Polly Walters — Pretty Polly (1934) 🇺🇸
Pretty Polly isn’t a parrot; and she doesn’t like to be called “Polly”, either. She much prefers the nickname which was given at her christening, — “Teddy.” Personally I don’t think either name fits her, because she doesn’t remind one of a bear cub, nor is she as talkative and noisy as a parrot.
by Dr. Abbuh Wretlaw
Polly Walters, as she was “dubbed” on the Warner Brothers and First National lots, will probably stick to her as long as she remains in the spotlight, and it is the name she carries in electric lights while She Loves Me Not is packing them in the aisles in New York City.
The blonde beauty, who formerly graced the Florenz Ziegfeld’s beauty chorus, sometimes has dark hair, sometimes platinum blonde; at least she was willing to admit that much between chuckles which make talking to her some what of a pleasurable innovation.
There’s no question but that personal pride and selfish joy is now filling the breast of Tom Weatherly, co-producer with Dwight Deere Wiman, of the harum-scarum rumpus in the 46th Street Theatre, illogically called She Loves Me Not.
On the morning after the opening, with almost childish grins of self-congratulation,
Mr. Weatherly counted telephone callers who asked, “Who is the girl playing Curly Flagg? She’s a natural!”
Mr. Wiman personally selected John Beal for the important role of Paul in the mad-campus antics of undergraduate cavaliers out to save a night club dancer from “worse than death.” But he graciously doffs his hat to Mr. Weatherly for finding Polly Walters to become Curly Flagg.
When he first beheld in the Vanderbilt Revue four years ago a slender, blonde minx with a nasal pitch to her voice that made you laugh but want to hear more, Mr. Weatherly made some inquiries. He discovered the lass to be Polly Walters, who had been recruited from the three-a-day to the Broadway showshop. Of course Miss Walters, who is a “Buckeye” beauty, having been born in Columbus, Ohio, had a background of considerable film experience. This includes the job of relieving the tension all. through that heavy drama starring Edward G. Robinson in Five Star Final, in which the half-pint beauty played the role of the telephone operator.
Film lovers are still laughing over the way she cooed into the receiver during calls: “Good afternoo-oon, Evening Gaze-ette.” Put plenty of rising and falling inflection into that and you have it. Tom, who had been a friend of Polly’s for years, remembered that.
And again, when Mr. Weatherly observed Polly Walters’ wide-eyed stare and hinterlandish twang in Larceny Lane, he knew a time might come when his mental file would yield up a gold mine that Hollywood had overlooked.
It wasn’t so easy to convince either Dwight Deere Wiman or Howard Lindsay, the author and director. They had not seen Polly Walters in the films.
But no sooner had the two doubting Thomases heard Polly Walters read the rowdy lines of She Loves Me Not than the thumbs on four pairs of hands went up.
Polly made her debut with RKO-Radio Pictures in support of Helen Twelvetrees and Eric Linden in Young Brides. She has worked in Columbia Pictures, Warner Brothers, RKO-Radio, and First National. In American Madness she was again cast as the dizzy blonde telephone girl with the shapely legs, and she filled the role to perfection.
It was common talk on the Hollywood lots that if you wanted to find Miss Walters, you could get her in the stills department. She was forever posing for pictures, — of all sorts. Polly wishes she had been able to collect a dollar for every “leg shot” they made of her, or for every “stunt still” in which she posed with Joan Blondell.
Her birthday? She says it was January 15th, 1913.
Last time I saw her she was smartly attired in a black and white afternoon suit which set off her blonde beauty superbly; a Claire Julianne creation of some sort of Cheney Brothers materials. She has an odd way of walking, — a sort of dignified carriage with just a tiny little swagger which goes with the sweet impudence of her personality.
Her next picture venture? I was sure to ask that one!
“Will be She Loves Me Not, for Paramount has bought the show, and me with it,” she confided. “I also have a chance to do two films for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, but the way things look now we’ll be on Broadway for many weeks yet.”
She likes New York, but hates New York weather in early winter. Has posed for several famous artists, likes movie fan magazines, and has had her photographs made by Hal Phyfe, Joel Feder, and other famous cameramen.
Polly has to her credit, in addition to the films I have already mentioned, Blonde Crazy, Smart Money, Expensive Women, Love on a Budget, Play Girl and Union Depot.
—
—
Collection: Broadway and Hollywood “Movies” Magazine, June 1934
++
American Madness ** 1932
Smart Money ** 1931
++