from Modern Screen, March 1949
WHAT IS really the matter with Judy Garland? That is the question hurled at me everywhere I go.
All right, let's get at it.
Judy is a nervous and frail little girl who suffers from a sensitiveness almost bordering on neurosis. It is her particular temperament to be either walking in the clouds with excitement or way down in the dumps with worry. The least thing to go wrong leaves her sleepless and shattered.
She has never learned the philosophy of "taking it easy." Last year, when she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, she got in the habit of taking sleeping pills -- too many of them -- to get the rest she had to have. I'm not revealing any secrets telling you that. It was printed at the time. But for a highly emotional and highly strung girl to completely abandon sedatives, as Judy attempted to do when she realized she was taking too many, puts a terrific strain on the nervous system.
The trouble is, Judy does not take enough time to rest. The minute she starts feeling better she wants to go back to work. She cried like a baby when she learned she was not strong enough to make The Barkleys of Broadway with Fred Astaire so soon following The Pirate and Easter Parade.
"I'm missing the greatest role of my career," she sobbed. With Judy -- each role is always the greatest.
Sometimes I believe Judy's frail little form is packed with too much talent for her own good. She is an artist, and I mean ARTIST, at too many things.
She sings wonderfully and dances almost as well. And as for her acting -- well, listen to what Joseph Schenk, one of the really big men of our industry and head of 20th Century Fox (not Judy's studio) has to say. I sat next to Joe the night we saw Easter Parade. He told me, "Judy Garland is one of the great artists of the screen. She can do anything. I consider her as fine an actress as she is a musical comedy star. There is no drama I wouldn't trust her with. She could play such drama as Seventh Heaven as sensitively as a Janet Gaynor or a Helen Mencken."   And I agree with every word Joe said.
   I am happy to tell you as I report the Hollywood news this month that Judy is coming along wonderfully, resting and getting back the bloom of health. Soon we will have her back on the screen -- her long battle with old Devil Nerves behind her and forgotten.

Left: On August 5th, Ida Lupino married
film executive Collier Young at a La Jolla church .
They left afterward for a honeymoon on Catalina Island.

THE ROBERT WALKER-Barbara Ford marriage was short and sad. They were married in a whirl of excitement, as reported last month in Modern Screen, and then exactly six weeks later Barbara packed up and went home to her parents,director John Ford and his lovely wife, Mary.
The marriage seemed ill-fated from the start. John Ford is a devoutly religious man and he was none too happy, despite earlier reports to the contrary, at having his adored only daughter marrying a boy who had been divorced. But he was far from being the irate father. He advised Barbara wisely; beyond that he could not go.
When Barbara and Bob were married it was a sad note that her mother and father were not present. The marriage took place in helter-skelter fashion in a Beverly Hills Club with Bob arrayed in a lumberman's shirt and the bride in a sports dress.
It all happened so quickly the wedding cake wasn't ready in time to be cut by the "happy" couple. There was no time for a honeymoon because Walker was working on One Touch of Venus.
Bob's two boys by his marriage to Jennifer Jones were visiting their father at the time.
There were rumors of trouble before the end of the first week.
Let's face it -- Walker is a moody, temperamental fellow who seems to make a point of being "difficult." He is completely unpredictable. He believes that the press has no right to comment on his personal life -- yet he is continually doing outlandish things (marrying in a lumberman's shirt, for instance) that call for comment.
Ever since his divorce from Jennifer Jones he has been "mixed up." But, good heavens, he isn't the only person in the world to be faced with heartaches. It is the test of maturity and growth to overcome unhappiness not to wallow in it or brood forever.
Barbara Ford is a young girl, a non-professional, who has never been married before. She fell madly in love with Bob. But she had neither the experience nor the years to cope with Walker's moodiness.
When she called to tell me their marriage was over she said, "I took all I could."
There is the same old moral back of this break-up. But how can parents make youngsters realize that congenial temperaments, understanding, and sympathy of interests are far more important in making a marriage work than moonlight-and-roses infatuation?

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