Hollywood Filmograph (Jan-Jul 1930)

HOLLYWOOD FILMOGRAPH NEW YORK 31 JUNE 7, 1930 SECTION 1 HOLLYWOOD 1 ImodraprL Roy Mack Talks About Screen Developments This Is an Age of Color, and Screen Reflects the Age "We are living in an age of color — bright colors, happy colors," says Roy Mack, who has directed many technicolor Vitaphone Varieties for the Vitaphone Corporation. '■The modern vein in both business and art is predominantly that of color. The dull and the gray have no place in our modern scheme of things It is only natural, therefore, that motion pictures, the very furthest step forward in twentieth century entertainment, should be filmed in color. Motion pictures reflect the age more sensitively *-Mn most of the arts. :Color Photography for certain -es of talking pictures lends a ■ tic effect to the productions that lid never be approached in black white photography. "It is almost paradoxical that color ography does not aim at realism, at instead tends to create a beautiul lusion — a poem in color. Realism and realistic motion pictures do not aim primarily at beauty; they are so concentrated upon truth to reality that beauty is well nigh forgotten. Yet beauty is the life-blood of any art. The gift of color to the screen gives it a more powerful lever upon i the emotions and instincts of the people. It can give the public more exhibition of beauty than any other one art medium for it combines practically all arts now that it has a voice and color. Color, I am persuaded, is going to play a bigger and more important part in motion pictures than it does today. Color photography will be perfected until we can catch on film and reproduce on the screen the delicate color harmonies of the sunset." Mr. Mack has directed a number of Vitaphone Varieties in Technicolor — "Dance of the Paper Dolls," "Poor Little Butterfly," "The South Sea Pearl," "A Holiday in Storyland," '•Contrary Mary," "The Sultan's Jester" and others. 1 i i Members of the Paramount organization returned to New York from the annual convention at Atlantic City carrying Pullman slippers distributed by Harold Lloyd's representatives as fitting reminders of Harlold's new comedy, "Feet First." One of them suggested that Lloyd make as his next vehicle, with appropriate souvenirs, a film called "Suits Me." BROADWAY SCREEN Richard Halliburton. author of "The Royal Road to Romance" and other travel best sellers glorifying the international Halliburton, is reported to be preparing an original story for the films. The question is, will Hollywood have enough scenery to go around for it? ^* xc* t%* The devoted but indignant film fan is one of the most interesting persons in the world. One such telephoned to the Paramount local office the other day to inquire, with much resentment, why that company no longer had Baclanova as one of its stars. And another, even more irate, wanted to know why Nancy Carroll wasn't being presented in person at the Paramount Theatre during her stay in New York. It took some persuading to convince this fan that Miss Carroll was so busy starting her new picture, "Laughter." that she didn't have either time or energy left for displaying herself to an adoring public. Incidentals. Nancy offered an interesting stud} in contrasts the other day when she voluntarily attended d luncheon in honor of Sergei Eisenstein, at which the noted Russian director delivered an address bursting with profound, double-jointed terms. And from the rapt, intelligent way in which Nancy listened to it, 'one would never suspect that she had once frisked about as a member of a flighty Broadway chorus. *£* ^7* <0* Speaking of Eisenstein, that entertaining, dynamic personality has been doing some engagingly contradictory things himself. The director, who has been very popular with the Russian peasants and has been taken up by the intellecturals in New York, has been delivering penetrating lectures on the screen at Columbia and other universities, while varying his activities by dipping into Coney Island. He has also had close-ups of Harlem. Greenwich Village and other old corners of New York. Eisenstein was particularly captivated by Coney Island — in fact, he liked it best of all New York's features, and immersed himself with the utmost relish in the atmosphere of hot dogs, soft drinks and squalling infants. He had two outstanding impressions— the enormous mamas chaperoning broods of children, and the dizzy swoops on the scenic rail ways. He rode on every giant slide he could find, and avowed an intention to flit back to Coney Island at the first opportunity, in order to round out his razzle-dazzle education. •J* St J* A film announced as "For Men Only" at a Broadway theatre, and advertised as "sexsational," isn't drawing very healthy business. Perhaps sex is going out, anyhow. William Powell is arriving in town with as much muffling of the publicity trumpets as his crony Ronald Colman. Having finished "For the Defense," his latest picture, Powell boarded a train from Los Angeles without letting even the Pullman porter know about it, and when he was safely on his way East, he specifically requested the New York office not to have anyone meet him at the station or make any fuss over him. He merely intended to mark time until he could catch a steamer to Europe and join his friends, Percy Marmont and Ronald Colman, and have a pleasant vacation abroad denying that he knew anything about the movies and, if necessary, panning this fellow, William Powell, if necessary to preserve his incognito. ■J* S Jt Speaking of Colman, Frederick i^onsdale, noted English playwright, having finished the script of "New Morals" as a vehicle for Ruth Chatterton and Clive Brook, is now gathering strength in English to write the next vehicle for Colman. Lonsdale no sooner completed his work in Hollywood than he skimmed through New York in order to return to his native land, being a Britisher who feels at a loss unless he gets his occasional sniff of London fog. But he's not likely to escape the Hollywood atmosphere entirely. Samuel Goldwyn, who has retained him for the Colman opus, has heard of the transatlantic telephone, as witness the figures sent out concerning the way Goldwyn's international loquacity recenth' rang up four figures on the cash register. We may now expect to hear that Goldwyn is so interested in literature that he's willing to expend $5000 worth of eloquence on him. %2fr *&J* s5* Director Edward Sutherland has just set a new film record at the Astorio studio hy spending three hours rehearsing a very brief scene. What proved so difficult to handle wasn't an actor, but a piece of paper. This sheet, which is supposed by the story of "The Sap From Syracuse" to blow from Ginger Rogers' desk to the deck of the steamer, thus leading her to run after it, collide with Jack Oakie and thus make his acquaintance informally, had to be manipulated in various ways before it could be coaxed to perform properly, and at one point, before success rewarded him, Director Sutherland was thinking of substituting a Pekinese pup, even if it cost a bit more. 1 i i Is the horror of matrimony passing among screen stars? Not so long ago many of them were afraid to acknowledge that they had just been married, fearful that the public might lose interest if they saw a married woman, no matter how young, dallying through a romance on the screen. Doug Fairbanks and Mary Pickford were among the few who came out openly and admitted that they had committed matrimony. Now comes Sidney Blackmer to New York, frankly to celebrate his wedding anniversary with Lenora Ulric at their Westchester home, and makes it plain that film luminaries, when they marry, can now tell all. The good-looking young actor acknowledged that when he first married the alluring Miss Ulric, both of them believed that the whole affair should be hushed up, like other actors who had come to regard publicity about their weddings almost in the light of a scandal. News of the marriage leaked out. but whenever Miss Ulric and Blackmer were asked about their deep secret, they always answered, "I only know what I read in the newspapers." finally they were cornered and compelled to make a clean breast of it. And nobody seemed to mind at all. Not one of their admirers appeared to be shocked, estranged, downcast or overwhelmed. Their fan mail went right on increasing. They lost that hunted look and began to regain their lost weight. Blackmer, with the smile of one whose burden has rolled off his mind, acknowledged that now he has lost that guilty marital complex. Nobody has to use threats now to get him to admit he's married. As a result of their experience, marriages in Hollywood are likely no longer to be a matter of secret diplomacy, for the bridal bugaboo seems to have been laid. t5* fc?* ^* Leni Stengel, celebrated entertainer and songstress of Berlin and Paris, has arrived in Hollywood and is to have a featured role in Radio Pictures' "Half Shot at Sunrise."