The Brooklyn Daily Eagle from Brooklyn, New York • Page 108

rage Ten A Sophisticated merican omen All Our Women Are Blase, Says Maurice Chevalier, French Movie None as Sophisticated as the Women of France amusing In a true Parisian manner about his chansons. At eighteen Maurice Chevalier appeared at the Folies Bergere with Gaby Delys. Paris surrendered its heart at once. Waifs of Mont-martre and spangled prima donnas flocked to hear him. The artist is the lord of Paris.

Maurice Chevalier became a king of artists. His first appearance In New York took place on the Ziegfeld roof, where he held a four weeks engagement last February. New York, too, found him charming and Irresistible. And if New York, can Hollywood be far behind? Chevalier has Just returned from Hollywood in time to make a personal appearance at the world premiere showing of his first screen work, "Innocents of Paris." "I like making the picture better than a real show on the stage," Chevalier said. "The picture does not become monotonous.

One puts in the sincere heart because one does not repeat over and over, night after night, as on the stage where the work becomes mechanical. Always I have wished to play until my act is perfect, then to change for a new part. That Is the way in Hollywood. It is creative By Marjory Belisch MERICAN women, French women quelle differ- ence! They have so different personality, one Ja- may be lover to both at the same time." Maurice Chevalier smiled. In his smile there was a sense of humor and all the Irresponsible gaycty of the boulevards and less elusive a wide streak of perfect teeth.

In his eyes there were many things. There was softness. There was a thrilling worldliness. There was a manner of looking at you. unyieldingly yet slyly, and taking you in, appraising if you happened to be a woman from your head to your feet.

The blue eyes, worldly wise, enigmatic, knowing, they gave him some precious Intangible quality. It has made bim the klol of fifty million French women. It bids fair to make him chief sheik or the screen. For that quality is personality. "One might have a French wife and an American wife together, at the same time, and they would not how do you say? click," he continued.

"In the heart of the lover they do not clash because they are so different they cannot compare. The French, she is like champagne. An Amert- can. she Is like fine, like fine liquor. "French women are two kinds.

The yoffng girls are modest, quiet little mouses. The women ah, they are true sophisticates. In America all are the same. The young ones, the older ones, toutes sont blase. All lng around music halls! I tell you, I won't have it.

IH fetch him." A few blocks away in a hovel that was a hybrid cafe and saloon a slight boy of twelve held an audience of workmen and tipsters spellbound with his merry patter and gay songs. He did not notice his father who had entered and was standing behind him. v. i I -vV- l- A work because one does not work scenes over until he no longer feels it." "How do I speak English so well? Do I speak well? Ah, that, too is a long story." Once Maurice Chevalier forsook the stage. It wasn't on account, of wine or women.

It was war. He enlisted at the beginning, in 1914. After two years of continuous fighting there came a day in an open field near Belgium. Men were falling all around. The enemy were coming closer each minute.

Death peered Into your face and you felt the wind his strong fingers made as he seized comrades on every side. Your only chance was to get wounded and you didn't think of that. For that day's work Chevalier received the Croix de Guerre. A shrapnel wound in the right leg caused him to be carried back across the lines to a Red Cross hospital. Later the Germans advanced and captured him in bed.

He spent twenty-six months in a prison camp. "So there I learn to speak English." Chevalier lighted another cigarette and finished his story. "I say to myself, there Is nothing else to learn. I wish always to come see New York some day. I ask an American prisoner to teach me English." Chevalier has a ruddy complexion and most attractive light blue eyes.

There are things about him besides his wide bottom trousers and gay handkerchief and socks that suggest his nationality. One Is his height medium for a Frenchman. Another Is the natural ease and grace with which he walks and gestures and acts. He is also a boxer. "Mais, my work comes first." He explained his interest in prizefighting.

"First of them are sophisticated but, pas du tout, none are so blase as the women of France. In France the women are extremes very innocent or very not innocent. In America they are in between. "Here young girls seize upon life. They are aggressive.

The girl of France waits for life to come to her. Your women have freedom. The married ones, the unmarried ones, they come and go as they wish. Ladies of France cannot do so. American women own themselve.

As you say, they are their own bosse." Out of the window of M. Chevalier's suite in the Elysee Hotel dusk was beginning to descend over the rooftops In a blur of blue grayness that was city dusk. A few blocks south, at the whitest spot on the brightest way in the world, electric letters four feet high proclaimed that Maurice Chevalier, the darling of Paris, was making his bow to the American movie public. Chevalier blew a cloud of cigarette smoke toward the ceiling and. with narrowed eyes, watched it circle about like an unbottled genie and escape through the window to become part of a tired city that would forget itself dullness, grime, tiredness in the fanfare of tinseled night life once the dusk hour was pxst.

He began to speak of the beginning of his career. Memories of people and places mingled with old tunes. He paused now and then to seek an English word for his French thought. Afaurice Chevalier my work, as with every true artiste, then my family and my friends." "Maurice! Est-ce que vous avez le journal, Maurice?" It was a voice from the next room. It belonged to Yvonne Vajaee, former dancing partner and, for the past two years, wife of the French entertainer.

Chevalier smiled. "I make a mistake," he said. "My family, she is first. First my family, then my art." When he rose he glanced across the housetops. "Your New York," he said, "is great.

But it is too much rush. I like it but not for all time. To live In France and in Hollywood and also in New York part of the time, that is best. Then one does not become overbalanced with too much leisure in Europe and too much work in New York. And your theatrical people here, they are charming.

They are broad with true intelligence and personality. Chevalier first came to this country in October of last year and went immediately to Hollywood to make his sound picture. When he arrived on the He de France he managed to get a rise out of the hard-boiled ship neas reporters with his choice of a pet. It happens to be a turtle yes, a real live turtle only different from the backyard variety in that it is studded with rubles and sapphires. American movie and stage people with whom Chevalier has become a great favorite avow he Is bubbling over with personality.

One time when this sentiment reached the ears of the Frenchman, he begged to know what the word personality means. Labored explanation finally brought a light of understanding. "Ah, you mean sunshine," And sunshine It is. finally satisfying himself with the French expression and a hopeless gesture. He recalled one night In particular.

It was one of those early evenings In a Paris suburb when the city seemed to be a man who had hastily thrown a dark cloak, over his shoulders. Night had descended suddenly. But only the border of the cloak reached to half-darken the suburb. Homeward bound vehicles rumbling slowly over the rough cobbled pavement gave forth a bedraggled tone. The Chevalier house stood with a group of others.

They were the color of wine dregs and each was fronted by a ditch where the cluldren floated paper boats during the rainy season. But to the minds of the neighborhood children the Chevalier maiscn stood out. Sometimes gamins from blocks away would gather around it. The oldest boy. Maurice, knew more ballads than all the rest of the kids together.

He'd sing them until you tired. Tonight a woman had been peering nervously out of tli? front door. She was a small thin woman. She wore that anxious look one f.r.ds so often on the faces of Pans working people. Catching sight of a dark figure that had tamed down the street, she hurried Into the house.

Papa Chevalier was a houe painter. Madam was placing supper on the table when he entered and tossed his lunch pall on one of the rush-bottomed chairs. "But Where's Maurice?" M. Chevalier regarded his wife. "I dont know.

He has r.ot relumed." 1 know well where he is." Chevalier scowled. "Hang- "Maurice!" The boy's notes died out abruptly. Chevalier?" A man rose from a side table and approached the father. Chevalier nodded curtly. Chevalier," he said, "I am Gilbert Defarges, the ballad singer.

I listen to your son sing many times. If you will let him train and study he has a future. It means money. He will become professional, a great artiste. The boy has talent But the painter walked past him.

"Lapin!" he exclaimed to the boy. "Do I allow you to spend evenings in music halls? Come home to bed. I will not have my son a singer of gutter songs in cheap cafes." But what Defarges had said made a deep impression on the boy. That night he determined to become a singer, an artist, in spite of the lack of encouragement and training. He began to haunt the music halls of Paris.

He sang. He danced. He trod the back streets of Paris until the spirit of the city wore itself Into his heart. Sprung from the low ranks, with an art that truly reflects the light-hearted city of boulevards, Chevalier's career reminds one of that other weaver of songs Francois Villon. At first he received the magnificent wage of fifty cents a week.

When his salary advanced to ten, twenty, thirty francs it seemed nothing short of a miracle. At seventeen he began to attract attention. There was something Irrepressible and completely joyous about the young fellow, they said, something exhilarating and.