Picture Play Magazine (Jul - Dec 1929)

ADVERTIS] NG N.i I [ON ll.r, What Are tke Talkies Saving? inued from page K7 And two sisters heard themselves speaking words of sisterly devotion the other day, and when the scene was finished, one of them yelped, "Well, I'll bet if she doesn't quit moving her feet when I'm talking, I'll make that Jane look like a fifty-cent kimono after a hard day's wash!" The play-back room, yon know, corresponds to the former room where rushes were shown at the end of the day; only in this case the players listen to their scenes minus the picture. Vernon Rickard told me ahont a picture he was playing in for Yitaphone, which Bryan Foy was directing. "We did a scene, and when we listened to the play-hack, we were dumfonnded to hear the most awful flood of profanity issuing from the horn, without knowing where on earth it came from," said Vernon. "A property man up in the flies was supposed to drop a bucket down on an actor's head. The bucket dropped all right. It was just then we heard the swearing. Finally we discovered it was the man in the flies who had done the cussing. He swore when he dropped the pail. " 'Aw, well,' he said, T could see it wasn't going to he a very good scene, anyway, so 1 knew it didn't matter if J did speak.' " 'Ladies and gentlemen <>\ the stage," Bryan Foy addressed his company, 'we now have Mr. Belasco up in tlu1 flies directing the scenes. Please pay attention to him. I fe knows whether a scene is any good or not !' " .And what a producer at one of die big studios was heard to saw over the play-back, about one of his stars, is just nobody's business ! Here's another funny thing ahont the talkies. You hear an amusing line and you want to laugh; hut they don't give you a chance. On they rattle. Then in a ivw minutes there's another line, supposed to he funny, and the actor waits for his laugh, while the house sits in deadly silence with never a giggle. That spacing for laughs is a tough business. But do you notice how nice all the actors are to each other in the talkies with regard to trying to push each other upstage? That isn't kind-heartedness, my friends. That's hecause if an actor pushes another hack-, he himself gets further away from the microphone. Wken The)? Love Out Loud Continued from page 59 "We took that scene twenty-eight times. Because of the exterior setting, it could not he filmed on a sound stage. Consequently, just as we were getting into the mood of the thing, a street car would go by (longing a hell. An airplane would hiss overhead. Truck drivers seemed to be inspired to honk just as they went by. Finally, when we believed we had succeeded in getting a fair degree of silence, an ambulance whirled along. Twenty-eight times Buddy told me he loved me. "The Richard Dix picture didn't offer much of a chance for really romantic love scenes. The story was in a comedy vein, so naturally the love interest was light. But Richard should make an awfully thrilling sound lover." Because I'm just that type, I asked if any of the charming gentlemen ever became so inspired with their love scenes with June that they junked the dialogue and suhstituted their own ideas? "Heavens, no!" she gasped. "The director wouldn't let them. Footage and the running length of a scene are even more important in sound pic tures than in silent ones. Xo matter what the personal feeling of the actors— I mean their feeling for one another — they have to speak their lines and then quit. That's one way in which the love scenes have changed. Some kind-hearted directors used to let them run on and on, and I bet more than one girl in pictures has had the experience of finding her own name suhstituted for that ot the heroine — when movies were silent. "Did you ?" T asked. "I'm not telling." laughed Mrs. Collycr's little girl. "But don't forget this angle," she added. "Remember that not all scenes are played between people who are interested in each other. Tn that case the dialogue is a lift' saver. Having certain set phrases tn speak covers the lack of natural inspiration, and no matter how hectic the finished scene may look to the audience, it was just business to the players." Somehow T got the idea that loving out loud was all right with any one, except the one who might have some ideas of bis own on the subject. Or am T wrong. June ? < ERE'S your chance to own that brand new Genuine Model 3 Corona you've wanted — on the easiest terms ever offered — at LOWEST PRICE ever offered! Complete in every detail; h.-n k spacer, etc.. MANUFACTURER'S GUARANTEE. RecoKnized the world over as the finest, strongest, sturdiest, portable built. Only a limited number of these splendid machines available. To get one, you must act now! 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