Hollywood (5 page)

I wondered why he had reacted so oddly to being called by that name. He was more than thirty years my senior, a distinguished star. Why
shouldn’t
I call him Mr. Barrymore? It struck me that because he had lost a certain amount of respect for himself, it embarrassed him to sense even the suggestion of it from someone else, especially a stranger. Could this be the key, I wondered, to the solution of the problem? I remembered what Pan Berman had told me about Barrymore’s camaraderie with the crew.

I decided upon a stratagem.

Three days before shooting was to begin, I assembled the crew and that part of the cast which was available. I explained our mutual problem.

“Our star is John Barrymore and it’s no secret to any of you, especially those of you who know him, who’ve worked with him, that he presents certain problems. I happen to think he’s a great actor. I call him Mr. Barrymore, and I’d appreciate it very much if all of you would do the same. Now, it may seem like a small thing but I believe that one of the principal functions of a director is to create an atmosphere in which creative work can take place, and what worries me is that if we get into one of those loose work situations full of highjinks, horsing-around, laughing-it-up, everybody-topping-everybody-else, calling him Jack, and remembering all the peccadilloes, I’m not going to be able to do that. So I need your help. Let’s keep it businesslike. We’ve got a long picture and a short schedule. Rule number one. He’s Mr. Barrymore.” I turned to my assistant. “And, Nate, anyone who isn’t here, like the gateman and the people in wardrobe and makeup, please tell them to do the same.”

A grizzled old grip raised his hand. “Can I say something?” he asked.

“You bet.”

“Balls,” he said.

It got the expected laugh, but not from me.

“What do you mean by that?” I asked.

“Look,” he said. “The front office may think you’re hot stuff but as far as I’m concerned you’re just a lucky punk and a Johnny-come-lately.”

“Okay,” I said.

He went on. “Jack Barrymore’s a friend of mine. I been out on the town with him many’s the time. And he calls me Chuck and I call him Jack and nobody’s gonna tell me what to call my pals. And if you want me off the crew I’ll get off the crew. Get yourself another boy.”

“That suits me,” I said. “In fact, that’s the way it’s going to have to be. Anybody else?”

There were two more. They were replaced.

On the first day of shooting, as John Barrymore was driven onto the lot, the gateman greeted him.

“Good morning, Mr. Barrymore. Nice to have you back. Good luck with the picture.”

He was driven directly to makeup where the head of the department, Mel Berns, awaited him along with his own makeup man, Jim Barker.

“Good morning, Mr. Barrymore.”

“Morning, Mr. Barrymore.”

He arrived on the set.

The doorman: “Good morning, Mr. Barrymore.”

The script girl, Adele Cannon: “Good morning, Mr. Barrymore.”

Russ Metty, the cameraman, who had been the camera operator on an earlier Barrymore picture, came over and offered his hand.

“Hello, Russ,” said Barrymore.

“Good morning, Mr. Barrymore,” said Russ.

Barrymore snorted again. “What the hell is all this Barrymore shit?” he said. “Who’s Mr. Barrymore, for Christ’s sweet sake? You must think I’m
Lionel
.”

A laugh, but my loyal cast and crew persisted.

Russ Metty said, “Okay, Mr. Barrymore, no shit.”

Throughout the twenty-four days of shooting, no one called him or referred to him as anything but “Mr. Barrymore.” In a matter of days, I believe he began to think of
himself
as Mr. Barrymore.

Never before had I worked with a more thorough professional. He was never late, never objected to overtime, gave everything on every take, and was totally prepared, although he insisted upon using his notorious blackboards.

This was the one thing about his work I could not understand. I am sure he knew his part perfectly, yet he insisted upon having his man somewhere in the line of sight, holding up that blackboard.

There were, in fact, many blackboards, in varying sizes and shapes. Large ones for the long speeches; small ones for the shorter speeches; oblong ones to fit between the lights if necessary; tiny ones for single lines.

In these days of Teleprompters and cue cards, the blackboards would not seem unusual, but I had never seen them used.

Barrymore’s technique for using the blackboard was ingenious. He would position himself for reading the board. Often, this occasioned spectacular turns and twists and bends; a favorite trick was to turn his head sharply as though to scratch the back of his head, thus turning his eyes to the blackboard.

I discussed the matter with him.

“It seems to me, Mr. Barrymore, that what you do to get the words off those boards is a hell of a lot harder than learning them.”

He looked at me balefully and said, “I’ve learned enough words in my time. Let somebody else do it now.”

“Shall I tell you what I think, Mr. Barrymore?” I pressed on. “I think you really know your lines perfectly, and that this is just a habit you’ve fallen into.”

He fixed me with his hard look again, and said, “Of course I know my lines. I always do.”

“Then why the—?”

“Because,” he interrupted. “Have you ever been to a circus? Seen the blokes on the high wire? Even doing back flips? On the tight rope. Have you ever seen one of them fall?”

“Of course not.”

“Then why do you suppose they always have a net underneath them? Those blackboards are my net, that’s all.”

One morning, as we were about to begin, my cutter came onto the set and asked if, for his convenience, I would make one small additional shot. It was simply an entrance to tie in two scenes. The whole shot would consist of a medium angle on an empty door.

A woman comes in and knocks. The door is opened by Barrymore. She asks, “Are you Gregory Vance?” He replies, “Yes.” Whereupon she enters. That would be all.

We set up the scene and I went off to get a cup of coffee. All at once I heard a furious row from the vicinity of the camera. As a rule, these flare-ups died out as swiftly as they began but this one continued. I went over to see what the trouble was.

Henry, Barrymore’s blackboard man, was engaged in a violent shoving match with the principal gaffer. The assistant director was attempting to intercede, but was being threatened by the gaffer’s assistant. A free-for-all was imminent. It was only a question of who was going to throw the first punch. I heard myself yelling.

“All right! That’s enough! Hold it! Shut up
everybody
! Now
cut it out
!”

I succeeded in bringing about a temporary abatement.

“What
is
all this?” I asked.

The gaffer spoke. “Listen. I’ve put up with this goddamn pest every day since we started, but enough is enough. He doesn’t have to be in here with that goddamn sliver. I need this spot for my key light and I want him the hell out of here.”

Henry, a dignified old gentleman, said, “I know my job and I'm going to do it and no one’s going to prevent me from doing it. My job.”

I was confused. “What job? What do you mean ‘sliver’?”

Henry held up a blackboard the size of a child’s slate. On it was written the word “Yes.”

“All right, Henry,” I said. “Just relax.”

I went over to Barrymore, who sat in his chair, smoking and smiling.

“Could I have you in the scene, Mr. Barrymore, for just a moment?”

“Of course. Of course,” he said, and joined me near the camera.

“We have a little problem,” I explained. “You know the scene. We’re outside here with the camera. Miss Alexander knocks on the door. You open it. She says, ‘Are you Gregory Vance?’ You say, ‘Yes.’ She walks in and that’s it.”

“Fine,” said Barrymore. “What seems to be the trouble?”

“Well,” I explained, “Henry here seems to feel that he has to be standing here with this little slate that says ‘Yes.’ ”

“Oh, by all
means
!” said Barrymore.

I did not grasp his meaning at once. “You mean it’s all right for him
not
to be here. Is that it?”

“No, no,” said Barrymore. “I’d like to have him there. With his slate.”

I was losing patience, struggling for control. “But let’s be reasonable, Mr. Barrymore. All she asks is, ‘Are you Gregory Vance?’ And you
are
, so what else could you possibly say?”

Barrymore thought for a long moment, then looked at me and said, “Well, I could say ‘No,’ and
then
where would you be?”

We found a spot for Henry and his slate.

Moviemaking is full of long, dull waiting time. But on this picture, the waits were never dull. John Barrymore talked. He tried to interest me in a theatre production of
Macbeth
.

“I’ve got it all worked out,” he said. “I designed it with Willie Pogany—a genius. Do you know his work?”

“Yes, I do. Some of it.”

“
Macbeth
always fails. We’ll do the first successful
Macbeth
. How would that be? We’ll make history. It’s going to be Scottish. The whole damned thing. Kilts, by God, and tam-o’shanters and scarves.”

His gestures accompanying these words made one see him in the costume.

He continued, “All through it, bagpipes, by God!”

He began to play an imaginary bagpipe. His elbow flailing, his fingers dancing, and out of his nose or mouth or ears a perfect reproduction of the sound of bagpipes—not a bagpipe—but
bagpipes
.

“The trick here,” he went on, “is the sex thing. Why is Shakespeare the greatest dramatist who ever lived? Because he wrote the greatest characters. And
how
was he able to write the greatest characters? Because he understood the human race. He understood that every human being, male or female, is a combination of both sexes. And that sometimes the weak ones or the sick ones allow the opposite sex in them to take charge. That’s why he made his most powerful men as tender, and sometimes as soft as women. Othello. Antony. Richard III. And why he gave some of his most marvelous women certain masculine aspects. Portia. Rosalind. And, of course, Lady Macbeth. Now the
Macbeth
trick is that
she’s
the
man
and
he’s
the
woman
. Do you see it?
She’s
the
husband
and
he’s
the
wife
. God damn it! If you had any
real
guts, you know what you’d do? You’d let Katharine Cornell or Judith Anderson or one of those play Macbeth, and let
me
play
Lady
Macbeth. That would
really
be the way to do it.”

Whereupon he suddenly began to move in the most graceful, feminine way. His voice became another voice and he said:

“ ‘…I have given suck, and know

How tender ’tis to love the babe that milks me:

I would, while it was smiling in my face,

Have pluck’d my nipple from his boneless gums,

And dash’d the brains out, had I so sworn as you

Have done to this.’ ”

The effect was electrifying.

And this, I thought, is the man who insists upon having the word “Yes” written on a little slate.

A visitor turned up on the set one day. A short, chunky man with a lovely Irish-potato face. He wore an old-fashioned suit and hat. Barrymore greeted him royally. They embraced, pounded one another on the back. Who could it be? The face looked vaguely familiar but I could not place it.

Barrymore led his visitor over to me and said, “Boyo, I want you to meet one of the great ones. I have the honor to present Mr. Marshall Neilan.”

My knees buckled. We shook hands.

“All right if he hangs around for a while?” asked Barrymore. “He’s trying to break into this business, and perhaps he could pick up a few pointers?”

“I’m honored, Mr. Neilan,” I said.

“Mickey,” he said.

Barrymore spoke. “No, no. You’ll never get anywhere. This kid calls everybody ‘Mister.’ I often think he has the soul of a bellhop. He thinks if he says ‘Mister’ he’ll get a bigger tip. It hasn’t worked so far. Has it?”

They moved away. I could not take my eyes off Marshall Neilan. Mickey.

No American director had ever done more interesting work. I had heard of a movie of his made in 1921 called
Bits of Life
and spent years tracking it down. Finally, a print showed up in Washington, D.C. I went down, ran it, and was not disappointed. It was a masterpiece, absolutely original and unlike any other film ever made. It turned out that he had also written it.

I remembered his production of
Penrod
, and
Tess of the D’Ubervilles
, also a marvelous film with Mabel Normand called
Mike
. He had not made a picture for nine years, his last being a minor prizefight number called
The Lemon Drop Kid
.

It was easy to see why he and Barrymore were attracted to each other. They had both squandered great talent, had both ditched tremendous careers, could both blame the same enemy. Alcohol.

The great Marshall Neilan was having a bad time. He was constantly being picked up for disorderly conduct or drunken driving, and because he was out of money, often had to spend time in jail.

At a Directors Guild meeting one evening, when I was its secretary, the council voted to award Marshall Neilan the Directors Guild Award for that particular year. The
form of the award had not been decided. Someone suggested a watch. Some thought it should be a trophy. Others thought a plaque.

“No,” said Frank Capra, our president. “Not a watch. It ought to be something a guy can hang up in his—you know—in his—”

“—in his cell,” said Ernst Lubitsch.

The bitter joke got a bitter laugh, but then we were all silent. It could happen to any of us.

And there he was, that day, on our set. The great Marshall Neilan. I went over to talk to him.

“Tell him about that time in Florida, Mickey,” Barrymore urged.

“No, no,” said Neilan.

“Go on,” said Barrymore. “Tell it, and I’ll give you a double bourbon. Twice.”