The Wilmington morning star., 1940-04-15
Man bout
Manhattan
By George tucker


NEW YORK, April 14.-For sew.
eral wears now this department. has
been watching an adoleseent If
heroic struggle going on in the
Inewsnaper world-the Hollywood
columns of Ed Sullivan and Sidney
skolsky trying to write Broadway's
obituary. Their approach has been
to scott at New York, to plead
that all the interesting people now
live in Hollywood, and that Broad.
way is only a place where a man
named Ziegfeld used to put on leg
shows.
Mr.. Sullivan is a part-time
vaudeville hoofer who used to
write a Broadway column, and
Mr.. skolsky is the author and for
all I know the inventor of the tin
type" style of column that tells
you whether Lupe Velez has on
pants. The lone point of similarity
between the two is that recurrent.
ly, like vagrant grave-diggers from
Hamlet, they bob UP with news
that Broadway is embalmed and
that Hollywood has escaped the
cooling board.
Only the other day Mr.. Sullivan,
who is currently heel-beating
through the sticks with an act,
paused to note: "Once upon a
time, and not SO many years ago,
if you passed through the country
the youngsters in the various towns
asked you about Florenz Ziegfeld,
and Charlie Dillingham; or George
White The big idea then was
that the country seemed to have
its eye focused On the lights that
Uttered electrically along Broad.
way To date, we have signed
literally thousands of autographs
and we have yet to meet a single
person who wanted to know any
thing about Broadway All of
them, young inc old, have appar.
emily transferred their interest to
Hollywood This is a trend that
should be noted"
To me this is an incredible
thing. Knowing Mr.. Sullivan is
from Hollywood, it doesn't seem
possible that the people haven't
plagued him with questions about
Broadway. When 1 interview dip.
lomats from Paris I always ask
them about Shanghai. And when
Col. Batista came over from Cuba
recently the first thing the ship
news reporters yelled was, Tell
US about Seattle, Uncle" If we
had inquired only after Havana
the colonel would have concluded,
and rightly, too, that Seattle was
dying and that only Young DR.. Xii.
dare could save it.
While we are about this we
may as well call the undertakers
and tell them to make ready for a
newcomer. Washington, D. c., is
dead, too. In the old days, when
you travelled through the country.
the kids used to ask you about
Grover Cleveland, and Warren G
Harding. and Woodrow Wilson.
But Grover is dead now, and so
are Warren and Woodrow. and
there hasn't been a spark of life
TO the place since Frank Capra
himself took Mr.. Smith to Wash.
lngton some months ago. This is
another trend that should be not.
ted n 1 am sure that such an
expert trend-noter as Mr.. Sullivan
wont mind my bringing it up.
Sometimes I take a certain
crude pride in the many manifesto.
tons of this city's material wei.
tare-St. Patrick's cathedral, which
IS emb4ematic Of the spiritual and
intellectual wisdom of the ages
Wall street, which merely owns
hollywood and everything in it,
including Garbo-the city herself
with her valiant towers and the
music of her streets. I know this
is nothing a compared with, we'll,
seeing Lana Turner in a sweater,
or Carlo pacing Malibu beach in
Stacks. But what ear you expect
from a guy who has spent 10 years
IN the cornfields of Manhattan?