HE PLAYS HITLER

New Zealand Listener, Volume 2, Issue 41, 5 April 1940, Page 33

HE PLAYS HITLER

And His Name is Goring

lh | ee GORING, who plays part of Hitler in "The Shadow of the Swastika," was selected as an outstanding actor, not because of his very apt name, He comes from a sound Sussex family. After making his first stage appearance at the Old Vic at the age of fourteen as a fairy in "A Midsummer Night’s Dream," he spent the next three years in France and Germany as a student, and was at Munich University when Nazi enthusiasm was growing and riots were taking place everywhere. Nazis would come up to him, slap him on the back and say: "Gott in Himmel, Goring, it’s good to have a name like our Hermann!" In addition to all this, he speaks German fluently. So you can understand now why he was cast for Hitler.

As an actor-and he is one of the best--Marius owed his chance to a rare opportunity. After returning from Germany he joined the Old Vic Coms pany, and one night both principal and understudy were "off" in "Macbeth" and he went on for the part and showed his mettle. As a result, at the age of eighteen, he was chosen to play Romeo to Peggy Ashcroft’s Juliet. Two years later he toured France with the Compagnie des Quinze in a repertoire of plays acted in French. On the air he has played among other roles the lead in "L’Aiglon," Shakespeare in "The Dark Lady of the Sonnets," Marchbanks in " Candida," and the Fool in "King Lear ’’-and all in the last few years. And just now in the theatre he is playing Pip in Alec Guinness’s adaptation of "Great Expectations" at the Rudolf Steiner Hall, London,