LONDON THEATRE

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 979, 23 May 1930, Page 16

LONDON THEATRE

“HIGH TREASON” TODAY “High Treason,” the sensational alltalkie spectacle, due for presentation at the Grand Theatre today, is of esp* cial interest to women. The ache-: of the film is set in 1940. Not alor, will the eternal feminine be intrigu-:. by the futuristic fashions shown on t: screen, but the producer, ManricElvey, has forecast that the women o: 1940 will be virtual rulers, socially ate politically. When war breaks out women ax conscripted as well as men. One scershows the women conscripts filing in: the recruiting station and being serve: out with their uniforms and equipmer One girl surveys an article of feminitunderwear in horror, saying “Isn’t wir terrible!” The women, too, are the chief supporters of a Peace League, and wb*they are ordered to load bombs on ' a squadron of airplanes they defy the:: officers. Soldiers are ordered to f. pon the women; they refuse, and uwomen triumph. There is a big love interest in th? film, Jameson Thomas and Bec:'Hume being the exponents. 1940 v according to the film, will fe a purely mechanical age. Teieviao: and wireless will be used instead <■ newspapers. Helicopters and airplanes alight and depart from special constructed landing stages. The nig ' club’s dance band is a mechanical oitf controlled by wireless. Such is a brnl survey of the mechanical mam - which the film suggests will he a general use 10 years hence.

CRYSTAL PALACE AND WEST EM Gary Cooper lias the leading role b “Seven Days Leave,” which wa ; adapted from Sir James Barrie’s *Tt“ Old Lady Shows Her Medals,” and * now at both the Crystal Palace Theatre, Mount Eden, and the Weet BoTheatre, Ponsonby Road. It is a sympathetic role, endow* 4 with all the rich whimsy of Barrie* literary original. Beryl Mercer, that deligbtfio.quaint little British lady who madeb* screen debut in “Three Live Ghosts’* Mrs. Gubbins, portrays the leads* supporting part, that of Mrs. the charwoman, who adopts Coop® so that she can affect the bravado* her neighbour’s charwomen, who hi given sons to their country** c* o * Miss Mercer established the rok the original stage production In don in 1920.