Tuesdays with The Screen Guild Magazine

BROTHER, CAN YOU SPARE A DIME?
By Chester Morris
[Reprinted from The Screen Player, 1938]

Christmas comes but once a year and when it comes it brings Good Cheer! To whom? I’ll tell you.

To The Amalgamated Society For Ruptured Newsboys, Mrs. J. Dufflefinkel’s Needy Cases, Inc., The Home For Unwed Mothers, The Home For Fatherless Babies, The Society For Leading of Blind Police Dogs, The Police Dogs Leading the Blind Society, Inc., The Better Milk for Little Tots, Ass’n., A Christmas Turkey for Every Cab Driver Society, Mrs. J. Dufflefinkel’s Next-To-Needy Cases, Inc., The Fallen Arch Society For Policemen, The Fallen Women Society Against Policemen, Religious Turkey Raffles, Inc., Motorcycle Officers Fund for Widowed Wives of Speed Maniacs, Inc., Society for Anybody’s Widowed Wife, Better Little Moppets in 1938, Inc., Who Won The War Society, Inc., The “We Did” Society, Veterans of The Boxer Rebellion, Ltd., Veterans of Any War Ever Fought Anywhere, Inc., Mrs. J. Dufflefinkel’s “Nothing-Will-Help” Cases, Inc., The Bad Child Actors Society, The Society for The Prevention of Bad Child Acting, A Christmas Tree in Every Intersection Fund, Inc., No Christmas Trees in Any Intersection Fund, Inc., Let’s Give Our Boy A Bike Society, More Happy Wagging Tails In 1938, Inc., etc., etc., ETC.!!

Good cheer, eh? What’s good about it? Just for fun, in 1934,--four weeks prior to Christmas, I set out to do a little statistical research on organized charity. Being a charitable man myself, I was a bit annoyed at my own reactions.

“Someone must do this work,” I thought. “Why should I complain because every morning I’m forced to read a personal (mimeographed) letter stating: “I’m only three years old, Mister--Mother left me last Tuesday and I haven’t eaten since last August--.” “Of course,” I said, “There must be cases like that and somebody must take car of them.” So, I’d send the five dollars.

After the first two weeks, when my breakfast every morning was costing me in the neighborhood of twenty bucks, I set about my task in earnest. Each day I’d compile all the “Calls For Help” from starving moppets, starving policemen, and that pathetic little heart-tearer-outer, --“Please, Mister buy me a new dog,” etc., and I discovered I was receiving some fifteen letters a day.

Figuring my Yuletide sympathy at five dollars a crack--that totaled $75. A day, mind you! On a weekly basis, my philanthropy would reach the munificent sum of $500.00--this amount figures on four weeks--the letters dwindle after the tree lights burn out--presents a sum total of $2,100. All this, I might add, does not include Mrs. J. Dufflefinkel, Inc. The hell with her!

Then, of course, there’s the little (?) item of my own family’s Christmas to look after, including about eighty relatives, whose little girls’ mothers have all, practically,-- “left them last Tuesday and they haven’t eaten since last August.”

Approximately, my charitable offerings for the year 1934 totaled $7,200. Add to this one’s household budget, clothes, hats and shoes for the kiddies, food, upkeep on the car--a Filipino to bring in the “Fifteen letters a day”--an occasional trip to keep you in check-signing condition--and what have you when it’s over? Nothing, brothers,-- nothing and that’s where the trouble starts.

If every letter from the Mrs. J. Dufflefinkel, Inc., was answered with a “fiver” or perhaps a “tenner” (your heart may be bigger than mine), over a period of two years, I figure, providing of course, you’re not a millionaire, you’d be badly bent if not broke. Then what happens, you say? Oh, lots. I’ll prove to you just how vicious this charity business can be.

In your sympathetic efforts to raise these poor “Fallen Ones”--you gradually, oh, so gradually, become party of the first part yourself! You have spent all your money--you are broke—and so, one morning you have to sit down, if you can find a place to do so, and write Mrs. J. Dufflefinkel’s Needy Cases, Inc., asking for a few dollars help because “—your wife and children left you last Tuesday and you haven’t eaten since last August!” You think you’ll get it? You will not! A letter will arrive in a few days informing you that, “—there are needier cases ahead of yours—that they’ve put you on their list and will probably get to you around 1940 when they’ll be only too happy to look into your case.” Case is right. By 1940 it will have four sides, a top and bottom and be made of knotty pine!

Believe me, gentlemen, --I made up my mind they wouldn’t catch me with buttons off my panties! No sir! I’ve solved the problem in my own way and it works.

“How?” you ask. Simple. I send letters to myself from myself! Pathetic letters they are, too and I start them four weeks before Christmas.

They arrive at breakfast along with Mrs. J. Dufflefinkel’s, only I throw hers in the waste basket. My heart is naturally touched as I read of my pathetic state of affairs, and, as I have already stated, being a charitable soul, there’s but one thing to do—and I do it. I put five dollars in an envelope and send it to myself!
Be your own Mrs. J. Dufflefinkel, gentlemen, and I promise you one of the happiest of New Years!



With a career that spanned over fifty years, Chester Morris was born into a Broadway background and started his career onstage. Comfortable with audiences and a magician enthusiast, he often incorporated magic tricks into his personal appearances at film premieres and in his films themselves. Gaining stardom in the early thirties, Morris’ career waned by the end of the decade forcing him to perform in a few B-rated movies until he found a firm following with his Boston Blackie character in fourteen low-budget movies produced by Columbia.
Morris spent the latter half of his career mostly on television, performing in the occasional film, and doing some stage work. Already dying of cancer, Morris was appearing in a stage production The Caine Mutiny Court Martial when he took his own life via an overdose of barbiturates in 1970.

The Return of Dr. X (1939)

When reporter Walter Garrett (Wayne Morris) finds the dead body of actress Angela Merrova (Lya Lys) in her hotel room, he immediately alerts the newspaper he works for. However, by the authorities arrive, the body is missing, and Merrova is threatening to sue the paper. Confused and unemployed, Walt determines he really did see a dead body and proceeds to investigate. First he visits his friend Dr. Rhodes (Dennis Morgan), for some advice, and Rhodes refers the case to his associate, Dr. Francis Flegg (John Litel), a doctor renowned for his work in hematology. Flegg suggests that Walt stop drinking so much but Rhodes's interest is piqued when he is called in to identify the body of Rodgers, one of his patients, and Walt insists that this murder is identical to what he found at Merrova's apartment. A dead body drained of all its blood. That night, Rhodes visits Flegg to have him examine an odd blood sample he found at the scene of the crime. This is when he meets Flegg's sinister assistant Marshall Quesne (Humphrey Bogart). Walt secretly follows Rhodes to the doctor's house, and when he later sees Merrova enter the building, he convinces Rhodes to visit Merrova with him. The next day, they both call on the actress at her apartment, where she confirms Walt's story and promises to elaborate the following day. Their visit is interrupted by the arrival of Quesne who is there on behalf of Dr. Flegg. When Merrova mysteriously dies, before giving an explanation, Walt digs deeper, convinced he has seen Quesne somewhere before. While researching the newspaper files, Walt comes across a picture of Quesne that identifies him as Dr. Xavier, a killer executed for murdering a child via research. When Walt and Rhodes discover Xavier's empty grave, they confront Flegg, who confesses that he brought Xavier back to life as an experiment, hoping to create an artificial blood that would keep him alive. Until he does, Xavier takes matters into his own hands by killing for the rare blood he needs to remain alive. While Walt and Rhodes are confronted by police on Flegg’s front steps they hear a gun shot, Xavier has overheard Flegg’s confession and demands his blood donor book. When Flegg refused, he shot him. Xavier then kidnaps Joan Vance (Rosemary Lane), a nurse who has the rare blood type he needs, and takes her to his lab out in the woods with Walt, Rhodes and the police on his trail. They arrive just in time to shoot Xavier and save Joan from death.

Ok, synopsis aside, the real entertainment of this film is the fact that it's a B level horror film that features one Humphrey Bogart. Whaaa??? Though billed third in the credits, Bogart is the most memorable feature of the film with his odd appearance as a neurotic, half-dead lab experiment gone awry sporting bad hair. Unfortunately the rest of the film though not entirely bad, fades into the background due subpar acting, a insubstantial plot, and what seems to be a reluctant Bogart. That said, I didn't really dislike the film, I was mostly just bored whenever Bogart was not onscreen. I wonder how audiences of the thirties felt when they saw it.

I originally thought Bogart did this film as a hoax but upon further research learned that he was not quite the big name he would become a couple of years later after the successes of High Sierra (1941), The Maltese Falcon (1941) and Casablanca (1942). I also read, but am not entirely sure if it's true, that Warner Brothers made him do the film as punishment for acting up in public with his then wife Mayo Methot, a woman who contributed to their popular moniker, "The Battling Bogarts".
Humphrey Bogart reviled the film and said: "This is one of the pictures that made me march in to Jack Warner and ask for more money again. You can't believe what this one was like. I had a part that somebody like Bela Lugosi or Boris Karloff should have played. I was this doctor, brought back to life, and the only thing that nourished this poor bastard was blood. If it had been Jack Warner's blood, or Harry's, or Pop's, maybe I wouldn't have minded as much. The trouble was, they were drinking mine and I was making this stinking movie."


Today on TCM!
Sherlock Holmes!

The Divorcee (1930)

Last night I watched another Norma Shearer film, The Divorcee. A film about double standards and how it destroyed a loving couple's marriage. Ted (Chester Morris) is husband to Jerry (Norma Shearer) who has a brief affair with another woman. On the eve of their third anniversary and before Ted is set to leave on a week-long business trip, Jerry finds out about the affair when the "other woman" has the audacity to show up to their apartment with a group of Jerry and Ted's friends.

Harking back to before they were married, Ted tries to rely on Jerry's liberal attitude that she can take things just like a man and that's why their marriage will last, he tell Jerry the affair didn't" mean a thing". Well, with husband away, the wife will play and Jerry sets out to "balance the account" with Ted's best friend Don played by my favorite man, Robert Montgomery.

Suddenly, Ted realizes that infidelity might actually mean something after all. Despite throwing herself at his mercy (Lord knows why) Ted just can't seem to forgive Jerry (no big suprise there). Meanwhile, Don has taken the first ship that will take him far away from New York- though Jerry never reveals that it was him.

After the divorce an inwardly unhappy, but popular Jerry lives a party life while Ted sinks into a life of alcoholism. Jerry then runs into Paul (Conrad Nagel), an old friend who was crushed by Jerry's decision to marry Ted. Paul and Jerry's friend Dorothy who is in love with Paul comforts him with drinks then allows him to drive her home. Paul wrecks his car, disfiguring Dorothy's face in the process. Out of pity, Paul marries Dorothy. Years later, when he runs into Jerry he makes the decision to leave Dorothy and marry Jerry. But when Jerry sees Dorothy again, and hears her plead with Paul not to leave her, Jerry is suddenly reminded of how she begged Ted to stay and how much she lost over the mistakes they made. So, she turns Paul down and sets off to find Ted who is also ready and willing to let Jerry back into his life.

I am beginning to think there may not be much else to Norma Shearer's talent. If anything she was typecasted as the oft-deceived yet plucky ex-wife or ex-lover. I still like her though, she was quite beautiful and energetic. I am hoping to see something more from her in the later films she did.

Tonight on TCM!

1939: Hollywood's Greatest Year (2009) This documentary focuses on 1939, considered to be Hollywood's greatest year, with film clips and insight into what made the year so special.