THE REFRIGERATED STAGE

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 145, 20 June 1936, Page 29

THE REFRIGERATED STAGE

The filming of winter scenes has always been a great source of expense to the film industry which, located in the mild climate of Southern California, has had frequently to send equipment and actors up into the high Sierras, says the "Christian Science Monitor." There they had to wait, too, until the weather condition, whether a blizzard, light snowfall, or mild winter sunlight on snow-clad fields, was as demanded in the scenario. Naturally,the expense involved was almost prohibitive, and many such scenes were "shot" in the studios with bleached com flakes substituting for fallen snow, or gypsum and salt would do duty for fallen snow with shredded asbestos skilfully arranged on tree? and bushes • to heighten the effect. Just recently one of the large Los Angeles ice refrigerator companies with huge warehouses hit upon the plan of a refrigerated stage. With a floor space equivalent to a third of an acre, capable of carrying 10,000 tons of weight, and controlled temperatures, any desired winter scene may be taken in this stage. Water can be run in and frozen to form an immense natural ice skating rink within a few hours.

and a special machine, termed a snowslinger, will crush up huge blocks of ice to the consistency of fine snow. By means of a blower this snow may be directed at any section of the stage, may be sho f out as a fine driving mist as in a blizzard or in the form of a heavy snowfall. The snow-slinger may be moved to the outdoors on location or, in fact, used anywhere that electrical power is available for its operation. Within this refrigerated stage, as this special warehouse is designated, icicles of any desired length or thickness may be manufactured by the simple expedient of allowing water to drip in the desired locations. This does away with the need for imitation icicles of paraf-fin-dipped cellophane, and real winter conditions may be created whenever desired. Another thing which has not hitherto been possible under winter conditions artificially created for film photography is that within this stage the actors' breath may actually be photographed in the form of a fine vapour, thus adding another realistic touch to the filming of winter pictures.