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Interview with Howard W. Koch

Howard W. Koch is the producer of the 44th Annual Academy Awards, to be held at the Music Center on April 10 and telecast over the NBC network. Mr. Koch's office at Paramount is the nerve center of this year's show and one afternoon, recently, we interrupted his preparations to ask him if he would enumerate some of the problems in putting together an Awards presentation.

The difficult part of producing an Awards show stage at the end, all the presenters and winners is the inability to get the people you want, the and performers, and have a finish song. We've presenters, the stars, the glamour. Nominees talked about maybe, seeing it's Chaplin's birth­ don't seem to want to come. They' re not avail­ day, doing 'Happy Birthday' at the end. We're able. It makes it very difficult, and you have to still trying to make up our minds. compromise. It's always settling, rather than I got involved with this in December, and I getting what you really want. don't think that was early enough. Whoever Logistically it's an impossible kind of thing, produces next year should start sometime in too, because you're dealing with about 600 September, because this is a big job. We've people-the nominees, their agents, their busi­ been using glamour and nostalgia as our theme, ness agents, their press agents, their agents' but it wasn't until January we knew we had agents-and the presenters. Chaplin. Anytime you go after a presenter, you have to The first thing you do when you get the re­ go through his agent and his public relations quest to produce the show is to look at last man, so it takes time and energy, much more year's script, and the year before and the year than making a plain old movie. With a movie before, to see how you can improve on it or get you' re hiring people and you pay them, but a show as good. Looking at last year's show, when you're doing the Academy Awards you' re seeing the format of the Friends of Oscar, we always dealing with people who have other felt it didn't give the presenters a real introduc­ commitments. tion. This year we try to give them an entrance. One of the big problems is, always, what do I learned at least that. the girls wear? " I don't have the dress, I don't We try to write a screenplay and have a con­ have the right dress, should it be decollete or tinuity. Write a first draft, then try to change it, very simple and a high neck?" For each girl on bring it together, get it better all the time. We're the show you have to go through that with the trying to avoid being too cute. Last year had people who are doing the clothes. This year some cutesies. But each year you learn a little. we're asking the girls to wear one of three Another problem this year is the minor colors, black, white or gray. And we' re thinking awards. Naturally they don't seem minor to the about tails for the men-but it's tough for a lot people nominated, but we know the visual of guys to get tails. effects man is not going to be a personality the And, of course, everybody says "Will you pay whole world wants to see. Sometimes three or for it?" Wherever they may be they want to be four share an award. We don't want each of paid to be brought. Even the nominees want to them to get up and thank Mr. Zanuck. I hope be paid transportation. If I were nominated I they' ll understand. I hope I'd be smart enough, would swim across the ocean. if it were me, to say "Thank you, it was great The show, this year, looks like it's going to be to produce the picture," and walk off. But very different in many ways. We have a begin­ you' re dealing with people, and can never pre­ ning and end, which we never had before. If dict how their emotions will run. you remember, last year and all the other years, This year we' re using Liza Minnelli. That could they said: " Ladies and Gentlemen, the President be a very emotional moment, because she's of the Academy welcomes .... " This year we' re giving the Best Song Award. Songs are very going to start and finish with a number. We're much a part of her life and, although the words going to try and get everybody back on the we use are not directly about her mother, she

3 is saying that "music and lyrics have been some­ the set-up. There are really two production units thing of my life ever since I was born." working, and this results in some duplication of should be very emotional. expenditure. You'd never make a movie that We don't know how to rehearse that. Wi" he way. But otherwise we' re moving right along. get an ovation, or won't he? We've been trying Also there's a problem with the Music Center. to figure out, maybe five minutes, maybe six. You can 't get the lights where you want them, Could be twenty. We thought we should re­ you can 't nail anything, everything has to be hearse the ovation on the days we rehearse at hung. We've always had a flat light on the audi­ the Music Center. But then we thought, maybe ence before but, this year, we' re trying for a not, maybe it ought to be completely spon­ little more mood. That stage is big, and we're taneous. These decisions have to be made right using a" of it. up to air time. I notice NBC is advertising April 10 at 7:00, Camera is three days. The last two are the and every time I hear that I think, We'd better heaviest. Sunday, we get a" the nominees and be there! There are a few sticky days before we presenters. We go through them quickly. Then, start construction on the sets, before the Monday we have the dress. That's three days dancers start, before the costumes are designed. down at the Music Center. Of course, we' re Everything looks as if it wi" never come to­ rehearsing here at Paramount for three weeks. gether. It's the same as movies. The toughest 32 dancers this year, and a very mobile set. thing about movies is the preparation, but once Everything wi" be reflected in that set. you have a starting date you gotta go. It's like I' m known in my business for hitting a budget, pushing off a ski jump run, once you're started but I don't think anyone has ever made the you have to go down. budget on the show, because there's a defect in

4 An Overview of Animation by Philip Chamberlin

TIME OF THE VAMPI RE is a Yugoslav d irected by Nikola Mctjdak. It is part of the International Animated Film Exhibition, to be held at the County Museum of Art in April.

Animation is the oldest kind of film making, is the International Animated Film Association developing from the phenikistoscope, invented (ASIFA) formed some ten years ago by the lead­ in 1832 by the Belgian professor, Plateau, and ing animators of several countries as a mean of from a multitude of 19th century toys. Through keeping abreast of new developments. this same period photography was being in­ The Cannes Film Festival featured special ani­ vented and perfected-the first black-and-white mation programs in 1956 and 1958. Then, in photograph was produced in 1839, the first 1960, the Cannes programs were transferred to color photo in 1861 , the first roll-film camera in Annecy, and an international congress of film 1888-and when photographs were substituted makers was held there. Twenty-eight countries for drawings and technology supplied the nec­ were represented, ASIFA was organized, chan­ essary mechanism, then movies were born. nels of communication were set up, a quarterly Modern animation is defined as 'frame-by­ bulletin was founded, and plans for annual ani­ frame' filming, and is not limited to the drawn mated film festivals were laid out. figure. Through freeze-frame and stop-frame Why did all these things happen? Possibly the the human figure can be animated, and in mod­ main reason was changing conditions in theatri­ ern animation a mixture of the human and the cal exhibition, with short increasingly drawn can often be seen . Cartoons are a sub­ forced out of the programs by lengthening fea­ division of animation, cited for Academy tures. But, whatever the economic reasons be­ Awards since 1931. The Award, finally extended hind it, there can be no doubt that this co­ this year to all animation, has provided an im­ operation has been enormously beneficial, ar­ portant encouragement to excellence in what is tistically. The formation of ASIFA gave an im­ probably the most sharply defined of film petus to the creation of good animated short genres. films. These developments have not as yet, un­ It is also true of animation that its creators, fortunately, been adequately reflected in the the only film makers whose work can truly be Academy Awards, perhaps because rule changes explained by the so-called auteur theory, are have not kept pace with changing conditions. the most tightly-knit segment of contemporary Locally, the slow death of 'art theatres' have movie-makers. One of the chief reasons for this shrunk the opportunities to see the more strik-

5 ingly original and innovative of these films. So, there is still a definite black edge to the humor. in 1965, Les Goldman and other leaders of the Not very many of them are reminiscent of the International Animated Film Society (ASIFA, old cartoon approach. One might even say that West) approached the Los Angeles County the animated films have finally come of age Museum of Art. Their proposal, to establish an along with what is left of the audience. annual animated film exhibition in Los Angeles. A few imaginative exhibitors, observing the It is fitting that such an exhibition, now in its success of these shows, have arranged their own seventh year, should be held here. The local programs of shorts. Some have even secured branch of ASIFA is, not surprisingly, the world's the programs run at the Los Angeles County largest. American animators had been winning Museum of Art, and there are plans for an ani­ prizes at Annecy in France and at Mamaia in mation festival in Miami next fall. The battle, Romania, but the chances of seeing these films however, is far from won, because there is as yet on American screens was remote- Fred Wolf's no real theatrical channel for short films in this charming short, THE BOX, won an Academy country. The potential market is there, certainly, Award in 1967, for example, but is still without but attempts to tap it have been confined a theatrical release. Here, at last, was a chance largely to non-theatrical schemes, the most im­ for local animators to see new developments, portant of which is the International Tournee of and for local audiences to see new works. Animation, an organization created by ASIFA, The collaboration between the animators and West in 1968 to make the Museum's exhibition the Museum has been a happy one. About ten available to other museums, colleges, and film thousand enthusiasts now attend the annual societies throughout the country. The name of Animated Film Exhibition on weekend after­ the circulating film programs is also The Inter­ noons and evenings in April. Last year's pro­ national Tournee of Animation. A great many gram was extremely heavy, as one might expect groups have scheduled these programs during from the serious social and political trends of the past three years, helping to bring about the previous year. This year, though, the ap­ wider appreciation of frame-by-frame art. proach is much lighter, much funnier, although

From France comes UNE BOMBE PAR HASARD, d irected by Jean-Fran'l0is Laguionie, included in a retrospective of outstanding animation of the sixties, to be shown to Academy members in early June.

6 Preserving the Past by De Witt Bodeen

A . William Fo x's superproduction of (1917). sta rring Theda Ba ra and directed by J. Gordon Edwards. Publicity a t the ti me claimed a production cost of $500,000.

In the late '30s, when I first discovered the there are twenty or more researchers using the Academy library, I felt as if I'd stumbled on a library at one time-and that's not uncommon­ gold mine. Oddly enough, it had never oc­ one can suddenly feel as if he had joined a very curred to me that there might be somewhere a mad tea party. library devoted solely to the study of films, their Everybody these days is full of suggestions history and their people. That motion pictures and hopes for the new library which will be an might even have a history which would be a important part of the Academy's future home perfect mirror of its special time was not yet whenever that is officially opened. The present recognized then, especially by colleges and uni­ library just grew as the Academy itself grew and versities. One looks over the curriculum of the came of age. That it is more than a repository modern educational center and marvels at its and has a planned library set-up is due to Mar­ rightness: a whole course on D. W . Griffith and garet Herrick, its first librarian, who had the his films-another on Cecil B. DeMille-another vision and ability to put it realistically into orbit; on John Ford! You are looked at as if you were it's fitting that the library now officially bears a veritable relique when you exclaim, /l Why, I her name. remember when UCLA didn't even have a As time has gone by, certain omissions in Drama Department!/I Easily, you sympathize reference material have been filled until now with when she learned her films were there are some decades of film history that are included in an educational retrospective, /II virtually complete. But there are still holes never thought I'd be part of a curriculum!/I which need plugging. When doing research on The Academy's library provides a place with the ' teen years, there comes that inevitable time the means for the study and appreciation of the when the absence of the summer issues for 1917 motion picture. Over there and roundabout are of that invaluable bound weekly, The Moving all the published books on film ; here are. the Picture World, are felt. And it's felt doubly bound magazines; there, the files with separate when, on reaching the winter of 1918, the last envelopes with films filed alphabetically by title; three months are missing. This becomes serious and in an adjoining room, another set of files because all except December of the bound where personalities are filed alphabetically. Photoplay is also not on the shelves, and there's Right now the library quarters are overcrowded; only the bound Motion Picture New s to consult. space needed by the growing personnel as well So , then, there is that mandatory set of trips to as by additional rows of file cabinets has cut the the downtown library, where there is at least a reader's tables down to a single long one. When complete bound set of the New York Dramatic

7 Mirror as well as all the microfilm in the Audio­ be one of the most important additions that the Visual and Newspaper Departments. Academy Library ever acquired. To it, in time, The situation is at its most problematical, could be added microfilm rolls on the Los however, when working in the late '20s - a Angeles Times and other newspapers. These vitally important era, because it marks the become like reference volumes which do not changeover from silents to sound-and there is easily wear out. Believe it or not, copies of the a great dearth of information from every recog­ Film Daily Year Book and the Motion Picture nized source.* So once more that trip down­ Almanac have actually been used so much at town or out to UCLA or over to USC becomes the Academy that they can no longer be re­ necessary. bound and so must be replaced. Aging paper, These years can , and probably will, be filled .' when handled by thousands of hands, doesn't in when the missing issues can be located for last very long. The paper itself is perishable, but sale and then either be purchased or presented the information on it must not be. Lillian Gish as a gift by some donor to the Academy Library. pointed out in her book, Mr. Griffith, the And one always fondly dreams that somebody Movies, and Me, how the twentieth century is will find in his attic copies of those wonderful the first in history on which there is a full visual studio organs like Universal Weekly and Fox documentation-and on film. Yet the study of Folks, wherein the weekly releases were de­ film cannot be fully confined to the visual. Its tailed for the exhibitor, along with synopses of history is also recorded in newspapers and peri­ the films and complete casts and production odicals of the time. These must be gathered, credits. What a gift those would be ! The Acad­ bound, and preserved for use today. What bet­ emy has only a few of these, just enough to ter way than.duplication of that recorded history make one wish they were complete. on microfilm so that, in a sense, it too becomes What the Academy is really in need of is visual!

equipment for microfilm and its proper use. For • It is hoped that the A merican Film Institute Cotolog of Motion Pictures , instance, a complete microfilm set of the issues plann ed in some nineteen two-volume sets to cover al l the featvres , shorts, and newsreel s produced in A me rica since 1893, w ill rectify the of weekly Variety (as prepared by UCLA) could situation - Ed .

8 A lost career. DeWitt Bodeen has written that "without Theda Bara the Corporation could not have gained the eminence in the motion picture it did," but almost nothing of her filmwork now survives. Here she is (1918), again under J. Gordon Edwards' direction. Spaced Out (F urther Thoughts on the Academy Library) by Macauley Conner

Last year, in a letter to Academy members, Vice­ Another film historian, Lotte Eisner, once President Michael Blankfort described the Li­ wrote of the study of film history: "Strange as it brary as looking like " the back room of a run­ may appear it often seems that we know today down, second-hand bookstore." Far from re­ more about the prehistory of the human race senting or disputing this, the Library staff would than we do about the first quarter century of the be the fi rst to agree. For a long time now they've motion picture. Everywhere in the history of been faced with space problems, which are film there are blank spaces to be filled in, errors gradually crowding them out of house and to be corrected, important personalities over­ home. That enthusiasm for film, so general now looked or wholly forgotten whose histories among the young, strains our resources as more should be recorded." and more film scholars and film students want Film scholarship, particularly when it deals access to the library's materials for their re­ with the early days of motion pictures, is a bit searches. Each year, and increasingly, there are like archaeology, a matter of excavation. Evi­ more and more books on film to be fitted into dence must be pieced together since so much the available shelf space. of the primary source material, the films them­ As a result everyone is being crowded into selves, has been lost. Only one of Theda Bara's corners. Staff and readers find themselves in thirty-nine Fox films, A Fool There Was, is altogether too close a proximity (all the staff known to exist today, for example, and twenty­ tasks, the collating and the cataloguing, now two of these missing films were directed by have to be done in the reading room). The col­ J. Gordon Edwards-the grandfather of Blake lection itself is crowded into several rooms, Edwards-not one of whose works is known to even several buildings. have survived. None of these problems could have been The objective of the Library has always been foreseen when the Library moved into its pres­ to maintain and enlarge the collection of ent premises in July, 1946. Pictures taken at that printed and photographic materials, its aim to time show the familiar long reading room look­ preserve for posterity a knowledge of the past. ing spruce and uncluttered, almost like some­ Through acquisitions, through gifts from Acad­ one's private library, with easy chairs, plenty of emy members (a particularly valuable donation elbow space for staff and researchers, and a lit­ of early film magazines was made by George erature on film that fitted fairly easily into a Haight in 1965) and friends of the Library, the surround of bookcases. How times change! collection can offer some of the rarest remain­ Who would have predicted, then, that phenom­ ing records of early production-the files of inal growth of interest in film which began in such trade publications as The Film Index (1906- the fifties, and which shows no sign of letting 11 ), The Edison Kinetogram (1909-14), The Nick­ up, or that the collection itself would more than elodeon and its successors (1909-13). triple through the intervening years. A library, though, is in no position to call a Rarities, of course, greatly enhance the value halt to expansion when the space threatens to of a collection, but to the general reader, the run out. Of the libraries devoted to the motion student, the researcher, the inestimable value of picture, the Academy's is one of the most com­ The Margaret Herrick Library is that it brings to­ prehensive, yet the archive of information con­ gether, in one easily accessible place, a public stantly has to be added to. There are still gaps collection of books, magazines, stills, press­ remaining, and DeWitt Bodeen, screen writer books, posters, scrapbooks, even unpublished and film historian, enumerates some of them manuscripts, which help preserve the American elsewhere in this issue. film heritage.

10

A Tribute to Charlie by Harry Crocker

Harry Crocker succeeded Harry d' Arrast as Chaplin's assistant in the fall of 1925 and re­ mained with the comedian through THE CIRCUS and . After he left the Chaplin Studio he became a columnist on the old Los Angeles Examiner, eventually returning as the director of publicity on LIMELIGHT. The Harry Crocker collection of Chaplin memorabilia was presented to the Academy library by Crocker's sister, Mrs . Charles Sutton, after his death . In the collection there is an unpublished man­ uscript on Chaplin, written by Crocker. From it we have taken two extracts. The first. ...

12 For story conferences on pictures preceding Restlessly he would pace up and down like a THE CIRCUS and CITY LIGHTS Charlie used a caged animal. Sometimes he would detour small frame bungalow on the far northeast cor­ through the rest of the bungalow. That he was ner of the studio lot. Consisting of a bedroom in another room didn't stop him talking. and dressing room, a bathroom, and a small 'Yes man,' in Hollywood, is a term of oppro­ kitchen, it was secluded and quiet. bium meaning, as it does, an employee who un­ The living room, in which we usually worked reservedly agrees with his employer. There were on the story, also served as a dining room for periods in the creation of his stories when luncheon and occasionally, when the fires of Charlie deliverately asked us to 'yes' him, to creation were flaming high, dinner. agree, to enthuse with him. These came in the Charlie believed in concentration without preliminary stages when he was groping for distraction. Thus the building had a monastic ideas. There is time later for a critical analysis simplicity. The odds and ends which had ac­ of material. cumulated in it were quite extraordinary. " Have you got that down?" Charlie would On a bird's eye maple sideboard Clare Sheri­ demand incessantly of Carl Robinson* who, dan's bust of Chaplin reigned over the glass­ pencil in hand, had been making notes of all ware. When Charlie's friends and co-workers ideas expressed and suggestions made. He were upset at what they thought was a Chaplin would walk up and shake an impatient finger at obstinacy over a story problem they were ac­ the sheet of paper. " Get all this down! I can't customed to vent their feelings by snapping remember everything. Have you got the ring their fingers under the nose of this replica dur­ gag down? And the fruit stand? And the veg­ ing the original's momentary absence from the etable wagon?" room. Carl would nod. But Charlie is wrong when Across the sideboard, by a swinging door he says he cannot remember everything. He not leading into the kitchen, stood a nondescript bit only can, but does. His mind is an encyclo­ of furniture made of a dark wood. It was never paedia of comedy, a filing cabinet of ideas. used for anything. Where it came from or what During respites from the story conferences it was designed for, no one ever knew. Between Charlie was busy with other facets of produc­ it and the door was an upright chair usually tion. With Danny Hall he planned the necessary occupied by Henry Bergman. sets. On the backlot a one-ring circus tent was Almost the entire, windowless, back of the erected, and all the paraphernalia of a circus room was taken up by a large divan with a worn made its appearance. leather cushion. Over it was the only picture in It was characteristic of Chaplin that he deter­ the mom, an Alpine scene. mined to shoot the tightrope scenes on an ac­ Next to the divan was a small bookcase, most tual tightrope stretched thirty-seven feet above of the books being autographed gifts from the the sawdust, between two giant tent poles. This authors to Chaplin. To the left of it, near the en­ necessitated the building of a series of platforms trance door, stood a gilt stand with a woven beneath the rope in case of a spill. Giant paral­ metal basket containing a bunch of worn artifi­ lels were constructed for the cameras. cial roses, each blossom holding a rose colored As part of his preparations Charlie learned to electric bulb to its heart. This had been sent to walk the tightrope. He didn't call in the experts Charlie years previously by Max Linder, the to teach him. With his fetish for doing every­ French comedian who later committed suicide. thing for himself he had a rope stretched about Charlie occupied the divan when thinking. a foot above the stage floor. With a pole he set Sometimes he stretched out on it in silence for himself to master the art. While he was resting an hour or so. It would be difficult for Henry I tried it for myself. In a short time we were Bergman or me to tell whether he was thinking walking a tightrope eighteen feet above the or asleep. stage. Eventually Charlie cast me as the circus Sometimes he would sit, one foot tucked tightrope star, 'Rex, King of the AiL' under him, slashing at the leather cushion with The general plan of a story is always con­ one of his limber bamboo canes, as if in an ceived by Chaplin. He is, however, not always effort to whip out an idea. responsible for all the funny situations. Most Mostly, though, when he was thinking he any good suggestion was grist for his mind. Be­ would walk. Furiously. The room was small. cause we had conceived many of the gags to-

13 In the first year of the Academy Awards Chaplin was presented with a Special Award "for versatility and genius in writing, act­ ing, directing and producing THE CI RCUS" (right and below). That same year he was nominated as Best Actor and as Best Comedy Director, the latter a category never again used.

14 gether, had acted them out in the 'Sweat Room,' had rehearsed them on the set prior to shooting, Charlie used me in several roles. In addition to 'Rex, King of the Air' I played a clown in one sequence and al so led the striking tentmen. As the latter I was knocked out cold by Tiny Sanford, and lay prostrate on the ground near the outside of the tent wall. Charlie wan­ dered into the scene, heard the music inside the tent, saw a hole in the tent wall, and tried to see what was going on. After a funny bit in which he sei zes himself by the britches and tries to raise himself to the level of the hole, he stood on me to gain the proper elevation. One of the more curious facets of my job was playing Charlie Chaplin in rehearsals. When a scene had to be set up to Ch aplin's satisfaction he would go behind the camera and callout: " All right, let's see it I" With the famous bat­ tered derby on the top of my head-I stand an even six feet-and with the cane in my hand I would run through the actions of the scene with the other members of the cast. It was no sur­ prise when Chaplin would say " No, no, no, he wouldn' t do that!" and leap in front of the Cha pl in direct ing A WOMAN OF PAR IS (1923). Harry d'Arrast, camera to play the scene himself. Chaplin's assistant an and THE COLD Not only were the actors called upon to RUSH , later a director at Paramount, is seated. double and triple their roles (Henry Bergman, under contract to Chaplin for years, appeared in as many as seven different roles in one picture) any studio employee might find himself in greasepaint. Cameraman Jack Wilson played the Crown Prince in . Joe Van Meter, the purchasing agent, can be glimpsed occasionally on the screen. At times when we were fati gued with con­ centration on THE CIRCUS we turned to the script of NAPOLEON. Had films not suddenly gone talkie, Chaplin might actually have filmed a life of Napoleon. Those with whom he dis­ cu ssed the idea were sceptical. Audiences, they argued, would never accept the comedian as the conqueror. " That's what you say," Chaplin would argue vehemently. " You say the public will laugh. Very well, in the opening sequence I wil] give them something to laugh at, something to break the tension of expectancy. But I'd wager that by the next sequence I would win them. And I'd hold them." And, after working on several sequences­ sequences which Charlie would act out - I would have put my money on him .

.. Chapl in 's publicity director.

15 Choplin in one of his funniest sequences, the massage scene from THE CURE (1917) . The short, stout Henry Bergman is one of the most familiar figures in the Chaplin comedies. For over thirty years he worked with Chaplin, both as actor and assistant director. The second extract from Harry Crocker's manuscript is taken from the chapter devoted to Bergman. Not only does it give hitherto little known information about Bergman himself, it also gives a fascinating glimpse of a Hollywood that has vanished forever.

Chaplin an location with SHOULDER ARMS (1918). Albert Austin is an the extreme left. Next to him is Henry Bergman, talking to Syd Chaplin (in the black moustache). Alf Reeves, Choplin's general manager, is wearing a straw hat while Chaplin himself, seated, is wearing a cap. Th e man in the eyeshade is Roland (' Rollie') Totheroh, Chaplin's cameraman for many years.

That he understood Charlie Chaplin as well as don, he also appeared at the Crystal Palace with any man can understand that complex indi­ the Circus Wolff as one of a quartette in a vidual, and that he had worked in every Charlie mammoth extravaganza. Chaplin comedy*, were the two proud boasts For nine years he sang light comedy roles for of Henry Bergman. Augustin Daly and when, in 1907, Ziegfeld To reach Hollywood, Henry traveled a vast staged the first edition of the Follies, Henry was geographical oblong beginning at his birth­ in the cast. And so with 1908 and 1909. He place, , where his father was sta­ played under other managements but when, tioned in the Consular Service of Germany, and after th i rty-six weeks of rehearsal, The Pearl leading to Europe and back again to Los An­ Maiden by Earle C. Anthony (prominent Los geles, via the circus, musical comedy, and grand Angeles auto dealer) and Kales Jefferson, only opera. ran twelve weeks, Bergman gave up the stage Educated in Hanover, he chose music and and joined the pioneer film company, Pathe singing as a career. After several seasons in Freres, in Jersey City. Under Louis Gasnier he Essen , Dortmund, Elberfeld, and in other pro­ appeared with Pearl White in many of THE vincial German opera houses he was brought to PERILS OF PAULINE. the Metropolitan Opera by Maurice Grau, then At this time, the director, Henry Lehrman, impresario, to sing tenor bouffe or the lighter arrived in New York from California and, shortly comedy roles. After his twelve weeks at the Met, thereafter, the stout comedian was sent west to Henry played eight at Covent Garden. In Lon- join the newly formed L-KO Comedy Company.

17 In 1916, Chapl i n, havi ng left Essanay, was Hollywood then held the first of its famous beginning his Mutual contract, and Henry premieres. Sid Grauman, ex-newspaper boy signed up with him as part of the stock company from Nome and star showman of the west, which included Edna Purviance as the girl, Eric opened his Egyptian Theatre. Chief feature of Campbell-later killed in an automobile acci­ this motion picture palace was the forecourt dent-as the villain, Albert Austin and Lloyd where Sid, with his showman's psychology, Bacon-later a director-as actors, and with staged a free show to draw in the passers-by. Dave Allen-subsequently director of Central On quiet evenings the ' Late Shift'- as Grauman Casting-as prop boy. called it-became a rendezvous for Hollywood, In THE CURE, Henry, as the masseur, had the and to this patio Henry moved his informal unforgettable wrestling scene in the bath with cou rt. Chaplin. Charlie, sitting next in turn for the at­ During those evenings an idea began to ger­ tention of the giant bath attendant, watches the minate. All his years with Chaplin had been masseur's manipulation of his huge predecessor thrifty ones. Now he would invest his life sav­ on the work table. This massage culminated in ings in a business venture. Hollywood had no Henry's lifting the client bodily by one arm and public place where one could meet and dawdle tossing him into the pool. Then followed over coffee. Henry would provide such an Charlie's hysterically funny struggle to avoid a amenity. similar treatment. The first 'Henry's' was a hole-in-the-waJI, as For hour on hour on a sweltering August day Bergman himself termed it-a sandwich and during SHOULDER ARMS, Charlie forced the coffee shop with comfortably upholstered seats. weighty Henry, in a full parade of German arms Charlie Chaplin and Sid Grauman christened it, and uniform and sweating under a full muff (or the newspaper men spread its name-and seats crepe hair beard) to pursue him, disguised as a were at a premium. tree stump, through a eucalyptus grove. With Chaplin's advice on new furnishings, "You great fat hulk," complained the ex­ the rear wall was knocked out and the second hausted comedian. "Can' t I wear you out?" 'Henry's' became a delicatessen. Henry pled fatigue, but told Chaplin he was Still the crowds were forced to stand in line determined not to give up until Charlie did. for a table. Where stars, directors and execu­ Hollywood, in the days of Henry's arrival, was tives dined, there the public insisted on dining. a village and Hollywood Boulevard, its main Patrons could no longer dawdle - with one stem, an unpaved street. Far down on its west­ movement waitresses seized the dessert plate ern extremity was the Hollywood Hotel, where and presented the check as a hint for departure. the Thursday evening dance furnished the film Seats were still at a premium. colony'S only social life. Instead of being elated by success, Henry There being no local restaurants, the colony would mop his forehead nervously with his drove downtown nightly to Los Angeles for din­ handkerchief. His ever-present cigar hung at a ner and returned to chat along the main street. dejected angle. He couldn't eat. This wasn't the In a 1914 Haynes coupe. Henry would park in idea he had conceived. There was no rest, no front of his apartment house and hold court peace, no quiet conversation. Only the clatter with the villagers. of plates and a continual hum of busy talk. So, Hoot Gibson used to sit with Henry and still striving towards an ideal, Henry moved next bemoan the fact that he couldn't get a chance door into spacious premises specially built for in the movies, deriving comfort from Henry's him, and the third ' Henry' s' blossomed as a full­ unfailing faith in him. Eventually he became a fledged restaurant. It, too, nightly filled to over­ popular cowboy star. flowing. Later Henry got a Hupmobile. This stood in Chaplin was a regular. He was fascinated with front of his apartment for years, never receiving Bergman's success. He was also, as usual, greatly the shelter of a garage. As late as 1927 Henry taken with watching his fellow diners. Prize­ still operated this antique, the back seat clut­ fighting acquaintances like Mickey Walker tered with the accumulated magazines of years would drop down beside him to discuss an up­ of reading, windshield hitched to the driving coming fight. Henry 'Pathe' Lehrman, director post with wire, and scalloped fendersshimmying of Chaplin's first film, would stop by for a with every revolution of the rickety wheels. moment. One evening an ambitious mother

18 Virginia Cherrill as the blind girl on location with Chaplin during the filming of CITY LIGHTS (1931). brought her son in, pushing him in the direction When Herbert Somborn, Gloria Swanson's of Chaplin's table. The child, unfortunately, ex-husband, opened the Vine Street Brown went off-course and it was to Henry Bergman Derby, Henry claimed it would not hurt him. he began to deliver his carefully rehearsed But each evening he or one of his lieutenants speech, "Mr. Chaplin, I have seen you in all would walk slowly past the rival door and size your pictures and hope one day .. . " up the crowd. In this third version of 'Henry's; Bergman was The stars, directors and executives, ever on in his element. Handling himself with that grace the search for something new, moved in a body peculiar to some large men-he walked with a to the Brown Derby. The columnists, the pho­ strange short forward stride as though alter­ tographers, the fan magazine writers followed nately booting drop kicks off each foot-he the stars. The public chased after them. would visit from table to table, his cigar point­ Then came AI Levy's on Vine Street. This and ing skywards, radiating happiness. To each wait­ the depression hurt Henry, but when Eddie ress in turn he would say, "Nothing." To his Brandstatter, famous Hollywood restauranteur, friends he would confess he was on a diet. Then opened modernistic Sardi's next door to 'Hen­ he would add to the waitress, "Just bring me a ry's' it delivered the final blow. little liverwurst and some coffee." Under the 'Henry's' closed. belief that he was not eating enough to keep a Gone were the ranch and the Buick. Gone mouse alive, Henry consumed tons of indigest­ was the restaurant. Henry must now eat with his iblefood. surviving rivals. But he was still on Chaplin's He was now chaffeur-driven to the studio in payroll.** a shining Buick. He contemplated a Lincoln. He • Chaplin's first film was released early in 1914. Bergman didn't join purchased a ranch that was to supply his patrons him until two years loter. - Ed. with special eggs, butter and chickens. •• Bergman was still on Chaplin's payroll when he died in 1946. - Ed . Many diners,·surveying the waiting line, asked Henry how the restaurant was doing financially. On the back cover: another Florence Homolka study of Chaplin Rolling his cigar across his mouth, Henry would as Calvero the clown in LIMELIGHT. mutter non-commitally that he was "Breaking even." Printed by Artisan Press

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