Did YOU Know That ?

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 572, 26 January 1929, Page 25

Did YOU Know That ?

Habits and customs of Javanese natives were studied by Greta Garbo, who appears in tropical sequences in her next M-G-M picture, as yet untitled. * * , Charles Klein, director of Fox Films, is, in addition to his various studio duties, a foreign correspondent for a number of German magazines and newspapers. John Barrymore becomes a sailor after he finishes each picture. He can hardly wait for the last scene before throwing his costume away to don yachting clothes and board his boat, The Mariner. Norma Shearer’s picture, "The Little Angel” has two directors. Half-way through the picture Sam Wood was rushed to the hospital for an appendicitis operation, and Robert Leonard took over the cast and story. Baby stars keep in condition in daily gymnastic classes conducted by Dr. J. E. Anderson at the M.G.G. studios. Among the “patients” are Gwen Leem, Raquel Torres, Blanche Le Claire, Fay Webb and others. Tom Mix took several days off from the studio recently, when he made a ‘‘flying mount” that didn’t come off just right. He wrenched his knee badly enough to merit a vacation. | During Tom’s absence his director went right on making scenes in which the Western star and Tony, his horse, don’t appear. What amounts to a gathering of midgets and dwarfs is in progress at the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios. Every available wee person has been signed up for "The Mysterious Island,” a fantasy based on Jules Verne’s story. They impersonate an island race in the vivid adventure tale. More than 150 Lilliputians appear, ranging in age from 17 to 60.

the sorry results of early experiments in talking pictures through the use of a phonograph record played behind the screen. In our method the sound is actually photographed on the film. “To-day the screen takes voice. Titles give way to the actual dialogue, spoken from the lips of the players. The phantom figures of the silent screen become real characters of flesh and blood—they live, they talk, they sing—you hear it all. A shout or a whisper Is brought to you as clear as life itself. “Even in an age of mechanical and artistic marvels, the talking picture has made a notable debut. A public which watched the motor-ca.r, the airplane, the motion picture and the radio develop from feeble experiments to to-day’s high achievement, has given

the talking picture a kind reception. And yet their very experience with the marvels which preceded it in the last 20 years made the public expectant of not too long delayed improvement in the talking picture. "The first subject shown puDlicly was Raquel Mellor, Spanish artiste, in a cycle of songs. On December 3, 1927, the first regular issue of Fox Movietone News, the first talking newsreel, was shown. “No less sensational has been the development of all-talking features of short and full length, for the production of which the world’s largest sound 'tudio plant has been erected at Hollywood. This site, known as Movietone City, covers over 40 acres of ground.