ENTERTAINMENTS.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 1 June 1926, Page 2

ENTERTAINMENTS.

GRAND THEATRE. 'HELEN’S BABIES.” Statistics show that every fourth family in the entire civilised world has read or is reading ‘‘Helen’s Babies,” a story by John Habberton, of which over 340 editions, each including a quarter of a million copies or more, have been published in America alone. Published forty years ago, the book is going just as strong to-day as the start it got at its inception. The best part of it is that “Helen’s Babies” is now in the pictures. And still better is the fact that in the picture version, a Principal Pictures Master Production, that infant prodigy of the cinema, Baby Peggy, enacts the role of one of the babies. The book is a “houseword” in nearly every home. Its story, as nearly everyone recall®, has reached such success because of its literal dealings with youngsters. It describes just what they really do, and the picture simply has to because its star, Baby Peggy, is so typical of the average child. The screen adaptation of “Helen’s Babies,” a Sol Lesser presentation of Baby Peggy, is limited to a one-night season, and will be shown at the Grand l Theatre to-night. Supporting Baby Peggy are such cinema celebrities as Edward Everett Horton, Clara Bow, Claire Adams, Jean Carpenter, and a host of others. William A. Seiter, the famous supervisor of production, directed “Helen’s Babies.”

OPERA house. “CHARLEY’S AUNT.” Practically every prominent actor has played a part in “Charley’s Aunt” at some time in his career, while the play has been going these thirty-three years. Those who were chosen to play the time-honoured roles in the moving picture version, which opened at the Opera House last evening for a season of four nights, considered themselves fortunate to be the ones to immortalise these well-known parts in the celluloid, which will give the famous old farce a new lease of life and keep more generations laughing. Syd Chaplin plays the title role of “Charley’s Aunt,” or rather the young Oxford student who masquerades as the eccentric old aunt from Brazil, “where the nuts come from.” This, Syd says, is the biggest thing in his screen experience so far, and a part he has visualised playing ever since he left England to seek his fortune on the screen a number of years ago. Patrons should book early and secure a seat to see this funny picture —enough to make a cat laugh.