Back When No Movie Was Meaningless

Government Girl (1943) Was Special To Someone

I'll go sentimental route today and mention a rare find among lobby cards, one I nearly failed to note, as who regards the "verso" of such a collectible where imagery is on the front side? Serious gatherers are as scrupulous to the back, for often it is tip-off to damage and/or restoration effort having been made. Rest assured that lobby cards are a sought-after modern art, many of us hooked on them from early age. This sample was response to my liking Government Girl, a Washington-based comedy with Olivia De Havilland and Sonny Tufts. Presumably funny in 1943, it is dated now as meat rationing and black market tires (GPS dealt with GG in July 2010). What moves me about the card is what a long-ago someone wrote on its flip side: "Note --- This lobby is in memory of my beloved Aunt Evelyn, when we saw this film at Warner's Hollywood Theatre, Hollywood Blvd., Calif." A number of the words are underlined, as here was precious memory for whoever wrote the inscription. Unusual was someone getting a lobby card for a keepsake --- these weren't supposed to be given or sold to patrons. Was Aunt Evelyn and her niece, or nephew, members of an exhibiting family? A Government Girl lobby card might otherwise have been tough to come by as those black market tires.

I'm convinced that most stars had little idea of what they meant to their public. Olivia De Havilland no doubt figured Government Girl for a slight vehicle, but what would she say then (let alone now, at age 102!) to such expression as this on the part of anonymous fans who memorialized their evening out to see a film so few are around to remember first-hand? Joan Crawford once said that screen players have less way of knowing what they mean to an audience because, unlike stage performers, they don't get immediate gratification of applause, being stood before cameras and an indifferent crew. Short of going out among viewership, and interaction with them (Crawford certainly did that), how would film players truly know their value? It has been said that small towns were the last to forget a star, but how many stars ventured to small towns? I'm betting most from the Classic Era lived and died without realizing half their importance to an anonymous multitude who bought tickets and revered their work. The truly mass audience then was a thing almost beyond calculation now. "Stars" today scarcely warrant the name compared with what used to be. Never mind your TCM broadcast or Warner Archive disc, and imagine Government Girl at the Warner's Hollywood with 2,350 seats and as many laughing in them. Government Girl might have seemed like the funniest picture ever made in such an environment. I wonder how long this lobby card stayed in the family before they forgot Government Girl, Aunt Evelyn, and the reason why the outing meant so much. Such tribute for me turns an attractive representation of an obscure film into meaningful proof of what moviegoing once was to its public.