Picture Play Magazine (Mar-Jul 1929)

28 Over tke Teacups After completing "Prisoners," Corinne Griffith will take a vacation in Europe. ''There's a new development every day," Fanny assured me. "In the morning all the studios decide to go in for musical revues, with coon shouting, patter songs and general vo-de-o-do. Then at luncheon some producer is seen talking to a manager of operatic stars, and by mid-afternoon the word has spread that some one is to film an opera. Then all the studios decide to do opera. Imagine having to look at opera singers via the merciless intimacy of the camera ! "Conditions under which pictures are made are changing so rapidly that some stars are , almost afraid to go away for a week-end, for fear they won't know anything about the business when they come back. But Greta Garbo, with her beautiful Scandinavian calm, has gone off to Sweden for a vacation. Corinne Griffith is going to Europe as > soon as she finishes 'Prisoners,' and Colleen Moore is awfully anxious to make her next picture in Ireland." "I wish she would." I spoke from the heart. "I'm so tired of studio sets, I wish some one would go off to far countries and give us some new scenery. These talking pictures made in boxed-in stages have taken the greatest charm out of pictures." "We really owe a debt of gratitude to Esther Ralston, or maybe it is to Paramount. She is to make another nice, quiet picture. It's with Emil Jannings. She is the only girl I know who isn't bursting into song, or speech. She's just finished a really fine picture, 'The Case of Lena Smith.' Joe von Sternberg made a dramatic actress out of her. I "Come to think it over, there is another picture without dialogue " You will join me, I am sure, in cheers over that announcement. "But it is more or less of an accident," she went on. "D. W. Griffith made his last picture before the powersthat-be went dialogue mad. Then, when they decided that all pictures must have dialogue, he recalled his players and set up a microphone. The characters were all supposed to be French, but inasmuch as they were played by Jetta Goudal, whose accent is really French, Lupe Velez, whose dialect is strongly tinged with Mexican-Spanish, and Bill Boyd, whose locutions are pure Middle Western, the result was something ghastly. After one day's tests, Mr. Griffith staggered out saying, 'No, no.' And you can hardly blame him. "There is only one person I know, whose fame will be increased mightily by sound films. That's Victor Schertzinger. He is riding the crest of the wave of success. He is a composer of note, a brilliant violinist, and a writer as well as a good director. He had just finished directing Richard Dix, in 'Redskin,' when he went in as pinch-hitter and composed songs for Nancy Carroll to sing in 'Manhattan Cocktail.' Then he wrote a theme song for 'The Climax,' for Universal, wrote a story for Paramount, and now he has gone to New York to direct Dix in an all-talkie, 'Nothing But the Truth.' Almost any day, now, he is likely to walk in front of the camera to play a violin solo." "What about Carmel Myers?" Fanny gasped in amazement, as though I had made a great discovery. "Why haven't the picture companies utilized Carmel's talent for composing? Last year when she was in New; York she sold two or three songs to a publisher, and she is always working out nice little melodies. Any day, now, I suppose we will hear of Carmel writing a film musical comedy. "Dorothy Dwan has found a new way of bursting into sound films. She acted as official starter of the national outboard motor races at Lake Elsinore, and of course the news-reel men were there with their sound apparatus. She made a nice little speech. You won't realize how good it is, until the girls who won the race come out and speak their parts. Undoubtedly Dorothy will get an engagement in the talkies as the result of that appearance. "This month's bill of plays at the Writers' Club was a great show case of talent. Virginia Valli appeared in an awfully clever skit. All the while she was on the stage |L I kept thinking what an ideal Lonsdale heroine she would be. She has a real flair for high comedy. If some producer will only buy the screen rights to 'The High Road,' and let Virginia play it, I can go around saying, 'I told you so.' "Gladys Brockwell appeared in a medieval costume play. She was Aileen Pringle appeared in a stage thriller at the Writers' Club. w