The Times-Tribune from Scranton, Pennsylvania • 21

I Apsesm il 6 i TV Bit Part i t7 rM pm-- -i I oS Betty Blyllie, Now Of Queen of Slieba 65, Played Role in Her Heyday 7 -I (A sVv' By SCOTT THURSTON, (A 5 C' 70 a 2 in The story on The Lineup April 11(CBS-TV 10 P.M.) figures to be just another detective yarn to fill the air time between commercials. But for people who were going to the movies back in the 1920s, the show will be worth watching the sight of a once-familiar face. Playing a minor role in the TV show will be Betty -Blythe, who was a Hollywood star in the era when vamp was a national byword. No star now, Betty at 65, yields the spotlight to Warner Anderson, Tom Tiilly, Aline Towne and Robert Wilke in the tale a of a big stamp theft, a woman with a pris- on reconj an(j an ex-boxer living on yesterdays glory. Drab circumstances for a former queen like Betty Blythe; who was chosen over 5,000 other actresses to play the Queen of Sheba in -the William Fox spectacle which cost a staggering $8,000,000 to produce back in 1925.

Other names were famous then May Allison, Theda Bara Bayne Irene Castle Betty Compson Bebe Daniels. Betty was born in Los I S' I Bit, I X-s ,7 Deity Blythe note i A. I 1 4 A 'S'' i i p. A Jf 4 7 (inset) and as she appeared Times Staff Writer Angeles in 1893 according to the studio biography she issued then, she was educated at the University of California and in Paris. She had some stage ex-: perience before going into the movies, playing in So Long.

Letty, Nobody Home and Experience. Marion Davies Flora Parker De Haven Marie Dressier Helen Dunbar June Elvidge Louise Fazenda Pauline Frederick. Betty, whose real name was Elizabeth Blythe Slaughter, 'joined Vitagraph studios after leaving the stage and made her bow in Over the Top, which was followed by Tangled Lives, The Green God, Dust of Desire, Undercurrent, Silver Horde, Third Generation and The Yellowback all before 1920. Dorothy Gish Lillian Cish Corinne Griffith Texas Guinan Hope Hampton Mildred Harris Elsie Jdnis Leatrice Joy Kenyon Lillian Langdon. Betty Blythe was no third-rater.

In her time, she appeared with some of the matinee idols, and stars of the era: Francis X. Bushman, Lew Cody, Jack Mul-hall, Frank Mayo, Lewis Stone, Lon Chaney, Huntley Gordon, Ramon Navarro, Montague Love, Stuart Holmes, Clive Brook, Lowell Sherman, Conrad Nagel and Lou Tellegen. Betty was a luscious armful, a sharp contrast to the lean and streamlined types of today. She stood a statuesque five feet, eight inches tall and' weighed 145 pounds. She had dark hair, dark complexion, blue eyes.

-Mary MacLaren Mae Marsh May McAvoy Mary Miles Minler Colleen Moore Alla Nazi -moVa 7 Evelyn Nesbit I Anna Q. Nilsson Mabel Normand. Miss Blythe rated the full4 publicity treatment, even to such stunts as her capture by desert raiders. United Press reported from London on May 1, 1925, that Betty Blythe, film beeiy kidnapped star; has Beduoinsin by -Palestiner i i jf I 1 1 i 1 I in silent films I recall one evening on the show in which Jonathan Winters and Cliff (Charlie Weaver) Arquette exchanged unpleasantries in a session alittiost unbelievably funny; another in which Genevieve, Paars French vocalist, pursued a protesting Gypsy Rose Lee with a pair of. hair clippers; shows Jn which Her-mione Gingold and Hans Con ried exchange urbane syllables; and a couple of outings in which Britains Ustinov spun out anecdotes in an American accent.

T-3 The Paar show has provided a generous showcase for young comicsJikeJMQrLSahL-MiltKa Continued on Page S-A 'i, 7 i Troops have been dispatched to faces appeared to displace the Where some of them dropped, rescue her. 7777 7 older stars. Betty Blythe fell out completely, Betty Blythe 7,. victim to time, as did scores of stayed with it, working when Mary Ptckford Za ftthprs. and where she could.

When sound came in, she acted in -Pilgrimage and The Scarlet Letter, then tapered off into such- small stuff as Joe Pa looka and Jiggs and Maggie in Jackpot Jitters. Only a handful have had the Continued on Page 17 -A others9 Su Piinl nMa.r'e PreVSi Constance Talmadge Edna Purviance Norma Talmadge 7. Una Florence Reed Irene Trevelyn Virginia Valli Rich Roland. PoUy Vann opScran- Edeen Sedgwick Gloria Mary Warren, also Swanson Blanche Sweet. a Scrantonian Peart The years rolled on and new White.

Clip and Save April 5, 1958' msm "DSBlSid Across Tlie Pacific With Humphrey Bogart mi mms Holiday in Mexico With Walter Pidgeon, Ilona Massey and Jose Iturbi iimxt tmm JANIE. With Joyce Reynolds and Robert Hutton Three Hearts for Julia With Ann Sothern and Melvin Douglas ClfiEteGH UUJi They Gave Him a Gun With Spencer Tracy and Gladys George mm HD Boy Meets Girl With James Cagney and Pat OBrien arc Clip end Save BrightSpot of Television Season 'i Jack Paars Weakness; Fisjbing for Plaudits By WILLIAM EWALD and Andy Williams. It has had its arid stretches in which nothing much has happened at all. It has had its strained moments, particularly when Paar and his sidekick, Dody Goodman, were feuding. And even worse, it has had and still has its terribly embarrassing moments when guests and regulars have fawned over Paar, reassuring him to the point of nausea about his lika-bility and the worth of his show.

I wish Paar would stop worrying and quit fishing for verbal posies from his guests. For the record, hes doing fine. When his show clicks, it is TV as its very hip and swinging singers, mostaatlsfving 4ntimate, bright- Steve Xawrehce, Eydie Gorme and eff-theuffy..