A Farewell to Arms (1932 film) are passed over too abruptly, being suggested rather than told ... Gary Cooper gives an earnest and splendid portrayal [and] Helen Hayes is admirable as Catherine ... another clever characterization is contributed by Adolphe Menjou ... it is unfortunate that these three players, serving the picture so well, do not have the opportunity to figure in more really dramatic interludes." Dan Callahan of "Slant Magazine" notes, "Hemingway ... was grandly contemptuous of Frank Borzage's version of "A Farewell to Arms" ... but time has been kind to the film. It launders out the writer's ... pessimism and replaces it with
Bart Macomber his greatest role as an actor." After Illinois' 1916 win over Minnesota, one book indicates that Macomber "left school for the Orpheum vaudeville circuit." A March 1917 advertisement for the Orpheum vaudeville show appearing in Madison, Wisconsin promoted appearances by Kenneth Loane, Hoyt's Minstrels, and "Bart Macomber, The Famous Halfback in SONGS & STORIES." Macomber also went on to play professional football with the Youngstown Patricians in 1917. In 1917, he played halfback for a Youngstown team that included multiple college all-stars, including Tommy Hughitt of Michigan, Tom Gormley of Georgetown, and Freeman Fitzgerald, Bill Kelleher, Gil Ward and Stan