What Price Hollywood?

The film that precedes all four versions of A Star Is Born and is considered the source of that story. Mary Evans is a waitress at the Brown Derby who wants to be a star. One night the director Max Carey comes in drunk and arranges a screen test for her, and she rises quickly. Carey falls at the same speed: his drinking worsens, he cannot get work, and the studio lets him go. The idea is to show the price of stardom in both directions: Mary's marriage comes apart because of her fame, and Carey sinks while watching her rise. George Cukor directed. When the producer David O. Selznick made A Star Is Born five years later, the resemblance was argued over and RKO considered legal action. There is a suicide scene, and the way it is shot was unusual for the period: fast, fragmented cutting and frozen images. Constance Bennett plays Mary and Lowell Sherman plays Carey. An important source for anyone who likes films Hollywood made about itself. For anyone who has seen any version of A Star Is Born the story is familiar; what is interesting is that this is the first form of it.