Jane Winton — Hardly The Same Girl! (1930) 🇺🇸
Miss Winton," said Marion Davies, "I'd like you to meet Mr. Oettinger." "Meet him! I'll kill him," said Miss Winton.
by Malcolm H. Oettinger
Thus are the amenities galvanized at tea time.
It seemed that Miss Winton, like the elephant, remembered. Not that there is anything even slightly elephantine about Miss Winton. She is a Follies alumna who could still grace the commencement platform and rate a cum laude from old Professor Ziegfeld himself.
It was the memory of a former meeting and its printed results that caused Miss Winton to harbor homicidal thoughts. Some years ago, when Jane was elevating the drama at the New Amsterdam theater, Adolph Zukor said to Jesse Lasky, "That girl should be in pictures." So they put her in pictures and forgot about her. Warner Brothers developed her into highly likely material.
It was when Jane was haunting the sets at Astoria, wondering what would happen next, that I met her. Jane was just a slip of a girl and. Heaven forgive me, she didn't register much but girlish innocence, which in those days was hardly enough to make a story. So I called in Nita Naldi to help. And Nita gave advice to the newcomer. When all of that appeared in Picture Play, Jane felt neglected; the story was all about Naldi. That was no way to be interviewed, reasoned Jane.
It only goes to show what Hollywood can do to lend luster, add charm, and increase personality. When she was waiting for the good word at Astoria, Jane Winton was just another Follies girl. To-day she is properly poised, intelligent in her conversation, aware of what is going on in the great outside world, so to speak.
I hastened to assure her that what I had written still went for the first meeting, but that she was now a changed woman. This was satisfactory, apparently, because I was asked to breakfast the next day at noon.
Miss Winton managed to be unusual in two respects; she was on time, and she looked as well upon arising as she had looked the previous afternoon, flushed with tea. These two virtues are worthy of being recorded in the minutes.
"I'm in New York," she said, "to do the theaters, to study voice, and to see my husband's play open. He had to stay in Hollywood, so he delegated me to be a first nighter." Her husband is Charles Kenyon, whose play lasted only a week, unhappily.
"Talkies have changed the map of Hollywood, it seems. The screen is now much more important than the stage. People who have something of a screen reputation are eyed enviously by legitimate actors.
"I've just finished The Furies — that Laurette Taylor play — with Lois Wilson and Harry Warner [H. B. Warner]. And I want to cultivate my voice. I sing rather well. My teacher tells me that I should study, that it will be worth while. I hope he's right."
If the Winton voice is as effective as the Winton appearance, the girl is set for a career nothing less than operatic. For since she was in the "Follies," Jane has learned to make the most of her good points. She is tall and slender and sloe-eyed. Sloe-eyed people have slanting, somnolent eyes, and Jane's are purple and green. Her mouth is soft and seductive. Her hair is reddish. You'd approve. If Technicolor works its will with her, Jane will advance in importance.
Say what you will about the provincialism of Hollywood, it brought out the best in Jane Winton. She went out as a novice. She applied herself to the films studiously, enjoyed her share of breaks, I doubt not, and became a regular member of the Warner plantation, one of the favorite slaves.
Judging from the impression she created at Astoria, one would have said that she was never cut out to be a siren. After years in Hollywood, acquiring the necessary polish and poise, she would lead you to cast her as nothing but a siren.
"You know Estelle Taylor came East to take voice, and now she's in vaudeville," said Jane. "And Leatrice Joy is singing, and Carmel Myers, and Esther Ralston. So I thought it would be fun. And teachers here are so encouraging. Mine explained that singing is personality, not voice."
"Accounting for the boop-a-doop vogue of Helen Kane," I suggested.
"Yes, and Libby Holman," added Jane, "and Helen Morgan. They aren't technically good singers, you know. In fact, they don't sing at all. But they put their stuff across with personality. Why, even Evelyn Laye isn't a good singer, technically. And of course she is simply the hit of the season here in New York. But my teacher says that her breathing is not good. Technical fellow." It was Jane's idea to have a whirl in vaudeville, always keeping pictures as the chief means of artistic endeavor.
She spoke rapidly and amusingly. As a film debutante on Long Island, she had been silent to the point of dullness, reticent beyond propriety. It was difficult to believe that this was the same Winton. I remarked it. She laughed.
"People change, given the opportunity," she said sagely. "In Hollywood there are all sorts of opportunities. You can raise hell and party indefinitely and get nowhere, or you can be ambitious and. with a bit of luck, click rather well.
"I tackled the movie game seriously. I'm glad I did. It's worth doing, even if there are some amazing slants, some incredible angles. There are some people in high places who are fabulously incompetent, but I wonder if that isn't true of Wall Street and Main Street, as well as Hollywood. You know things are criticized in Hollywood that go unnoticed elsewhere."
Lily Damita swirled vivaciously across the dining-room entrance.
"Personality," said Jane. "Certainly not voice. But she is a hit in 'Sons O' Guns." Have you seen it? And Fifty Million Frenchmen? I love that title."
The conversation veered to the theater. The Winton taste I found excellent. She had enjoyed Berkeley Square enormously, and ranked June Moon at the top of the comedy list. Strictly Dishonorable we agreed was typical movie fare in that it sputtered up to a spicy situation, then morally fizzled out, with orange blossoms and wedding bells serving as a conventional finale.
"And I've seen Jimmy Savo, and Bee Lillie. They are two of the most perfect clowns in the world. I wish I could do comedy, but I'm terrible in it. Straight drama, they tell me, is my type. You know how the screen insists upon typing you."
Breakfast was over, and Jane was being called to meet a new music teacher.
"I'm glad I saw you at Marion's," she said. "I hated to have your version of me still standing."
"I told you that you were a new woman," I said.
"Good!" said Jane. Her soft red mouth curved in a smile, her green eyes narrowed, and she was gone. Technicolor should get Winton!
If Technicolor works its will with Jane Winton, she will advance in importance.
"Meet him? I'll kill him!" was Jane Winton's extraordinary reply to Malcolm H. Oettinger's introduction to her. In the story opposite, the writer explains why the beautiful actress so shattered the amenities, without in the least changing his high opinion of her.
Collection: Picture Play Magazine, May 1930