Lew Ayres: Hollywood's Conscientious Objector

CHAPTER 2. Young Musician in Search of a Movie

8 Chapter Two YOUNG MUSICIAN IN SEARCH OF A MOVIE There was only one subject in high school in which Lew excelled and showed a passion: music. Besides being in the school orchestra, he learned piano, banjo, and guitar and began playing professionally in a band with other high school friends. And as his home life became more difficult, constantly fighting with his stepfather, Lew spent more and more time with his musical friends, eventually forming a professional band of his own. With high school just a waste of time and little hope of having anything beyond a “working -class” job, at the age of just seventeen, Lew and the boys went to Mexico, where they worked at a café that was popular among American travelers. They stayed for months, enjoying the feel of being away from the demands of family and school, but they soon had to choose whether to accept another job in Mexico or return to America. Although Lew was an excellent musician, he could not shake his desire to be in the movies. He decided to return to America and try living in Hollywood. He left his band mates and returned to California. The summer he returned to San Diego, he joined the famous Henry Halstead Orchestra at the Mission Beach Ballroom. Lew had been playing with a small band that had been hired to play at the Mission Beach between Halstead’s two nightly sets. One night Halstead’s guitar player showed up drunk and they found they needed a substitute. Accomplished in several types of guitars and banjos, including the tenor and long neck, Lew was honored to step in with the famous orchestra. When the original guitarist came to work drunk again the next night, Lew was asked to step in again and informed that this was an audition. His performance was a success and Lew suddenly found himself employed by one of the most popular orchestras in America. young musICIAn In seArCh oF A movIe 9 Henry Halstead and His Orchestra, as they were better known to the public, already had a national following. They had appeared nightly at the famous St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco for three years in the 1920s and were broadcast nightly on radio. After working so consistently in San Francisco, Halstead began touring the West Coast for nearly twenty years. Halstead’s nightly broadcasts made them the perfect choice to appear in Warner Bros.’s first musical Vitaphone films, experimental sound films. Fortunately for Lew, he was with the orchestra when they were signed to Warner Bros. and appeared with his band mates in the film Carnival฀Night฀in฀Paris. Although brief, according to Halstead’s grandson Ken Pearson, Lew’s appearance shows early evidence of an expressive and camera ready individual.1 Lew’s natural abilities in front of the camera were noticed and utilized when the Henry Halstead Orchestra was hired to appear in another movie, this time a slapstick silent comedy, complete with pie-throwing. Fig. 2.1. An image from Lew Ayres’ film debut, the vitaphone short Carnival Night in Paris(1927), as a member of the henry halstead orchestra. Courtesy of ken pearson. young musICIAn In seArCh oF A movIe 10 Although the orchestra was only hired to appear as extras, Lew was selected to take on a larger role, as the love-struck youth whose romance is being sabotaged by the comic characters. In an interview decades later, the experience of appearing in his first movie left an obviously lasting impression on Lew: “The fact that they selected me at random out of the group to do the little role kind of encouraged me to feel that somewhere there would be a place for me in films.”2 Since childhood, Lew had dreamed of being one of the stars he saw on screen, playing makebelieve that he was one of these actors. But now the game of make-believe had changed, and Lew believed he truly could become one of these stars he loved. The pay with Halstead was good and afforded him some freedom and independence. The youngest member of the group, the usually introverted Lew enjoyed the camaraderie of being around fellow musicians. Because of this, Lew left California and decided to follow the Henry Halstead Orchestra to their next gig in Detroit, Michigan, for at least four months. They worked at the Addison Hotel, appearing...