‘FREE AND EASY’

Evening Star, Issue 20591, 17 September 1930, Page 7

‘FREE AND EASY’

UPROARIOUS COMEDY FOR REGENT

AA’hat is reported to be the largest collection of screen celebrities ever to be used in a talking comedy will bo seen on Friday at tho Regent Theatre, whore Aletro-Goldwyn-Alayer’s satire of Hollywood studio life, 4 Free and Easy,’ will bo shown

Buster Keaton, in his initial talking and singing screen appearance, is the star of the production, and the big cast includes Anita Page, Trixie Friganza, Robert Alontgomcry, Dorothy Sebastian, Kar l Dane, John Aliljan, Gwen Lee, AA’illiam Collier; sen., Edgar Gearing, Alarion Shilling, and Lottice Howell. The company did not stop with its regulai players, but even incorporated several ot its directors in the cast, such well-known executives as Cecil B. Do Alillc, Lionel Barrymore, and Fred Niblo making their appearance in tho inside studio scenes.

Information <is that the comedy in burlesquing tho making of talking pictures offers an illuminating slant on inside workings of tho studios, including tho faking of scenery, camera-enlarge-ments, and other tricks of the trade. Scenes in which players are shown in the actual process of making talkies include one in which Karl Dane and Dorothy Sebastian yre almost killed when a charge of dynamite is unexpectedly set off and a bedroom melodrama in which Lionel Barrymore wields the megaphone while Gwen Leo and John Aliljan do the acting. Other sequences in which well-known screen players may be seen are a Hollywood review, claimed to have been filmed at an actual occurrence, and a comic opera sequence done in typical Gilbert and Sullivan manner. Rumour has it that in those reels of tho all-star comedy in which Buster Keaton is seen in a series of acrobatic manoeuvres, tbe gags were adapted from features of the comedian’s appearance in vaudeville previous to his entering pictures. The act was known as ‘ TJio Three Keatons,’ and Buster’s chief part in the proceedings was to permit himself to be thrown about tho stage by his father as though lie were so much pulp. In ‘ Free and Easy’ Trixie Friganz.i assumes the role played by Keaton’s father, and is said to furnish many hilarious moments in hurling tho supple comediab about tbe coniines of a sound stage. From advance indications 1 Free and Easy,’ with its imposing cast and its riotous plot, will bo one of tho outstanding comedy attractions of the' current season.