They Tell Me That...

Radio Record, Volume XII, Issue 34, 3 February 1939, Page 15

They Tell Me That...

Our Special Correspondent, Jennifer Quentin, Gives You The Latest Hollywood Gossip

HERE has been an addition ta the Ritz family on the sereen. In their next wild comedy the Ritz Brothers will be supported by their father. .Max Ritz paid a visit to his boys on the set of ‘‘The Three Musketeers.’’ Did an. imitation of his family at work which seemed funny enough to Director Allan Dwan to offer him a place in their next film. Before embarking on his acting career, Mr. Ritz ran a hat factory in Brooklyn, but frequently took part in amateur dramatic performanees, He is now in his fifties and lives in Hollywood with Al, eldest of the three brothers. So now we shall see four Ritzes instead of three. Their next picture wilt probably be a naval faree. More New Leaves ARNERS are so pleased with their teaming of Pat O’Brien, James Cagney and the "Dead End" Kids in "Angels With Dirty Faces," that they’re having a new story written for them all, in which Pat O’Brien will again play a priest. it’s "The Battle of City Hall," a cleaning-up-of-civicwrongs story. But this time all our heroes are on the side of the law. In "Angels With Dirty Faces," O’Brien wrestles alone against the

combined lawlessness of Cagney, the grim gangster, and the "Kids" who worship his methods. . In "The Battle of City Hall," Cagney is the heroic District Attorney and the boys help him to clean up the town. Michael Curtiz is expected to complete the team by directing the second picture, as he did the first. A. Shocking Surprise i -ERE’S a sixteen-year-old lad in Los Angeles who may get over the shock of it some time, but he'll never be quite the same again. It all happened at Casino Gardens, the dancing casino at Ocean

Park, one of the near-by beaches. Noticing a tall slender girl watching from the sidelines, the boy came over and asked for a dance. He didn’t notice the meaning look that the girl gave her companion as she accepted-and so they went out on the floor-and went to town, terpsichoreally Speaking. After the music stopped, the lad escorted his partner back to her place and thanked her. "Gee, that was great!" he told her. "What's your name?" "Eleanor Powell,"* the lassie replied-and then had to run for cover as the surroundina crowd heard the answer, while the boy stood staring after her, utterly flabbergasted. Hleanor had gone to the hall with her dancing stand-in, Lee Bailey, to watch a bit and maybe get an idea or two for her next picture.

Stars Lose Dogs AN epidemic of dog-stealing has caused the members of the film colony to lose many valuable pets. Bette Davis, George Brent, Rudy Vallee, and Patric Knowles are among the victims. The animals are often returned when rewards are paid; but, in other instances, they are never heard of again-probably being sold to people who are not too curious about 2a doz’s ownership if the price is reasonable. . Convinced that the thefts are the work of an organised gang, the stars have put detectives at work, and hope to soon bring the miscreants to justice. Hay’s Latest Headache T,ATEST headache for the Hays Office is the present tendency toward realism in pictures. It is having quite a struggle, for instance, to prevent the too gruesome depiction of disease on the screen. It was necessary to jump on one film dealing with Father Damien and the Molokai leper colony, and on "Union Pacific,’ which is concerned with an outbreak of cholera on board ship. In the Father Damien film all the lepers will be shown with their hacks to the camera. The only people likely to be disappointed are the make-up men, who had done a very good job. They had devised an effect by spraying the extras with white

paint, then with greenish-grey paint and finally using a cobweb machine which produced a horrifyingly realistic result. After ‘‘Snow White’"’.. WALT DISNEY’S new full-length cartoon, "Pinnochio," will not be ready for the screen until about the middle of the year. Disney, one of the few film artists whoa really does not care for money, cheerfully scrapped over £50,000 worth of work on the film the other day because he wasn’t satisfied that he’d got the characters just fight. "Pinnochio," an Italian fairy tale, is less well known than "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs." It is a story of a rather pathetic Hittle puppet whose nose grows longer with each lie he tells. Disney, incidentally, is apparently still keen on the horrific. Pinnochio’s adventures take him into Bogy Land and to the bottom of the ocean. The spectacular highlight of the film, according to present plans, will be a stor m-under-the-sea sequence. The inevitable picture-stealer of the cast will probably be Jimmy, deseribed as @ supercilious cricket who eventually turns out to be Pinnochio’s benefactor. He is expected to emulate the success of Dopey in "Snow White." Chiff Hdwards ("Ukulele Ike’) has been cast for Jimmy’s voice. Can Such Things Be? HE First National studio is searching for 125 16-year-old girls who:Do not use mafce-up. Do not smoke. Do not bleach the hair. And do not presume to be sophisticated. These paragons of the maidenly virtues are wanted for "Nancy Drew-Deiective," first of the "Nancy Drew, Girl Detective" series, featuring Bonita Granville. "The girls selected," the publicity boys solemnly assure us, "will be subject to an 11 o’clock curfew during production and the studio will also attempt to keep e rigid watch on them to see that they do not acquire the habits which would have disqualified them automatically in the first place." Our cynical office boy, greatest

living authority on the female young of the species, observes pessimistically that he thinks that First National will have to call up Walt Disney and borrow Snow White. Hedy’s Torrid Theme FiVIDENCE that ‘the Hays Office is unbending slightly is forthcoming in the plot for Hedy LaMarr’s first film on her home lot, "tI Take This Woman." Hedy will play a New York girl who goes away with a married man without benefit of chaperon. When she is deserted and on the verge of suicide, Spencer ("Old Faithful’’) Tracy comes along and she finds happiness with him. It is to be hoped they are not going -to type Tracy in this type of role. He did very much the same sort of thing for Joan Craweford in "Mannequin." Order Stayed THE expulsion order passed by Mussolini on comic strips of foreign origin has been stayed in the case of Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. Walt Disney’s creations are considered even in Italy so original as to merit particular consideration, but as soon as Italian substitutes have been found they will have to go. Popeye the Sailor has also been aceorded official lenience, but all other strips must be banished forthe with.