1959-10-22 — Page 4

THE CHINA MAIL, THURSDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1939.

....and then, the end

Hollywood.

ERROL FLYNN had run through some 30 movies

and two wives by 1949, and the public was wearying of his off-screen antics as well as his pictures.

Warner Brothers studio, which provided his ladder to cinematic heights, discovered his pictures were not as popular as they once had been.

At the age of 40 one of Hollywood's most romantic figures throwback to the days of John Barrymore was on the way down.

Flynn kept up his bon vivant front, continuing to spend His parties became more frequent and bawdy. money recklessly. But the big names, important people, failed to answer invitations. Where once the cream of movie town's elite snt at his table, there now came hangers-on, freeloaders, and ambitious iftile starlets hitch-hikers on Flynn's private merry-go-round.

He talked about changing his movie pace, playing serious dramatle roles in place of the outdaled swashbuckling heroes.

Errol was not unaware of to his happening

what carect.

Was

During this period he com- Elained, "The scripts they give me are Infantile. I feel like a Tool reading the dialogue and I look ilkel one, too, when the pictures come out."

Slowly, the youthful lines of his face gave way to flesh. His nose refireted his medtlichen for the bottle-- le wos drinking Ikpior a fast-

a fifth of

Disaster

This is the final chapter in the series: of the life and times of the late Errol Flynn.

By VERNON SCOTT

By now his physical appenr- Beverly Aadland, Flynn wound ance reflected the years of hard up in Cuba. living. Be could no longer play As happened to leading men. John Barrymore, Flynn became #caricature of himself,

He turned his quick wit on himself, spoofing Errol Flynn, never apologising or excusing himself. It hurt those who see him knew him best to

people burlesque himself so could never tell when he was clowning.

In 1952 Warner Brothers

In 1957 Darryl Zanuck gave finally dropped his contract, anti

actor a character rate in thr

which to live aboard Flynn decided

"The Sun Also Rises," He bought his yacht, Zaco. property in Jumalca, setting up was fibred in Mexico.

"It's

"I play a trunk in this eple," nother band of followers there.

him to laly Flyan declared, Hls travels led where Flynn decided to shore casting."

up bis dwindling funds by pro- Cucing and starring in an inde- pendent production of "William Tell." It was a total disaster.

was

Seriously

But Ertel

took

only and turned in

fight performance. experi

pe-

the

rale

top

an

an

Many felt he deserved academy award nomination.

A new career?

What a fall for the

mighty

TELEVISION here is in disgrace, and the quiz

show with the big money prizes is finished. The most-sought-after man in America today is tall college professor Charles van Doren, an intellectual giant who once won HK$560,000 for questions unerring answers to the most involved and for a demonstration of erudition which made millions of televiewers gape.

Mr van Doren has vanished and the Congressional Investiga- tion Committee, which has been probing charges of fixing and faking on the quiz shows, de- van Doren has

NEW YORK clares that Mr deliberately eluded a mibpoena which would have compelled have given nworn him 10 evidence before the investiga-

Errol's last flying at adven- ture was his wacky Involve mat in Fidel Castro's revolu- tion. Flynn played a cavaller,tors. if ineffectual part, in the shoot- ing. later drinking toasts, with the bearded victors in Havana,

Fortunes

No one says Mr van Doren is guilty of being coached and fed aright answers-as some of his rivals now freely confess that they were but he has vanished Undversity for

He

from Columbia took advantage of this Bing anolber encounter by Independent Ncture, **The Cuban Rebel Girls," starring his girl-friend-protege, Miss And-

land,

to

Still he needed funds, and once again--for the last time,

to Hollywood he returned replenish his fortures,

Now it wasn't for a movie-

half-hour med orly a show.

" week's leave" after sending an indignant and tactles tele- Ream to the committee insisting on his integrity.

Other

star quiz performers and the predpeers of quiz pro- grammes have

not been bashful.

Coached

Herbert Stempel, a contestant on the Twenty-One programme whom van Doren defeated after testined bluntly "I was conched marmoth battle of brains,

to the hilt by Dan Enright the

producer."

A

DON

IDDON'S

DIARY

TUESDAY.

minds

Attomey siffed the evidence of scaled envelopes containing correct answers mailed to con- tentans, of coaching and from- ing. No decision was handed down.

Then,

District Attorney Hogan began a new investiga- tion of TV quiz fixes and Promised this time to tell all.

no

Bible from end to end, and that the Bowery bum was not 4 musical genius

What 4 let-down. What a fell for the mighty minds.

་

Fresident Elsenhower is 69 and looks

AL Irina,

and youthful. This has bren one of the best, years of his lifes No linemen other than' an occl»- sional cold. No poļilical defeats at home or abroad. Only the wrating stool and waterfront atrikes to challenge and

dety him.

The roly-poly court Jester George Allen now emerges as Jke's best friend. Curlously, the some George Allen waa Harry Truman's best friend and, next to Harry Hopkins. Franklin Roosevelt's best friend.

Allen is a phenomenon. Some

Allen People collect "slamps. collects Presidents and is the author of a book Presidents Who Have Known Mc.

Switched

VAN DOREN Not available

once

What does he say about his role? "My Influence la greatly exaggerated. I have no Influence and if I had I wouldn't use it.

friend-Presidents I'm just 0 seem to like me." To be able to switch from

Today the man who being the intimate of President Roosevelt to being the sidekick owed half a million dollars has two or three million in the of President Truman, ond jump from Truman's side into bank and on the Stock Market. a director of dozens al formance.

companies. He is an expert in renhower's lep is quite a per- He is

Ask Ike. George, known as "L' Ol; palsmanship. George."" has done it effortlessly He is Mr Eisenhower's host, house-guest, gotting companion, and financial adviser. They share farm property together in There were, of course, some Gettysburg and are investment genuine winners, but it now partners.

clear that there were Allen came

The last of the big quiz shows died on television about year The big probe is the big sen

ago, but formal charges sation here. A series of fraudst

any individual were Howard Felsher, a producer of Brainst have been perpetrated on the public and upon the sponsors Tic Tac Dough, told the in- made and although there have

been many flrings and suspen- who financed the Giant quiz Vestigatory "at one time 75 .c. glens no one so far has got into shows which had a three-year of the programme performances trouble with the law. TV

110 span, once totalled 14 were fixed." separate programmes, and were always in the top popularity bracket.

his travails, Throughout Flynn had managed to hang onto the symbol of his former wealth and affluence, the Zaca. He had to sell the yacht to meet debts and back child sup- port payments.

un

Several times during filming of the movie Flynn was forced fo halt production for lack of funds. Law sulls plied up and the Italian governinent got Into the uel "William Tell"

Warner Brothers thought ro,

Thus, he was on the car for never completed, and Flynn and loved their old

Ilfo role-this happiest mission of his gin-cooked escaped Italy in a storm of con- another

heart came of a troversy, somehow, cruzlly, in- lime playing John Barrymore when death

British uitack in Vancouver, volving oldtime actor Bruce in "Too Much, Too Scon."

Columbia the other day. Cubot and dethroned King was a supporting role,

He died with a care Farouk of Egypt.

Financial problems continued

vodka, a 17-year-old blonde actor, and but to beset the

and HK$600,000 pained fron Zanuck came to HKS24 again

the sale of his beloved vacht -the end of a unique saga. and by Errol Flynn's Ughts a jiting end Indred,

Whipped financially,

claiming he was worth

million on

Investments and

It

once his

the strength of his rescue, casting him as a drunk in in "The Roots of Heaven." It property

matinee was not enough, however, and year or I returned to Hollywood and after skylarking for a

16-year-old pictures,

Jamalca, the fading

£0

Jhen with

-U. F. International,

of.

Get All Your Needs at

And Mr Enright himself said, "fixing had been a practice for many, many years, and In-

seems

Some genuine

to

Washington

QUOTE

Van Doren was the king, and volved several shows," after he won his HK$750,000 Last year the quiz shown scores of contestants who were owing half a million dollars and he was given a HK$300,000-a- begun to slide in popularity as coached year job with the National rumours

of fixing spread and long before the show went on but quickly switched to Frank Montgomery after inspecting a

усег

19

not-

who

1

or given the answers first worked for Herbert Hoover,

Field-Marchal Viscount

Broadcasting Company

I lin Roosevelt, who made him work: He continued to draw today there are only two small the air.

-Commissioner of the District of parade of St John Ambulance quiz shows on the American air. his HK$24,000

cadets at Romsey, Hampshire: It is a great disillusionment, Columbia. teacher of English at Columbia Maric Goodson, a leading TV particularly to children. Thee amused Roosevelt with his University.

producer here,

never public has been proved gulubie, Breshness, his wisecracks, his YOU are told what to do and entered the big-monty quiz field. The suckers were not given an charm. When Truman came what not to đó, and I have

"The big chance even break.

It turns cut that along he became court jester and no doubt s good deal goes in Last week N.B.C. suspended said:

prac-one ear and out of the other. tram the Middle was called "a buffoon van Doren as a television com- show lasting week after week is the old soul

It's dead and doomed.""

know her thing low comedy In high It certainly happened in my Wast farm didn't mentator and poetry-reader. For cone.

own case. I think that is prob- places by his critics. days now the investigating com- There have been a series of Shakespeare from cover to cover,

when Then

Eisenhower jably becsUSA you are told too during the past that the infant prodigy had not mittee have been trying to get investigations

the stepped up there was Goorge many things, and you cannot year. A Grand Jury arst met conquered calculus, Van Doren to telity, but have failed.

in New York and the District smiling cop did not know his again, the old pal of Presidents, remember them all,

that

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