HOLLYWOOD NOTES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 285, 2 December 1933, Page 5 (Supplement)

HOLLYWOOD NOTES.

GOSSIP OF THE STUDIOS.

(By MOLLIE MERRICK.)

HOLLYWOOD, Calif., Oct. 28. That imitation is sincerest flattery has yet to be learned by some marketers of the creative product. I am really laughing heartily up my sleeve at the naivette of the owners of the German-made film "M" who seek to obtain one hundred thousand dollars damages against the De Mille-made picture, "This Day and Age." "M" is perhaps one of the best pictures released in this country in some time. The performance of Peter Lorre was a masterpiece. The indirection of the filming of a terrible story was thrilling and powerful in its direct reactions upon the audience. It was marked by super artistry and originality, and its dialogue was succinct and terrific, if you were lucky enough to understand German, especially the psychology of the child murderer when faced by his haphazard court with his: "You want to kill. I must kill . . . If anyone found anything thrilling, or original or telling in the very funny "This Day and Age," I am glad; I certainly didn't. Charlie Bickford being chewed by rats—a lot of college kiddies marching through the streets singing—a good deal to much of that great De Mille "find"—Judith Allen, ex-wife of Gus Sonnenberg, the wrestler—and a good deal of old-fashioned palaver and dull dialogue. But it seems to me that there is very little protection for creative minds against the sort of mind that leeches on them. Rene Clair has been copied by every Hollywood director, aS 1 have other foreign directors. You can find all the

technique of our tremendous Hollywood geniuses in the foreign releases of the six months preceding their adaptation of those releases. All borrowing in art is not intended plagiarism. Some of it is the frank tribute of tremendous appreciation. When we like a thing tremendously we try to do something like it. It is sincere flattery, really, on the part of gentlemen who get enormous salaries and who have had their originality —providing they ever did have any —smothered by large incomes. It's a funny situation, but I can't see where you can collect one hundred thousand dollars on it.

"The Last Round Up," that minor swinging rhythm that has captured the radio "world, will find its way into pictures via a film called "The Border Legion." Although the air waves have popularised this song until it is a musical landslide, it originated in the theatre when young Joe Morrison, with George Olsen's band, sang it. Two hundred thousand copies of the song were sold during the first six weeks after this song was launched. A friend of mine tells me that her aunt learned the basic theme of this song from a cowboy on the Texas plains 30 years ago, and that this is merely a new orchestration and arrangement of an old cattleman's chanty.

Herbert Mundin tells a good one on himself. He was strolling along the 'street on Hallowe'en when some kids, all wrapped in sheets and wearing masks, came running up to him. "Gee, mister," he quotes one of them as saying,® "you got a wonderful mask!" Mundin, who was ace comedian of the Chariot Revue before pictures brought him to Hollywood to play an outstanding part in "Cavalcadc," is always making fiin of himself—and most of his stories hold up this one.

There's a hey nonny nonny about the evening gowns. It's the hot-cha-clia backs, I guess. And the funny little trains that mark the smart formal frocks of the season. Demure you may be, face to face, with your hair parted in the centrc and high flung little locks curling up and back above your ears; demure you may be with the neck of your frock traipsing along your collarbone. But the moment your back is turned you become another type entirely "Harness" backs and "fishtail" trains —nothing demure about either of these! A perfect example of their lack of demureness is found in Madge Evans' Chinese red formal gown worn in the picture "Day of Beckoning." Two tiny shoulder capes keep narrowing along the back until they are inch-wide bands at the waistline. The back is entirely exposed. There is a wide girdle; diamond clips make the bands secure where they meet this softly folded cincture. Four fishtail points that elink along the, floor for a good six inches or so, give the final touch of experienced chic.

The evening gown that buttons down the back is new also, and quite the oppoeite to the type just described. Myrna Loy wears one of these in "The Prizefighter and the Lady." Tiny black satin, ball buttons close the gown—and keep it closed. They ran from the

shoulder to the hip. There is a circular neckline in front which drops off the shoulders and the whole thing is caught into a black satin bracelet at the back of the neck.

Mary Carlisle's black cliiffon froclc, which she wears in "The Vinegar Tree," keeps the interest in the buck in a most unusual fashion. The decolletage is outlined with ruffles and the same type ruffles are repeated in the fishtail train. The frock is high about the throat in front. Its back decolletage is cut in a deep circle to the waistline anft the circle is outlined with ruffles. The ruffles begin at the hemline and make the fishtail train more youthful than it usually is. With a black satin bandeau in her blonde curls Mary Carlisle is most demure when you face her in thifi frock. But when she walks away . . .

Jean Harlow has accepted the shorter bob dictum and haa had her famous platinum locks cut in a different fashion. This is a decided point in favour of the chic of shorter liair. The platinum locks of Harlow are her trademark and everything is done to keep the dramatic quality of this crowning glory without interfering with the smartness of the general appearance. The hair has been worn quite long —almost to the shoulder —curled loosely at the ends and parted on the side. The new hair has had almost four inches taken off the ends. It is now parted in the middle and

curled softly up and back. The hairline in the back is covered by-a soft fringe. Gently fronds of hair cover the ears, but the forehead is left bare.

I happened on the "Miss Fane's Baby is Stolen" set the otliep day. That's a terrible mouthful for a picture, it just occurs to me, and it might be as well to change it right now. Well, what I started out to say was the nun-like pyjamas which Dorothea. Wcick was wearing were interesting in the extreme.