I’ve diagnosed my own case—and do you know what has been responsible for the anaemia of the bankroll that has afflicted me all these years? My early training was all wrong. Every time I spend a dollar I squeeze it till the birdie cuckoos “One hundred cents!”
I guess that year I spent in school spoiled me.
I took them there copy book Maxims too seriously. You know the stuff I mean. About—“Two bits saved is a jitney earned,” and “Save the pennies and the dollars will draw four per cent.”
Well, here I’ve been in the fillum flurry a dozen years little one, before the truth dawned on me. They shoulda put silencers on them Maxims or else handed them to you with interpretations and reservations. Chief of which same is this here: “Nothing in these articles shall be construed as referring to THE BOSS’S MONEY.”
His bankroll is made to be shot; he isn’t happy unless it’s riddled. He won’t say “Good Morning” to you unless you caused him to say “Good Night, Mr. Receiver,” the day before.
I’m starting on a new picture now, Liz, and to tell the truth if I hired an oil promoter for property man I don’t think I could spend more than fifty thousand dollars making it a good picture. But I’ve learned the secret—and if I break a leg doing it I am going to take more time on this picture than George Loane Tucker needs; I’m going to spend more money than Von Stroheim; I’m going to build more sets and tear ’em down faster than Mickey Neilan at his best; I’m going to have a bigger hospital bill than a Holubar production.
If I don’t spend more than two hundred and fifty thousand on this picture I’ll be willing to take a job making LoKo comedies. Of course, two hundred and fifty thousand doesn’t put me in the class with the big boys but it’s a pretty fair start for a guy with wrong upbringing.
It was this nut Stroheim that give me the idea. You know, Liz, when this Von got through serving the time in the army that all them Heinies has to, he came here and first broke into the United States histories in the packing room of a department store. He studied stagecraft wrapping planks around “This Side Up” signs.
He musta come to Los in one of his own shipping cases for when I first saw him hanging around the studios looking for extra parts he didn’t look as though he’d ever possessed Mister Santa Fe’s price. The boys gave him a rough deal in those days—you know it wasn’t a popular time for gents with the “Von” handle on their monickers. But we had so many beastly Berlin pictures that we all had to use him. He played more German captains than there were in the Kaiser’s army.
Then one day he negotiates a ten minute loan of Carl Laemmle’s ear and comes out of the office with the title “Director.” He earned the brackets by guaranteeing to make a picture for twenty thousand, and faithfully fulfilled his promise by spending not a cent more than fifty. What’s more it was a good picture.