interpretation of the character, of Du Barry, with a spectacular ground of French Revolution. G yPsY ‘BLooD Pola Negri in an artistic presentation of the classic tragedy of Spain—‘‘ Carmen.” BOB HAMPTON OF PLACER Custer’s last stand as the climax of a humor and pathos film that runs the gamut from slapstick to tragedy. A YANKEE IN KING ARTHUR'S COURT Some of the best humor yet seen on the oon ne a vivid a Saiineasion) of Yankee THE F "FOUR HORSEMEN THE C CABINET OF DR. penotreg a A complete study of insanity from the pie guaranteed to fill the & the booby hatch, THE Ki A film that shows how even grotesque toner can be artistically blended with real story interest and pathos. Screen You register—with a hundred others— and leave cabinet photographs of blushing loveliness. Perhaps after a year or so you get a few chances as an “extra,” and become a “professional.” Or, you sit in line with many of your sisters, while a casting-director casts his eye directly at you. “This little girl,” says the agent, hope fully, “is just the type you're after.” “Nose too long,” says the c.-d., and passes on. Or we can look at it from the casting- director’s side. You represent, we’ll say, Whiskamoff Pictures, and are looking for a brand new ingénue—some “little girl’? who will be hailed as your “discovery.” It’s a very pleasant pipe-dream. You look over about three and a quarter quires of cabinet photographs, presented by the aforementioned booking agencies. You select a quarter gross or’ so of these “stills” as being “good prospects.” Then they appear before you, and you look ’em over. The first one had a wun-der-ful profile in the photograph. But when the lady appears in person you see she has the fine, full cheeks of a German cab-horse. Out. The next dame is a blonde, with blue eyes. Tooblue. Won’t photograph. Out. Then a brunette. Look at the bones in her neck! Then a red one. Nose like a Bartlett, pear. By this time the bloom has pretty well worn off the picking of the peach—but you keep on. Number nine looks promising—until you notice her ankles. Never do a-tall, these days. Then Number Twenty-four seems fair, until she makes a gesture. Born to awkwardness, as the sparks fly upward, Out. By the time the real and only potential successor to Mary Pickford comes along, Number Sixty-One, you are fast asleep, or so confused you can’t tell whether she’s an Ash-blonde or a Blue Andalusian. (Continued on page 33.) ” = comicbooks.com