Merton of the Movies Part 30

"Oh, yes, I like it. He's fine. He has a great appeal."

"Good! That's the kind of a part you're going to get in this new piece.

Lots of managers in my place would say 'No-he's a capable young chap and has plenty of talent, but he lacks the experience to play an Edgar Wayne part.' That's what a lot of these Wisenheimers would say. But me--not so. I believe you can get away with this part, and I'm going to give you your chance."

"I'm sure I don't know how to thank you, Mr. Baird, and I'll try to give you the very best that is in me--"

"I'm sure of that, my boy; you needn't tell me. But now--what I want you to do while you got this lay-off between pieces, chase out and watch all the Edgar Wayne pictures you can find. There was one up on the Boulevard last week I'd like you to watch half-a-dozen times. It may be at another house down this way, or it may be out in one of the suburbs. I'll have someone outside call up and find where it is to-day and they'll let you know. It's called Happy Homestead or something snappy like that, and it kind of suggests a layout for this new piece of mine, see what I mean?

It'll suggest things to you.

"Edgar and his mother and little sister live on this farm and Edgar mixes in with a swell dame down at the summer hotel, and a villain tries to get his old mother's farm and another villain takes his little sister off up to the wicked city, and Edgar has more trouble than would patch h.e.l.l a mile, see? But it all comes right in the end, and the city girl falls for him when she sees him in his stepping-out clothes.

"It's a pretty little thing, but to my way of thinking it lacks strength; not enough punch to it. So we're sort of building up on that general idea, only we'll put in the pep that this piece lacked. If I don't miss my guess, you'll be able to show Wayne a few things about serious acting--especially after you've studied his methods a little bit in this piece."

"Well, if you think I can do it," began Merton, then broke off in answer to a sudden thought. "Will my mother be the same actress that played it before, the one that mopped all the time?"

"Yes, the same actress, but a different sort of mother. She--she's more enterprising; she's a sort of chemist, in a way; puts up preserves and jellies for the hotel. She never touches a mop in the whole piece and dresses neat from start to finish."

"And does the cross-eyed man play in it? Sometimes, in scenes with him, I'd get the idea I wasn't really doing my best."

"Yes, yes, I know." Baird waved a sympathetic hand. "Poor old Jack. He's trying hard to do something worth while, but he's played in those cheap comedy things so long it's sort of hard for him to get out of it and play serious stuff, if you know what I mean."

"I know what you mean," said Merton.

"And he's been with me so long I kind of hate to discharge him. You see, on account of those eyes of his, it would be hard for him to get a job as a serious actor, so I did think I'd give him another part in this piece if you didn't object, just to sort of work him into the worth-while things. He's so eager for the chance. It was quite pathetic how grateful he looked when I told him I'd try him once more in one of the better and finer things. And a promise is a promise."

"Still, Merton, you're the man I must suit in this cast; if you say the word I'll tell Jack he must go, though I know what a blow it will be to him--"

"Oh, no, Mr. Baird," Merton interrupted fervently, "I wouldn't think of such a thing. Let the poor fellow have a chance to learn something better than the buffoonery he's been doing. I'll do everything I can to help him. I think it is very pathetic, his wanting to do the better things; it's fine of him. And maybe some day he could save up enough to have a good surgeon fix his eyes right. It might be done, you know."

"Now that's nice of you, my boy. It's kind and generous. Not every actor of your talent would want Jack working in the same scene with him. And perhaps, as you say, some day he can save up enough from his wages to have his eyes fixed. I'll mention it to him. And this reminds me, speaking of the cast, there's another member who might bother some of these fussy actors. She's the girl who will take the part of your city sweetheart. As a matter of fact, she isn't exactly the type I'd have picked for the part, because she's rather a large, hearty girl, if you know what I mean. I could have found a lot who were better lookers; but the poor thing has a bedridden father and mother and a little crippled brother and a little sister that isn't well, and she's working hard to send them all to school--I mean the children, not her parents; so I saw the chance to do her a good turn, and I hope you'll feel that you can work harmoniously with her. I know I'm too darned human to be in this business--" Baird looked aside to conceal his emotion.

"I'm sure, Mr. Baird, I'll get along fine with the young lady, and I think it's fine of you to give these people jobs when you could get better folks in their places."

"Well, well, we'll say no more about that," replied Baird gruffly, as one who had again hidden his too-impressionable heart. "Now ask in the outer office where that Wayne film is to-day and catch it as often as you feel you're getting any of the Edgar Wayne stuff. We'll call you up when work begins."

He saw the Edgar Wayne film, a touching story in which the timid, diffident country boy triumphed over difficulties and won the love of a pure New York society girl, meantime protecting his mother from the insulting sneers of the idle rich and being made to suffer intensely by the apparent moral wreck of his dear little sister whom a rich scoundrel lured to the great city with false promises that he would make a fine lady of her. Never before had he studied the acting method of Wayne with a definite aim in view. Now he watched until he himself became the awkward country boy. He was primed with the Wayne manner, the appealing ingenuousness, the simple embarra.s.sments; the manly regard for the old mother, when word came that Baird was ready for him in the new piece.

This drama was strikingly like the Wayne piece he had watched, at least in its beginning. Baird, in his striving for the better things, seemed at first to have copied his model almost too faithfully. Not only was Merton to be the awkward country boy in the little hillside farmhouse, but his mother and sister were like the other mother and sister.

Still, he began to observe differences. The little sister--played by the Montague girl--was a simple farm maiden as in the other piece, but the mother was more energetic. She had silvery hair and wore a neat black dress, with a white lace collar and a cameo brooch at her neck, and she embraced her son tearfully at frequent intervals, as had the other mother; but she carried on in her kitchen an active business in canning fruits and putting up jellies, which, sold to the rich people at the hotel, would swell the little fund that must be saved to pay the mortgage. Also, in the present piece, the country boy was to become a great inventor, and this was different. Merton felt that this was a good touch; it gave him dignity.

He appeared ready for work on the morning designated. He was now able to make up himself, and he dressed in the country-boy costume that had been provided. It was perhaps not so attractive a costume as Edgar Wayne had worn, consisting of loose-fitting overalls that came well above his waist and were fastened by straps that went over the shoulders; but, as Baird remarked, the contrast would be greater when he dressed in rich city clothes at the last. His hair, too, was no longer the slicked-back hair of Parmalee, but tousled in country disorder.

For much of the action of the new piece they would require an outside location, but there were some interiors to be shot on the lot. He forgot the ill-fitting overalls when shown his attic laboratory where, as an ambitious young inventor, sustained by the unfaltering trust of mother and sister, he would perfect certain mechanical devices that would bring him fame, fortune, and the love of a pure New York society girl. It was a humble little room containing a work-bench that held his tools and a table littered with drawings over which he bent until late hours of the night.

At this table, simple, unaffected, deeply earnest, he was shown as the dreaming young inventor, perplexed at moments, then, with brightening eyes, making some needful change in the drawings. He felt in these scenes that he was revealing a world of personality. And he must struggle to give a sincere interpretation in later scenes that would require more action. He would show Baird that he had not watched Edgar Wayne without profit.

Another interior was of the neat living room of the humble home. Here were scenes of happy family life with the little sister and the fond old mother. The Montague girl was a charming picture in her simple print dress and sunbonnet beneath which hung her braid of golden hair. The mother was a sweet old dear, dressed as Baird had promised. She early confided to Merton that she was glad her part was not to be a mopping part. In that case she would have had to wear knee-pads, whereas now she was merely, she said, to be a tired business woman.

Still another interior was of her kitchen where she busily carried on her fruit-canning activities. Pots boiled on the stove and gla.s.s jars were filled with her product. One of the pots, Merton noticed, the largest, had a tightly closed top from which a slender tube of copper went across one corner of the little room to where it coiled in a bucket filled with water, whence it discharged its contents into bottles.

This, it seemed, was his mother's improved grape juice, a cooling drink to tempt the jaded palates of the city folks up at the big hotel.

The laboratory of the young inventor was abundantly filmed while the earnest country boy dreamed hopefully above his drawings or tinkered at metal devices on the work-bench. The kitchen in which his mother toiled was repeatedly shot, including close-ups of the old mother's ingenious contrivances--especially of the closed boiler with its coil of copper tubing--by which she was helping to save the humble home.

And a scene in the neat living room with its old-fashioned furniture made it all too clear that every effort would be required to save the little home. The cruel money-lender, a lawyer with mean-looking whiskers, confronted the three shrinking inmates to warn them that he must have his money by a certain day or out they would go into the streets. The old mother wept at this, and the earnest boy took her in his arms. The little sister, terrified by the man's rough words, also flew to this shelter, and thus he defied the intruder, calm, fearless, dignified. The money would be paid and the intruder would now please remember that, until the day named, this little home was their very own.

The scoundrel left with a final menacing wave of his gnarled hand; left the group facing ruin unless the invention could be perfected, unless Mother could sell an extraordinary quant.i.ty of fruit or improved grape juice to the city folks, or, indeed, unless the little sister could do something wonderful.

She, it now seemed, was confident she also could help. She stood apart from them and prettily promised to do something wonderful. She asked them to remember that she was no longer a mere girl, but a woman with a woman's determination. They both patted the little thing encouragingly on the back.

The interiors possible on the Holden lot having been finished, they motored each day to a remote edge of the city where outside locations had been found for the humble farmhouse and the grand hotel. The farmhouse was excellently chosen, Merton thought, being the neat, unpretentious abode of honest, hard-working people; but the hotel, some distance off, was not so grand, he thought, as Baird's new play seemed to demand. It was plainly a hotel, a wooden structure with balconies; but it seemed hardly to afford those attractions that would draw wealthier element from New York. He forebore to warn Baird of this, however, fearing to discourage a manager who was honestly striving for the serious in photodrama.

His first exterior scene saw him, with the help of Mother and little sister, loading the one poor motor car which the family possessed with Mother's products. These were then driven to the hotel. The Montague girl drove the car, and scenes of it in motion were shot from a car that preceded them.

They arrived before the hotel; Merton was directed to take from the car an iron weight attached to a rope and running to a connection forward on the hood. He was to throw the weight to the ground, plainly with the notion that he would thus prevent the car from running away. The simple device was, in fact, similar to that used, at Gashwiler's strict orders, on the delivery wagon back in Simsbury, for Gashwiler had believed that Dexter would run away if untethered. But of course it was absurd, Merton saw, to anchor a motor car in such a manner, and he was somewhat taken aback when Baird directed this action.

"It's all right," Baird a.s.sured him. "You're a simple country boy, and don't know any better, so do it plumb serious. You'll be smart enough before the show's over. Go ahead, get out, grab the weight, throw it down, and don't look at it again, as if you did this every time. That's it. You're not being funny; just a simple country boy like Wayne was at first." He performed the action, still with some slight misgiving.

Followed scenes of brother and sister offering Mother's wares to the city folks idling on the porch of the hotel. Each bearing a basket they were caught submitting the jellies and jams. The brother was laughed at, even sneered at, by the supercilious rich, the handsomely gowned women and the dissipated looking men. No one appeared to wish his jellies.

The little sister had better luck. The women turned from her, but the men gathered about her and quickly bought out the stock. She went to the car for more and the men followed her. To Merton, who watched these scenes, the dramatist's intention was plain. These men did not really care for jellies and jams, they were attracted solely by the wild-rose beauty of the little country girl. And they were plainly the sort of men whose attentions could mean no good to such as she.

Left on the porch, he was now directed to approach a distinguished looking old gentleman, probably a banker and a power in Wall Street, who read his morning papers. Timidly he stood before this person, thrusting forward his basket. The old gentleman glanced up in annoyance and brutally rebuffed the country boy with an angry flourish of the paper he read.

"You're hurt by this treatment," called Baird, "and almost discouraged.

You look back over your shoulder to where sister is doing a good business with her stuff, and you see the old mother back in her kitchen, working her fingers to the bone--we'll have a flash of that, see?--and you try again. Take out that bottle in the corner of the basket, uncork it, and try again. The old man looks up-he's smelled something. You hold the bottle toward him and you're saying so-and-so, so-and-so, so-and-so, 'Oh, Mister, if you knew how hard my poor old mother works to make this stuff! Won't you please take a little taste of her improved grape juice and see if you don't want to buy a few shillings' worth'--so-and-so, so-and-so, so-and-so--see what I mean? That's it, look pleading. Think how the little home depends on it."

The old gentleman, first so rude, consented to taste the improved grape juice. He put the bottle to his lips and tilted it. A camera was brought up to record closely the look of pleased astonishment that enlivened his face. He arose to his feet, tilted the bottle again, this time drinking abundantly. He smacked his lips with relish, glanced furtively at the group of women in the background, caught the country boy by a sleeve and drew him farther along the porch.

"He's telling you what fine stuff this grape juice is," explained Baird; "saying that your mother must be a wonderful old lady, and he'll drop over to meet her; and in the meantime he wants you to bring him all this grape juice she has. He'll take it; she can name her own price. He hands you a ten dollar bill for the bottle he has and for another in the basket--that's it, give it to him. The rest of the bottles are jams or something. You want him to take them, but he pushes them back. He's saying he wants the improved grape juice or nothing. He shows a big wad of bills to show he can pay for it. You look glad now--the little home may be saved after all."

The scene was shot. Merton felt that he carried it acceptably. He had shown the diffident pleading of the country boy that his mother's product should be at least tasted, his frank rejoicing when the old gentleman approved of it. He was not so well satisfied with the work of the Montague girl as his innocent little sister. In her sale of Mother's jellies to the city men, in her acceptance of their attentions, she appeared to be just the least bit bold. It seemed almost as if she wished to attract their notice. He hesitated to admit it, for he profoundly esteemed the girl, but there were even moments when, in technical language, she actually seemed to "vamp" these creatures who thronged about her to profess for her jams and jellies an interest he was sure they did not feel.

He wondered if Baird had made it plain to her that she was a very innocent little country girl who should be unpleasantly affected by these advances. The scene he watched shot where the little sister climbed back into the motor car, leered at by the four New York club-men, he thought especially distasteful. Surely the skirt of her print dress was already short enough. She needed not to lift it under this evil regard as she put her foot up to the step.

It was on the porch of the hotel, too, that he was to have his first scene with the New York society girl whose hand he won. She proved to be the daughter of the old gentleman who liked the improved grape juice.

As Baird had intimated, she was a large girl; not only tall and stoutly built, but somewhat heavy of face. Baird's heart must have been touched indeed when he consented to employ her, but Merton remembered her bedridden father and mother, the little crippled brother, the little sister who was also in poor health, and resolved to make their scenes together as easy for her as he could.

At their first encounter she appeared in a mannish coat and riding breeches, though she looked every inch a woman in this attire.

"She sees you, and it's a case of love at first sight on her part,"

explained Baird. "And you love her, too, only you're a bashful country boy and can't show it the way she can. Try out a little first scene now."

Merton stood, his basket on his arm, as the girl approached him. "Look down," called Baird, and Merton lowered his gaze under the ardent regard of the social b.u.t.terfly. She tossed away her cigarette and came nearer.

Then she mischievously pinched his cheek as the New York men had pinched his little sister's. Having done this, she placed her hand beneath his chin and raised his face to hers.

"Now look up at her," called Baird. "But she frightens you. Remember your country raising. You never saw a society girl before. That's it--look frightened while she's admiring you in that bold way. Now turn a little and look down again. Pinch his cheek once more, Lulu. Now, Merton, look up and smile, but kind of scared--you're still afraid of her--and offer her a bottle of Ma's preserves. Step back a little as you do it, because you're kind of afraid of what she might do next. That's fine. Good work, both of you."