Theda Bara Says She is Going To Quit Vamping

1920

Famous Movie Vampire Says Everybody is Some Sort of a Vamp But She is Tired of the Business

New York — Theda Bara, she of celluloid fame, who has had the unique experience of vamping herself into fame, vamping herself out of fame, and now intends to outvamp herself — as it were — expects greater success on the stage than she ever found on the screen.

Seated in a little dressing room off the stage suite of Al H. Woods, her new producer, she told me of her new ambitions. She confided that when she appears in "The Blue Flame," under the direction of Woods, America will see not the old Theda Bara, not the new Theda Bara, but "The old Theda Bara and the new Theda Bara and the real Theda Bara."

The interview was not a minute old before I discovered that Theda Bara has a voice extremely well suited to the stage.

"I have given myself up to this new thing to a greater extent than I ever did before," she said. "Practically every minute of every day since my rehearsals have started has been devoted to work, and, with the exception of the theater, I have almost given up amusement, for the time being. My new play — my first on the stage — is everything I could desire, for it gives me a chance to show a woman of modern times as many of them are, entirely conscienceless and hardened at times and yet as lovable at others, changeful brilliant, and yet just a woman."

"Then, said I, "you believe every woman is more or less of a vampire, and that this is particularly true in these days of fur coats, automobiles, and $1,000 evening gowns?"

"Surely," said she. "And by saying that, I don't mean there is anything wrong in being a vampire — at least, not in the way I mean. Doesn't every wife do the vampirish tricks to please her husband? Doesn't every girl strive to appear at her best? And shouldn't they? Surely. The parts I portray only show that trait in an exaggerated, or rather extreme form."

—Appleton Post Crescent, Appleton, WI, Feb. 9, 1920, p. 8.