MIXED “SETS”

Greymouth Evening Star, 10 November 1928, Page 2

MIXED “SETS”

A DAY IN A FILM CROWD. A wilderness like a vast carpenter’s shop, full of planks, bendh.es, thin partition walls, making up the different “sets,” here a Hindoo temple, there a bedroom scene, next door a country cottage. Everywhere workmen were hammering, painting, sawing. In the dressing-rooms, the experienced rush for- the best lighted mirrors, and begin the lengthy process of make-up; faces gradually turn yellow, eyes are shaded with green or red, there is a ceaseless babble of conversation, requests, “Lend me your 9|, dear,” “ ‘Wet-white’ my back for me, like an angel.” At 9.30 people wander on to the “set,” the novice trying to look as experienced and nonchalant as he or she doesn’t feel. It is a ballroom scene, the men in evening shirts of glaring yellow, a band playing forlornly how and then (writes “A.F.” in the London “Daily Chronicle”). Under the brilliant mercury lights faces look strange and deathly, colours change. The camera man, the producer, and the bevy of assistants talk together in corners, shout directions to the sceneshifters, and electricians. Sometimes there is dancing, more often we stand about, leaning against the walls. Rehearsal follows rehearsal, lights on and off from the overhead with s£range noises. The whistle blows again and again : “No, no 1” the producer groans in despair, “Stop!” At once everyone droops, expressionless and bored, against the walls, tn the interval well-known studio celebrities are pointed out —the woman whose legs are photographed for those stars with bad ones.

The whistle blows, again the band plays, again false bright smiles spread over .the faces, automatic pleasure is instantly produced. Over and over the scene is repeated.

In the morning you may notice oh all .sides people trying to catch the producer’e eye, to get noticed in some way, to be caught in front of the camera—but by the afternoon all that energy has melted, as the grease paint is beginning to do, false moustaches droop, eyes close in the glare of the •arc lights. At 8 o’clock we knock off, and emerge into the grateful dimness of ordinary daylight, our guineas in our pockets, our legs aching.' In the train we wonder suddenly what the film was all about, what it was called. Ah, well, it doesn’t very much matter; to-day’s piece will probably be cut. .