Look Who’s Here

SUZAN BALL

It was making a chocolate cake that got Suzan Ball her screen test. Suzan made a cake that won a prize at a charity bazaar at Santa Maria, California. Talent scouts spotted Suzan’s picture in the paper, with the cake of course, and she was in. She made her screen debut in the dramatic part of the “other woman” in “Untamed Frontier” for Universal. As always, the studio wanted to change the new contract player’s name. Suzan turned down the names they suggested, and offered a compromise: she’s changed the “s” in Susan to “z.”

Suzan lives alone in a small Hollywood apartment with her Siamese cat. She’s an excellent swimmer. Tony Quinn’s eyes popped when he saw her do perilous dives for “City Beneath the Sea.” “Suzan’s completely fearless,” he says.

She wants to be a competent actress, and in time a great actress, and she doesn’t care how hard she has to work to obtain her goal. She is grateful to U-I for the opportunities they give new players and she takes advantage of all the improvement courses, including acting, dancing, singing, riding, fencing. In her off-time she takes painting lessons, does her washing and ironing, reads, and goes to concerts and museums. When Rock Hudson was leaving for France to make a picture, Suzan asked him to visit the Louvre and write her about the paintings. Rock promised to write, but not about the Mona Lisa.

(Born: 2/3/33. Birthplace: Buffalo, New York. Height: 5’7”. Weight: 120 pounds. Eyes: hazel. Hair: dark brown.)

ANNE BANCROFT

Anne Bancroft is TV’s gift to motion pictures. Twentieth Century-Fox signed her, named her Anne Bancroft and gave her her first part, that of the night club singer in “Don’t Bother to Knock,” with Marilyn Monroe and Richard Widmark. Anne’s real name is Anne Italiano, and before coming to Hollywood she was a New Yorker, along with her parents and two sisters. In Hollywood, Anne has a small studio apartment in a big apartment house with a swimming pool. The studio rushed her through three pictures so fast she barely had time to take her hat off; she is in “Treasure of the Golden Condor” and “Tonight We Sing.” But for the moment she is having a breather and enjoying the swimming pool. She hasn’t had any time to meet the boys, she says. But she will. When she first came to Hollywood she was in the throes of a frantic romance with a New York actor, but that’s over now. She’s fancy free.

Anne’s special dislikes are long phone conversations and people who “drip sweetness.” As for likes—she likes to see her movies in drive-ins. When the studio ups her salary and she can afford a house she hopes to have her parents and her—younger sister, Peggy, come live with her. The first thing to shock her in Hollywood was “cheesecake” pictures. “But it’s different now,” says Anne. “They can’t keep me out of a swim suit. I’m always asking, ‘When do we go to the beach?’ ”

(Born: 9/17/31. Birthplace: New York City. Height: 5’5” Weight: 120 pounds. Eyes: brown. Hair: black.)

DEWEY MARTIN

Even since the first preview of “The Big Sky,” Dewey Martin, who used to usher at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, has been a big rave. Producer Howard Hawks, who knows talent when he meets up with it, has Dewey under long-term personal contract; fanatical outdoor man Dewey hopes that Hawks will type him (imagine an actor who wants to be typed!) as a western character. “A sort of sawed-off John Wayne,” says five-foot-nine Dewey with his friendly smile.

Dewey’s life to date has been anything but plushy. His family was quite poor. When his father died and his mother’s health broke down, he and his younger brother, Jimmy, had to go to live with distant relatives. His mother and brother came to Hollywood to live with him, after a separation of twenty-one years. And to do things up right, Dewey brought a bride home a year later, a model named Marie Havelhurst. He met Marie while he was in Sun Valley doing a ski layout (you’d think Dewey was born with his skis on, he’s that good).

Mr. Hawks’ gold mine doesn’t drink or smoke. Dewey is a trained athlete and goes in for surfboarding, skiing, swimming and hunting. He likes sports clothes, dogs, classical recordings, small cars and any picture that has Claire Trevor in it. When and if he gets enough money stashed away he wants to buy a ranch in Texas or Colorado.

(Born: 12/8/23. Birthplace: Katemcy, Texas. Height: 5’9”. Weight: 150 pounds. Eyes: blue. Hair: black.)

GIG YOUNG

Gig Young is one of the fortunate few who had his option picked up by Metro five months before it was due. After seeing him in “Holiday for Sinners” and “You for Me,” the studio brass said, “Sign him again. Give him a raise.”

Gig came to Hollywood in 1939 and worked as a gas station attendant and drive-in car-hop until he won a scholarship to the famous Pasadena Community Playhouse. He was spotted ‘there by a talent scout, signed by Warner Brothers. His first outstanding part was as the character, Gig Young, in “The Gay Sisters.” Fan mail started coming in for Gig Young. So with the studio’s okay, he took the name for himself.

Right after Pearl Harbor, Gig enlisted in the Navy. After ‘his honorable discharge in 1945 he resumed his movie career, has made seventeen pictures to date. His thirteenth picture was with James Cagney in “Come Fill the Cup”—his part in that won him an Academy Award nomination.

Gig is married to Sophie Rosenstein, a test director at Universal-International studios. He met her twelve years before they married—when she directed him in his first test at Warners. The Youngs recently bought a house with a swimming ‘pool in the Valley.

Gig loves tennis, golf and hunting and fancies himself a handy man around the house. “But Sophie always calls in ‘someone to re-fix things!” he grins.

(Real name: Byron Barr. Born: St. Cloud, Minnesota, Nov. 4. Height: 6’1”. Weight: 180. Eyes: hazel. Hair: brown.)

 

It is a quote. PHOTOPLAY MAGAZINE NOVEMBER 1952