Such Is Fame

Article appeared in The New Yorker, November 14, 1925

[Spelling and punctuation are Mr. Howard's]

Despite the advantages of acting in a successful play there are a number of attendant drawbacks. Being in the same theatre eight times a week for months on end does put one at the mercy of all kinds of things—and people. One night while appearing in The Green Hat I received the following telegram: 'Bringing party to see your play tonight. Act up kid—Wilfred Jones.'

Now this would be disconcerting if Wilfred Jones happened to be one of my closest friends, but I hadn't the vaguest recollection of ever having heard his name before. However there was nothing to be done about it, and I went to my dressing room to get ready for Act One. By the end of Act Four I had forgotten all about Wilfred. At the fall of the final curtain I returned to my dressing room, removed all my clothes—except for a pair of underpants—and was smothering my face with cold cream when the door burst open and a cheery fat man appeared.

'Attaboy!' he bellowed in salutation.

'Hello,' I murmured politely, gazing at him in some alarm with one eye, the other being temporarily closed with cold cream. I saw that he was a youngish man, bald and with a hook nose. I was convinced that I'd never set eye on him in my life before.

'Well, how's the kid, eh?' he continued—and then stopped, arrested by the blank look in my eye. 'Say, you remember me, don't you—Wilfred...?' I didn't—but the telegram came back to me in a flash.

'Of course,' I replied with simulated enthusiasm, 'Wilfred...Yes, indeed—I should say so—attaboy!'

'I should say so, too!' Wilfred echoed, slapping me jocularly on a bare shoulder. 'Remember that night on the ship, eh? D'ye ever see anything of Alice now?'

'Alice?'

'Oh, come on now, don't pull that stuff. Little Alice Fraser—you bad boy! What you did to that little girl—whee! Wait a moment, I've got a gang here waiting to see you.'

Looking through the door over his shoulder I observed what appeared to be dozens of people waiting in the passage. I tried to stop him—indicating my nudity, my horrible countenance covered in cold cream.

'What the hell!' he shouted. 'They should worry. Come on in, folks—Les is in his alabaster, but he looks beautiful.'

Arthur, my dresser—appalled at the wholesale invasion—got me hurriedly into a dressing gown. Then, they trooped in—girls with bobbed hair wearing evening wraps and their partners in dinner clothes. They came towards me like a wave, hemming me into a corner where I stood trying to clear my right eye of cold cream.

'Mrs Jones, Mr and Mrs Smith, Mr and Mrs Robinson, Miss Brown...' Wilfred went through the introductions. Fortunately I refrained from shaking hands. Everyone nodded, beamed and chattered. The sound was indescribable. Finally, Wilfred bawled above the general din: 'Say, Les—why didn't you ever come over to Montclair like you said you would—you big bum!'

This completely floored me. I strove to find a clue in Montclair—but drew a complete blank. I murmured something about working very hard at the time.

'Work, Les!' roared Wilfred. 'Work! What sort of work? Like you do in the second act, eh?' And he accompanied this sadly with a leering wink at his friends.

'Very busy rehearsing,' I said innocently. For some reason they all thought this very witty and laughed uproariously.

'Well, I hoped you liked the play,' I said, with an optimistic smile—then, wished I hadn't. It was an invitation to a large, serious-looking young woman in glasses to express herself with unexpected candour.

'I hated every minute of it,' she said. 'It beats me why you people want to do this sort of play at all.' She would have gone on had not Wilfred chimed in. 'What the hell, Edith—I think Les takes his part great. He's the finest actor in the country.'

'He may be,' said the woman, not to be outdone, 'I'm not criticising Mr Howard. I just don't like this kind of play, that's all.'

I was about to ask her what she didn't like about it when another woman chipped in.

'This Mr Arlen, the author, must be a peculiar man. Egyptian, isn't he?' I tried to explain Arlen's nationality.

'Well,' she insisted, 'sort of Oriental anyway. No mistaking it, the way he writes and the things he writes about.'

'What's he like?' several people chorused. This is difficult. I tried to describe his appearance. Nobody seemed satisfied.

'Say, how do you like acting with Katharine Cornell?' said a young man in a blue Tuxedo.

'Very much indeed,' I replied briefly.

'Is she the same off the stage?'

'Well, no, not really—the same and yet different,' I answered evasively.

'Say, that's a great scene you have with her in the second act—oh, boy!'

'And takes money for doing it!' said Wilfred.

'That Margola Gilmore is a pretty girl, too,' someone said.

'Her name is Margalo—not Margola,' I replied.

'Is it? Well, it's a strange name. How do you suppose she got a name like that?' My only answer was to glare at the individual through the mess on my face. Suddenly, the large, serious woman returned to the fray.

'I just don't like this sort of play. And, by the way, exactly what disease is it that the young man has who commits suicide in Act One?'

They all crowded round eagerly. I began to feel a sense of being imprisoned, like an animal in a cage.

'I don't know.' I answered. 'Nobody knows. It's a mystery.'

'And what's that thing you say about Iris being a tower of delight?'

'I say, "Iris, you are a tower of delight in the twilight of the world".'

'Say that again.'

'Iris-you-are-a-tower-of-delight-in-the-twilight-of-the-world.' (I am convinced at this moment I should have done something else for a living.)

'What's that mean?'

'It is obvious,' I replied, seeing a red mist. 'It means that the heroine is a pillar of joy in the dusk of the earth.'

'Yes, but why?'

'I didn't write the play,' I replied a trifle hysterically. 'I would advise you to ask the author.'

They all seemed to be talking at once. 'Funny name, Margola'...'And gets paid for it'...'Does that stuff hurt your skin?'...'I bet he's really Persian'...'He was wonderful in the book'...'I don't like the play.' My old friend Wilfred came to the rescue finally. He shepherded them out. At the door he turned for a parting roar.

'Goodbye, kid. It's been great seeing you again. Come over to Montclair soon. Give me a ring and I'll have the gang there—and little Alice too. Attaboy!'

'Attaboy!' I replied weakly—and collapsed into the arms of Arthur. He had to dress me from head to foot. I couldn't even tie my shoe-laces.

Two things I would like to know. Where on earth did I encounter Wilfred—and what exactly did I do to little Alice?

Trivial Fond Records, pgs. 53-56

"Such Is Fame" The New Yorker, November 14, 1925


Subscribe to Leslie Howard by Email • And don't forget to respond to the verification email!