HUMOROUS FILM IN MOSCOW

Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21411, 1 March 1935, Page 5

HUMOROUS FILM IN MOSCOW

RUSSIAN WRITERS' CRITICISM "DOWN WITH LAUGHTER FOR LAUGHTER'S SAKE!" The writer of a leading article in the "Morning Post" comments lightlyon the screening of a humorous film in Moscow which has drawn criticism from the Moscow House of Writers. The article, which is entitled "Risky Laughter." is as follows: — The Old Adam in the hearts of the Russians may yet be fatal to the Soviet's Brave New World. After sanctioning the resumption of table man-

ners and the telling of fairy stories to children. Moscow has perpetrated the crowning blunder of a funny film. A picture is being shown in Paris —Les Joyeux Garcons—which is empty oi propaganda but full of bourgeois humour—an "atrophy of the political sense." This has roused the Moscow House of Writers fa set of scribes who think smiling is the mark of Pharisees) to stormy remonstrance. "Down with laughter for laughter's sake! cries one infuriated intellectual, "Long live our own laughter, seasoned with the bitter salt of class hatred." The House of Writers is enough to make a cat or a proletarian laugh; yet its members have shrewdly spotted the danger of lapses like this ordinary, jolly Russian film. For one cannot have a sense >£ humour and remain a Red.

drama with its professors, its doctors and its spectators." Mr Cochran's statement was as follows: — I am not going to Hollywood and have no desire nor invitation to tie myself up with Hollywood pictures. Nothing would give me more joy than to go to Hollywood as a tourist, but my impending production campaign in London puts such a happy project out of sight for many a moon. I have entered into no contract with Mae West; I haven't even approached her. But she is my favourite American actress. I should be happy to offer her all the money Mr Chamberlain can spare, from the exchequer if she will come over and play for me. Elisabeth Bergner Miss Bergner was not discovered by Max Reinhardt, but was famous before she even played for him. Miss Bergner was not made known to the English public or any other public through the films, but was t tlie best known actress in Europe before she did a film. She was not exiled from Germany by the Nazis, but had If ft Germany nearly a year and a half before the commencement of that government. It is curious that the most eminent American critics of the drama have appraised Miss Bergner as a highly technical actress, ■whereas Reinhardt recently stated in a eulogistic commentary that her disregard of technique and reliance upon inspiration had been his despair in directing her. "An Inspired Actress" Although I have had the honour ot presenting Sarah Bernhardt and Kleonora Dime to British audiences, I was not so precocious as to introduce them for the first time. And, although in my humble opinion Elisabeth Bergner ranks as an inspired actress with the greatest of all limes, I have never been so foolish nor so irreverent as to make the stupid statement which has been attributed to me that my divine Elisabeth is greater than the two giantesses above mentioned. Comparison between any two or all three of these great artists is utterly impossible. People have asked me for engagements in the London production of "A Room in Red and White." I have not bought this play, and therefore cannot employ any one for it.