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Carole Lombard rode to her first real fame on Barrymore's somewhat shiny coattails in 1934 in Twentieth Century, but she had been working in pictures since 1925 when cameramen discovered that her figure, satin-draped, was highly photogenic. A later greater discovery, that she was also a prime comedienne, pushed her into the big-money brackets. Her present vogue, starting with My Man Godfrey, has elevated her to the biggest salary per picture ($150,000) of any female star.
Born in Fort Wayne, Ind., not later than 1909, Cinemactress Lombard arrived in Los Angeles at the age of seven, played in child parts and as a Mack Sennett beauty. In 1925 she had smashed up in Playboy Harry Brand Cooper's Bugatti roadster, an accident which brought her $3,000 compensation and an indelible scar on her left cheek bone. She lives in an English farmhouse in Bel-Air, Calif. Her workmanlike interpretations of drunk scenes, as in Nothing Sacred, are merely acting; she drinks nothing but beer. A good tennis player, she plays often with Alice Marble, ranked No. 1 in U. S. tennis and one of her best friends. An inveterate ribber, she likes practical jokes: when her good friend Clark Gable gave her a BB gun, she practiced potshots at him. Gable thrives on such horseplay, but her 1931 marriage to William Powell ended in a 1933 divorce.
On the set Carole Lombard is a hard worker, but is regarded as a "caution." Because of the scar on her cheek, she refuses to work with any cameraman but Teddy Tetzlaff, who can hide it. She frequently muffs her lines in the middle of a scene and throws one of the violently vituperative tantrums which have earned her the name of Hollywood's most efficient female cusser. Current Hollywood tattle tells the tale that she broke down in the middle of a scene of True Confession while there was a covey of Missouri sightseers on the set. She outdid herself in expressing her annoyance. A distraught assistant director scurried up waving his arms: "Please, Miss Lombard, please! Remember there are ladies present."