What She Gets For Being Herself By Howard Wilcox • No Gag-Writers--No Dictatorship by Sponsors--Always She Will Be HerseH-Tbat's Beatrice Lillie. And Why Does She Desert Her Leading Comedienne's Place on the Stage of Two Continents lor Radio? ... '''The Offer Was Too Ducky," 'She Says presario. That bow started as a courtly gesture-it ended up a riot of crooked legs and deliberate, artful burlesque. It was more than a bow-it was a pan­ tomimed lampoon of everything stiff and ponderous in British tradition. Everyone in the theater sensed this -and a few of the other performers tittered and tried to look as if they hadn't. Charlot sat like a man of stone. Then, wilh legs still askew, the little Canadian hoyden burlesqued t he chorus of a popular song: The Next Horse I Ride On, I'm Gonna Be Tied On. N AND ON she caroused, expecting any minute to . bt stopped and icily dismissed with the English Ohauteur she knew so well. But her heart exulted within • her. She improvbed three simple little "props"-an eye­ 1 brow pencil, with which she daubed a black moustache "I have plenty of funny songs with special on her upper lip; a broken red feather which she stuck lyrics "'hich I'll sing in the most awful into her hair; and a slavey's cap she had ~,,"atched up. voice pos~ible. My sketches will be satiri· With these Beatrice burlesqued many familiar English cal, and I will burlesque famous people" types-policemen. ser\'ins·maids and many others. Then she looked at Charlot 1T0nically. The great producer ,>tared back at her. "Something new!" he said softly-and offered her a WENTY YEARS AGO-almost to the day-a three years' contract! discouraged young Canadian Rirl stood in London's So Bea Lillie didn't go home to Canada. Instead, Strand while a typical London fog ooled and ed­ ~he went into the ladics' lounge and had a good cry, T year~' died ahout her. rOT a few momcnb she he~itated­ I hat three contract carried a salary of only then ~uddenly she signalled the dri\'Cr of a hamom cab. twenty pounds a \\cek-about ·90.......... but to the spunky ''I'll do it!" she said to herself ~rimly. "The worst kid \\ho had shown the splendid courage to Jeer at he can do is to throw me out. But '''e got to cut loose defeat and be her~clf, it was the splendid gateway to a and be myself once-ju~t once-before I bust!" grc;H career. A few minutes later Beatrice Lillie faced Andre Bca Lillie since has risen to internation<ll fame as Charlot. the Horenz Ziegfeld of the English stage. a glittering musical·comedy star and the toast of lWO She stood acro~s Ihe empty ~paces of the Alhambra­ continents. She became a pal of the Prince of Wales 1.0ndon'sJeading theater-along with a lot of other Job- and the wife of one of his friends, a British peer. To­ hungry slOgcrs. I ry-<lUts had beAun. day, as the star of a new radio program, she bids fair to Slim little Bca Lillie watched and hstened. Oc­ become one of the air's brightest stars. ca~ionally the no~trils of her larRe, handsome nost: In one important re~pe.:t the twenty years that ha"e twitched-for this slip of a Canadian girl was mad brought honors, fame, wealth. lo\'e and a title to Bea clear through. One by one the anxinus singers poured Before achieying Lillie (who now is lady Peel) have llot changed her ~ouls ~n.d her high place in out their to the empty. theater to the coldly the entertainment one bit. For she is ju"t .IS del ermined ~adder to be herself as she \\;t:) on that foggy critical Charlot. And steadily, Bea Lllhe grew world, nea Lillie and madder. L'nlike the re~t...he had not come 10 the day in London when she bearded Char- th~t dur~ng did plenty to en· lot in his theatrical den-and m.ade him hope of geninR a job. She had .Io..t hope of {ertain dou~hbors the past twelH months of faIlure-months 111 whIch like what she offered. And she is going producers had turned her down after listening to.her and Tommies to he herself on the air. 'l;ing such dignified and re5pectable hallads as 1 he S':ln­ Over There She will not employ gag-writers. <.hine of Your Smile, Tommy Murphy, I Hear 'rou She will not pattern her..elf on any other Calling Me. radio ~tar. She will not e"en permit her spomor to _~hape her programs; the new O. BEA LILLI E didn't expect to sing herself into a contract lean~s that enlirely up to her. job-for ~he was gomg home to Canada the very Will ra.dio fans accept and under­ Nnext day a failure. She had called upon the great Char­ stand her suhlle hur1e~Que-though un­ Iot be,a~se 10 her he rel)rc~ntf'd the whole British stage able to see her delicious pantomime? which had trCJted her (I coldly-and she \\3.. going Frankly. she i.. n't .. ure. but she's de­ to make fUll o/lJ1m right in his own theater' She was termintd to try in her own way. She going to burle..que the 3riti.. h theater and British tradi­ hore to offer her Ii.. renl'r" unique mate­ tions-and get thrown out Oil her CM. But she ",ould rial \\ hich will make up for the ges­ have her own thrill from that! Then the saucy young tures, Aflmaces, stumbks and dilly cos­ minx would go home to Canada. nursing her wounded tumes which they \vill not be abh~ to see. pride. At least she would have stuck nut her tongue Beatrice Lillie has made a fl'putalion by at the institutions that had refu<.;ed to give her a break. offering con~tantly something new. And "Mi~s lillie!" rhey called her name. She stepped something new is what ~he is determined to the center of the .. tage. to afTer radio fans. "Won't You Come and Spla"h Me'" shrieked this Miss l.illic·s boyish head ..hone "lim, dynamic miss-yodeling at the great Charlot the black and sleek (Colllm"ed on Page ,;) words of a popular dilly in a voice purposely pitched off-key. While the other performers looked and lis­ tened in stO'nned am.uement, Bea bowed to the im- A rare candid camera shot of Bea showing her companion of many stage reviews. Gertrude Lawrence. and her companion of ",everal screen plays, Richard BarthelmesB 2 1 There's 8ome-­ thinK very mov· ing about VERA VAJ."l when she unleashes those Drivin' the vocal plaints of perfidy and car­ ries the torch right into lOU living room Blues Away LORETIA LEE is a KoOO antidote aKainst winter's chill. Her voice has the Radio's Queen in 1934, IRE 'E BEAS· sultry warmth of ada)" Lb., J~ ...adlo la""I.i.e an) olu Jear. on a Florida beach Steeped in the tradition of the- South, lhi~ ." ts • fine Dixie fl.vor to her songs Smoke gets in your eyes "'"hen petite FRAXCES LANGFORD turns on the heat that lurks in her "pipes" awaiting a sonII! 3 The Private Life of Wal ter Winchell If You Think That The Gray Ghost of Broadway Is In­ separable from the Noisy and Lurid Night Clubs--the Guys and Dolls Who Infest Them-the Bawdy and Hu­ morous Gags-the Furtive Whispering of News Tips­ the Odds and End. of Gossip and Confidence........... Mod­ ern and Sinful Boswell of Broadway-Then Come up and See Him Some Morning Playing with Walda, His Daugh­ ter, or Discussing Household Happenings with His Wife good trouper he is, and when he signed off not a single listener was aware of the black despair in his heart. Ilc broke down completely after the broad~ast, and was rushed home in a state of collapse by studio officials. Walter's startling radio success is but another instance of hiCi ability for tloing the unusual. and then turn­ ing to something else still more un­ u.. u.:I1. Walter IS on a continuous re .... tles:o. que"t for something to en~ trap his intcrest; there is an everlast­ ing bounce in him that drives him up and Oil. In his four years on the .:Iir, Win­ chell has compiled a proud record of radio lle\\sbeJh. \\'hal oc.;urrcd , .... on one of his recent Sunday night broadcasts is typical of his aSlound­ sho~n ing ability to garner the new;) before Walter and his wife and daughter"!, Walda (the elder) and Gloria, as any of hiS competitors. they enjo)'ed the sun at Miami Beach the Winter preceding Gloria's tragic end When Walter submitted his script to the Pre.... ) Radio Bureau several weeks a~o. the eyes of that collecth-e a daily 5'tint and was retUTnlOg to the peace and quiet body ot augu!ll gentlemen almost By Jack Banner of his home and familv. For the next t",ehe hours or popped from their heads, for leading so the ",heels of tabloidia woulll cea~e grinding w far 3S the ..cript was the sensatIOnal story the Gray Gho"t of Broadway wa~ concerned.