Mabel normand

Minta: Well, you see, what I HAVE been doing, I have a manager up in San Jose, and I have these pictures that I SHOW, then I tell the vignettes about it, I have questions and answers, and San Francisco, I have to tell this to you, I’ve never seen such a rainstorm since God made rain. And of course I wear beautiful evening clothes, I mean I always dress for everything that I do like that. And when we wee riding up from San Jose, maybe an hour’s ride, I thought to myself, there won’t be a SOUL in the theater. It’s a very famous old theater, it holds 1,000 people. I had 900 people in a driving rain that I wouldn’t have put my FOOT out-side. I mean, as far as I’m concerned, had I been a person that was going to be a patron. Well, when I got thru, I had a standing ovation. He made a tape recording of it, and I stood up there, and they would ask me about my husband’s trial. And I had the answer for them if they HAD. So he said to this manager, “Don’t worry about Mrs. Arbuckle, she’s very articulate. And she will answer.” But they didn’t. I told them and I told them and I ranted and I raved around about Mabel Normand, and I had over a hundred pictures of Mabel, and more Mabel, and all this business. I told them a great many of the very things that I have told you today. And instead of those people having brains enough to go home, in the rain, and go home, they were WAITING in the LOBBY when I get thru, and my pictures, I autographed I think a hundred pictures, half of them were Roscoe, I have a very cute picture of Roscoe, with all of his little things around him, and I’m up in the corner. And they STILL wanted to know more about Mabel Normand. So I said, the manager said, this is just what he said to me, “We don’t care HOW long we keep the place open, because I live upstairs.” That’s what I do. Then I went to the colleges. On my 82nd birthday, I did all the colleges on the Northern part, from San Jose up. Carry right on, with Mabel Normand. Because we had pictures up there, you know. And I go right into it.

Stephen: I appreciate that.

Minta: It’s TRUE. Everybody that KNOWS me, dear, knows that THIS and my husband are very touchy subjects with ME. Because BOTH of them have been so absolutely MISTREATED by the press. Which makes me like I am. I don’t hate anybody in the world, but I mean, when I get a chance, to open my big mouth, I do it.

Stephen: That’s good. You should do that. It’s not a big mouth, it’s very fortunate that you’re able to get up and talk and say it because a lot of people just don’t have that way. They DO keep silent.

Minta: See, what I’ve got to do, I’ve got a plan to have a regular, get all my pictures back to me, and then I’m going to try to purchase some pictures. And I’m going to build for clubs, and gatherings, where I can go out and I can tell the stories. I’ll have to do it partly for my living, because I’m living on a very small budget, and all that kind of thing, but that’s what I’m going to do. And that’s what I LOVE to do.

Don: She’s very good at it.

Minta: You see, I love an AUDIENCE. I’m still a stage girl.

Stephen: Never lose that. I have a problem (with spelling) I write British, and I also write American. Sometimes you’ll see a word spelled the British way.

Minta: Do you think you’ll come out here to live?

Stephen: I HOPE I DO come back, yes. ...

Minta: Isn’t Julie (Julia Benson) sweet?

Both: Oh, yes.

Minta: I just love her. ...

Stephen: Well, I came out at their invitation to SEE the play, ...which I DID see, and they told me that there was going to be some things I wouldn’t like, they didn’t say exactly what it would be. They didn’t exactly say clearly what the problems were going to be. I knew there was dope in it, but I didn’t know how it was going to be presented, they didn’t say HOW it was going to be done. But they told me there’d be changes. I have correspondence with them, telling me this will be all ironed out by the time it gets to New York, well I have an attorney that informed them that we have the medical evidence now, and that things will be pressed, there will be a case against them if they don’t change it, so when I saw the play as soon as I got back, I spoke to my attorney on the telephone and told him what I saw. So they got in touch with the Merrick office, and they claim that they’re going to make changes, before it hits New York. They’re re-writing the script now. It was just in St. Louis, it will be in Washington for almost a month, it starts there on Monday, it opens there. Then it hits New York. They invited me to the premiere in New York, so I guess by inviting me to the premiere, I’m sure they’re going to have changes. They wouldn’t want me to go thru this thing again, I suppose. That’s on the 6th of October.

Minta: Well, I wish they’d take out the bad language that they have for Mr. Sennett, in all due respect to Sennett, because the thing’s about the Keystone (sic,) anyway, with Mabel and him, and that guy that runs in there at the last and says something about, “Well, what do you expect, she was a heroin addict.”

Stephen: I know. Also they make it look like Mack and Mabel were living together, and they make some snide remarks about Mabel’s parents --

Minta: And yet there is NO ROMANCE in the darn thing.

Stephen: I didn’t see any. ...Dick Jones, he was her favorite director.

Minta: Well, I hope you can do SOMETHING about it, because it is just terrible.