Uncle John's Great Big Bathroom Reader by Bathroom Readers’ Institute Page A
Authors: Bathroom Readers’ Institute
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earth, with 66,000 employees in 1,700 different offices. It has built elevators for the White House, Eiffel Tower, Vatican, and even the space shuttle launch pad.
Part II of the World’s Tallest Buildings is on page 138 .
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By any other name: Apples are part of the rose family.
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FAMOUS HOLLYWOOD PUBLICITY STUNTS
Publicity is the mother’s milk of Hollywood, and over the years, it has been refined to an art by a handful of practitioners. Here are three publicity stunts that built Hollywood legends.
“I VANT TO BE ALONE.”
Background: When Greta Garbo came to Hollywood from Sweden in the 1920s, she didn’t realize how conservative America was. In her first newspaper interview, she mentioned casually that she was living with director Mauritz Stiller. Today that’s no big deal, but in the ’20s, it was a shocking revelation.
Publicity Stunt: When MGM head Louis B. Mayer heard about the interview, he was furious. He banned Garbo from ever speaking to the press again. That suited Garbo fine—she was shy anyway. But how to explain it to the press? Someone in the MGM publicity department came up with the famous quote: ‘I vant to be alone.’”
THE SEARCH FOR SCARLETT
Background: Producer David O. Selznick wanted the perfect actress to play Scarlett O’Hara in the film adaptation of Gone with the Wind , so he launched a nationwide talent search that lasted (coincidentally) for the two years it took to prepare for filming. Joan Crawford, Bette Davis, and Tallulah Bankhead all wanted the part. So did Katharine Hepburn, who told Selznick, “the part was practically written for me.” “I can’t imagine Rhett Butler chasing you for ten years,” Selznick replied.
“George Cuckor, the intended director, was sent scurrying southward to scout locations, but also, supposedly, to check out high school plays for ingenues,” explains a film historian. “To keep the game of who-will-play-her alive, every female willing to try out was tested.” Newspapers and radio stations kept the country updated on the progress of the search.
According to legend, just when the search seemed hopeless, Selznick’s brother escorted a young British actress named Vivian Leigh onto the set. They signed her on the spot.
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Geography lesson: How many Rhode Islands would you need to make one Texas? 268.
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Publicity Stunt: Selznick had Leigh in mind for the part from the very beginning. But there were two problems: Leigh was a foreigner, which might not go over well with Southern audiences, and she was in the middle of a scandalous affair with actor Laurence Olivier (both were married to other people at the time). M. Hirsch Goldberg writes in The Book of Lies:
A scenario was devised in which Vivian Leigh would be discovered at the last minute after an extensive search for the right Scarlett had not been successful. In this way the foreign-born aspect would be diffused, especially since Scarlett, the character, and Vivien, the actress shared the same Irish-French background. And with Olivier and Leigh agreeing not to move for a divorce at the time, the scandal would be abated in the flurry of good news that the Scarlett part had finally been settled.
WONG KEYE, PIANO TUNER
Background: When Barbra Streisand announced that she wouldn’t give any interviews to promote On a Clear Day You Can See Forever , publicity man Steve Yeager was stuck—if the star wouldn’t cooperate, he’d have to find another publicity angle.
Publicity Stunt: Yeager called AP gossip columnist Jim Bacon and “suggested we do a story on one Wong Keye, a mythical tone-deaf Chinese piano tuner who was tuning all the pianos on the Streisand movie.” Bacon agreed. According to Bacon, in his book Made in Hollywood: “The story was written with appropiate tongue-in-cheek. It told how Wong Keye had started out in life as a fortune-cookie stuffer in a Chinatown bakery, then sold exotic fish for awhile until he found his niche tuning pianos.
Part II of the World’s Tallest Buildings is on page 138 .
----
By any other name: Apples are part of the rose family.
----
FAMOUS HOLLYWOOD PUBLICITY STUNTS
Publicity is the mother’s milk of Hollywood, and over the years, it has been refined to an art by a handful of practitioners. Here are three publicity stunts that built Hollywood legends.
“I VANT TO BE ALONE.”
Background: When Greta Garbo came to Hollywood from Sweden in the 1920s, she didn’t realize how conservative America was. In her first newspaper interview, she mentioned casually that she was living with director Mauritz Stiller. Today that’s no big deal, but in the ’20s, it was a shocking revelation.
Publicity Stunt: When MGM head Louis B. Mayer heard about the interview, he was furious. He banned Garbo from ever speaking to the press again. That suited Garbo fine—she was shy anyway. But how to explain it to the press? Someone in the MGM publicity department came up with the famous quote: ‘I vant to be alone.’”
THE SEARCH FOR SCARLETT
Background: Producer David O. Selznick wanted the perfect actress to play Scarlett O’Hara in the film adaptation of Gone with the Wind , so he launched a nationwide talent search that lasted (coincidentally) for the two years it took to prepare for filming. Joan Crawford, Bette Davis, and Tallulah Bankhead all wanted the part. So did Katharine Hepburn, who told Selznick, “the part was practically written for me.” “I can’t imagine Rhett Butler chasing you for ten years,” Selznick replied.
“George Cuckor, the intended director, was sent scurrying southward to scout locations, but also, supposedly, to check out high school plays for ingenues,” explains a film historian. “To keep the game of who-will-play-her alive, every female willing to try out was tested.” Newspapers and radio stations kept the country updated on the progress of the search.
According to legend, just when the search seemed hopeless, Selznick’s brother escorted a young British actress named Vivian Leigh onto the set. They signed her on the spot.
----
Geography lesson: How many Rhode Islands would you need to make one Texas? 268.
----
Publicity Stunt: Selznick had Leigh in mind for the part from the very beginning. But there were two problems: Leigh was a foreigner, which might not go over well with Southern audiences, and she was in the middle of a scandalous affair with actor Laurence Olivier (both were married to other people at the time). M. Hirsch Goldberg writes in The Book of Lies:
A scenario was devised in which Vivian Leigh would be discovered at the last minute after an extensive search for the right Scarlett had not been successful. In this way the foreign-born aspect would be diffused, especially since Scarlett, the character, and Vivien, the actress shared the same Irish-French background. And with Olivier and Leigh agreeing not to move for a divorce at the time, the scandal would be abated in the flurry of good news that the Scarlett part had finally been settled.
WONG KEYE, PIANO TUNER
Background: When Barbra Streisand announced that she wouldn’t give any interviews to promote On a Clear Day You Can See Forever , publicity man Steve Yeager was stuck—if the star wouldn’t cooperate, he’d have to find another publicity angle.
Publicity Stunt: Yeager called AP gossip columnist Jim Bacon and “suggested we do a story on one Wong Keye, a mythical tone-deaf Chinese piano tuner who was tuning all the pianos on the Streisand movie.” Bacon agreed. According to Bacon, in his book Made in Hollywood: “The story was written with appropiate tongue-in-cheek. It told how Wong Keye had started out in life as a fortune-cookie stuffer in a Chinatown bakery, then sold exotic fish for awhile until he found his niche tuning pianos.
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