NEW BOY STAR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 April 1939, Page 5

NEW BOY STAR

“A REAL WINNER.” Shirley Temple and Jane Withers, both under 10, are two of the 10 most popular stars in the world (writes the London Film Weekly). There, have been no competitors in their class for a long time. Certainly there have been no little boys in it since Freddie Bartholomew grew out of his Fauntleroy velveteens, though Bobby Breen's studio had high hopes. The.same studio has discovered another little boy who may prove a real Winner. He is Peter Holden and his first film is “The Great Man Votes.” ’ Peter is only eight. He is a sturdy, almost stout little boy, almost comiclooking and anything but handsome. His dead straight, fair hair is cut in a “pudding basin” fringe. His head is enormous, his face both long and round, his teeth prominent and his mouth big and full. His eyes can look big but are usually overhung by a scowl which has, no regard for the camera. But Peter has the one and only essential gift of naturalness. He has the solemnity and the self-contained charm of a real little boy. preoccupied with the independent matters of his own mind.

He came to Hollywood from a huge success on Broadway in “On Borrowed Time.’’ Peter played the part for eight months. In London three boys were engaged to alternate in it and the play ran only a few days. That was Peter's first appearance on a stage. His only previous attempt at acting had been a radio performance in a play written for him by his mother, Mrs Parkhurst. Mr Parkhurst was a writer and actor. Mrs Parkhurst a writer and musician. A friend of theirs, the actor Tom Powers, first tried to teach three-year-old Peter the tricks of his trade. After the radio play, taken very lightly when Peter was four, his mother firmly refused all offers of other engagements until Peter, aged seven, became a leading man on Broadway. In “The Great Man Votes” he plays the kind of small-town boy who wears a cloth cap. rather grown-up suits with shorts, and stockings over his knees. He and Virginia Weidler are the selfreliant kids who take care of their derelict father, John Barrymore. -I