THE SCREEN AND THE STAGE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 15 July 1929, Page 8

THE SCREEN AND THE STAGE

EFFECT OF THE "TALKIES" Far from "killing" the theatre, the '•'talkie" will eventually make it prosperous, says the London "Evening News." "They say that big queues are at all the talkie cinemas. . There were big ._queues for 'super'-pictures before talkie s came. » Now they are bigger because everybody wants to see this novelty. How long is curiosity to last? Give it a year or so; and then the.talking film will have to Jive on "its merits, mere curiosity having bSeh satisfied. Afid everybody in the cinema- trade itself admits that ther.e are and will be for some time great and even appalling crudities in the talkie. Ajj. long as there are great or. even very good plays oil: the stage the theatres will fill. No mechanical invention can ever be as attractive to the public as the '■ great actor. No loud speaker can ever take the place of the beautiful human voice. The ;cjnema has these great advantages over the,'theatre: it is more comfortable; if it can give as many as. six' slsws a day. Then, if a single picture mak.es £1,000,000,, the producers can' spend £500,000 on the next: whereas it is a gamble to spend £20,000 on a play that may fail in a week. Obviously the theatre cannot compete in this large financial sense with the cinema. But it is not needful that it should. All that it lias to do is to offer good plays. That is the root:of the matter. The two sorts of entertainment are wanted by the public,/and it is .nojjsense to talk of one 'killing' the' other. There is no reason for the theatre to lay itself down and die."