The Nome daily nugget., 1937-08-07

| " IHEN Hollywood nad only | W 300 people and not even W "nickelodeon," pioneer ing actors rented an old barn there and began to film "The Squaw Man." Armed cowboys, dashing through dusty streets to fight" h. dians, alarmed the village.
 If the play called for scene on a front porch, the actors simply got permission to use somebody's porch. No one, at first, built special "sets." Such colossal structures as Baby lonian palaces 300 feet high, built later to film 'Intolerance,' were undreamed of.
 Now studios that are walled cit les within themselves house this stupendOus industry, whose feats smack almost of witchcraft.
 To make ''horror" picture, the Illusion of prehistoric monsters in- vading a modern city was achieved with Texas armadillos. Shot at 20 times normal size, while waddling past the toy buildings of a min- iature city, the final effect on the screen was realistically hideous. One studio has toy shop where boats, airplanes, cities, railroads trains, and automobiles are all made in miniature. In "The Invis- lble Man," a tiny automobile, load ed with gasoline soaked cotton, and a fuse, was run off toy cliff, burst ing into flames. In the same pie lure a railroad train (with cars 2 feet lOng) tumbled down a noun tain side. Both accidents" were strangely convincing.
 Coral and marine plants for un- dersea views are cleverly cOun- terfeited. "When we found ocean stuff wouldn't transplant" said a Universal director, i've dipped cac- tus and other desert growth in a plaster solution. Dried and painted, this bottom of the sea fooled everybody"
 Octopus tentacles and snakes may be merely jointed tube, strung on piano wire, coated with sponge rubber, and painted.
 Human Actors of All Kinds.
 But 1t is human beings and their behavior, as much as tricks with cameras, that make Hollywood, which is only part of Los An geles, better known abroad than the big city itself.
 Since most of the worlds movies are made hereabouts, the millions paid in salaries lure performers, real and wOuld-be, from every other cline. Besides stars and plain five-dollar-a-day "extras," these actors range from real pygmies, as in Tarzan," to acrobats and bona fide bareback riders in plays like Polly of the Circus"
 Casting offices for years have studied hordes of people for diff ferent roles. more than 17,0OO are listed on cards for bit" and atmosphere" work. Every conceivable type is needed. AS one official said, We could not use the same crowd for an embassy recep- tion as for a clandestine meeting of the Black Hand"
 At the Metro-G Mayer stu diO, experts keep in mind the faces of some 1000 semi-regulars, and use filing system for thousands of extras.
 Eighty per cent of the types needed fall into such groups as dress men, bellhops, police, col legians, buffers, riders, tall, short, and fat men, stunt men, army and navy men, tough men, judges. etc. 1; dress women (meaning intelligent, society types who can wear smart clothes), pretty girls, homely girls, stenographers, tall, short, fat, and stunt women, maids, character women, riders, dancers, dowagers, healthy children, peaked children, Hawaiians, Orientals, Latins, Nord- ic and Slavic types.
 An emergency call for lone tough mechanic with broken n6se and two teeth missing" was quickly met. | Trained acrobats who can take rough falls and not get hurt ; sailors with one eye; a distln- guished- looking man with a con- tinental-like "spade-beard" who can work as count or a diplomat all these are in the cards!
 Some of the Trlcks.
 '.These bottles we break over each others heads in barroon brawls couldn't hurt anybody" ex. plains m actor made up as Jesse