STAGE AND SCREEN

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIV, 10 January 1931, Page 4

STAGE AND SCREEN

, Brisbane reports state that many admirers of old returned to the Theatre Royal to witness the farewell performance of Nellie Bramley’s company. The attempt of Miss Bramley to stage a come-back in Brisbane, where she had formerly played nearly two years, was a failure. She has now taken a new company to Perth. The company’s losses during the present year were £9OOO, but they arc determined to carry on.

The historic London Sadler’s Wells Theatre, said to be the oldest theatre in the world, has been renovated and will open on Otli January with “Twelfth Night,” presented by the “Old Vic.” Co. Pavlova and her company are touring the English provinces. Oliver McLennan, who played in several musical comedies in Australia and New Zealand, has a part in “Charley’s Aunt,” a talking picture made by Al. Christie.

BRITAIN’S STAR ASCENDENT IN HOLLYWOOD

GOOD NEWS FOR MOVIEGOERS With the coming of the talkies and the passing of the screen’s “beautiful but dumb” set, British players, writers and directors, and even pictures of Empire locale, have shot into the ascendant in Hollywood. Once thoroughly cosmopolitan, this world mecca of the motion picture bids fair in the very near future to 'shelter as large a distinctly British colony as all other foreign colonies combined. And this despite the recent establishment of a large co-operative “stock company” of foreign stage and screen celebrities from which all Hollywood producers can select players for the foreign versions of their pictures. The explanation is simple. English as spoken by British actors and actresses is clearer and purer in fact and in mechanical reproduction than the language spoken by most of the old screen identities. It is naturally therefore a better medium for the microphone besides being more pleasant to the ear when reproduced for an audience in the theatre.

One notable company had no less than ten famous British players, headed by Norma Shearer, on its lists long before the motion picture found its voice. Britain was also well represented on this company’s roster of directors, and its selection of stage plays and novels for filming. Other Hollywood producers had a sprinkling of British players and from time to time produced British stories, which in the aggregate amounted to a large number, which demonstrate that Britain’s traditional literary strength, and the culture oY her players, had been fully recognised in Hollywood before talkies came.

In analysing Britain’s much increased representation in Hollywood to-day, these preliminary thoughts arc interesting, inasmuch as they indicate that those in Hollywood who sought to make silent pictures of the highest quality, regardless of nationality, turned inevitably to British authors, stage plays, novels and culture. And when the talkies came along the same people were in the most advantageous position to adopt the new technique, and make a success of it.

In viewing the future, it is quite evident that, British talent will seize the greater opportunities and larger remuneration Hollywood offers, as such players as Norma Shearer, Marie Dressier, Basil Rathbone, Ronald Colman, George Arliss, Clive Brook and many lesser ones, at present demonstrate. Elstreo will in a large measure welcome this, leaving the try-out process to Hollywood’s expense. Hollywood producers have demonstrated their willingness to co-operate with British producers along other lines, and have thrown open their studios and methods to the thorough study of British studio representatives. Following the ordinary precepts and practice of commercial economy, a still larger measure of co-operation will doubtless develop out of this good-ill liason. Whatever the ultimate measure of co-operation across the Atlantic —and for commercial reasons it is bound to be large —the moviegoers in this part Of the world, to say nothing of those in other parts of the Empire, can confidently expect increased British influence in Hollywood to bear the fruit of more and more enjoyable talkies. One company has on its literary staff Frederick Londsdale, British playwright, and P. G. Wodehouse, the British humorist.