Hollywood Studio Magazine (February 1967)

'The Miracle on Stage 28 ' Charlton Heston, tall and com¬ manding, stands atop a podium fac¬ ing seventy serious-faced musicians seated in concert formation. Sud¬ denly, he extends his arms, holds them high for a frozen moment and then whips his baton into a cutting downbeat that tears from the sym¬ phony the electrifying “ta-ta-ta- taaaa” that begins Beethoven’s mighty “Fifth” and Universal Studios’ cavernous Stage 28 is filled wall-to-wall and floor-to-ceiling with glorious music. The opening scene of “The Battle Horns” has begun. That such music could be created by one man and recreated by sev¬ enty is a miracle, but an even greater miracle is that what you are seeing and hearing is not reality but il¬ lusion. Charlton Heston can’t read a note of music and the musicians you see performing are making no sound. The music you hear was re¬ corded months ago by the Los An¬ geles Symphony. So perfectly weld¬ ed are the mute musicians and the recorded music, you will believe and enjoy what the screen asks you to believe. Excepting the actors who are por¬ traying orchestra members, every musician in the symphony is a top Hollywood professional. Most of the actors are well-known stage and film personalities. There’s Leslie Neil- son, who plays the concertmaster. A non-musician, he plays the violin like a virtuoso. Leading lady Kathryn Hays is not a cellist but her work with that instrument is as convinc¬ ing as she is beautiful. Charlton Heston as Conductor Lionel Evans in "The Battle Horns." In the viola section you will see Broadway favorite Neva Patterson, whose husband, James Lee, is one of the picture’s writers. Neva is play¬ ing the viola for the first time since her school days. Other actors in the orchestra who are former musicians are Parley Baer (French horn), Nor- bert Schiller (French horn), Gregory Morton (violin), George Perina (bass viol), Cyril Delavanti (triangle), Wil¬ liam Erwin (trumpet), and Forest Wood (French horn). Along with the pro musicians, they “sync” the taped performance of the Los Angeles Symphony in Beetho¬ ven’s “Fifth Symphony,” Brahm’s “First Symphony,” Schubert’s “Un¬ finished Symphony,” Tschaikow- sky’s “Swan Lake” and Wagner’s “Tannhauser Overture.” A miracle of such proportions must be brought off by not one but a team of magicians. Rudy Friml, Jr. (son of the beloved composer and a big wheel in Universal’s music de¬ partment) engaged Leo Damiani, founder and director for many years of the Burbank Symphony, to make the picture’s ersatz orchestra look genuine. First Damiani taught non¬ musician Charlton Heston to con¬ duct the five principal symphonies featured in the film. Then he re¬ hearsed the orchestra to bow & blow perfection. Finally, he joined star and orchestra together before the camera and the result is a tribute to the perfection demanded by Ralph Nelson, the picture’s director, and Richard Berg, the producer. In a sense, the protagonist of “The Battle Horns” is the orchestra. As a USO unit travelling in Belgium at the time of the Battle of The Bulge, the orchestra is captured in its en¬ tirety by the advancing Germans. Its captor is Maximilian Schell, who plays an egotistical German general determined to win a psychological battle over the orchestra and its con¬ ductor before he executes the entire organization. Performing some of the greatest music the world has ever known, and conducted by a star of Heston’s mag¬ nitude, the orchestra of “The Battle Horns” is expected to strike a mighty blow for the popular appre¬ ciation of fine music everywhere. -Bill Erwin