PLAZA

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 795, 16 October 1929, Page 17

PLAZA

LAST DAYS OF “THE DIVINE LADY” One of the greatest heroes of all times is portrayed on the screen in * The Divine Dady,” the picture starring Corinne Griffith, which will be shown for only two more days at the Plaza Theatre. A fine programme of short talkie features is also being presented. The outstanding item is the appearance of Giovanni Martinelli, tenor of the New York Opera, who sings a solo from the opera “Aida.” Other attractions are the overture ‘•Evolution of Dixie,” by the Vitaphone Symphony Orchestra of GO players. conducted by Herman Heller and banjo-playing by the American vaudevillian, Roy Sheck. A regular old-time minstrel show has a prominent part in the Eddie Dowling starring production, which comes to the Plaza Theatre on F riday as the next change. “Doc. Hardy’s Minstrels” and later “Ryan and Hardy’s Minstrels” in the story of “The Rainbow Man” present the characters Rainbow Ryan, played by Eddie Dowling, and “Doc” Hardy, played by Sam Hardy. Dowling is the star, and Hardy is the old-time I manager and interlocutor of the | troupe. A picturesque setting is used lor the j presentation of the minstrel show as j it plays in a small Southern town in j the story. Opening with a parade, | with the minstrel men in their grey I top hats and linen dusters, the minstrel I show is put on just as it would have • been played in the town opera house. In the minstrel show, sequences of the picture, Eddie Dowling, accompanied by the stage full of minstrels, the orchestra and the bangings of tambourines. sings several of the catchy songs which are part of the entertainment. James Hanley, writer of many successful song hits, wrote the melodies used in the minstrel sequences and elsewhere in the picture. Fred Newmeyer directed the production, and Louis F. Gottschalk staged the musical ensembles and arrangements. Tod Browning, creator of mystery drama, is struggling with the biggest mystery of his career, in working out the tiilking version of “The Thirteenth Chair” at the Metro-Ooldwyn-Mayer studios. “The thing,” he says, “is to keep the plot moving without moving the chairs and making it look like moving-day in a lecture hall.”