Mary And The Movies

[Gerry O.]

In 1937 Mary Livingstone appeared in her first and last feature film, "THIS WAY PLEASE" (in a supporting role as an usherette). In researching promotional material about the film, Paramount was really touting Mary as a "new comedy sensation", etc.....however, after this film, her movie career just fizzled and she never appeared in another feature film.

I'm very interested in the story behind this....

Whose idea was it to put Mary in the movies? Jack? Jack's agent? Paramount? Mary herself?

Also, what happened to Mary's film career? Did she fail to make an impact in "THIS WAY PLEASE"? Did she suffer from severe camera fright and refuse to make any more features? I've always thought it strange that she didn't appear in Jack's film "BUCK BENNY RIDES AGAIN"....EVERYBODY from the radio show appeared in that except Mary. Even though Ellen Drew was Jack's love interest in the film, Mary still could have worked nicely in the story as Jack's radio co-worker, razzing Jack about being a "two-fisted he-man".

Any info on Mary's brief movie career would be most appreciated...Thanks!

[shimp scrampi]

Good question Gerry. I have to say I've never gotten around to seeing THIS WAY PLEASE (I know it's in the video library), but here are some thoughts.

Most accounts of Mary's stage/mike/camera fright seem to indicate it was, for want of a better term, degenerative - that it was much worse for her as she went on in her career than it was early on. So, 1937 might have marked a different psychological state for Mary - she might have been more willing to experiment than she was at the time of her TV reluctance by the fifties.

That doesn't explain the Buck Benny absence though. I'm not remembering who exactly this should be attributed to, but in one of the Benny biographies there's a good line about Mary not ever really wanting to be a movie star, but rather the wife of one. So, lack of ambition was probably a factor. She just didn't really want to pursue it probably.

THIS WAY PLEASE also wasn't a great success as far as I know. The Mary "hype" in the publicity might have been more an attempt to sell the film than to push Mary per se. She was certainly well known by the radio audience and probably drew some ticket buyers out of curiosity - but a supporting role in a small picture doesn't really seem like the way to set up Mary for a big film career - had she even wanted it.

[Roman]

This Way Please is more notable today as a showcase for Betty Grable who had just been signed by Paramount (Jack's studio at the time). Betty Grable was really an amazing talent and this movie should be of interest to anyone who wants to see her a few years before she achieved her greatest fame with movies like Down Argentine Way. Considering what a huge box office star she became for 20th Century Fox in the 1940s and 50s, it's kind of amazing that first RKO and then Paramount refused to pick up her option. Their loss and Fox's gain.

Betty Grable has another connection with Jack and Mary besides This Way Please. She was supposed to star opposite Jack in Man About Town but was replaced by Dorothy Lamour at the last moment because of an illness. She has a small singing part in the movie which, as I understand the story, Dorothy Lamour, one of Betty's closest friends, insisted she be given after Betty had recovered.

[LLeff]

Mary's part in "This Way Please" is definitely a supporting role, with Mary constantly trying to nudge Ned Sparks (of all people) to the altar. There's no chemistry there, and there aren't a lot of character actors less attractive than Ned Sparks. So the concept that Mary wants to marry him so badly is pretty unfathomable. At this time, Mary's character is still the vaguely ditzy man-chaser, and there were an awful lot of those in those days. She does a yeoman's job with the role, but doesn't do anything to particularly stand out from the crowd of other actresses who were doing essentially the same role in other movies.

Also in comparison to other performers in the movie, like Fibber McGee and Molly or the guy who sings "I'm the Sound Effects Man", they can pretty much dominate their scenes and steal the show. Mary doesn't.

I don't have a specific anecdote about why Mary chose not to do another movie (or no other movie chose her), but I'd bet it's pretty in line with what others have surmised.

[Gerry O.]

In thinking about Mary's TV appearances on Jack's show, I've come to realize that Mary wasn't really a visual comedienne....Her humor was best heard on the radio.

On Jack's TV show, Mary didn't have the funny facial expressions to "punch up" her one-liners....she pretty much said her line and that was it.

Other comediennes like Eve Arden, Patsy Kelly, Martha Raye, Joan Davis and Lucille Ball would follow their gag lines with double takes, eye-rolling and other funny bits of physical business. Even Gracie Allen had that blank and confused "Did I Say Something Funny?" expression after many of her comedy lines and Audrey Meadows had that deadpan look that could kill....but Mary didn't seem to have any humorous facial expressions or reactions that complimented her dialogue. That could be a big reason why she just didn't click in a visual medium....at least not the way that she did on radio.

[Gerry O.]

Mary's part in "This Way Please" is definitely a supporting role, with Mary constantly trying to nudge Ned Sparks (of all people) to the altar. There's no chemistry there, and there aren't a lot of character actors less attractive than Ned Sparks. So the concept that Mary wants to marry him so badly is pretty unfathomable.

Laura, don't underestimate the raw animal sex appeal of Ned Sparks. In 1937's Fox musical "Wake Up And Live", Patsy Kelly chases after Sparks and also tries to get him to the altar....so there had to be SOMETHING there to attract the ladies!

Sure, there were 1930's heartthrobs like Clark Gable, Cary Grant, Robert Taylor and Tyrone Power....but NOBODY had female co-stars lust after them so aggressively in films as studly Ned Sparks did!

[shimp scrampi]

Interesting point about Mary's lack of visual schtick. But, I think obvious mugging was really not the Benny show style, certainly not in the early TV years. Even characters that could potentially be played very broadly (Rochester, Dennis), tend to come across as a little more sedate than a lesser comedian might have pushed them to be. It's hard for me to imagine someone as animated as, say, Patsy Kelly, fitting in as a regular on Jack's show. I think it's actually part of the reason why it holds up so well.

I really like Mary's appearances on TV, she adds a little lilt to the proceedings and some needed female balance to a generally all-male cast. There are a few shows where she seems a little uncomfortable - she definitely has those awkward "bad hands" on occasion. But her delivery is fun, she usually intones some of those biting, deflating lines with a sweet smile that takes some of the edge off, especially in comparison with the harsh Mary of the Jell-O era. It works for me in the handful of shows she did, it's a pity that Mary couldn't have done more on TV.

[Gerry O.]

I really like Mary's appearances on TV, she adds a little lilt to the proceedings and some needed female balance to a generally all-male cast. There are a few shows where she seems a little uncomfortable - she definitely has those awkward "bad hands" on occasion. But her delivery is fun, she usually intones some of those biting, deflating lines with a sweet smile that takes some of the edge off, especially in comparison with the harsh Mary of the Jell-O era. It works for me in the handful of shows she did, it's a pity that Mary couldn't have done more on TV.

Yes, Mary seems more mellow and sedate on Jack's TV shows. She still razzes Jack, but it's in a gentler, friendlier manner than on the earlier radio shows. The TV Mary "insults" Jack in a kidding way....sort of the way a loving wife good-naturedly kids her husband about his faults. Her TV attitude is kind of an "I've been dealing with this for YEARS....this is just how he is, but I'll still call him on it" way of responding to Jack's cheapness, vanity, etc.

To the best of my knowledge, Mary only appeared on episodes of Jack's TV show that were filmed with a canned laugh track. Did she ever appear on his live shows with a studio audience present?

[shimp scrampi]

Yes, Mary only did the filmed shows. But, taking off on a tangent, here's something I've wondered. How "canned" was the laughter? Jack's filmed shows have a jumbled production history. I know he didn't do the three-camera ("I Love Lucy" style) show with a studio audience until almost the end of his run.

Jack's filmed shows from the fifties are all done using a single-camera technique without a studio audience (much like feature production). Because there would be so many repeated camera set-ups, a studio audience would be impractical to have on hand to record laughter. So, shows had a couple of options - use an entirely canned laugh track, or show the completed film to an audience and record the audience's reaction to the film. Burns and Allen did the latter, only "sweetening" with the canned stuff if a joke really bombed. So, which did Jack use? I know there's an anecdote about him disliking some overdone canned laughter, but did Jack ever use the natural audience reactions to the completed film? I know at least a few of the shows were done by George Burns' McCadden productions, so it doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility that he'd use George & Gracie's method for doing a laughter track.

At least one or two of the film shows seem to have audience laughter slightly overlapping Jack's next lines in his monologue, something that probably wouldn't occur if you were just plugging in laughs with a machine.

Sorry for the tangent!

[LLeff]

Yes, Mary only did the filmed shows. But, taking off on a tangent, here's something I've wondered. How "canned" was the laughter?

This question comes around every so often (it's probably here on the Forum as well), and some day I'll really analyze which shows have canned laughter vs. not. The tip-off for me is always if I hear "the howling woman" at some surprise moment of the show. Her unique "HWHOOOOAAAAAAHHHHH" is unmistakable (and vaguely annoying if used more than once a show). Jack also worked with less and less of an audience in later years as he had trouble remembering lines and reading cue cards.

On the show where he falls into Bob Hope's arms, I know they show an audience laughing and applauding. I haven't looked at it in a while, but I don't think that was an actual audience there. I don't know that Jack would have ever so completely "blown a take" if there was a real audience there. (Yes, I know about Frank Nelson's story of him falling down on Drear Pooson, but that's an analysis for another time. Suffice it to say compare Frank's story to the actual show and decide what you think.)