STALLS GOSSIP.

Taranaki Daily News, 27 November 1915, Page 11 (Supplement)

STALLS GOSSIP.

MIMES. MUSIC AND MOVIES. It is reported that ,fack Johnson, pugilist, is to finance and star in a revue in the London music halls. He will play the role of a coloured porter, and give, also an exhibition of boxing. An English opera company became stranded in South America recently. Several of the lady members were sent back to England by the Consul-Central. Many of the men had to work their passage back on a cattle boat. Twenty pretty girls doing the Charlie Chaplin walk to music was an entertaining spectacle to be witnessed during the week (says a London paper). They are the chorus of the new revue, "Charlie Chaplin Mad." * • « Lily Langtiy, one time famous as the "Jersey Lily," goes to the States shortly to play Sydney Grundy's adaptation of \V. B. Maxwell's "Mrs. Thompson." Tt is a modern comedy, in which Mi's. Langtry plays the part of an up-to-date business woman.

Charles Brown, a comedian wellknown in New Zealand as one of the foremost players with Bland Holt, and also as the leading character in the last production of "Beauty and the Barge," is said to have made a big hit in South Africa as Tom Lambert, in ''The Whip."

Nance O'Neil, who starred in New Zealand a good many years ago in "Madga," "Queen Elizabeth," "Caiaille," "La Tosca," and like plays, is appearing in American vaudeville, presenting various scenes from drama, including the sleep-walking incident in "Macbeth."

A new process in color photography, the discovery of William Alder, camera man in charge of the cinematography laboratories at the Quality Metro studios in Hollywood, has recently been shown in a public exhibition for the press and public at the Majestic Theatre in Los Angeles. * * *

Playing comedy for the ''movies" is strenuous work; latest journals from America say that Mabel Normand, the popular Keystone girl, is dangerously ill as the result of concussion of the brain received while working in a "Triangle" comedy picture. Latest advices state that the popular Mabel is recovering.

Miss Dolly Castles, the well-known actress, is at present a patient in a private hospital in Melbourne. She has had to undergo a slight surgical operation, and is progressing favourably, the operation having been very successful. Miss Castles expects to leave for America by the steamer Ventura towards the end of the month.

John McCormack, the Irish tenor, had his engagement cancelled, in Montreal when the Canadian manager heard he had refused to sing "Tipperary". in Kansas City. MeCormack refused on a purely musical ground, he pleaded, thinking it far beneath the usual numbers in his recitals. Curiously enough, he sang it for a phonograph.

According to a writer in the Green Book Magazine, the salaries paid circus performers and workers are about the lowest, paid to any public entertainers. For instance, the "death defiers," the performers who risk life and limb to provide "thrills" for the audience, are said to often receive no more than £3 per week.

John M'Cormack will hereafter be known as a hero as well as an Irish tenor. On 22nd September he saved Mario Korbel, the sculptor, from drowning in Long Island Sound, when a yacht in which the latter was cruising capsized. Mr. M'Cormack was near by in a power boat, and speeded to the rescue. Mr. Korbel could not swim, and was sinking when the singer plunged overboard, grasped him by the hair, and pulled him aboard the power boat.—New York Dramatic Mirror.

Dorothy Cumming has left J. C. Williamson, Ltd. In her case it was not a matter of the firm leaving her (says the Theatre). Miss Cumming is going to America. She has for years been the most distinguished looking girl on the Australian stage. Miss Cumming has brains, too. So the Theatre confidently looks forward to her achieving considerable success—if not fame—in America. For fame has been enjoyed by others with only a fraction of Miss Cumming's stage assets.

The Kalcm Company has closed negotiations with \V. K. Hornung, the wellknown author of "Raffles," the gentleman burglar of fiction, for a series of twelve stories. These will have to do with tne adventures of "S'tingarce," the leading character in the Ilomuug novel of that name. It is interesting to note that the production of "Stingaree" marks Kalem's introduction into fiction, and shows that the trend of the motion picture is to discontinue the old rule of sticking to screen stories made on the premises.

It has often been said that "Imitation is the art of flattery," and there arc a whole lot of imitators of Charles Chaplin, which is no doubt very flattering to that talented artist. But the latest thing in the imitation line will not only be flattering to Charlie Chaplin, but it will add to the bank roll of a clever child who is being featured by the Klcctrie 'Picture Company of America. This young performer makes up exactly like Clnuplin, and does the very things that he does, in new comedies that would probably be the sort of comedies he would play in. The first release of this youngster made a hit in California a few weeks ago in a comedy, "When Charlie was a Child." That sort of thing could not happen on the speaking stage.

The newest thing in moving pictures that promises to be a huge success is the vaudeville pictures. A company with a capital said to. be two million dollars has been formed, which is to be called the Vaudeville Players' Film Company. It is backed by several American multi-millionaires, and it is going to make only vaudeville films. Already overtures have been made to many vaudeville headlines of importance in American to act for the new concern, on a yearly contract. The scheme is to film all kinds of vaudeville acts which are adapted for the camera, Acrobatic dancing, and those kind of acts which will film easily are to be produced for the screen, and it is planned to give an exhibitor a complete programme of vaudeville acts, and an afterpiece in which the leading stars of the varieties will appear, one release a week being the rule.