High society

by George S. Chappell; Frank Crowninshield; Dorothy Parker

REMEMBER YOUR MOTHER

“I want to insist upon the importance—in an artiste—of listening to the counsel of a good manager. Only last night, for instance, after the ring-down in my triumphal screen scene in ‘A Woman at Bay,’ (the one in which the screen, behind which I am dressing, is knocked over by the maid), my manager joined me, in the Ritz grill, and gave me the most wonderful advice in the world. He showed me how I could kill the star’s act by laughing in the middle of it; how I could steal the leading man’s entrance; how I could get the spot for a whole act—by giving the spotlight operator a Tecla pearl pin; how I could centre the publicity man’s interest in little me (merely by kindness) and how I could get my name up, in gas, merely by asking a dear friend of mine—(who is the President of a steel company) to invest some money in a musical comedy which my manager is going to put on. He has also given me advice about my dear mother. He thinks that the city air is disagreeing with her, and he suggests that, in the country, he could engage a single room for her—with the use of a bath—where she could pass the winter very comfortably. So there is another thing to remember, girls: ‘Always be good to your mother!’”