Sweet Revenge: 200 Delicious Ways to Get Your Own Back

just as he determined to break Jack Gilbert, axe him and make him unemployable, Nick Schenck went behind his back and signed the mother-mocking star to a four-picture contract worth $lm. Ensuring that Gilbert's first talkie was a fiasco would have killed two of Mayer's birds with one stone -menaced his victim's career and made Schenck seem foolish for betting a million bucks on the wrong horse.
    Facts clash with received wisdom that John Gilbert was ruined by the talkies. After all he appeared in nine more movies after his sound debut, so his voice can't have been all that unacceptable. Vintage sound-tracks and recordings of Thirties radio interviews suggest that Gilbert had a light, not particularly high voice, no better nor worse than scores of actors who made a smooth transfer from silent films. What emerges over the years, as Mayer's death loosened studio tongues, is that tragic Gilbert wasn't killed by the talkies but his heavy drinking - and the revenge of Louis B Mayer.
    - an insight into Hollywood by kind courtesy of film writer, Shaun Usher.
     

     
    'I'm ashamed of this story. I like actors very much and seldom find bitching on the stage, but on one occasion I was sorely tried.
    'One of the male stars in the play behaved very badly, and with such arrogance that life became miserable for us all. As far as I was concerned my trouble was that, for some reason, he refused to give me my entrance cue. I asked him very nicely if he would do so, and he looked at me coldly and said "No." I asked why, and he replied, "It doesn't interest me," and when I said, "But how do I know when to come on?" he answered, "Please yourself." So I did.
    'It was a breakfast scene, and he had made up a very funny piece of business where he choked over his coffee cup. I decided to teach him a lesson. I arrived on stage earlier than he expected, swooped happily towards him crooning "Good morning, good morning", slapped him hard on his bald head with a rolled up newspaper and, as he was about to pick up the cup, removed it and left the stage, briskly and with no further dialogue. The actor who should have followed me on was unprepared so the rogue star was left entirely alone, and totally speechless with rage. He never behaved badly to me again.'
    - with thanks to Dulcie Gray, actress and author.
     

     
    'It was my first job as an Assistant Stage Manager and I was, unfortunately, working with a monstrous actress. She did everything to make my life hell. Five minutes before going on stage she would pull her pearls off from round her neck so that they scattered all over the floor and demand that the Assistant Stage Manager pick them up immediately and string them together. Her bad behaviour was endless and caused much grief. The time had arrived when I had had enough.
    'Her exit at the end of the play was a dramatic one, she would grab her bag from the sofa and sweep off the stage to tumultuous applause. However, on this particular night, a stage weight had been placed in her bag. As she took her bag the weight was so immense that it forced her to collapse, face first, on to the sofa.'
    - with thanks to Roger Redfarn, theatrical director.
     

     
    'There was an amusing incident in Los Angeles which happened to Jack when he was out there ''pitching” ideas, i.e., selling himself to the youngest, most fresh-faced twelve-year-old moguls he could find. After one exhausting day beating what was left of his brains out to blank faces, he arrived in the office of another tiny tyrant at around 6.30 in the evening. The secretary had already left so he waited patiently in the lobby.
    'The mogul's door was slightly open and he heard through the aperture a voice on the phone saying ''No, I can't get away for another hour, honey. I've got to see some shmock from England." More twittery goodbye noises followed, at the end of which Jack strode down the

     
    corridor, opened the door of the office, poked his head in with a big grin on his face and said “Hello, I'm the shmock from England. Where are you a shmock from?"
    'The big cheese had the grace to apologise and during the meeting that followed further endeared himself to Mr Rosenthal by saying that his company, "Movie of the Week", dealt in three areas only: heart, stomach and groin. Seeing Jack's expression, he elaborated: "Heart is romance, stomach is horror and groin is sexploitation." Jack nodded gravely, stood up and said, "I'm sorry, this is not for me. I'm afraid I only do 'elbow'." The