STATE THEATRE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 30 September 1939, Page 2

STATE THEATRE

“WUTHERING HEIGHTS” A SCREEN CLASSIC. The terrible blight on the life of the Brontes—the son, Bramwell, a drunkard and a drug fiend—is shown in much of the writings of the three sisters, ‘ Emily, Charlotte and Anne Bronte. During the last dark years of her life it was always Emily Bronte who was able to handle Bramwell successfully. It has often been said that her novel, "Wuthering Heights.” reads like the dream of an opiumeater; and there is little doubt that while the atmosphere of the book was her very own —the pure, wild, rainswept atmosphere of her beloved, purple-black moors of Haworth —much of the stirring human drama in the story of Heathcliff and Catherine, was Emily Bronte’s weird and powerful interpretation of the ravings of her drug-sodden brother. There is a close association between New Zealand and the Brontes because of the fact that Mary Taylor, “the little militant radical,” who fought Charlotte Bronte’s battles at school and who was also the firm friend of Emily and Anne Bronte, had gone about 1848 to New Zealand, continuing a correspondence with Charlotte Bronte until the latter’s death in 1855. Emily Bronte died in 1848, a year after “Wuthering Heights” was first published. Emily Bronte’s book was the work of an extraordinary genius, written with a woman’s very heart blood and surcharged with a sort of moral electricity. On the screen it has become a masterpiece, and the large audience at the State Theatre last night was deeply impressed with the magnificence of the picture and the hand of genius shown in its authorship. The story of the life of the Brontes is one chiefly of sadness, and “Wuthering Heights” reads like a chapter from its pages—just as we find “Jane Eyre,” “Villette,” and “Shirley” other pages from the drama that surrounded the living of Haworth, finally closing its last chapter with the death of Patrick Bronte, the father, in 1861, Little did the eccentric, lonely Emily Bronte realise in 1847 that “Wuthering Heights” would become one of the great screen classics. It was Charlotte Bronte who appealed most to the readers of fiction in England 90 years ago by her books, but it was to be Emily Bronte who was to finally set the seal of fame on the Bronte family by providing a story which has been today proclaimed by millions of picture patrons as one of the greatest of all screen presentations. “Wuthering Heights” is a haunting, tragic love story such as could only be written in the atmosphere of the parsonage at Haworth. Merle Oberon (Cathy) and Laurence Olivier (Heathcliff) are cast as the romantic lovers and these brilliant stars are supported by such outstanding players as David Niven, Flora Robson, Hugh Williams, Miles Mander, Geraldine Fitzgerald and Donald Crisp.