Leslie Howard

2018-06-01T12:43:00.000-07:00

On TCM this month.

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Remembering Arthur O'Connell On His Birthday

2017-03-29T01:01:00.000-07:00

[Arthur O'Connell and James Stewart in
Anatomy of a Murder, 1959]

The year 1955 was very good for Arthur O'Connell (29 March 1908 - 18 May 1981). He appeared in Picnic, for which he received his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. He also had parts in The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit and Bus Stop.

He was one of those great character actors who always turned in a stellar performance. My favorite was as Parnell Emmett McCarthy, the washed up, alcoholic attorney who saved the day for Jimmy Stewart in Anatomy of a Murder (1959) for which he received his second nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Happy Birthday, Arthur O'Connell.

Arthur O'Connell's Obituary, The New York Times, 19 May 1981

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Remembering Thelma Ritter On Her Birthday

2017-02-14T01:01:00.000-08:00

[Thelma Ritter, 1955]

To me, Thelma Ritter (14 February 1902 - 5 February 1969) was the best character actor ever to appear on film. I loved her and believed everything she ever said. Co-incidentally, or is it, Ritter appeared in all my favorite films:

Miracle on 34th Street (1947)
Call Northside 777 (1948)
All About Eve (1950) - Nominated for Best Actress in a Supporting Role
The Mating Season (1951) - Nominated for Best Actress in a Supporting Role
Rear Window (1954)
Pillow Talk (1959) - Nominated for Best Actress in a Supporting Role
How the West Was Won (1962)
Move Over, Darling (1963)
Boeing Boeing (1965)

Just to name a few.

Ritter also delivered what I believe is the best comeback line ever to be uttered on film. In All About Eve when Gary Merrill asks Ritter on his way out of town to direct a movie in Hollywood, "What do you want me to tell Tyrone Power," Ritter responds, "Just give him my phone number. I'll tell him myself."

Oh, how I love you Thelma Ritter. Happy Birthday.

Programming Note

2017-01-26T00:01:00.000-08:00

[Leslie Howard and Vivien Leigh in Gone With The Wind (1939)]

Gone With The Wind to air on TCM Thursday, February 9, at 9:00 PM PST [Please check your local listings]

[Leslie Howard with author Victor Fleming and Vivien Leigh
on the set of Gone With The Wind (1939)]

Although Gone With The Wind was Leslie Howard's least favorite film—he actually detested it—it is undoubtedly the character for which he is most remembered.

[Leslie Howard as Ashley Wilkes]

Leslie Howard resented the rôle from the start, referring to the character as "the abominable Ashley." Howard called Ashley "a dreadful milk-sop, totally spineless and negative" and told David O. Selznick "I don't really think I can do much with him." Selznick's advice, "Don't do anything, Leslie. Just be yourself." This comment most likely irritated an already annoyed Leslie. Howard also didn't think much of the size of the part either, complaining that "if you sneeze, you miss me."

[Leslie Howard and Vivien Leigh in Gone With The Wind (1939)]

And Howard felt he was too old to play Ashley Wilkes. He was also annoyed that he had to wear makeup for the first time in a movie part. Howard said of the film later:

"From my own point of view, it was the most—what can I say?—violent film I've ever played in. Just one climax after another. That's what happens when you try to compress a story of that size and that virulence into a film. All the bits between the high-spots have got to go. It's full of deaths and murders and passions and jealousies and fighting—oh, and fires, lots of Technicolor fires.

"The Technicolor cameras made me break one tradition of a lifetime. I had to wear make-up for the first time on the screen. My own hair photographed reddish-brown in Technicolor and Ashley you know, was definitely 'tow-colored.' So I had my hair bleached and had to use a greyish-white make-up on my face to get a natural pale skin tone."

[Leslie Howard on the set of Gone With The Wind (1939)]

Ronald Howard recalled in his book, In Search of My Father (p. 19), his father's answer to Ronald's question of why he had been offered the part: "Well, Wink, I suppose it must have been because I could sit on a horse. The other actors they tested fell off!" Of course, this wasn't true. The film's producer, David O. Selznick, wanted Howard for the part of Ashley. [For anyone who disputes this or wishes to assert that Howard was not Selznick's first choice, please consider that a part in Gone With The Wind was highly sought after and any actor who had been offered a part would have gladly accepted.] Leslie didn't want the part however. He even set his price at a figure designed for rejection by Selznick. But Selznick did accept it. Leslie Howard had been one of Hollywood's most sought after leading men for nearly a decade, not only by producers and directors, but by Hollywood's leading ladies as well. He was able to to command $75,000 for the part, plus a 2% share of the profits.

The hours were long and boring for Howard and the shooting seemed to go on forever. It has always been reported that Howard secured his producer credit for Intermezzo: A Love Story (1939) as enticement from Selznick to appear in Gone With The Wind. However, according to Leslie Ruth Howard, her father actually received that producer credit in payment for having to remain in the United States for the never-ending retakes ordered by Selznick after initial filming had been completed and at a time when Howard was anxious to return to England. Although filming for Intermezzo had already been completed by the time retakes were being shot for GWTW, Intermezzo was not released until 22 September 1939 so Leslie Ruth's assertion may be true.

[Leslie Howard and Olivia de Havilland in Gone With The Wind (1939)]

Leslie Ruth, along with Howard's sister, Irene, stated that they had never seen the film in its entirety—had never sat down and watched the movie straight through—simply because of Howard's animosity regarding ticket prices for the film. When the film was released in England in 1940 the war had already started. Howard felt England was alone and vulnerable. Howard himself had given up all his future film revenues—estimated at $2 million in today's currency—by returning to England when he did and then to see his fellow countrymen gouged at the box office was just too much for him. So, per Howard's orders and to appease him, the family boycotted the movie. Nevertheless, although the movie may not be Howard's best work, it will stand as Leslie Howard's best known work.

To read the original The New York Times Review, click here.

Bibliography:
Leslie Howard: On & Off Screen. Dir. Thomas Hamilton. Film.
Howard, Leslie Ruth. A Quite Remarkable Father: The Biography of Leslie Howard. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1959.
Howard, Ronald. In Search of My Father: A Portrait of Leslie Howard. London: St. Martin's Press, 1984. ISBN 0-312-41161-8.
LeslieHowardForever. Leslie Howard - British Greats 1980. Film. YouTube. LeslieHowardForever.tumbler.com. Ginevra di Verduno, 18 March 2015. Web. Ongoing.

Nugent, Frank S. "THE SCREEN IN REVIEW; David Selznick's 'Gone With the Wind' Has Its Long-Awaited Premiere at Astor and Capitol, Recalling Civil War and Plantation Days of South--Seen as Treating Book With Great Fidelity." The New York Times, 20 December 1939, p. L31

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Leslie Howard: On & Off Screen

2017-01-05T01:23:00.000-08:00

Leslie Howard: On & Off Screen

Recently, Tom Hamilton, Writer, Producer and Director of the documentary films Leslie Howard: The Man Who Gave a Damn and The Mystery of Flight 777, the story of the ill-fated flight of the IBIS in which Leslie Howard met his death, made some of his Leslie Howard memorabilia available for purchase online at LeslieHowardMemories. [Items are still available for sale.] Of course, I had to purchase a few items—more than a few really—and Tom was kind enough to forward me a copy of Leslie Howard: On & Off Screen. [To see a write up of the original screening of the film by The Cinema Museum, click here.]

Leslie Howard: On & Off Screen is a compilation of material Mr. Hamilton was not able to use in his main documentary due to time constraints. The DVD is a full two hours and contains Leslie Howard's actual home movies, along with portions of Mr. Hamilton's interview of Leslie Ruth "Doodie" Howard, Leslie Howard's beloved daughter. Viewers will hear Doodie tell several of the stories about her father that she recounts in her book, A Quite Remarkable Father—with a few extra details—and never before heard additional stories. The viewer sees what Leslie Howard saw through his camera lens, along with clips taken by others of Leslie playing polo and Leslie with family and friends such as Marion Davies, Cary Grant, Gary Cooper among others.

[Leslie Howard and Marion Davies at San Simeon]

Mr. Hamilton explains how he happened upon Leslie's home movies—these truly wonderful glimpses into Howard's life. Also included is the movie Bookworms (1920), one of Howard's first appearances on film which is shown in its entirety. This is a version I have not seen anywhere else. The only version available here in the US is not of good quality and the film is cut off at the end—an end which I now see has a little surprise I did not know was there up until now. Also included is Leslie's public service announcement filmed with Noël Coward on the set of In Which We Serve (1942) and an extended clip from the documentary, Leslie Howard: The Man Who Gave a Damn which contains a voice recording of a portion of Leslie's performance in Hamlet (1936). You will also hear from one of Doodie's school friends with personal stories of Doodie and what it was like for a 12-year-old schoolgirl to meet Leslie Howard, film idol of millions of women.

[Leslie Howard as Hamlet by Alfredo Valente]

This DVD contains amazing historical home movies of New York's Times Square and Great Neck where Leslie lived and spent time with many friends including F. Scott Fitzgerald and his wife, Zelda. Viewers will also see Leslie at home in England and Beverly Hills, Hearst Castle in San Simeon and film of at least one of his crossings during the 1920s and 1930s. Personally, I was excited to see that I had stood in many of the very same spots where Leslie filmed.

As a Leslie Howard fan this DVD is priceless. However, Mr. Hamilton is making it available to the general public for only £17.49 ($21.59). It is well worth the price for anyone who loves Leslie Howard and all fans of that era. I hope you will support Mr. Hamilton and his good works by purchasing the DVD.

DVD available at Leslie Howard: On & Off Screen.
Other memorabilia available at LeslieHowardMemories.

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Programming Note

2017-01-01T00:01:00.000-08:00

[Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer in A Free Soul (1931)]

A Free Soul to air on TCM Sunday, January 15, 2017, at 9:00 AM PST [Please check your local listings]

Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer in A Free Soul, Produced and Distributed by MGM, Precode 1931. Best Actor Win: Lionel Barrymore. Best Actress Nomination: Norma Shearer. Best Directing Nomination: Clarence Brown.

A Free Soul went into the Guinness Book for the longest take in a movie at 14 minutes. Many believe it was this scene that was responsible for Lionel Barrymore's Best Actor win that year. The film also made Clark Gable a star. It seems the audience liked to see him push Norma Shearer around. The studio reportedly received thousands of letters asking to see more of "the guy who slapped Norma Shearer."

[Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer in A Free Soul (1931)]

Interestingly, according to Wikipedia, "the Canadian Pharmacists Association protested what they claimed was an unfair portrayal of druggists in the film." I actually had to watch the movie again (not that I minded) to figure out what this was about. As near as I could tell, it was the scene where what appeared to me to be a store clerk sells Lionel Barrymore's character a bottle of booze from behind the sales counter. I'm not sure why the pharmacists of Canada got upset. Canada wasn't under prohibition and I never had the sense that the scene even took place in Canada. The movie also must have upset Catholics as well as it was banned in Ireland altogether.

The screenplay was based on the novel written by Adela Rogers St. Johns. Apparently, after Norma Shearer read the book she told her husband, Irving Thalberg, she wanted to play the part. Thalberg tried to buy the rights and St. Johns did agree to sell but the asking price was initially too high for Thalberg. After all his attempts to get the story at a bargain rate and St. Johns' insistence on the initial sale price of $40,000 and I imagine some convincing from Shearer, Thalberg agreed to pay the full price.

[Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer in A Free Soul (1931)]

Thalberg's biography also notes that St. Johns wrote A Free Soul with Joan Crawford in mind as Jan. St. Johns asked Thalberg to rethink but why should he when he bought the part for his wife. I mean, can you imagine how that would have gone down at home? Even Crawford could understand that as evidenced by her comment after she learned that the part was written for her. She reportedly quipped, "How can I compare with Norma when she sleeps with the boss?"

[Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer in A Free Soul (1931)]

Leslie Howard's part is not huge, but it is critical, and I loved him in it. His heroism is legendary. I have never understood the criticism, even though it is rare, that he plays such wimpy parts. His characters may be sensitive, but he always adores his woman and would give up his life for her and his happiness for honor. There is nothing more romantic to me than that.

To read The New York Times Review of A Free Soul by Mordaunt Hall, June 3, 1931, click here.

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Happy New Year!

2016-12-31T13:13:00.000-08:00

[Leslie and Ronald Howard at Marion Davies’ circus party 1937
(from LeslieHowardForever.tumbler.com)]

Hello, everyone!

I hope you have all had a very happy holiday season and are looking forward to ringing in a new year we all hope will bring peace and prosperity to everyone. I have been absent for the last two months but will be back in the new year with new posts and pages on my blog.

Well, I'm not sure if this Marion Davies' circus party where Leslie and his son, Ronald, were celebrating was held on New Year's Eve, but I am going to use it to wish you all a very Happy New Year!

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Programming Note

2016-11-17T11:39:00.000-08:00

[Leslie Howard and Vivien Leigh in Gone With The Wind (1939)]

Gone With The Wind to air on SundanceTV Thursday, November 24, at 10:00 AM PST [Please check your local listings]

Leslie Howard, Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable and Olivia de Havilland star in the top grossing movie of all time, Gone With The Wind. Produced by David O. Selznick, Directed by Victor Fleming and Screenplay by Sidney Howard, this film was delayed for two years while Selznick negotiated with MGM for Clark Gable and conducted an extensive "American Idol" type search for Scarlett O'Hara.

Top Awards:

Best Picture - Selznick International Pictures
Best Director - Victor Fleming
Best Actress - Vivien Leigh
Best Adapted Screenplay - Sidney Howard
Best Supporting Actress - Hattie McDaniel

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Remembering Jack Elam On His Birthday

2016-11-13T01:01:00.000-08:00

[Jack Elam]

I just love character actors. And today would have been the 96th birthday (if I did the math right, and his year of birth is disputed) of one of my favorite character actors, Jack Elam (13 November 1920 - 20 October 2003).

Born William Scott Elam in Miami, Arizona, Elam appeared in 73 movies and 41 television series. Elam played the scheming, no-account, dastardly bad guy better than anyone. It is no coincidence that one of his best performances was in one of my favorite films, Rawhide, starring Tyrone Power. But Elam could also play the funny man which he did with greater frequency in the later years of his career.

Happy Birthday, Jack Elam.

Jack Elam's Obituary, The Guardian, 28 October 2003

Remembering Martin Balsam On His Birthday

2016-11-04T01:01:00.000-07:00

[Martin Balsam in Psycho, 1960]

Martin Balsam (4 November 1919 - 13 February 1996) was one of those great character actors I loved watching. You know the kind. They seem to appear in all your favorite films, the ones you have on DVD and have watched so many times you know the dialogue word for word.

Balsam was the ardent detective, Milton Arbogast, in Psycho (1960) whose agonizing fall down those stairs went on forever. He was the calm and controlled Juror #1 in 12 Angry Men (1957). The way Balsam stood up after the jury had taken one more of those secret votes, you just knew Henry Fonda had finally turned the jury. His portrayal of O.J. Berman in Breakfast at Tiffany's always sticks in my mind, "She's a phoney. But she's a real phoney." Balsam played the sympathetic but ineffectual cop, Police Chief Mark Dutton, in Cape Fear (1962). And when he sneezed that last time in The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974) and Walter Matthau realized he had gotten his man...well, what can I say?

Happy Birthday, Martin Balsam.

Martin Balsam's Obituary, The New York Times, 14 February 1996

Programming Note

2016-10-14T11:00:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard and Kay Francis in British Agent, 1934]

British Agent (1934) to air on TCM Friday, October 28, 10:45 AM EST, 7:45 AM PST [Please check your local listings]

British Agent is a film based on the autobiography of R. H. Bruce Lockhart, a member of the British Secret Service. Lockhart's book, Memoirs of a British Agent, was also said to have inspired one of the
most successful miniseries of the 1980's, Reilly, Ace of Spies (1983), starring a very young Sam Neill. British Agent was directed by the up and coming Michael Curtiz and stars Leslie Howard and the beautiful Kay Francis in a very strong role. Also appearing is Leslie Howard's good friend, William Gargan. Cesar Romero plays Tito Del Val. The film was produced by First National Pictures and distributed by Warner Bros.

Howard plays Stephen Locke, a British Consul General assigned to the British Embassy in Moscow. On the night of the October Revolution Locke is in Petrograd and helps a beautiful woman, Elena Moura (Kay Francis), escape from a Russian soldier she has just shot. Their meeting is brief and the two go their separate ways. After Lenin's party assumes power, most of the embassies withdraw their diplomats, but Locke is one of the few left behind in Petrograd. While waiting for word from his government on how to proceed, Locke begins a romance with Elena. Unfortunately, however, the two are on opposing political sides. Locke then becomes involved in negotiations with the new government attempting to persuade them not to form a separate peace with Germany. He is frustrated knowing that for every Russian who stops fighting Germans a German soldier is freed up to begin fighting the Allies on the Western front. But, Elena knows his real status as a private individual and not an official representative of his government and gives him away to her friends. The movie follows their on-again, off-again romance set against the turmoil of the Revolution going on around them.

[Movie Poster British Agent, 1934]

Memoirs of a British Agent was a hugely successful novel when it was released in 1932. Warners scored the movie rights and hyped the movie as the "most important dramatic event of the year." It was the most expensive movie Warners had produced up to that time. Unfortunately, the British government was not pleased as the book was basically 300 pages on how the British government had screwed up in WWI. The Brits told Warners they had better soften the storyline or else it wouldn't play in English movie houses. That capitulation is essentially why British Agent isn't rated higher by today's critics. They see the movie as a missed opportunity. Although Leonard Maltin gave the film only one and a half stars out of four, most viewers give the film at least four stars out of five on the TCM website. The movie was very popular when it was released and Leslie Howard fans will undoubtedly enjoy this movie.

[British Agent Trailer, 1934]

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A Very Surprising Man

2016-10-09T19:46:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard as Peter Standish in Berkeley Square, 1933]

When I first decided to start my Leslie Howard Fan Page on Facebook I had only intended to post some pictures. But in my search for new photos my natural curiosity was piqued and I wanted to know the stories behind the images. This launched me on an almost compulsive search for information about Leslie Howard—The Man. I soon realized that I needed a blog to contain all the information I was discovering and that is how LeslieHowardSteiner.blogspot.com came into being.

I have now been on this quest for information for at least eight hours a day, day in and day out, for a little over six months and I believe that I have a fairly good idea of who Leslie Howard was and what his personality was like. One of the things I discovered that surprised me was that Howard was a hypochondriac. Leslie Howard never stopped thinking about and obsessing over his health. He was convinced that he suffered from all sorts of diseases and that his heart would give out at any moment. Howard "never moved without a perfect battery of pills and medicines"(1) for this disease and for that condition and wouldn't put any type of food in his mouth until it had been thoroughly inspected. No amount of evidence produced by doctors could convince him that he wasn't about to succumb to a terrible illness at any given moment.(2)

[Leslie Howard as Berry Rhodes in Five and Ten, 1931]

Another shocker was the methods used and money spent by Leslie Howard attempting to contact Violette Cunnington, his lover and soul-mate, after her death in 1942. I know what it is like to lose someone who is loved and cherished and the overwhelming feelings of desperation to see and talk to them one more time. I also know that a feeling of guilt can exacerbate those feelings. And I do believe that Howard had an unreasonable and unwarranted feeling of guilt over Cunnington's death.

But the most perplexing discovery I have made is Leslie Howard's attitudes regarding the theater, movies and the acting profession. He seemed to look down on acting, stating that because it was an "outlet for emotion" it was a profession better suited for women(3) and calling it the most "unfathomable profession in the world."(4) Howard "saw the whole business of acting as a sheer process of embarrassment, with its sheepish daubing on of grease-paint followed by a period of immodest prancing about in borrowed finery."(5) Howard even went so far as to demonstrate how all the essential ideas of a story could be conveyed on the stage without an actor ever making an appearance. [Click here to read the article.]

[Leslie Howard as Dwight Winthrop and Norma Shearer
as Jan Ashe in A Free Soul, 1931]

According to Ronald Howard his father "often said in moments of infuriation, or even exasperated amusement at his predicament, that acting was a silly, futile, bogus sort of job and actors no more than clever performing seals, or, at worst, mere puppets jerked into life at another's bidding."(5) The more success Howard achieved as an actor, the more his distaste for his profession grew. He didn't like being known by his fans and stated that actors "should not exist off-stage."(6) Howard said the actor "should be able to wear such a complete make-up on the stage that he will never be recognized off it."(6) He went on to state that "actors ought not to be human beings; they should be part of the rôles they play, and the audience should not be aware of them as personalities apart from those rôles."(6) Howard stated that familiarity "destroys that important element in the theater—illusion."(6) He felt that when the actor became too familiar with the public the result was a "remarkably short career."(6) That the public was familiar with what their favorite actor "eats, how they sleep, where they go in the summer, what color ties they wear, what they think about babies, the international debt, cauliflower and marriage"(6) soon destroyed the fantasy and without the fantasy, the fan soon lost interest.

And Howard's opinions of movies and those that made them was worse. He referred to films as "typical effusions of the conveyor mentality."(7) Before Howard had ever made his first film he let his feelings be known about the movies stating: "A certain part of the theater, which has been dying for the past 100 years, did die a natural death and that was the part that went into talking pictures. The public would rather see a bad movie than a bad play because it is so much cheaper. Those at the head of the motion picture industry still find it hard to believe that the public wants anything in the way of motion pictures that is worth while. Despite talking pictures the theatre is still able to exist as a living, breathing organization."(8)

[Leslie Howard as David Trent and Ann Harding
as Shirley Mortimer in Devotion, 1931]

As I became more and more aware of Howard's attitudes about the theatre, the movies and acting, I went through several attitudes myself. At first I felt surprised that my favorite movie actor had such a dislike for doing something I so enjoyed watching him do. And as I discovered how Howard felt about being known I felt that I was intruding on his secret and private world. Should I even be researching his life and career? Was I just one of those fans he disliked and wanted to avoid who lurked at the backstage entrance, waiting for a glimpse of him? Then, I think I became a little miffed that he seemed to be placing himself on a higher plane than those ignorant among us who didn't understand the reality of the situation—until I read of the high esteem in which he held the public. Next I felt sad—sad that Mr. Howard didn't feel the pride of his accomplishments and the enjoyment that success should bring. And, finally, I felt the way someone feels who has just been pranked. Because I finally understood that, although Howard did really think all these things, I am not sure that he believed all of them. Or if he did believe all of them, that he continued to believe all of them once the words passed his lips. Every time I felt sure that I knew where Howard stood on an issue, I would read something that contradicted my understanding.

[Leslie Howard as Max Tracey in Service for Ladies, 1932]

Leslie Howard seemed to be a man who needed to "try on" a belief to see if he really believed it. He professed to want anonymity, but he sought fame. He expressed a desire to be alone, but he had many friends and enjoyed their company and they enjoyed his. He was a man who wanted everything but hung on to nothing. I sometimes have the feeling that Howard would make a pronouncement that would leave his audience stunned and then turn around and laugh, or at least be surprised at his own words. I said before that I think I have a fairly good idea of who Leslie Howard was and what his personality was like. I also think that at any moment I may read something about him that totally changes everything I believe. Howard was a complex man and that is what makes him so fascinating. He could be annoying, too, and at times I find myself rolling my eyes when I read some of the things he said and read about some of the things he did. I have the feeling that those who knew him and loved him best did some eye-rolling, too. But getting to know Leslie Howard has caused me to come to a very realistic view of The Man, and even though he was far from perfect, he was a truly kind and generous man, with very little ego and a very big heart.

[Leslie Howard as Tom Collier and Myrna Loy
as Cecelia Henry in The Animal Kingdom, 1932]

Sources:

(1) Howard, L. R. A Quite Remarkable Father: The Biography of Leslie Howard, p. 7. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1959.
(2) Howard, L. R. A Quite Remarkable Father: The Biography of Leslie Howard, p. 8. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1959.
(3) Reed, D. "Tea-Timing with the Horsy Mr. Howard." Silver Screen, March, 1935. Screenland Magazine, Inc., New York.
(4) Howard, L. "In Which Mr. Howard Talks About Acting." The New York Times, March 23, 1930. Retrieved from www.nytimes.com.
(5) Howard, R. In Search of My Father: A Portrait of Leslie Howard, p. 38. London: St. Martin's Press, 1984. ISBN 0312411618.
(6) "Howard Gives Views on Actors and Other Things." Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 5, 1932.
(7) Howard, R. In Search of My Father: A Portrait of Leslie Howard, p. 21. London: St. Martin's Press, 1984. ISBN 0312411618.
(8) "Calls 12 Good Plays Enough for New York." The New York Times, January 22, 1930. Retrieved from www.nytimes.com.

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Murray Hill

2016-10-02T19:37:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard pictured in Film Weekly, September 30, 1932]

Most people remember Leslie Howard as Ashley Wilkes from Gone With The Wind (1939) or as Sir Percy Blakeney from The Scarlet Pimpernel (1935). What most people don't know is that Howard was also a writer and had many articles and stories published in The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, The New York Times and many trade magazines. Howard's first published story appeared in The Penny Weekly when he was in his early teens. But Howard didn't limit himself to stories for magazines. He was also a playwright. Two of the first plays he produced, staged and appeared in were of his own composition: The True Artist—of which little is known—and Deception—the story of a private detective on his quest to track down stolen jewels.

Howard's most famous play, though, was Murray Hill. According to Leslie Ruth Howard in her book A Quite Remarkable Father, Murray Hill was a play her father worked on for many years. Howard was constantly revising the play, changing its title each time—Higginbotham, Tweedie, Tweedie Gets Married, The Man From Crumbles, A Farce In Three Acts, Collecting Cousins, Tell Me the Truth and Elizabeth Sleeps Out—until he finally settled on the title Murray Hill.

Murray Hill, according to Ronald Howard in Trivial Fond Records, was named for a "respectable locality of seedy retirement in New York where the action takes place—the principal characters were three maiden ladies who lived, concealed from the world, behind the shutters of an ancient, 'brownstone' house. Totally divorced from contemporary time, they existed oblivious of 'speakeasies', short skirts or 'The Charleston'."

Leslie Howard showed the play to anyone and everyone who was willing to read it, including his friend Scott Fitzgerald. He even read it aloud at family gatherings. After many years he finally found someone willing to produce the play, E. E. Clive, and the play went into rehearsals in Boston at the Copley Square Theatre in August, 1927, with Howard directing and appearing as "Wrigley." Howard and Genevieve Tobin were to be the guest players. The play opened on August 13th and received very favorable reviews by the Boston critics, so favorable that Lee Shubert sent his agent to see the play. The agent must have liked what he saw because the Shuberts offered to produce the play at their theater in New York.

Murray Hill was originally scheduled to run in Boston for two weeks but because of its popularity continued to play there for a full ten weeks. A New York company was formed with the plan to bring the play to the Shubert's Maxine Elliott Theatre in New York on September 19th. Howard and Tobin left the play in Boston at some point after September 3rd to take the play on out-of-town tryouts to the Shuberts' theaters in Wilmington and Philadelphia. The play was very popular in those cities as well.

[Click here to read an article Howard wrote for Vanity Fair titled "The Broadway Première" on how out-of-town tryouts can ruin a play.]

Due to various delays Murray Hill finally opened at the Bijou Theatre in New York on September 29th with Leslie Howard again in the rôle of Wrigley and again directing. This time the critics were not so amused. Although Howard received favorable reviews for his performance and some critics found parts of the play witty, the play was criticized as being "funny at unimportant moments, not nearly funny enough when it should be funniest. And quite often it seems merely silly."(1) However, there were dissenting opinions: "Howard...employs familiar material turned and twisted so well that we are almost convinced we have never met it before."(2) But most reviewers were not kind, some even nasty, stating the play was "slovenly written"(3) and calling the play "a wreck" and "a bore"(4) One unappreciative critic, who knew and liked Howard on a personal level, commented on how the audience must have been somehow "uncommonly friendly" because they seemed to actually enjoy the play.(3)

Howard must have been discouraged. The play closed after only 28 performances and he sold the rights to it under the title Elizabeth Sleeps Out. What happened next says a lot about why it is never good to judge a play by its critic. Elizabeth Sleeps Out went on to be a favorite of stock and repertory companies for decades. I have been investigating the history of Murray Hill, aka Elizabeth Sleeps Out, for eight hours a day every day for the last week and am only just now coming near the end of all the newspaper articles written about this play.

Murray Hill was performed as Collecting Cousins in Tunbridge Wells and Eastbourne (both in England) in 1928 and as Tell Me the Truth in London at two different theaters for a total of 64 performances also in 1928 and as Elizabeth Sleeps Out in just under 40 cities—at last count—from the early 1930s through the late 1950s, with some productions being extended over and over again. The 1933 production at the Hollywood Playhouse was continually extended from two weeks to a total of three months. But, Howard was embarrassed by the play, or at least claimed to be so. When it reappeared as Elizabeth Sleeps Out on Broadway in 1936 he actually apologized to New Yorkers for being its author. Howard would like to have had the production shut down, but having sold the rights to the play there was nothing he could do. That production, however, was poorly presented and somewhat suspect—non-union actors and crew had been hired and when the show folded no one got paid, the producers disappeared—and the show closed on its own after 44 performances.

But Howard had no reason to be embarrassed. The play served as a vehicle for many up and coming actors and for older actors who were retired to regional theater, and obviously brought pleasure and happiness to a lot of theatergoers who paid good money to see it throughout the years.

Sources:

(1) Arthur Pollock, The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, September 30, 1927
(2) The Enquirer, Cincinnati, October 9, 1927
(3) J. Brooks Atkinson, "The Play," The New York Times, September 30, 1927
(4) The Pittsburgh Press, October 9, 1927

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Remembering James Whitmore On His Birthday

2016-10-01T01:01:00.000-07:00

[The Next Voice You Hear Trailer, 1950]

James Whitmore's (1 October 1921 - 6 February 2009) career spanned radio, stage, film and television. He is one of only a handful of performers to have won three of the four EGOT honors. His 1999 Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actor - Drama Series came for his appearance as Raymond Oz in The Practice. Whitmore won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Battleground in 1949, probably my favorite WWII movie. He was also nominated in the same category by the Academy Awards but lost out to Walter Huston for his role in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948). And Whitmore won a Tony for Best Newcomer in 1948's Command Decision.

But my absolute favorite James Whitmore performance was as Joe Smith, average man, in The Next Voice You Hear (1950) co-starring Nancy Davis, soon to be Nancy Reagan. In it, Whitmore hears a voice on the radio claiming to be God who speaks to humanity for several wonderful but terrifying days. I watch the movie at least once a year.

Happy Birthday, James Whitmore.

James Whitmore's Obituary, The New York Times, 7 February 2009

Berkeley Square

2016-09-22T21:42:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard as Peter Standish in
Berkeley Square, Lyric Theatre, London]

After years of disappointments on Broadway, Leslie Howard finally had a string of successes. It had been ten years since Howard made the decision to "try" acting and he was finally seeing the rewards. Howard had received rave reviews for The Green Hat and Her Cardboard Lover and was now an actor in demand. He got his first chance to star in a purely dramatic role in Escape, touted (due to a misunderstanding) as the last play John Galsworthy would ever write.

Sometime in the late fall or early winter of 1927 while Howard was appearing at New York's Booth Theatre in Escape—a play for which Howard would receive his best reviews ever and be firmly accepted as a dramatic actor—producer Jed Harris stuck his head into Howard's dressing room and said, "You were not bad, not bad at all. Come and see me sometime. Good night." Leslie called out into the hallway after him, "What about Berkeley Square?" (For all you Americans who don't know, it is pronounced "Bark-ley.")

You see, back in 1926 Leslie had been extolled the virtues of Berkeley Square by his friend and theatre critic Alexander Woollcott who had somehow gotten his hands on the script straight from London where it had already been staged. Woollcott convinced Howard that the part of Peter Standish was made for him and that only Howard could do it justice. Leslie was very interested in time travel—one of his acquaintances and an original stockholder in Leslie's film company was H. G. Wells, after all. Howard was also very interested in the possibility that mind could survive death. He knew Harris now owned the rights to the play.

Well, Howard finally heard from Harris some weeks later and Harris invited Leslie to his office to discuss the play. Unfortunately, by the time vague Leslie showed up, Harris had already left New York for his winter vacation in Florida. But, Howard did manage to get a copy of the script out of Harris' office. And he loved the play.

Berkeley Square was written chiefly by John Balderston, an American living in London, from an unfinished story, "The Sense of the Past," abandoned at the turn of the century by Henry James. James attempted to finish the story later, after WWI, but didn't seem to have the mental capacity required to finish the complex storyline. The novel was published posthumously but it wasn't treated favorably by critics.

The principal character, Peter Standish, was an American who was traveling to London just after the Revolutionary War to marry Kate Pettigrew. The very forward-thinking Peter Standish of the eighteenth century has a relative, another Peter Standish, living in the twentieth century in the very same house in Berkeley Square, London. The modern Peter Standish is obsessed with the past and time travel and has all the papers and letters of the original Standish. He longs to experience the life of the previous Standish. The previous Standish longs to experience the scientific wonders he imagines in the future. By the wills, or mental longings, of the two men they somehow manage to trade places with each other. The adventure of the modern Standish transported to 1784 is the substance of the play.

Even though H. G. Wells had written The Time Machine (1895) well before Berkeley Square made its appearance on the London stage in 1926, this was a very new concept to theatergoers of the mid-1920s. Unlike The Time Machine, which deals with the negative attitudes an inventor encounters when he explains time travel to his friends in the present, Berkeley Square deals with the problems the time traveller has when he is transported to the past and the risks he takes of being considered a lunatic because of his knowledge of the future.

In a commentary by the playwright and novelist Charles Morgan which appeared in The New York Times in March, 1929, Morgan explains the problem:

"In a beautiful scene and amid beautiful costumes, we see Peter struggling with the manners of the past—causing a sensation at White's because he turns his back in horror when the Prince of Wales, "the First Gentleman in Europe," blows his nose with his fingers, and [Standish] causing an even greater sensation by insisting on washing himself all over every day and despising the dandies of the period because they will not do likewise. He meets the great Duchess of Devonshire at a ball, and dazzles and confuses her by sprinkling his conversation with the epigrams of Oscar Wilde. He upsets Sir Joshua Reynolds by talking of a portrait of Mrs. Siddons As The Tragic Muse at a moment when the portrait is but begun and its title is still a secret. He gets into an infinity of trouble because he knows too much of the future and is forever letting his knowledge of it appear, with the result that he is solemnly believed to be a magician practicing the black arts."

When the modern Peter Standish has had his fill of the smells, the dirtiness, the inconvenience and the small-mindedness of those in the past and is ready to return to 1928, there is only one problem. He has fallen in love with a girl who can't travel through time with him and is destined to remain in 1784. And it is not the girl the original Standish traveled to London to marry. It is her sister, Helen. Standish has no machine to transport her. The play needed work but Howard wanted to be the one to bring it to the American stage.

Howard contacted Harris again but Harris was only offering the part if Howard would agree to a five-play deal. Leslie Howard could barely be pinned down for lunch tomorrow let alone a five-play deal that could possibly take over the next three years of his life. He declined. But he couldn't stop thinking about Berkeley Square. He knew the author was in England so he cabled John Balderston in an end-run around Harris. Unfortunately, even though Balderston wanted Leslie for the part, Harris now owned the rights to the play. Leslie tried to forget about it. Again he couldn't. He told his wife that the thing was "burning holes in my brain." Howard thought of his good friend, Gilbert Miller, who Leslie was now in partnership with. He sent a cable to Miller, who was also in London. Howard soon received the following response: "Dear Partner, have bought Berkeley Square. Good luck, but don't blame me. Gilbert."

After 173 performances as Matt Denant in Escape, the play finally ended its New York run and went on the road to Boston, Hartford, New Haven, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Toronto and Montreal. By spring Leslie was itching to get back to England. He had already arranged to reprise his role in Her Cardboard Lover in London, this time with Tallulah Bankhead as his female lead. After selling their Long Island home, along with their possessions, the Howard's took off for London, on separate ships—you'll have to read my Leslie Howard Chronology • 1928 to discover why.

After Her Cardboard Lover was well underway and Leslie's life had calmed down, he began work on Berkeley Square, stopping with his wife at Balderston's home in Trevor Square every night after his performance in Her Cardboard Lover. There, the two wives kept their husband's awake by the constant flow of beer and cheese—a problem for Leslie's fragile intestines—and toiling at rewriting, reorganizing, rearranging, adding to and subtracting from the existing Berkeley Square, making it into the sensation it became.

[Leslie Howard as Peter Standish of 1928 in
Berkeley Square, Lyric Theatre, London]

[Leslie Howard as Peter Standish and Valerie Taylor as Kate
Pettigrew in Berkeley Square, Lyceum Theatre, New York]
Museum of the City of New York

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Captured!

2016-09-19T01:19:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard in Captured! 1933]

In March 1933 Leslie Howard was filming Captured! for Warner Brothers. The film co-starred Howard's friend, Douglas Fairbanks Jr. Howard had met Fairbanks during the summer of 1925 when the two happened to be crossing the Atlantic aboard the RMS Majestic at the same time. Fairbanks was just fifteen years old and hadn't yet made his first film.

[To read Howard's thoughts about his friend, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., at the time of Fairbanks' split from Joan Crawford, click here.]

Captured! was about RAF Capt. Fred Allison (Leslie Howard) who had been languishing in a WWI German POW camp for two years all the while worrying why his wife hadn't written to him. Along comes his best friend, also an RAF pilot and also captured by the Germans, Lt. Jack "Dig" Digby (Fairbanks), whom Allison is mighty happy to see. Capt. Allison is hoping "Dig" may be able to give Allison news of his wife back home. But it seems "Dig" isn't so happy to see his best friend. It seems that "Dig" has been filling in—if you'll pardon the expression—for Allison with his wife back home. The movie tells the sad tale of how Allison comes to realize the truth about his wife and his best friend.

[Leslie Howard and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in Captured! 1933]

[Leslie Howard and Margaret Lindsay in Captured! 1933]

Also being filmed on the Warners lot, in the adjacent soundstage as a matter of fact, was Gold Diggers of 1933. This was happy news for Leslie Howard, who could think of nothing better to do than wile away the long hours waiting to film his next scene by visiting the ladies next door. Howard was frequently missing from the set of Captured! during that spring, only to be found next door getting private lessons—violin, that is.

[Leslie Howard and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. are being given the basics of the
violin by Busby Berkeley, dance instructor for Gold Diggers of 1933.
Yes, their eyes really are on the violin.]
Modern Screen, July, 1933

Apparently, Howard was so enthralled with all the women that when asked if he would take the salary cut being imposed by First National Films during the studio financial crisis of 1933, he quipped, "First, tell me, will those girls be working on the Gold Diggers of 1933 set very long?" After being informed that they would, Howard responded, "Well, in that case, just don't bother about cutting. I'll be only too happy to work for nothing."

One of the scenes in Captured! shows the POW's, including Howard, being forced by their German captors to shower. By 1933 Howard had already attained the status of movie idol and I am sure the scene was added by studio executives to satisfy Howard's growing female fan base. The film was pre-code so Warners could get away with such obvious tactics.

[Leslie Howard when wet]

[Shower scene in Captured! 1933]

Well, by a freak coincidence, at exactly 5:54 p.m. PST on March 10, while the actors were filming this shower scene, it just so happened that the 1933 Long Beach earthquake hit. The epicenter was offshore, but it was powerful with a magnitude of 6.4 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe). Over 100 people died as a result of the quake which also caused over $40 million dollars' worth of property damage (over $720 million in today's currency).

Here is a segment of film which has survived from a movie which W. C. Fields and Franklin Pangborn were shooting at the time the earthquake hit.

And what about all those Captured! actors who happened to be au naturel at that very moment the earthquake hit? Well, they gave the ladies who were still on the Warners lot that early spring evening a real eyeful when they all came running out of the soundstage wearing only their astonished countenances. I would have braved a 6.4 to see that sight!

[Movie Poster for Captured!]

To see more photos from Captured! click here. To see advertising and articles about Captured! click here.

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Programming Note

2016-09-16T11:00:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard and Bette Davis in Of Human Bondage, 1934]

Of Human Bondage (1934), directed by John Cromwell and produced by Pandro S. Berman and RKO Radio Pictures, stars Leslie Howard in the finest screen performance of his career up to that time and Bette Davis in her breakout role. Of Human Bondage is based on the 1915 novel of W. Somerset Maugham, a novel which has never been out of print since
its first publication. The novel was not a biography but contains elements of Maugham's own life. Philip Carey's club foot was Maugham's stutter. And like Philip Carey, Maugham understood the pain of losing his parents at a young age.

Leslie Howard plays Philip Carey, a young man who was orphaned as a child and sent to live with his rather cold and distant uncle but loving aunt at his uncle's vicarage. The film begins when Carey has already reached adulthood and has been living in Paris as a struggling artist for four years. Carey has decided to face the reality that he is only a mediocre painter at best and will never be able to sustain a living. He returns to London to pursue a career in medicine. Carey calculates that he has enough money in the form of bonds left to him by his father to finish his education. But then he meets Mildred Rogers (Bette Davis) and all his plans go awry as he becomes more and more obsessed with this waitress who mistreats and abuses him from the start. Carey's desperation for Mildred takes over his life and he finds himself sinking into utter despair, unable to control his own destiny.

Of Human Bondage presents the notion that good and bad are not mere philosophical ideas like right and wrong, but are the real occurrences of joy and anguish in a man's life that determine his state of happiness or hopelessness.

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Vague Leslie

2016-09-16T01:00:00.002-07:00

[Leslie Howard in John Galsworthy's Escape, Booth Theatre,
New York, 26 October 1927 - March 1928, 173 Performances]

By 1927 Leslie Howard had become very well known as one of Broadway's best comedic actors. But it wasn't until his appearance as Matt Denant in John Galsworthy's Escape that he was fully accepted as a dramatic actor. And his reviews were the best of his ten-year career:

"One of the fine performances of our day in the theatre is
contributed by Leslie Howard...Now and then this flawless and charming comedian takes time off to remind us all (and assure himself perhaps) that he is also an actor equipped to scale the heights. I hear a good deal from time to time about the decay of the art of acting in our day but for my own part I ask nothing finer than the honest, sensitive and beautiful performance which Leslie Howard gave last night on the stage of the Booth Theatre. I have not often seen anything better." Alexander Woollcott

"Leslie Howard gives a performance which, as if for nothing else on earth, he seems to have been born...he never had a finer part to play nor played it finer." Gilbert Gabriel, The Sun, October 27, 1927

"Mr. Howard goes through it superbly, sheared utterly of those engaging mannerisms which have made him so popular as a comedian. He plays easily and expertly, and gives such a mounting crescendo of fatigue that both he and the audience seemed likely to collapse from the plain sleeplessness of his sweaty, heavy-lidded exhaustion. The rest is no less effective, and makes it peer of the best performances in town." John Anderson, New York Evening Post, October 27, 1927

One thing Howard may not have been known so well for at that time, however, was his compulsive tardiness. But it would soon become legendary:

"The scene [John Galsworthy's Escape] in which she [Frieda Inescort] appeared was a bedroom in a hotel on the moors. The fugitive is discovered by the lady, hiding under her bed. As was bound to happen with vague Leslie, when the curtain went up one night on the bedroom, he was in his dressing room. Frightful sawing noises were heard off stage, as the carpenter cut a hole in the scenery so that he [Leslie] could crawl under the bed while Miss Inescort bravely shrieked her lines to the audience." A Quite Remarkable Father, pg. 144

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Leslie Howard's Rules of Theatre Etiquette

2016-09-08T00:01:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard as Oliver Blayds-Conway in The Truth About Blayds
by A. A. Milne, Booth Theatre, New York, March 14 to June 1922,
108 Performances]

Leslie Howard's Rules of Theatre Etiquette:

Don't ask the box office man if it's a good play.
Don't have any faith in dramatic critics, the star system, press agents, photographs in the newspapers, or articles by actors.
Don't try to buy tickets for a play an hour before the performance. You will either see a bad show or pay much too much for a good one.
Don't attempt to explain the play to your neighbor during the performance. If it is not understood, come again.
Don't venture out if you have a bad cough or cold. Stay in bed.
Don't, if you know you are well, let the rest of the audience persuade you that you have any bronchial trouble.
Don't, when the play is advertised for 8:30, come at 9:45 and then say you couldn't make head or tail of it.
Don't, I beg you on bended knees, come in late on first nights, talk loudly after the curtain is up, wear top hats in the aisles, scramble over innocent spectators, bang the seats down, or indulge in any other of the bad manners of the theatre. Unless you happen to be friends of the management—in which case these things will be quite in order.

Howard, Leslie. "A Prominent Actor Views the Audience." The New York Times, December 28, 1929. The New York Times Company, New York.

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Real or Imagined?

2016-09-07T06:35:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard with Archie Mayo
on the set of It's Love I'm After, 1937]

Leslie Howard's son, Ronald "Wink" Howard, talks about his father's shyness:

"As far as living in Hollywood was concerned Leslie had always kept a pretty low profile, not from any innate hostility to the place, but simply because he was not a very social animal. He was rarely seen 'around and
about' whether in London, New York or Hollywood and carefully avoided gatherings of large numbers of people, suffering from a genuine agoraphobia—crowds really frightened him—and having, as he admitted, no 'head for parties.' In fact, elusive as was his nature, he generally got out of Hollywood as quickly as he could, if only to the nearby desert at La Quinta where he could ride or lie about in the sun without feeling he was under inspection. It was in no sense a 'Howard exclusivity cult' but simply that he needed to escape from time to time, was basically solitary and shy and only really wanted the company of a very few intimate friends."

Leslie Howard's daughter, Leslie Ruth "Doodie" Howard, knew her father a bit better than her brother:

"He had built up a reputation for shyness, which he took considerable trouble to maintain. He was excused from many parties because he was supposedly too frightened of large gatherings to appear. It really rather depended on the gathering. A huge group of painters at the Royal Academy dinner delighted him, but an invitation to a fashionable New York party brought the comment: 'I did not go...I don't like brokers, Long Island society, Italian princesses, etc., and I'm sure that's what I should get.'"

Howard, Ronald. In Search of My Father: A Portrait of Leslie Howard. London: St. Martin's Press, 1984. ISBN 918-0-312-41161-8.
Howard, Leslie Ruth. A Quite Remarkable Father: The Biography of Leslie Howard. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1959.

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My Chronology of Leslie Howard's Life

2016-09-05T10:19:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard with his children, Doodie and Wink,
at their home Stowe Maries, at Dorking in Surrey c. 1939]

I have now been working on my "Chronology of Leslie Howard's Life" for months and have just made it halfway through his professional life—to 1930, where his movie career now begins. This is monumental for me. I cannot tell you how difficult it has been to put the pieces of Howard's life together in a meaningful sequence. I have outlined the reasons this is so arduous in a note which can only be viewed by clicking the link in the Chronology, or by clicking here. I am not going to rehash all those reasons in this post, but I will talk about the most primary among them.

Leslie Howard was a master storyteller. He began writing stories at a very young age and, according to his children, had an excellent imagination—his children being the recipients of his many fantasies in the form of bedtime stories which he seemed to be able to make up on the spot. It is interesting to note, however, that although Doodie, Howard's daughter Leslie Ruth, believed the stories she was hearing were made up just for her, when she compared the stories later in life with those her older brother heard as a child they were the same, word for word. The only difference was in a few characters which Howard created to symbolize himself and his son and which only the two of them knew about and shared in their secret world.

Howard also used his real life events—as I am sure all writers do—as the basis for the stories he told his friends and family and wrote about for newspapers and magazines, which means that his tales were woven together with elements of both truth and fiction. It is not always easy to tell which is which. Also, these stories were sometimes told to interviewers who reported them as fact—something I am sure amused Howard to no end. Dates get confused. Parts of his various life events are blended together to form a more interesting whole. Names are changed to protect the innocent. Howard like to embellish. It is difficult to unravel actual history from his many "stories."

I think the reason that Howard's children loved him so much becomes obvious. Howard didn't merely go through the motions when he was with his children. He existed for them. And Howard didn't just enter their world, he brought them into his. How fortunate for all of them that they had each other for as long as they did.

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I Know What It's Like to Be in Human Bondage, Continued

2016-09-03T03:34:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard with his daughter Leslie Ruth "Doodie," c. 1926]

"He was not a great party-lover, which also endeared him to his children, and most parties, when I was small, found him sneaking up to my room like a conspirator and again dozing off on my bed. He was usually found out; someone would miss him, and my poor mother then had to play the villain and come searching for him. Suddenly, her voice would be heard
saying she hoped he was not in 'that' child's room at 'this' time of night. We would giggle with our heads under the blankets, and he would beg me to hide him. This was obviously terrible for discipline, but wonderful fun for me." (pg.7)

"He was great fun as a father, and Winkie [her brother, Ronald] and I would never miss any opportunity to be with him. Being the younger and also at home all the time, I had more chance than my brother, and never had a child a more entertaining companion. He had a rare talent of being able to suit his humor and his interests to whatever age his children happened to be. Perhaps we unconsciously suited our age to his, but whatever the case, I cannot remember a time when he talked down to us or failed to get the same ridiculous glee out of the little things. For at least the first twelve years of my life, I was his shadow, feeling no need for friends of my own, riding with him, learning to dance or draw or read with him, and always laughing with him." (pg. 9)

Howard, Leslie Ruth. A Quite Remarkable Father: The Biography of Leslie Howard. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1959.

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I Know What It's Like to Be in Human Bondage, Continued

2016-08-30T03:48:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard with his children, Ronald and Leslie Ruth, c. 1930]

In August 1934, Gladys Hall interviewed Leslie Howard for Motion Picture Magazine. I do not know if Ms Hall realized before the interview began that Howard was at that moment so preoccupied with thoughts of his children, but she definitely knew it afterward. In one of the longest interviews Howard ever gave, he talks exclusively about his feelings on
being separated from his children for the first time in his career. Howard and his wife, Ruth, had decided that because the children were older, they should be allowed the choice of whether to make the "awful annual exodus" to America or stay at home in England. The children opted to stay behind—I am sure with some subtle prodding from the two grownups who had become convinced that Hollywood was not a good environment for their children. Howard had just completed Of Human Bondage (1934) when he made these comments:

"Yes, I am in human bondage, and not to a lady with a greenish pallor, either.

"I have been in bondage ever since my son was born. I have never, from that moment to this, drawn one completely free and all-for-myself breath. I am in bondage to my love for my children, my concern for them and for their concerns, my nostalgia when we are separated, my anxiety for the way their lives shall go when we are not together. There is no human bondage unless the chains are riveted on by love. If love does not exist, then, naturally, one does not care—and where one does not care, bondage is impossible.

"No, it is not physical bondage. It's a matter of mental and spiritual bondage. Never again, after the birth of children, is one free for one moment from worry about what they are doing, wondering if they are safe, happy, in the right environment, getting what they should be getting from life and countless other things. It is the most subtle and the strongest of all the slaveries in the world. Mothers, frequently, feel it more keenly than fathers. I must have a good deal of the mother in me."

Hall, Gladys. "I Know What It's Like to Be in Human Bondage." Motion Picture, August, 1934. Motion Picture Publications, Inc., Chicago.

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I Know What It's Like to Be in Human Bondage

2016-08-29T04:47:00.000-07:00

[Leslie Howard with his son and daughter, Ronald "Wink"
and Leslie Ruth "Doodie," in one of the last pictures they
took together before the start of WWII]

Following is an excerpt from an interview with Gladys Hall for Motion Picture Magazine printed in the August, 1934, issue:

I was reminded, as he talked, of a little incident Bette Davis told me about him when they were working on Of Human Bondage together. She said that Leslie was standing just off
the set, waiting to do a scene. She happened to look at him and thought that he looked like a little boy gazing at a far horizon, bewildered and enchanted by what he saw there. He was holding a letter in his hand. Someone came up and talked to him about the honor he had received at the Academy of Arts and Sciences—he was one of the three actors chosen for the best performances of the year [for Berkeley Square (1933)]. He didn't seem to hear, Bette said, much less to care.

He told Bette that the letter was from Leslie, his small daughter. She had seen her first pantomime show and was writing her father about it, very critically, very maturely. He said, "She wants to be a dancer," and when he said that, Bette told me, lights of pride danced in his near-sighted blue eyes, very far-sighted at that moment. "He said to me," smiled Bette, "'She writes that the snowdrops are blooming at home, and the hawthorn is white in the hedges. She says that I may be enjoying the sunshine of California and she adds "But Daddy, it's Spring in England—"' He puffed at his pipe for a moment after he had read me that. He said, kind of low, 'Kids are funny.' He didn't look at me when he said it. I can tell you one thing, it is not Spring for Leslie Howard anywhere on earth except where his children are."

Hall, Gladys. "I Know What It's Like to Be in Human Bondage." Motion Picture, August, 1934. Motion Picture Publications, Inc., Chicago.

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Leslie Howard In Sing-Sing

2016-08-25T05:30:00.002-07:00

[Leslie Howard, New York Public Library,
Billy Rose Collection, c. 1924]

On 1 January 1924 Leslie Howard began to keep a diary. Whether it was because he received a leather-bound journal for Christmas, or he had made a New Year's Resolution, or he merely wanted to keep a record of his life and the people he met, we don't know. Howard and his family were living just a block away from Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald in Great Neck, New York, at the time.

Ronald "Wink" Howard included the first six months of entries in Trivial Fond Records (1982), the book of Leslie Howard's own writings with
prefaces by Ronald. There are many days missing and Ronald does not state whether they were omitted from the book on purpose or because his father did not make an entry that day. Ronald does tell us, however, that the next to last entry was made by his angry wife, Ruth, on 18 October 1924, the day Howard's beloved daughter Leslie Ruth was born. Howard made only one other entry after that. Maybe he decided that a diary wasn't such a good idea.

Here are four entries:

Thursday, 28th February: Most of day occupied in trying to get rid of unholy headache acquired God knows how. Drive through mud to see unspeakably beastly shack with doddering fool of estate agent. Made headache much worse. Very annoyed. Train very late to town. Bored with performance. More headache—stomach probably deranged. Ruth meets train and car won't start. End of perfect day.

Sunday, 2nd March: Interesting visit to Sing-Sing prison to present Outward Bound to the dear convicts for the good of their souls. We are met by ambassadorial gent, looking like Sherlock Holmes or Lord Grey, who turns out to be forger doing second term. Name of Wyatt, son of a judge. Performance rather agonising in brown paper scenery. Dinner was pork, potatoes and salt-petre.

Monday, 3rd March: To my drawing lesson. [Alfred] Lunt not turning up—still suffering from effects of Sing-Sing. Did Mr. Hercules in yet another position. Shall soon know the gent's anatomy.

Tuesday, 4th March: Walking with Scott Fitzgerald over golf-links we discuss Otto Braun and the advance of science over the arts. Poor old Wink in bed with cold—but the snow is melting. Spring is in the air.

Howard, Leslie, ed. with Ronald Howard. Trivial Fond Records, pgs. 41-48. London: William Kimber & Co Ltd, 1982. ISBN 978-0-7183-0418-8.

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