This Is For Railroaders
Casey, a section boss on the Great Northern railway, in making his report to the superintendent, used considerable profanity, so the superintendent said: “Casey, I have lady stenographers here and if you must use that profanity, after this you must write your own reports.” “A train from Duluth came lickety skoot and passed me hand car by. Some son of a gun left open a switch and it piled them ten cars high.”
* * *
Georges Carpenter lost a battle last July, but he won a greater prize than the golden purse and the coveted belt offered at Jersey City. The handsome Frenchman showed America the smile of Napoleon; the stoical smile of defeat.
As one of the multitude witnessing the brief clash of France and America at Boyle’s Thirty Acres, permit me to remark that Carpentier did not live up to his reputation as great pugilistic champion, but he more than met his reputation as a great red-blooded gentleman.
The American won, but the applause usually due the winner was lost in the outburst of surprise of the multitude. Carpentier, instead of hanging his head at the defeat of his hopes and aspirations for the title, hid his sorrow behind a great big boyish smile. He wore that smile through the blood-stained rounds, and it radiated as the gong clanged.
The soul of fighting France was behind that smile; the same as the smile of Napoleon as he handed over his army to Wellington at Waterloo, and the likeness of Joffre at the first battle of the Marne. It puzzled his primitive opponent. Dempsey was bewildered—his face revealed his knowledge that behind that smile was a superior intellectual being.
* * *
What good is alimony on a cold night?
* * *
Many who “kiss and make up” don’t like the taste of the “make-up.”
Doug’s Peacock Walk
BY RICHMOND
What are the personal peculiarities of film people? In view of the fact that it is our bounden duty to torment, dilate and comment upon ye people of the screen, it behooves us to stop now and then to observe what they are and how they become that way, aside from being good looking, drawing big money and getting divorced.
Let’s get right down to business. Take Allan Dwan, a well known director. Dwan doesn’t hate himself any more than the law provides for. In fact, there is no reason Dwan should despise himself. He was a good electrical engineer; became interested in pictures and makes various flurries of coin according to the Angels who can be dug up to back his ventures.
Dwan formerly was a good athlete. He is powerfully constructed but noticeably short. About the studios it is well understood that one of the few faults Dwan finds with himself is that he isn’t just up to his own personal idea of tallness. If he has a tender spot, it hinges upon this item of feet up and down. Someone conceived the idea that in order to tab him “Napoleon.” But that line of bull has been overdone and so another gag had to be hatched up. “The Big Little Man,” that is what those in close touch with Dwan call him when they desire to make a favorable impression. “The Big Little Man,” that’s a good title—better than some of the ones that appear on Dwan’s pictures and a lot of other pictures.
Thus we dispose of Mr. Dwan, a cocky, brainy, peppy little fellow whose only regret is that he should be a little longer. Next we will consider Mr. Fairbanks, Mary’s present husband, barring every state in the Union but Nevada—and Nevada isn’t quite certain that Mary is still married to Owen Moore. Doug likes to tread about with his gang of retainers at his heels. Fairbanks cottons to the custom, styles and bequeathments of the English sporting gentlemen who stalked abroad with a company of idol worshippers.
Doug is not always the most distinguished looking of his company. At any event, he frequently is not the most noticeable. It was Fairbanks that discovered the now famous Bull Montana, who doubles for monkeys when one is required in the cast and whose ability to take punishment one time resulted in nine fire hoses being turned on him at once as he was swept down the gutter.
When Doug Fairbanks and Bull Montana walk down the street together the Bull “takes it away from him,” as they say in the pictures when a subservient character grabs the best of the scene from the star. Bull has a face, at once fearsome and fascinating. He is so ugly that crowds follow him around. It is a frequent spectacle in Los Angeles to see Fairbanks, Bull Montana, Spike Robinson, Crooked Nosed Murphy, Benny Zeidmann, the press agent de luxe, and Mark Larkin, Fairbanks’ special representative, beating it down the broad. Of course, Doug always struts in front, while the others in platoon formation tread proudly in the rear. The only place where Doug falls down is that some of his gang look funnier than Doug acts on the screen and the big star stands a chance of being overlooked in the “what the h—is coming here” attitude that rends the atmosphere as the Fairbanks battalion bears down upon the multitude. Yes, Doug likes to lead his gang into the big hotel corridors, where his cohorts then fade gracefully into the oblivion necessary to leave Doug alone in his solitude for the yokels to admire and wonder at. You gotta hand it to Doug for rushing in with his gang and then giving them the fade away sign at the psychological moment.
Lottie Pickford—we have thought out loud a time or two before in these columns about Lottie. Unlike the demure Mary, Lottie likes the jazz stuff, the bright lights and some good looking young dude hanging around her. We never saw Lottie chew tobacco, but she can stow away a lot of the “grape.”
If we had our decision to make as regards Lottie’s chief peculiarity we would say that her idea is to be thoroughly known as Mary’s sister by doing things that Mary doesn’t. Lottie isn’t the first contrary girl, though, who can claim to be of famous family. There was Miss Roosevelt and later Mrs. Longworth. Didn’t the colonel himself call long and loudly for commodious families? And did you ever read that his daughter attained any particular fame aside from smoking cigarettes and not rearing children?
If you are a sort of a junior member of a family and fear that you will be overshadowed by some relative, cast for a famous mold, one way to attract attention is to copy the other one—backwards.
We come to Fatty—Roscoe Arbuckle. Roscoe’s peculiarity just now is to have people try and forget that his name is Fatty. Roscoe is getting dignified. He has half a dozen cars, just because people came to know him as “Fatty Arbuckle” and paid a lot of dough to see him. Just where Fatty expects to promote himself by being Roscoe passeth understanding. Surely he doesn’t think that he could act seriously without being thought funny. Perhaps Fatty is subtle. He may have tired of drawing laughs as a result of acting natural and figures he may get as many more by trying not to appear natural.
Now we are down to Mr. Griffith. Mr. Griffith, to our notion, is a great director. But Mr. Griffith is more or less deftly endeavoring to implant the idea in the public mind that he is a poet. That is Mr. Griffith’s peculiarity. He would not be seen much in public; rather he seeks to attract attention by remaining in seclusion. His well organized staff and his actors and actresses, who like him much, never pass up an opportunity to breathe it about that “Mr. Griffith is a poet.”
We never read any of David’s verses, but if he is a poet, it devoutly is to be desired that there were more poets and fewer directors operating in pictures.
After all, these little peculiarities or hobbies of the picture people are not harmful to any one in particular. We all like to strut and fluff and show our fine feathers. It’s human nature.
* * *