Evening star. [volume], December 15, 1946, Page 18, Image 108

About Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972

Image provided by: Library of Congress, Washington, DC

                
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TEAM. Jimmy needles Director Capra after a tough camera session
Stewart’s Story
(See Front Cover)
BY NORB RILEY
Jimmy's back in Hollywood.
Here's what happens when
the winner of an Academy
Award returns from a war . .
After time out (four-and-a-half years) for
war, James Maitland Stewart, the
gaunt, far-flung gentleman from Indiana,
Pa. and Hollywood, Calif., has made a mo
tion picture called "It’s a Wonderful Life.”
If the picture is as good as it promises to
be, he will surely point out that Frank
Capra, who directed it, is a genius. If it
flops, Jimmy, whose critical vocabu
lary has been considerably enlarged in
the Army, will blame himself in choice,
pungent, front-line phrases.
Stewart is still a man with no palpable
conceit and a homey, boyish demeanor. He
has suffered few alterations in the service.
Minor changes are a few gray hairs and a
tendency to bellow — an occupational afflic
tion that’s likely to recur in all newly sepa
rated officers.
B« Scared Riskin
He weighs 148 pounds, exactly what he
scaled when he went in, and the weight is
stretched as thin as ever over his six-foot
three frame. His green-gray eyes show a
trace of weariness. He is 38 years old, a de
liberate, slow-talking man with a habit of
eyeing his listener thoughtfully before speak
ing. His speech is direct, and so naked of
Hollywood hyperbole as to unnerve the
long-term natives.
He gave Robert Riskin, who wrote and
directed “Magic City” (next on the Stewart
list), quite a scare.
“When I asked him how he liked the
script,” said Riskin, “he answered, ’I like it.’
Now when anybody in this business tells me
that I figure it’s either a trick or he thinks
it stinks. He didn’t even say it was terrific.
So I waited for him to lower the boom on
me. He didn’t say anything. So I said. ‘Great
story for you, Jimmyl’.He mumbled, ’Yeah,
guess so,’ and left. He liked it and told me
so, but it took me a long time to understand
that he wasn't going to sue me.”
As this story may indicate, the Holly
wood Jimmy has returned to hasn’t changed
much either in his absence.
ClvilUa Headaches
Like every returning veteran he has his
problems as a civilian. They are not too
serious. He had to hole in with the Henry
Fondas for three months before he could
move back into his own house in Brent
wood. Then he bought a second-hand car,
a medium-priced machine of interesting
eccentricity. He speaks of it without love
but with something like respect. "Kind of
strange car. Explodes a good deal.”
His major anxiety is to resume acting
where he left off, which — and that’s what
scares him — was right at the top. He won
the Academy Award for the best male per
formance in 1940. And when he enlisted, in
1941, he was at the height of his glory. His
following was tremendous, and of both
sexes. He created the Stewart type, a cross
between Van Johnson and Gary Cooper,
wholesome, lovable and rough-cut. In
females he roused a powerful maternal
ism, and males recognized that he
didn’t need mothering; he was a good
guy who could take care of himself.
His war record was distinguished, and
anonymous. He gave no interviews while he
was in the Army, made no pictures, and
tended to his bombing with a zeal that
startled his superiors and the men under him
alike. He flew 20 combat missions over
Europe, at times commanding as many as