MAJESTIC

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 766, 12 September 1929, Page 17

MAJESTIC

“THE IRON MASK” TODAY D’Artagnan and the three musketeers are riding once more. Douglas Fairbanks is with us once more as D’Artagnan. “The Iron Mask,” a United Artists picture coming to the Majestic Theatre, is a sequel to his story of “The Three Musketeers," which he made six years ago. Again Mr. Fairbanks is playing Dumas’s swash-buckling hero of the 17th century. Tho scene of the picture is laid in France during the latter part of the reign of Louis XIII and the first years of the regime of the young Louis XIV. The story opens with the birth of the heir to the throne of France, and carries through the years of his boyhood to the early period of his rulership. In the second part of the picture, D’Artagnan and his three faithful friends, Athos, Porthos and Amaris, grown older but still adventuresome, wield their swords in defence of the young king as loyally as they served his father.

Months of careful preparation were spent in perfecting every detail of the production before starting the actual filming of the picture. Mammoth sets have been built for this great film—exact duplications of the Palace of St. Germain, of the Carmelita Convent and of French streets and buildings as they appeared in the 17tli century. Under tho personal supervision of M. INlaurice Leloir, the world’s greatest authority on the customs, manners and costumes of that penod, every phase of the life of the France of that time is reproduced .with historical accuracy. In addition to Mr. Fairbanks, several

members of the cast are playing the parts they created in the first story of D’Artagnan and his fellows. Marguerite de la Motte is again Constance, the object of D’Artagnan’s devotion. Cardinal Richelieu is being played once more by Nigel de Brulier. Leon Bary has returned to the part of

Athos, Lon Poff to that of Father Joseph and Charles Stevens to Plancliet. The rest of the cast includes Oino Corrado as Aramis, Stanley J. Sandford as Porthos, Ulrich Haupt as De Rochefort, Rolfe Sedan as Louis XIII, William Bakewell as the young • Louis XIV', Dorothy Revier as Milady de Winster. Vera Lewis as Madame Peronne and Otto Matiesen as the conspirator. Tomorrow’s programme will also include a number of new and most entertaining - short talkie features.