Picturegoer (Jan-Jun 1938)

"Basil Rathbone has become one of the most indispensable villains in Hollywood." 7jM^^~of^S TO Hollywood THE film see-saw is gradually tipping For years it has been weighed down in the direction of Hollywood, but all is not well in the film capital and a boom is on the way here, so, slowly, ponderously, the see-saw tips. And not a moment too soon. One sure sign of the complete resuscitation of the British film industry will be the return of the British players, now basking in the Californian sun, to play in British pictures. Have you ever thought what would happen to some of those great Hollywood epics of English history, for instance, if the British players were all to pack their bags and catch the boat ? Hollywood claims to have a perfect right to film British history. "Up to the fifteenth century," the Americans point out, "your history was our history also." Agreed; but there's this matter of speech, which thrusts itself into the limelight every time a "costume film" is made. We're really quite hazy about how Englishmen spoke in preMayflower days ; some say they spoke good strong Lancashire dialect, of which there are still traces among the hill-billies of Tenessee and Kentucky to-day; but in any case the general superstition seems to be that they didn't speak with an American twang. That's where the British players come in. Take Adventures of Robin Hood, for instance. I'll admit this is an extreme case, but it shows the way events are shaping. Out of the eleven chief members of the cast, t ight are British ! The remainder arc Olivia de Havilland. play 8 The manner in which British players have taken possession of the Hollywood floors is clearly shown in this article by Max BREEN ing Maid Marian, who has had to keep reminding herself that her father and mother were British so as not to feel so much "out of it"; Alan Hale as " Little J ohn " ; and Eugene Pallette as " Friar Tuck" — and each of these last two made one of his greatest personal successes in a British film, Pallette in The Ghost Goes West and Hale in Jump for Glory. Errol Flynn, of course, plays Robin Hood, the bold Saxon who leaves the court of John Lackland and is instrumental in replacing Richard Cceur-de-Lion on his rightful throne. We never really felt the loss of this lanky young Irishman in British films, for the simple reason that he had only been in one British film — and that a feeble Quota quickie — before being spirited away to Hollywood; but he has certainly made a great deal of money for Warner Bros, since. His greatest successes have been in "costume," and Warners evidently mean to keep him in it. South African-born Ian Hunter, who plays King Richard, certainly never had a fair deal in films until he left for Hollywood four years ago, since when he has played a number of important roles. The base Prince John is played by that uncannily clever character actor, Claude Rains, who started his theatrical career as call-boy at His Majesty's Theatre, and who, apart from a trip home three years ago to appear in a film for Gaumont-British, has been playing important parts in Hollywood ever since he came to the screen (for the most part invisible !) in Thi Invisible Man; but it was his brilliant work in Crime Without Passion that set the seal on his film career. The bold Sir Guy, just as villainous, but perhaps a shade less base, is Basil Rathbone (another South African-born), who has long since established his claim to these cloak-and-dagger roles; no mean hand with a rapier, he is rather like a rapier himself on the screen — supple, keen, cold, wicked. You can't blame him for staying in Hollywood ; the only real chance he has ever had in British studios was as the madman in Love From a Stranger, which was really over-melodramatised to the point of farce; whereas on the other side he has dug himself in as one of the most indispensable villains in Southern California. Robin Hood's lieutenant, Will Scarlett, is in the hands of another six-footer, young Fatric Knowles. The Warner-First National outfit at Teddington were naturally so elated at the success of their "find," Errol Flynn, in Hollywood, that they set about discovering another one in the same class, and Patric Knowles was the candidate. But Patric doesn't seem to have set the Pacific on fire in the way Errol did. He has figured in a number of films. 1ms first in Hollywood being The Charge of the Light Brigade, and a year or two ago he came home and played in a couple of British films, but somehow he hasn't hit the high spots. His turn may come yet — possibly as a result