Army of Stars in New Talkie

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 846, 14 December 1929, Page 30

Army of Stars in New Talkie

PARAMOUNT PLANS BIG SPECTACLE

FORTY PLAYERS NAMED

1 Seeking wags and means for talking pictures, the impresarios i v f the microphone hare reached I out to adopt forms long sacred to the stage, namely , musical comedy | and revue. ONFIDENT that whatf . ever the footlights threw 1 up into glory on the IragEPWI stage. the projector i i\mm/| could cast in greater ftfay :j glory on the screen, the ! producers rounded up siugers by the score, dancers by the hundred and I directors who could be relied on to do : in Hollywood as they had done on Broadway. i Out of this movement came tne I Movietone Pollies from -he Eox Studio, the Hollywood Revue of 1919 from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. "The Love Parade” from Paramount (yet to be seen in Auckland), with volatile M. Chevalier, and from V arner Brothers, “The Show of Shows,” with fully a. hundred “names” in the cast, and' “Gold Diggei-s of Broadway,” both coming here soon. These and many lesser efforts, springing out of the camera s earl> exploration of the footlight realm, have proved that revue can be photographed and flung, with a fair degree of success, on the screen. The impulse among experts is to

find a new mould in which to present forms, voices and colours on the screen. From Paramount comes Jesse L. Lasky’s announcement of a contemplated all-star song, dance, scenic and camera spectacle. The production will be called “Paramount on Parade,” and it is announced not as a revue, but by the high-sound-ing title of “a einephonic festival.” "The almost limitless possibilities of the sound and natural colour screen will be realised in ‘Paramount on Parade,’ ” says Lasky. True Reflection “It will be a true reflection of the wave of courage and longing for advancement In all directions that have swept the moving picture industry since it has conquered sound: a veritable mania for pioneering and improvement that has carried us so far and so rapidly that we within the industry, being so close to it, fail to appreciate unless we stop to ponder and to get our breaths.” Among those mentioned as principals are:—Richard Arlen, Jean Arthur, William Austin, George Bancroft, Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent, Mary Brian, Clive Brook, Nancy Carroll, Ruth Chatterton, Maurice Chevalier, .Gary Cooper, Kay Francis, Harry Green, James Hall, Neil Hamilton, O. P. Heggie, Doris Hill, Phillips Holmes, Helen Kane. Jeanette MacDonald, Fredric March, the Four Marx Brothers. Mitzi, Moran and Mack, Jack Oakie, Warner Gland, Eugene Pallette, William Powell, Charles Rogers, Lillian Roth, Hal Skelly. Regis Toomey, Fay Wray, and others under contract to Paramount.