“THE TALKIES” BEGIN

Evening Star, Issue 20137, 30 March 1929, Page 11

“THE TALKIES” BEGIN

OCTAGON THEATRE TO-NIGHT To-night at the Octagon Theatre Fox movie-tone talking, singing, and sound pictures will bo introduced to Dunedin, with production on an ambitious scale. This is a milestone in the history of dramatic art. In Japan’s famous “doll theatre” there is an age-old form of drama, wherein the action belongs to mannequins pulled by strings, the dialogue being spoken by a “story-teller.” The primitive dramatic idea of the Orient is now associated with the marvellous inventions of modern science, and “ the talkies ” are evolved. What kind of world theatre do thfey foreshadow? Before long the dwellers in any hamlet on the earth’s surface may hoar and see the exact reproduction of a play or an opera by the world’s greatest artists. And, , when television is added to telegraphy, telephony, and radio (as is obund to happen) the future Bernhardt or Caruso will be able to play and sing within sight and hearing of the whole population of tho world at one moment. Tho programme to ho presented at the Octagon Theatre to-night will be n Fox movie-tone newsreel, in which Lady Heath and Marshal Joffre are among the world’s celebrities who will speak. George Bernard Shaw, the word’s outstanding literary genius, delivers a short speech packed with wit and philosophy; “Chic” Sale, stage and screen star, is supported by a notable cast in a comedy entitled ‘ The Star Witness ’; Gertrude Lawrence, English comedian, will be heard in a song entitled ‘ I Don’t Know ’; and ‘ Street Angel,’ starring Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell, is accompanied by the Roxy Theatre Orchestra, New York’s famous orchestra of HU pieces.