The President-Now Offers Fine Foreign Film
The President—Now, Now Offers Fine Foreign Film The Stage The Movies Music The Week On The Stage By Joseph T. Shipley JUSTICE DONE "MIDNIGHT." By Claire and Pan, Sifton. At the Guild. THE...
...On that date acts that heretofore were confined to the Palace Theatre and RKO theatres in more important cities will be brought to the stage of RKO's 58th Street Theatre...
...On the night she is to die, while the press of the country, catching the pace of the tabloids, makes a sweet martyr of her, considerable attention is turned on Weldon, because, out of the jury-box...
...Jim Penman, offering unicycle novelties...
...Mere melodramas, therefore, of American extraction, would not suffice...
...Fiddling lawyers and fussing attorneys had overlooked the critical query...
...Among the following films to be exhibited at an early date will be the French version of "Little Cafe" with M. and Mmex Maurice Chevalier, the Italian version of "Dangerous Paradise" with Mile...
...he pleads with the district attorney...
...Her answer condemns the girl...
...Its cause lies deeper than the director's inability to sweep the play along...
...the conversation deals almost entirely with the drive toward a social message the play is preaching...
...Chas...
...Will Cowan In "Footsteps...
...Well done, Weldon...
...The theatre is now showing Greta Garbo in the German version of "Anna Christie," directed by Jaques Feyder...
...Only, we have come to think, when it 13 ladled out in the midst of a drama its first effect is usually to weaken the drama...
...Had she taken the money, her husband's money, before or after she killed him...
...and the article in the current issue of the Theatre Guild Magazine, by its editor, "In Defense of Melodrama," indicates further feeling that all is not well...
...Bob pointed out to the district attorney how another case, on the tall of the fir3t, would be run by the tabloid as the direct result and consequence of making a martyr and therefore heroine out of the other girl—so that her example had inspired others to equal deeds of derring-do...
...not murder—let I her plead guilty to manslaughter...
...This question, upon which the whole case for murder in the first degree hung, had somehow been overlooked by the district attorney (though really it would have been the first item seized upon by every tabloid—the importance of Weldon hinges on it also...
...And there was the district attorney, whom Weldon's question, winning the verdict against the girl, had made sure of re-election...
...Impressed by the subtle points of the reporter-savior, and eager to help the Weldon family, the district attorney talks to the girl, and finds the way out...
...Her murder is a delusion...
...but the Siftons probably figured the audience would be as sure to overlook it as the district attorney...
...THE bitter end of justice is depicted in dark "MidnlghtyJ'' the first of the Theatre Guild's melodramas...
...Among them are "Pagan Fury," by Samuel Warshasky...
...Tottestng under the most grievous blow he has ever been dealt, he is saved by the curtain fan...
...I The district attorney answers bluntly: murder in the first degree— if we can find the man who did it...
...and Liberty Realty Corp...
...Fanchon Marco Revue Part of Big Bill at the Fox Brooklyn Everything's new at the Fox Brooklyn Theatre this week— "Along Came Youth" is having its New York premiere at that house...
...And as a matter of fact, if the structural ineptitudes of "Midnight" were removed, and all the social theory — perhaps quite true, but hopelessly ineffective, for at the end of the play the audience does not even know whether to sympathize with the father who has lost his ideals or with the girl who has shot her lover, or with both or neither—if all the undramatic conversation and the padding of radio and bridge-playing were dumped out, the entire first two acts could be neatly eliminated...
...But on the night of the execution, by a peculiar twist of that fate which plays so many games, I at the very instant when the wires were hot with the current that was burning out the life of the murderous woman, Weldon's daughter slipped from the path of rectitude —she killed her lover...
...The Gnat of the Guild A note in the program informs us that "Midnight" is the first American melodrama that the Theatre Guild has ever produced...
...he had asked the question that turned the tide against her...
...Charles Rogers, that handsome young favorite of film fandom, whose sparkling zest has made his name a household word, is again the delightful star of a refreshing romance-comedy, "Along Came Youth...
...If the Guild's idea of tragedy and of melodrama is as peculiarly confused and erroneous as that of the article in the Guild magazine (of which perhaps more elsewhere), there is further cause for the futility of '*Midnight...
...Instead of such a play, the Guild selects a piece that is in reality more of a problem play than a melodrama...
...The producing firm will be known as Levy A Gugliucci, will produce several plays...
...It's out of Soviet Russia: this suffices to make interesting a play of the quality of our old ten-twent'-thirty cent melodrama days, just within memory, when the villain had tied to the track the heroine toward whom an engine and a prairie-fire were racing...
...That the polyglot talkie should come to Broadway is natural, for nowhere else is the concentration of foreign speaking people greater than at the cross-roads of the world...
...the man had been wanted by gangsters, who got him at last...
...He had helped one woman get it...
...Extended Engagement Of Chicago Shakespeare Society Presenting Fritz Leiber in Repertoire Owing to the increased Interest in the presentations of the plays of Shakespeare by the Chicago Civic Shakespeare Society, presenting Fritz Leiber and company at the Ambassador Theatre, and the big jump in box office trade here, the limited engagement has been extended for an additional week, beyond this, which was to have been the final one this season And with the return to college and school of so many students engaged in the study of Shakespeare it is expected, judging from the large orders for blocks of seats, already in strong evidence at the Ambassador, that it may be necessary for Mr...
...and the organ is given a new touch by the twenty fingers of Ron and, Don instead of Bob West's ten...
...The President Theatre Note an international Talkie House The President Theatre, on 48th Street, West of Broadway, unto recently a legitimate playhouse, is now under a new management with an unusual policy of presenting first-run talking featuret in all foreign languages...
...Weldon, his mind tortured between love and duty, does not comprehend...
...they must be plays—plus...
...Nee Wong, the Chinese Ukulele Ike...
...Edward Weldpn, representative of the finest type of American manhood, has been a juryman in the case of a girl accused of murdering her husband...
...The Guild thus has chosen a play that mixes tragedy and melodrama (bv the Guild's own confused definitions) and social message...
...and all the fine acting of Glenn Anders, the natural effects of Frederick Perry, and the breeze of Linda Watkins hurry it but Utile...
...Far be it from us to object to social message...
...What she did was immaterial...
...RKO's Proctor's 58th Street Theatre is the first to benefit by this new alignment commencing with the program to be presented the four days beginning this Saturday, January 10...
...Here will be the future home of French, Italian, German and Spanish talkies produced by Europe's finest Studios under the creative guidance of the most talented continental directors...
...Featured herein are Joe A Jane McKenna, master and mistress of ceremonies...
...But there were others on hand...
...Its plays must therefore not be merely plays...
...though in the past few seasons several excellent ones have been seen, and straight melodrama may be tense with excitement of high and true theatrical character...
...to Weldon, the main point was justice...
...And Weldon's sense of Justice has been slain...
...Rogers in "Along Came Youth...
...This is a land where justice is dealt out fairly to all...
...He ought to know...
...The increased patronage which it is felt, such "name" acts as Ken Murray, Carmel Myers, Dave Apollon, Leatrice Joy, Harry Fox, Tom Patricola, Nick Lucas, Lillian Roth, Harry Hershfield, Herman Timberg, Weaver Brothers and others of similar drawing power, will bring to the 58th Street Theatre makes it unnecessary to raise the box-office prices...
...There was Bob Nolan, disguised as a reporter, but really the man who was to save Stella—and help ruin Weldon...
...and Beatrice Franklin & Florence Astell, songstress duo...
...Fanchon and Marco introduce a new Idea...
...Foreign flavor, popularity abroad, have been excuse for exquisite productions of insignificant plays—though here, more feebly, others too have erred...
...interest should center on the effects of a problem on those involved, on "the selfishness which seeks to prevent one's doing one's duty toward one's neighbor or toward the state...
...This drastic change in the vaudeville policy will In no way affect the sale of prices which will remain as attractive as ever, to wit: 25 cents, 35 cents and 50 cents for afternoons and 50 cents and 75 cents for evening performances...
...303 W. 92nd St., better known in the real estate field, and president of the Wall Street Mortgage Corp...
...If these went by the boards, perhaps five minutes of deftly interpolated exposition would make, out of the final act of 'Midnight," an effective strong-piece for the vaudeville stage...
...as a secondary result, the power of the message is itself destroyed: the residue is neither proper play nor propaganda...
...curiously, the words I have auoted are from Hiram Motherwell's description of tragedy, in hU effort to distinguish it from melodrama and to justify the latter as of equal rank and validity with tragedy...
...Leiber to further extend his New York engagement...
...But beyond lie still more reasons for it alt The Guild has a tone to maintain...
...But this inexperience on the part of the Guild is not the only reason for the present failure...
...Carmen Bonl, the Spanish version of "Grumpy" with Ernesto Vilches and the original German edition of the Emil Jennings' picture "Blue Angel...
...Jean Mac Donald, "Kick Sky High...
...Never more can he believe that this is the best of possible countries, that there is one law for the rich and the poor, the beautiful and the ugly, the favored and the friendless...
...bravely and clearly Weldon brings it forth...
...What the extra quality is may seem not much to matter, so many things have served...
...This is precisely what the "melodrama" "Mldnieht" turns attention to...
...The remodeled little playhouse will be found an intimate theatre containing the most modern and efficient equipment for the exhibition of talking pictures...
...Levey Is Joined By Gugliucci in Drama Enterprise Bernard Levey, newspaper man who turned Broadway producer, with several plays to his credit in seasons past, has formed an association wijh John W. Gugliucci, No...
...in his honest earnestness to see right done and evil punished, Weldon popped the question...
...RKO's 58th Street to Change VaudevillePolicy Radio-Keith-Orpheum officials aware of the constant and growing demand for major vaudeville as presented at the RKO Palace Theatre and In appreciation of the remarkable business being done at the mother house, are extending the routes of super-attractions to play important neighborhood theatres...
...The introduction of the unnecessary word "ever" implies trepidation...
...A bevy of bejewelled beauties in a sparkling stage show are presented by Fanchon and Marco in their "Gems & Jams" Idea...
...This, of course, providing they can adjust their road bookings to follow their second annual season here...
...Again we have impressed upon us the fact that all that's Guilded is* not gold...
...Claire and Paul Sifton trace the tragedy as it falls upon and blackens the nature and career of Edward Weldon...
Vol. 12 • January 1931 • No. 2
