Saturday,
HONGKONG TELEGRAPH
August 24, 1940.
preane Cod
3
ENTERTAINMENT SECTION
Zorina Proves Musicals
can be Intelligent
Bouquets
BEST FUN: On Your Tors (King's).
BEST FILM: Primrose Path (Queen's, Alhambra),
BEST ACTING: Ginger Rogers (Primrose Path),
80%
Primrose Path
(Ginger Rogers, Joel McCrea) QUEEN'S, ALHAMBRA
OF course, they expressed it
terribly delicately, but I did get the impression that Ginger Rogera mother and grandmother were abandoned
women.
They wore dressing-gown and you could 'hear the railway every ume they opened the door.
So when Ginger went "soft" on the young man who ran the Alling station, married him, and invited him to meet the family, he couldn't take it, and motor-bleycled to San Francisco.
FREYA STARK
MISS FREYA STARK,
whose "A Winter in Arabia" (Murray, 168.) has just been published, is gener- aily regarded by now as one of the most brilliant living writers of travel literature. And, when one says "ltern- ture,
79 ono means "literature." Miss Stark writes, not flaw- lessly, but what is better, beauti- fully. Through words the veya to # her recurren! hilaration
of adventure among people and places-especially among people--and her books are an un- falling and entertaining record of human nature as it reveals itself In the remote corners of the earth.
con-
ex-
So Ginger couldn't take it. dressing- and went into the gown business herself.
As a sensitive sort of chap, my reactions to all this were that it was sordid but satisfactory.
Once Ginger was a great little dancer. Now she is a great to
actress.
Gas-filling Joel TVOJ suitably pure when confronted with the local
I must admit they wantons did everything very natural, very lifelike, but I rather agree, after studying these types, with the old chap at the gas station who kald the world would be a "darn right better place with fewer people in It."
75% On Your Tors (Vera Zorina and Eddie Albert) "KING'S
"ON YOUR TOES” eounda
like the ordinary musical entertainment with a spot of hoofing, but it's a great deal better than that.
I think I shan't be on
any- body else's loes if I say that this la the first and only musical picture which makes any sort of appeal to the Intelligence.
Her Travel Books Come
Close to being Brilliant
How delightful, for example, is the comment of the broad-minded sayyid on women's education.
- BETI- nat," ho told Miss Stark, "averse to female education no long as it is not excessive. If it is carried on to the age of nim and then stops. I do not think it can do any harm."
Miss Stark has a gift for getting on good terms with all sorts of people robbers and
Kunmen
among them. Good humour, and the recognition of the human equality of the Arabs with whom you are speaking, she holds, will usually be an effective passport for the traveller.
A
She hoa good sense of fun, AS when ahe describes the festival at which there was
to be a horse-
"An Irish Journey" is illustrated by Mr. Poul Henry, who excels all other artists as an Interpreter of the beauty of the face of Ireland.
MR. WICKHAM STEED
has in "The Fifth Arm" (Constable, 5s.) written a hard-hitting book on the fallure of British propaganda.
He deplores the short-sighted- ness with which the English threw Dway the propagandist weapon after the Treaty of Versailles, and writes with pugnacious vigour of the propaganda of ostrichiam ip recent years by eminent as Lori
BOOKS
race with only one horse compet- ing, as two of the three horses that had run the previous year had since died.
The many photographs in the book are particularly good.
* ☆ ANOTHER unusually in- teresting travel book is Mr. Sean O'Faolain's "An Irish Journey" (Longmans, 12s. 6d.).
Mr. O'Faolain is one of the ablest writers who has come out of or rather stayed in-Ireland in recent years; and, like most of the younger Irish writers, he is candid, realistic, humorous and hard- headed, and says what he thinks about his country without fear, or favour.
Thus he lashes at Dublin in the sentence: "No soaner does any man attempt, or achieve here, any- thing fine than the rats begin to emerge from the sewers, bringing with them a skunk-like stench of envy and hatred, worse than the drip of a broken drain." That is bad, but, when he gets to Belfast, he announces of the social struc- ture there: "It is a brutal and a. brutalising society."
Ulstermen will perhaps forgive him when they, discover that he loved Coleraino and writes with enthusiasm of the heroin shown during the slege of Derry.
Mr. O'Faolain, Indeed, is a lover of his country as well as, occasion- harsh critic. The Irish poor, he declares, whether, in the cities or on the land, are beyond corruption.
4
B THE" Is an original and honest -book which, though it will excite plenty of dimgrennent, is well kworth' reading?
Buch
inen
Rotherm ere, Lord London- derry and Mr. Arthur Bryant.
His book is on ardent plea for the forging of a new weapon of propaganda for the winning of the war. "Not a day should be lost," he declares, in forging it aright. and in learning to wield it with sure and valiant hands."
* ✩
IN "Fifty Years' Work in London" (Longmans. 10s. 6d.) Dr. Winnington- Ingram has written an attrac- tive account of his work in London before and during his Bishopric
He tells a number of amusing stories, one of them about the failure of Lord Sallsbury to recog- nise him at a house, party given by King Edward VII.. at Sandringham. "But you need not mind, Bishop," said King Edward. "He took up a photograph of me, looked at it for a few moments, and said, 'Poor old Bullert
MR. CLIFFORD BAX, in
"The Life of the White Devil" "Cassell, 8s. 6d.) has made an entirely fascinating story of the life of Vittoria Accaromboni, Webster's White Devil.
-
Vittoria necumulated murders about her rather os did Mary, Queen of Scots (her more famous contemporary) and, in the same way, leaves the biographer puzzled by the conflicting evidence of out- standing wickedness and outstand ing goodness, PARA
Vittoria was considered the pre- eminent beauty in the Rome of her
For the lads who don't like that sort of thing, fl's fortunate that the picture can be laken in two way
You can laugh at the prepos- terous Bohemiañben of the ballet company, at the gypsy aristocracy of the producer who pays 10,000 dollar hotel bills with the gift of a Uirre-dollar word which once belanged to the Grand Duke Cyril (click heels and stiften the neck).
You can feast the tired eyes on shapely imbs In graceful move- men
The music Is tuneful. and there's more than a spice of thrill when the chap who has to "shoot" himself on the stage is about to be shot from a box in resì earnest.
Bul, as a matter of fact, the thing works up into a jazz ballet called "Slaughter on 10th Avenue, which, if produced at Covent Garden, would take the balleto- manes by storm.
60% Sergeant Madden
(Wallace Beery, Tom Brown) MAJESTIC
DEVELOPED largely on
lines of propaganda for the New York police force, "Sergeant Madden" is quite Interesting and exciting enter- tainment, although it does not get very far away from the beaten track,
There is perhaps a little too much dialogue for the amount of action, the sentimental angle gives added force to the argument that a certain type of youth, whether he -became pallceman or crook, is tern-
perementally unaulted to handling of a gun.
the
The author set ouť to establish the police na protectors of people and property rather than persecu- tors of criminals, and a good deal of footage is devoted to the im- pariance o! policeman being also a student of human nature.
Wallace Beery is in his element os Sergeant Madden, and by being somewhat more restrained than usual brings the character greater conviction and appeal. He is sup- ported by Alan Curtis, д the policeman turned killer. Tom Brown is his usuni boyish self, and Laraine Johnson
very charming.
UNIQUE FILM
"The Rafters
Ring."
an by original theme
Robert Stevenson, who also will act as producer of the picture, has been selected; adaptation is reaching the final stages and shooting is scheduled to begin.
RKO Radio
George Schaefer of Pictures has arranged for his com pany to advance the costs of pro- duction at bank Interest only and to distribute. the finished film at cost.
Slors, directors
contributing authors and supporting players will give their services free and the whole of the proceeds will go to American and British Charitles.
Stars who have already agreed to Brian appear in the film include:
Freddie Aherne.
Bartholomew. Mudeline Carroll, Ronald Colman, Gracie Fields,
ields, Errol Flynn, Joan Fontaine, Greer Garson, Cary Grant, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Charles Laughton, Anna Lee, Vivien Leigh, Herbert Marshall, Victor McLagien, Hay Miiland, Ray M
Anna Neagle, Merle Oberon, Maureen O'Hara, Laurence Olivier, Sabu, C. Aubrey Smith and Claude Rains. In addition nearly 100 leading and supporting players have volunteered their services and will be used as far as suitable roles can be found.
Directors who will share respon- sibilities include Edmund Goulding, Alfred Hitchcock, Zollan Korda, Frank Lloyd, Victor Saville, and
Herbert Wilcox.
Authors who have contributed in- clude Doctor A. J. Cronin. John Van Druten,
James Hilton; Aldous Hudey, W. P. Lipscomb, R. C. Sheriff and Dodle Smith.
30-
day. Mr. Bax sees her as clally ambitious young womani, discontented with her marriage to the nephew of a cardinal. Her re- putation as a beauty rather than herself, it seeras, inspired a fatal passion in the Duke of Bracciano, who had her husband murdered und carried her off as his bride.
The Duke had also murdered his first wife, who had been a Mediel, and the lovers now found them- selves at war with that redoubtable family as well as with the Church. Finally, to prevent Vittoria from establishing her right to the large portions of family property that the Duke had given her, one of her *inlaws" had her murdered.
In 'telling their story; Mr. Bax depicts the lurid and brilliant world of sixteenth-century Italy, a world of almost incredible beauty, cruelty and curruption.
VERA ZORINA
The attractive young lady at the right is Vera Zortna, She made her name *** ballet dancer. And in "On Your Toc" she leads in the fun in the most severe de- bunking ballet has evry re- ceived from the acreen,
The film directs its shafts af the pompous atmosphere sur- rounding Russian ballet, the die-hards of the old regime and the serious young women-and men-who talk soulfully of the soul of ballet.
SHOW NEWS
H.K. GIRL AND
DANCE STAR
When Zorina appears in "On Your Toes" at the King's Theatre it will bring memories of intimate associations to at least one person in Hongkong-Miss Al Lien Tal, ballet dancer who will shortly give a charity per- formance in ald of the Chinin Defence League.
Miss Tal and Zorina, whose real name is Brigitta Hartwig, and who is Scandinavian, were fellow-pupils for.
Anton years-1933-34 — at Dolin's Ballet School in London.
two
When Zorla married Mr. Georges Balanchine, ballet master, she and Miss Tai parted. Zerina went her way as member of a Russian Ballet and toured the United States. It was during this tour that Samuel Goldwyn, the Alm producer, "dis covered" Zorina. The troupe con- tinued its tour and is now in South America.
Rich,
prised of more than six pupils at ambitious and charming, Zurina is fortunate in her mother, one time, and these six are selected who wanted her daughter to reach from all Europe. the heights of fame.
Zorina wes of Miss Tai's class
world hus
IC achieved Anton Dolin's School is both ex- Zorina clusive and famous. It is never com- nown-little more need be said.
Evacuee in Australia
EVACUEE: AND WHO IS THIS DON BRADMAN?
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