Eddie Albert — Very Good Eddie (1939) 🇺🇸
There’s a reason why he’s tops in his profession — and here it is
by Mack Hughes
Of course, there are many varied interpretations for that overworked word, good! Candy’s good, but, not if its old. Actors aren’t usually good until they’re old! That is, aged in experience, technique and the many things that go into developing their histrionic ability. In short, we’re about to foster the opinion that actors are not born, but made! In so saying, we offer as an excellent example that very good Eddie Albert, of the cinema, the stage, the air lanes!
“It’s funny how you’ll start out to do one thing and end up doing another,” “Eddie Albert philosophized. “I used to be a bond salesman out west. Later, I managed some theatres — movie houses. I wasn’t bad either. But, do you know what I always wanted to do? Sing! I guess subconsciously I worked at it harder than anything. Anyway, before long, I found myself pushed right into the thing I’d thought I wanted. And like a Frankenstein, it devoured me. First I sang on the radio, just for fun of course, then I went into some stock companies and then came to New York. Now I’m completely living and breathing the theatre, every minute.
“I think you have to be pretty crazy about your work to succeed and I’m in love with acting! Of course I’ve been awfully lucky. Take Bing, for instance, in Brother Rat. I got wonderful notices, but the average person doesn’t figure it was the part that made them possible. Why, it was a natural! Most anyone who could look like him could have played Bing and been good.”
“Oh, I see! Then how do you account for such excellent notices’ in ‘Room Service’?” we cautiously inquired of New York’s most popular young leading man.
“Well,” Eddie well’d, “I did an awful lot of work on that part — months of it. I guess that’s why it showed up. The same’s true with Bing. I worked months to get down the right enunciation and the proper feelings for him.’ I read everything I could lay my hands on about ball players and athletes, till I even walked and looked like one. When I figured him out and knew he was the sort of fellow who’d wear his hair clipped, I made a bee line for the barber.
“But, you know,” Albert continued, “the story and situations are the important things. If the character’s believable, he’s successful with the audience. However, with Bing, the minute people don’t believe in him enough to feel sorry for him, the play’s lost. When we first opened Brother Rat (the play) on Broadway I had to feel that boy until I got hold of him enough to be able to sit back and watch the effect. Well, a lot of times when I’m playing a character I cry. I did that one afternoon with Bing and some of the front row saw me with tears in my eyes and said, ‘Gee, what an actor.’ Boom, the scene was lost because their attention was focused on me and not the plot.
“Take pictures. It’s the same. Not many people analyze things enough to tell whether it’s the actor that gives a performance or if the part is responsible. For instance, take a young girl we both know and who’s very good for light comedy. They have a scene where all the characters are wringing their hands and nearly dying with grief. Then there’s a closeup of the girl looking out the window with tears streaming down her face. Wow, she’s a great dramatic actress! That’s what everyone thinks and she’s done the simplest thing in the world. It’s a cinch to look right into the camera and cry.
“On the other hand, take John Garfield. He’s handed a few pages of script and figuratively stuck in front of the camera as they yell, ‘Take it away, Garfield.’ That’s what happened in ‘Four Daughters.’ In one speech that’s half a reel long, he has to build and spout a few pretty hoaky lines without becoming monotonous or losing the audience’s attention for a second. That’s a real job, for if he loses the fans one second, the whole scene is lost. Now there’s what I call real dramatic ability!”
Having seen both John Garfield and Eddie Albert on the stage as well as in films, it was enlightening to realize the wisdom in what our host pointed out. For, in reality, nine times out of ten it’s the play and not the player responsible for a great success.
“The studio is pretty set in its ideas out there, continued Eddie. “Why, they didn’t even want me to cut my hair for the part of Bing. I argued like the dickens, finally agreeing to cut it and do a test. If they didn’t like it, we’d do it the other way Of course, once they saw the test they were crazy about it. And, I’ll bet you anything when I get back for my next picture they have my hair clipped just as before!
“We hear you’re in line to do ‘The Poor Nut’?”
“Oh I’d like to do it if they don’t hoak it up. That can be a grand picture, but it’s got to be done right. If they’re not careful it’ll turn out to be just another of those things you see on a double feature bill. As a matter of fact, if they insist, I’ll have to play it no matter what they do. But this play I’m in now, The Boys from Syracuse, might run for two years, so —!”
Concerning Eddie Albert’s current success, for it seems he’s yet to appear in anything that’s not the hit of the town — New York, we mean, it reminds us of a slight lamentation we overheard recently, while in California. Just after favorable reports began pouring into the studio concerning their new star, Mr. Albert, one of the Big Boys from the front was purported to shake his wise head and say:
“He’s certainly good, but he’ll be an awful problem to cast. Not much in the way of romantic parts that he’ll fit.” Well, just to make a fibber of the bigger and better variety out of said gent, Eddie no sooner opens in New York than first nighters found a new romantic interest in front of them. Little short of being the matinée idol this season, Eddie emerges the toast of the town. And, with the cream of the crop of leading thespians surrounding him, too. Imagine playing practically every scene with a Jimmy Savo! Well, that’s just what Albert does, and shares all the honors to boot!
“You know,” he began, with a smile spreading over his face, “I was never so thrilled as when I opened with The Boys from Syracuse. Why, for days afterwards I went around grinning to myself like a kid at Christmas. I’d say, ‘What the heck are you acting so silly about, Ed? You’ve opened on Broadway before!’ Then I’d answer, ‘But, I’m happy, old boy. I feel good, so why can’t I grin my head off.’ You’ve no idea how gratifying it is to be in a show with good, seasoned actors. It’s darn stiff competition, but it’s stimulating. It’s hard work, but that’s what I like. Why, when we close at night, I sit around with other actors and talk theatre and argue for hours. You know, that’s how you learn. Hearing one person’s idea of how a thing should be done often gives you a new slant.”
Unsatisfied after many months of plugging on his part in the Broadway production of The Boys from Syracuse, he still slaves away even though his notices were raves. A rough idea is his daily schedule. First of all he reads aloud for one hour. This he explains helps his diction. Then each time the clock goes around, singing and dancing lessons have their allotted time. All this in addition to giving six evening performances and two matinées a week.
Now you’re probably thinking, as we, that he’s a busy man, but you haven’t heard all yet! Each week he reads two plays, one poor one and a classic. At the end of one year he’ll have dusted off 104 scripts, thereby improving his judgment and acquiring a better feeling for interpreting the author’s ideas.
Having seen Eddie successfully fill a romantic role we naturally wondered if this wouldn’t be his future in films.
“Let them have their romantic parts,” Albert emphatically stated. “There’ll always be plenty of good-looking guys to do that sort of thing. Give me a good script and a part with meat in it, and I’ll be completely satisfied. I’m not of the ham persuasion who has to get his profile down stage center, and, I’m not an admirer of those passe players who try to steal every scene, either. I’m interested in the story development and, if that’s good, then Eddie’s good!”
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Nothing Eddie Albert does is hit or miss — it’s always hit, although, modestly, he believes in luck.
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Collection: Modern Screen Magazine, March 1939