Hollywood - (AP) - Although Jackie Cooper gets $1300 a week, he must get along on $400.
When the 8-year-old movie star's mother, Mrs. Mabel Leonard Cooper, applied for legal guardianship, she told the court that to support Jackie as a juvenile star should be supported, she would require $400 a week or $53.33 a day. The judge agreed and the amount was granted.
But how does young Jackie manage to use that amount weekly? That's more than the average man earns monthly. Is Jackie throwing his money away?
His mother says he is not and tells how the $400 is spent.
One hundred dollars pays the rent on the Cooper home (now $75 a month), pays for groceries, light, gas, telephone and other such items and the maid's salary.
All of this averages $85 a week; the remaining $15 is put into an emergency household fund.
Jackie's mother and grandmother each get $75 weekly as "salary."
Fifty dollars is used to buy Jackie's clothes, pays for his education and entertainment and provides him with 'pin money' for incidentals, such as photographs. He spends between $10 and $15 a week for pictures.
Savings Account
One hundred dollars is put into a savings account in Jackie's name and used only for emergencies.
The balance of his salary, $900 is put in trust. Jackie's contract is for 40 weeks yearly, which means that at the end of this year he will have $36,000 plus compound interest, in his fund.
"When Jackie was quite young," Mrs. Cooper said in explanation of the salary she and her mother, Mrs. Leonard, take, "I had to work to support all of us and mother had to stay home with Jackie.
"Before he got his contract, his grandmother took him around to the studios looking for work. Now I think mother deserves something in return for her attention to Jackie."
Jackie's present contract is a three-year optional one. If it is renewed next year and the year following, Jackie will have more than $108,000 in his trust fund in addition to an approximate $12,000 in his savings account.
If Jackie remains a public favorite for six years, he will have accumulated a neat fortune of nearly half a million dollars. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer has another three-year optional contract with the young star after the present one expires. The second contract pays him $2000 a week for 40 weeks the first year, $2500 for the second and $3000 for the third year.
When he is 21 years old, Jackie will be given $67,000 in cash as a 13-year $50,000 endowment insurance policy matures then.
Master Cooper seems to be well on the way toward becoming a millionaire.