Show This Hollywood veteran still 4 sophisticated comedies as Noel Cowards "Design for Living" with Miriam Hopkins and Fred ric March and "Desire" with Marlene Dietrich It's been a long time though since Coop traded his buckskin vest for white tie and tails and he's happy with the change of pace in "Love in the Afternoon" It'll give him a chance to remind fans that his vocabulary is considerably larger than "yep" and that his acting talents go beyond looking bashful While movie-goe- rs may be startled by Cooper s suavity Hollywood will take it in stride They know Coop and his wife the former socialite Veronica Balfe as two of the town's leading looks as if he has straw behind the ears but It probably affair with his glamorous socially prominent wife Coop appears at a comes from unpacking a black-ti- e "iSiirj - case of imported delicacies A young star in filmville doesn't really feel he "belongs" until he has received an invitation to a soiree party-give- rs at the Coopers' Peer J Oppenheimer 62 Picture yourself sitting at a fashionable Paris restaurant overlooking the Seine Opposite you is a longtime movie star He picks up a menu the size of a billboard and says "If you'd like I'll order for you I know the cuisine here" Without hesitation he outlines the complete dinner to the waiter stressing precisely how each dish should be served Then he leans back adjusts a silk tie and discourses on art Who is he? Jean Pierre Aumont? Jose Ferrer? Rossano Brazzi? Nope folks just plain old Gary Cooper! And if you're disenchanted about this unfamiliar aspect of a favor- ite cowpoke figure you have nothing on me Yet that's how he was when I met him recently under just those circumstances Cooper was in Paris to film Allied ' rr v js"" I- I - If it J u- ' Hr ' door-to-do- or er er "aw-shuck- s" good-natured- rough-and-rea- t 0 4? f t '"! 'J ill-'f- TlXC - ' parents dy " ' S f ' i I i - - f -i' who had retired there Paris Its people are impressed only by Coop was quick to realize his big ophimself admires— portunity was in the movie capital— as the things Cooper good horses good food good living a salesman But don't be deceived into believing "Shy" Gary Cooper became a that Coop is the perfect cosmopolitan salesman of portrait coupons and in a few months was the top As he will proudly admit the rough in the field He's been a edges of Montana are still with him money-makLike the time he was driving to the ever since top money-makFrench Riviera for a holiday and Selling was still Coop's big goal when He listened a family friend got him his first film stopped to ask directions to a spiel of French nodded underjob in 1924 as a stunt man By 1925 he and took off with the ashad his first leading role and when standing his way Samuel Goldwyn cast him in 'The surance of a man who knows about the world Unfortunately he Winning of Barbara Worth" with 150 miles Ronald Colman sales ambitions lost ended up in the French Alps from his destination out to a movie career But in this case Coop's real personalWhile he's best known for on the roles Gary Cooper's polished ity matched the one he shows he simply shrugged off the background often has shown through screen— and sat back ly exterior He has mistake that achieved success for example in such to take things easy Artists' "Love in the Afternoon" a comedy costarring Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier He was as much at home promenading the Champs Elysees as he is strolling down that long dusty street for a showdown with a Western gunman "Why shouldn't I be?" he asked "I was born in Montana but hardly under pioneer conditions" Actually he comes from a wealthy family who provided him a cosmopolitan education that began at nine with his enrollment in an English prep school His father was a wealthy lawyer and Montana supreme court justice who instilled in the lanky youth a love for fine living and comfort Coop's ambition was to be a cartoonist and he studied art at Grinnell College in Iowa before joining a newspaper in Helena Mont The only reason he went to Los Angeles was to join his " - Ii""' v '" If you're getting the idea that the Coopers are simply Beverly Hills snobs a recent joke Coop tells on himself will set you straight He was at France's famed race track Longchamps when a spectator tapped him on the shoulder and said "Monsieur Cooper thees ees one" show where zee horses are zee stars—not you!" w he loves one reason as this But Coop cites U "ill M t - " ' ' fi?i 14it f cuiam - 1 - 1 uA - - rrf - tnpnt moit of his screen life in "The PainSman Shown kU Family Weekly June j —""' 16 J957 he-ma- n Bis0n 19 |