REGENT THEATRE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 August 1939, Page 2

REGENT THEATRE

•THE LAMBETH WALK.”

Starring Lupino Lane, Seymour Hicks and Sally Gray, “The Lambeth Walk” will be screened finally tonight at the Regent Theatre. LAUGHTON IN NEW ROLE. For the first time in his illustrious career, Charles Laughton, in the role of the arrogant entertainer of the London theatre queues in “St. Martin’s Lane,” the picture which has won such widespread acclaim and which will be seen at the Regent Theatre tomorrow, appears without make-up of any kind. But by a clever combination of costume, he possibly looks more unlike Laughton than he ever has previously. Laughton is a stickler for realism, and he prefers, where possible, to dispense entirely with makeup, so that if he is called upon to play a role calling for a moustache, he insists upon growing an upper-lip adornment. In this respect his ideas conform with those of yet another of the select circle of the screen great, Paul Muni. As “Captain Bligh” in “Mutiny on the Bounty,” Laughton wore, because the period called for it, a wig and false eyebrows, while for “Rembrandt” he wore a flowing moustache, which took him some weeks to grow. In “St. Martin’s Lane,” however, Laughton’s face is innocent of even the customary dusting of powder, considered a necessity for filming, but with the aid of a cloth cap, a cheap neckerchief, a poacher’s coat, a navvy’s belt, and tight-fitting trousers, Laughton succeeds in making himself almost unrecognisable. “St. Martin's Lane” is probably the first serious attempt to put London by night on the screen. Laughton, in this compelling comedydrama; appears against a background of some of the best-known spots in the West End. The cast is notable on account of the inclusion of Vivien Leigh, the young actress selected for the part of “Scarlet O’Hara” in “Gone With the Wind,” Larry Adler, Gus McNaughton, Rex Harrison, and Tyrone Guthrie.