PAGE TWO
PASSION PLAYERS IN U.S.. FAMILY'S ROLE FOR 170 YEARS.
HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, JUNE 29th, 1929.
Born to the lending roles of the Freiburg Passion Play, and trained from childbook : to the responsibility and hour of their inherited calling, here are pictured five of the Passat Tamily now appearins on Broadway. Upper right in Adolph in the role of Jesus af Nazareth; left is Amulis, as the Virgin Mary. Below, left to right, are George, Fasit- macht, Jr., is John the Baptial; George, Sr., who plays Judas; Elsa, the Mary Mugiltere:? Seven hundred years ago, before that the Christ story reach the shown to the church. America had been discovered, greatest number of people. So we the simple, superstitious peasant consented to come to folk of Freiburg. in Baden, pro-where there, are great centres of duced spem Their pastoral hillside population. #pageant of the Christ story a Broadwny has more Devils than jbility for the ceremony.
America,
"Family Granted Bonour,
WHY I LIKE THE ENGLISH.
By a French Girl,
Englishmen seem to me, physi cally speaking, very tall, straight,| and strong.. Rarely slender, they are well-built, look healthy, and keep young very long..
Their looks are firm and grave. Young men are generally nice- looking, realer, and more agreeable. to look at than the French.
English character is good, Arm, frank, and brave; these qualities are manly ones. When an English- man Buys "I will not," it in not easy, not to say impossible, to make him change.
Notwithstanding their strong will, the English are nearly al- ways good and kind to the poor. anet orphins, women, children, bensis.
This!
The English love animals. fact cannot be argued abant. Wej And dogs and cata in every English home; they are the favourites of! the nursery, the living toys of baby, who learns to love them. This last disposition was always a subject of wonder to me; In t um every Frenck home parents forbid animals to approach very young children.
I believe Englishmen are able to understand nature. However, they rarely are artists; they feel, the beautiful, they cannot express It.
With their strong but, simple mentality, they look like giants with childish sonla. Never dia- couraged, they push the progress: wheel, and are the most conrage- ous soldiers in the struggle for thei best.
,
Reem paradoxically cust. It is odd,' for instante, to watch 2 13 gromed for years to the Christ role answer a telephone or ring for ja pitcher of water. The surround-
ing of levators and noise seer. equally strange.
Finally there is the gigantie: which Hippodrome Theatre, in they appear, which has been pro-! vided with every appurtenance of "His petition was that he, and rundern-stage craft and lavish de- They say that this members of his family, might becoration within the imagination responsi- and means of Morris Gest and His peti- David Behren. Even the base- visioned by monks and stout, lung-ever inhabited the whole Blacktion was granted, with the proviment section, which once housed | Forest. It is well then that we fol- that the council could take the the Hippodrome midgets and uni-
hura.
Vallowed to, assume the
It seems that certain timid ones law the steps of our forefathers." sacred story lack at any time if mats, has been turned into a thea- who had bunted long over the!
Adolpht is a szentle, humble man the Fassnachts did not produce #tricalized Hegment of Jerusalem. cerie mysteries of the Black For-
devout and tradition-bound to with due reverence and beauty. In the theatre proper, glaring are ed, which borders their town, had
the role la playa. There is littled "So 300
can understand how lights contre the table figures So the Devil kingolf leave the
of the actor nut him. He is carefully we have been groomed and fabulous expenditure is indi- Schwarzwald and enter the town.)
ponant, as are his family mem-during the many generations." cated in the settings and the en- So the imitation of Christ
bera and the 35 other players The Fasstichts are literally tames of some 1000 extras. given to keep Sutan out. Thus
brought with him from Freiburg.
Bewildered by Metropolis,
was
the Passion Play has rome down por 170 years, the Fussnachts have born, to the roles they must play. played the leading roles in the They are trainest from childbond to, the responsibility and no are,
through time,
left, their natural theatre and The open sky lo face the glare and plifter and ch of
Broadway,
It's all very far away from the And
J:
·PICTORIAL SUPPLEMENT.
NOAH'S ARK” TO BE FILMED.
Warner Bros. are shartly to produce a remarkable film of "Noah's Ark," in which Dolores Costello and George O'Brien will appear. Above are two of the striking scenes.
WHY THE THEATRE WILL SURVIVE?
lly His Mother,
And now the reverent discord passion"-Judas, Mary, Jolin, the the peasants who play the various open hillsides of Freiburg. auts of these historic actors have Magdalene and the Blind Woman. Iminor roles. There is George, who the Fussnachts admit they were
"My family literally took upon plays Judas, and George Jr., who more than a little bewildered upon do not expect all worlds to be the A VERY MODERN SON.
their arrival for rehearsal. H was same. They will go on landing itself the responsibility for the plays John Che Baptist; Elsa, whoj
ja vast and incredible clunge from down their heritage from one gen- Passion Play back in 1760,"he has the role of Mary Magdalene, the company of street actors, pick-eration to another, leaving their the world's most heetie highway continued, with the aid of an in-and Anulie, who plays the Virgined from the peasant folk of the roles in the hands of
and I am afraid that my son is going Hears of Brendway "Devils," terpreter. "One of my great Mary.
countryside.
grandsons, wives wid daughters to be a motor engineer. I thought
The theatre is the last island in "But what matters it where our grandsires belleved that the pa-
The array of blinding lights, and sisters and brothers, spread-so when I first saw his hands. He mission takes us?" asked Adolph geant had departed from its earlier| Fassnacht, who was born to the traditions and was degenerating. Projected from their pastoral cast from their own and other ing the reverent story over the was then an hour old. Now holu.the sea of modern civilization in role of Jesus of Nazareth. "It is He went to the town countil and valley home into a modern hotel theatres, also was a bit upsetting. world and, they hope, throughout In his own words, "Nearly two" which that ancient Invention, the more necessary to-day than ever, complained of Dus lack of respect) in the skyline belt, the Fassachts they contele. But the Fassnuchtal time,
........
Present a Paradox,
PICTURES SHOW CHANGES IN THEATRICAL GARB SINCE 1815.
The habiliments of the slago favourite have elanged mightily since New York first went in for theatres in a big way-and Evelyn Brent, popular movie star, shows here what the changes have been like. Photo No. 1 shows her as an actress of the year 1815. In No. 2 she has moved up to the Ro- maner period, just before the Civil War. No.
shows her dressed in the theatrical styles of 1870, when Lotta Crabtree was the belle of Broadway, and bustles were in high favour. In No. 4 Mias Brent portrays a costume that shocked and thrilled the New York of the '90's-the first time that actresses appeared on the stage woaring tights. The costume
2
shown in No. 5 is one worn by the original Floradoras, about 1901. No. 6. shows a costume similar to the one worn by Fritzi Scheff in 1908-It was considered pretty daring, in those days. And, last of all, No. 7 shows the syncopating, jazz-mad chorus girl of the theatre of 1929.
By Karel Capek.
But all his conversation is of things spoken word, is, as if through a that move-and move rapidly. sort of enchantment preserved in Now my son is not a remarkables original purity; there stil child. He did not walk at the age lingers that ancient and wonder- of six months and he has never ful popular habit by which people dazzled either of his parents with make themselves mutually under- the brilliance of bla remarks. In stood, through talking and ges» fnet, Andrew is a very ordinary ticulating with their hands, using little my. And that is my paint.j
He is so ordinary that he is abso-neither machines nor marks, but lutely typical, and when I say ho only words,
is going to be a motor mechanic Viewed from this standpoint, am merely expressing the hopes there is a great future in store for (or fears) of must mothers of small
boys.
the theatre, as is the case with all
For that is the most romarkable things that have a great pust. It thing about Lhe young male gea-cannot be replaced by anything eration even in their infancy, else; it is the sacred reservation of They have been born with a new the spoken word,
sixth sense; the sense of speed and
The second advantage of the
the machinery that creates speed, They know and understand instine-theatre is the actor, not because tively things that we, their parents, he plays better than a film-actor, have grasped only after long and but because he is real and stands serious application.
before us in the flesh. In modern
But looking round at all the civilization the theatre 'ceases to small boys of my nequnintance, be A house of Illusions and ree that this is no cause for as- becomes a house of reallties. In tonishment. They are all the the course of a lifetime we rarely same. John, red five, will correct have an opportunity of observing, you with condescension If you confor several hours, Hying beinga fane two baby cars.
walking, sitting, and chatting of Michael, who will soon bo nine, things of general interest.j has made a study of motor speel-) fications and can recite these with
If we want to pass a few houre gusto and understanding. Billy, in contemplative observation of his brother, is already a speed wonderful reality and to see what maniac and regards Sir Henry a human being looks like, we must Sograve as the most astonishing go to the theatre.
demi-god the world has ever pro- The more we feel drawn towarde
duced. And so on-ad infinitum-
until I find myself compelled to reality the more frequently shall spend a few hours secretly with ajwe come back to the theatre. But motoring manual in the hope of here, too, it lies with the actors to acquiring sufficient jargon to pass satisfy this craving of ours. It is. the lofty task of the actor to place muster with these young experts.
bofore us living beings, a sight It is all very astonishing and porhaps a little disappointing to now so rare and so unusual. Aa the romantic young mother. 1long as there are actors, there wendor if we all have our fond will be theatres, as long as queer and silly dreams, imagining our people are bolag born with a wild cons as young Galahads, mounted desire to reproduce a living. man on One white thoroughbreds? If by shouts and gestures, we need [80, we soon tuck such pictures not put to ourselves the question the theatre will be away at the back of our minds, whether Homes? Dear slow old things, swallowed up by any other in
Iterest. Ask Andrew-he'll tell you,
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