SMART FROCKING

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 171, 12 March 1932, Page 7

SMART FROCKING

"REACHING FOR THE MOON" WILL REVEAL NEW FASHIONS. TWO-YEAR FORECAST. Douglas Fairbanks has given the public something new and years ahead of the times in "Reaching for the Moon," his new p:cture for United Artists. directed by Edmund Goulding, who is >called the most versatile man in Hollywood. The modern comedydrama eomes to the Majestic Theatre on March 21. Supported by a cast of noted stage and screen personalities, several of them stars in their own right, Fairbanks has put aside his spear and jerkin for a collar and fountain pen. He portrays a sensationally suceessful young stock broker who cuts a swath both in the financial and love marlcets. As the leading feminine interest in his life there is Bebe Daniels, i fit screen mate for the dynamic Doug., having beauty, eourage, and a splendid sense of drama. Jack Mulhall, young star with the experience of a veteran, is prominently cast as the star's best friend nad confidant. Edward Everett Horton, who has enjoyed starring honours on both stage and screen for years, has an outstanding comedy part as Fairbank's valet. Others of the "million dollar cast" inelude June MacCloy, late of George White's "Scandals," and hailed by Director Edmund Goulding as notable among the new crop of young actresses. There is also Luna Walters whose unusual poise and beauty brought her this, her first screen part. Claud Allister, as an English light comedy character, Helen Jerome Eddy and Walter Walker are all suitably cast. The Story. The story of "Reaching for the Moon"* is set in preserAt-day New York, or rather, it anticipates the architecture, fashions and speech of two years hence. Skyscrapers, pent-hous-es, a palatial ocean liner and fashionable haunts abroad provide the baekgrounds. This does not imply a fantastic riot of queer shapes and decorations. Modernistic furniture and approipriate settings in the best manner, beautiful and harmonious, bave been designed and created by Edmund Goulding and William Cameron Menzies, the supervising a(rt director. The effect is exactly suited to the theme and the tempo of the picture. The gowns worn by Miss Daniels and the scores of beauties in the cast will reveal what the fashion craze will be the year after next. Fairbanks is back in modern clothes for the first time in ten years. Laughter is the prime ingredient of the picture. As a stock broker busy making milfions, Fairbanks has fi^ver had time to woo a girl. But when he meets Bebe Daniels, who plays a society aviatrix, he forgets all about money and pursues her across the ocean finding out midway that she is engaged to a titled Englishman. This doesn't stop him. Horton, playing the valet, recently in the service of a naughty Grand Duke, instructs Fairbanks in the art of making love, and the comedy becomes uproarious.