CIVIC

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 853, 23 December 1929, Page 14

CIVIC

EXCELLENT PROGRAMME The Civic, Auckland’s wondertheatre, has had a most opening, and the same programme will be repeated every evening this week. The Civic is a huge theatre with a huge seating capacity and the management announces that there are available this evening quite a number of excellent seats in many parts of this house. The box plan is open at the theatre for the whole of this week and reservations may be made daily. Theatre again on Saturday evening. From the opening scene to the final note of music the show went with a swing, presenting what is undoubtedly one of the finest entertainments ever heard in Auckland. Ted Henkel’s Symphony Orchestra and Stage Band is a wonderful musical treat. Their appearance was again the signal for an outburst of clapping. Spectacular dances by the remarkable Continental trio, Ramon. Madeline and Pedro, colourful scenes and snappy dancing by the Civic’s Corps de Ballet, and two or three partUcularly fine organ solos by Fred Scholl, are a fitting prelude to the big talkie comedy, “Three Live Ghosts.”

These are some of the fascinating and colourful high-lights of “Three Live Ghosts,” an all-talking film version of the famous New York and London stage, which proved a brilliantly refreshing evening’s entertainment. Brilliantly acted by an all-star cast, several of whom have never before appeared before a camera, “Three Live Ghosts” introduces several new and magnetic personalities to the screen as its absorbing story unfolds. Prominent among them is Beryl Mercer, who, as “Old Sweetheart,” a product of London’s slums, gives one of the finest characterisations ever seen on the screen. Charles McNaughton, Claud Allister and Robert Montgomery, as the “Three Live Ghosts,” give delightful and convincing performances, as do Hilda Vaughn, Joan Bennett and Shayle Gardner.