VOLTAIRE IS BROUGHT TO LIFE

Evening Star, Issue 21715, 9 May 1934, Page 1

VOLTAIRE IS BROUGHT TO LIFE

GEORGE ARLISS'S FINE OPPORTUNITY For many years George Arliss has searched for a satisfactory play based on the life of Voltaire, oftencalled the father of the French Revolution. Now,after twenty years of gradual preparation, he brings this most famous of all Frenchmen to life on the talking screen in ‘ Voltaire,’ which opens at the Empire Theatre on Friday. It is a notable and magnificent production, said to exceed in dramatic quality even the far-famed ‘Disraeli,’ and marks the high spot of the career of the world’s most distinguished living actor. The picture ‘ Voltaire ’ features one spectacular incident in the life of the brilliant poet-philosopher who was a friend of royalty in Europe, but a champion of the common people in his native land. With the famous “ Galas ” case serving as the principal story about which the plot revolves,Arliss has evolved a character study and a living picture of France in the extravagant times of King Louis XV; Sumptuously mounted in sets of exceptional size and magnificence, ‘ Voltaire ’ unfolds a gripping melodrama in an atmosphere of breath-taking beauty and grandeur. The story moves from Voltaire’s, Paris apartment, into the boudoir .of Madame Pompadour,through the stately, gilded halls of the French King’s palace, and on to the unrivalled elegance of Versailles. The cast is the largest and most impressive oyer assembled for an Arliss production. Doris Kenyon plays the role of Pompadour, lending her great beauty and charm to the role which a dozen other famous actresses wanted but did not get. Margaret Lindsay,who leaped, to fame in ‘ Cavalcade,* and has since been featured in other pictures, plays the part, of Nanette Galas, the innocent cause of the uproar which almost brought on the French revolution thirty years sooner.