COMING ATTRACTIONS

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 329, 9 January 1937, Page 2

COMING ATTRACTIONS

Plaza Theatre. To-day and Monday: “Last of the Mohicans” (Randolph Scott. Henry Wilcoxon, Binnie Barnes). Tuesday and Wednesday: “The Case Against Mrs Ames” (Madeleine Carroll, George Brent). Thursday and Friday: “Private Number” (Robert Taylor, Loretta Young). Saturday and Monday: “King Steps Out” (Grace Moore, Franchot Tone). CAN TWIRL ROPES. In England they call her “Texas” Binnie Barnes. She won the nickname because she could twirl ropes, spin yarns, and do the stunts of the American cowboys. Yet, the exotic blonde English actress, who stars with Victor McLaglen in “Magnificent Brijte,” Universal’s drama of the steel mills, has never set foot in Texas.

“Odd, isn’t it,” she remarked, when interviewed in Hollywood. “The closest I have ever been to Texas has been in passing over the Panhandle in air trips from New York tc Hollywood. However, I intend to visit the place some day. In fact, it has become something of an ambition to me. I want to see the State which has played such an important part in my life.” The actress has no idea when she is going to be able to realise her ambition. She has gone from one picture to another since she arrived in Hollywood in 1934. When she isn’t working on her home lot at Universal she is on loan to other studios. Miss Barnes’ acquisition of the name “Texas” was the product of-an idea on her. part. She gave it,; to herself. CQMEDY-TH RILLER. The English critics are enthusing over the new picture, “Strangers on Honeymoon,” a romantic comedythriller based on the story of Edgar Wallace’s book, “The Northing Tramp,” the action of which takes place in America. It ranks as the first British-made effort to re-create an American background, and the job has been well done. It reaches the state of conviction attained by those best Hollywood pictures which re-create an English background. Constance Cummings, in her second film for Gaumont-British, scores a personal success. Hugh Sinclair (from “Escape Me Never”), Beatrix Lehmann, Noah Beery, David Burns, Tucker MacGuire, and James A rnol d are prominent in a long and very strong cast.

LONELY ROAD. The Basil Dean A.T.P. production, “Lonely Road,” was adapted from an original story by Nevil Shute, and is said to present Clive Brook with the opportunity of a fine portrayal as a secret service agent, a role entirely suited to his characterisation. Victoria Hopper is cast as a hostess in a Midland dance hall, the girl with whom Brook falls in love and becomes involved in a smuggling investigation. The picture is said to lack nothing in dramatic tension, and at all times is stated to retain interest with thrills and excitement. The backgrounds include , many coastal scenes and one thrilling scene shows a running fight between the Government officials, headed by .Clive Brook, and the gunning smugglers.

NEW FACES. Hollywood’s great problem is to find new talent of a high standard. All the great stars who are boxoffice draws are getting stale and will inevitably have to retire, if not from choice, at least from senile decay. It is the policy of all thp big studios to • give encouragement to anyone who shows signs of developing into a first-class artist. They have been searching the world for years, but never was their need so acute as at present. The newlyorganised Universal Film Corporation has been very successful lately in its choice of young stars. NATURAL HISTORY. “Tawny Owl,’ ’due for general release shortly, is another Mary FieldEmmett masterpiece of natural history combined with the outstanding wit' of the type only Emmett, the well-known Gaumont-British n4ws commentator, is capable of producing. Mary Fields sees to it that the facts with regard to the tawny owl’s private life are immaculately correct; E. V. H. Emmett on his part discusses the whole thing as if the owl family were close, but rather eccentric, relations. The net result is semi-delirium among audiences. It must be said that the tawny owl nestlings, small bundles of fluff with enormous bespectacled eyes, lend themselves to merriment.

IRISH COLONY. Dublin, Ireland, came to Hollywood recently for scenes in the Samuel Goldwyn production, “Beloved Enemy,” and every available Irish film player in the colony was summoned for duty. The 300-odd extra players worked in sequences in “Parnell Square,” the historic Irish area of Dublin, which was erected in replica on the studio back lot. The entire square, and the numerous

It was fitting that the petite Margaret Sullavan should make her return to the legitimate stage in a play about an actress who rebels against the lure of the movies. Miss Sullavan, who has made one or two good pictures (her best, was “The Moon is Our Home,” in which she acted wi'th her l ex-husband, Henry Fonda, sipce engaged to a society girl), came back to the Broadway theatre in “Stage Door,” a play by Edna Ferber and George Kaufman. The heroine of the comedy is a little girl from Wisconsin—or any of the thousand towns in the Middle West. The daughter of an actress mother who left the stage for domesticity .and then felt cheated. Terry Bandall goes to New York to realise her mother’s dream by proxy as it were. She goes prepared to dedicate her | art to the theatre. She joins a band of young hopefuls from the Footlights’ Club where she boards, who trudge Broadway looking for a job. But Terry is different; it is the theatre she loves and wants to serve. The authors carry their argument against the devastating practices of picture promoters (who take a girl while her talent is fresh, strip her of all she has to give and fling her back into the amusement market a forgotten favourite) to Terry’s determined stand for her right to be a real actress, and not a superficial camera actress. Miss Sullavan gave a superb performance as Terry. Ilers is one of the rarer talents of stage and screen.

f streets in its vicinity were faithfully reproduced for the scenes with an . Irish market-place being erected in | one section and stocked with pro--1 duce, livestock and fowls. In addition to tons of fresh vegetables, a score of pigs, 500 geese, 500 ducks, 700 chickens, 10 donkeys, 10 horses, 10 goats, and 1000 pigeons filled the market 1 stalls. “Beloved Enemy’’ is described as a vivid romance lari against an Irish and English background.