AMUSEMENTS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIV, Issue 163, 25 June 1934, Page 5

AMUSEMENTS

WILL ROGERS AT ARCADIA "Ml!. SKIICH” The one and only inimitable Will Rogers comes to the screen of the Arcadia Theatre to-night, in Fox Film s latest comedy release “Mr Skitch." The screen piny is based upon Anne Cameron’s “Saturday Evening Post" story, “Green Dice.” 'The I’ost story was read and approved by the millions of its readers a number of years back, and advance reports on the film indicate that it will be equally attractive. Rogers, head of a famiily of six, suddenly finds himself penniless, and is confronted with the task of making sufficient money to support his family. He places his brood in an old dilapidated car and stars towards California with the hope that he may secure a job in another community. Ho finally lands a job as waiter in a gambling casino. He gambles the first dollar he earns on the roulette wheel, and wins 3,600 dollars, only to have Ids wile lose the money in an auto camp. Penniless once more, ho starts oil to Hollywood, to capitalise on the talents of a movie-star impersonator, whose acquaintance he has made at one of the auto camps. How Rogers and his family finally manage to emerge from financial difficulties in Hollywood is said to bring tile film to an uproarious finale. In support of Rogers, the cast is headed bv Zasu Pitts. Rochelle Hudson and Charlies Starrett play the romantic leads, and are aided by three star funsters, Florence Desmond, Harry Green and Eugene Pallette. Also on the programme is loin Keene in “Beyond the Rockies. ’ ROMANCE AT THE COSY “IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT.” Motion picture enthusiasts who have ’ been waiting with keen delight for the initial Hastings showing of Columbia s “It Happened One Night,” the widely publicised romantic screen comedy co starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert? together on the screen for the first time in their distinguished careers, will be appeased with the news that the film screens to-night at the Cosy Theatre. “It Happened One Night” tells the story of a young newspaper man en route from Miami to New York by bus. On the road he recognises Ellen Andrews, a runaway heiress, for whoso return her father has offered a huge reward. The girl is totally spoiled and unable to care for herself, so he takes her under his wing, protects her from would-be sheiks, and bluffs off others intent on securing the reward. They lose baggage and money, and are forced to proceed north on foot, sleeping in strawstacks ami pawning their belongings for enough to provide meals. They fall in love, of course—but that’s telling just a bit too much about the plot. The supporting cast includes Walter Connolly, Roscoe Karns and Jameson Thomas, witli Alan Hale, Blanche Frederici, Wallis Clark, George Breakston and a score of other well-known players in small but important roles. DRAMA AT MUNICIPAL “THE WOMEN IN HIS LIFE.” Once again, a motion picture has corm to the screen that compels the audience to grip their chairs from the first to the last reels in the Metro Goldwyn-Mayer production of “The Women iu His Life", which will be shown at the Municipal Theatre tonight. The picture is a vivid unfold’•>’ of gripping events in the life of a great metropolitan lawyer who, though disgraced, saves the life of an innocent man from a sentence of death after the re-birth of his own soul. As the lawyer, Otto Kruger scores in one of the most dramatic roles of his career, one which equals his stage per forniance in “Counsellor at Law.” The talented supporting cast, who also register memorable performances, include such popular plavera at Una Mer kel, Ben Lyon, Isabel Jewell, Roscoe Karns, Irene Hervey and C. Henry Gordon. COMEDY AT THE STATE TOM WALLS IN “JUST SMITH” The treatment of “Just Smith,” the Tom Walls film showing nt the Stale Theatre to-night, can best be described as “slick” and proves that Tom Walls, who directed, is a director of significance in the film field. As Smith, a polished society crook, Toni Walls, cunning and urbane, has never appeared to better advantage. It al lows him full opportunity to exploit his personality and wealth of neatly interpolated gesture. “Just Smith’’ is adapted from the Frederick Lonsdale comedy “Never Come Back,” a very successful stage play, and the story concerns one Smith, and his colleague, an American (a part brilliantly played by Hartley Power), who cultivate society in order to pilfer their bonds. AU goes well with the crooked schemes of the pair, until n charming young American girl, whose snobbish mother is determined to marry her to a duke, falls in love with Smith and he find* it an extremely difficult task to kill

her infatuation and, incidentally ha? own. The picture is full of wit anj laughter, and is one of the most swift ly-moviug comedies the British studios have yet produced. Walls is a playe>of no mean ability—his many years or both stage and screen in the dual capacities of producer and star have given him histrionic experience second to none, a fact proven easily by the superb performance he gives in the Fox-released Gaumont-British picture, “Just Smith.” There will be the usual entertaining supporting pictures, and patrons are assured of an enjoyable programme. DRAMA AT THE REGENT “THE SILENCE OF DEAN MAITLAND.” Drama is the stirring keynote of Cincsoiiiid’s third screen epic, “The Silence of Dean Maitland,” to be shown at the Regent to-night. The story of “The Dean” opens twenty years ago, in the peaceful English seaside village of Glenville. There we find Cyril Maitland, a young theological student, fighting against the spell of the alluring charms of Alma Lee,

the beautiful daughter of a village fisher-nan. He sinned —and you will hate him for it, yet the pathos of his life will later reach the innermost depths of your heart. The girl’s father, in revenge of his daughter’s honour, attacks Maitland; in the struggle the older man is accidentally killed, and the horror-stricken cleric flies from the spot, unwittingly leaving behind strong circumstantial evidence that was later to send his best friend, Dr. Everard, to prison for 20 years. Why didn’t Maitland confess is your natural question, and we hasten to tell that after days and nights of mental agony during his friend’s trial, he did sensationally arrive in court just as Everard is about to be sentenced. “Stop, Everard is—Everard is ” but before the truth is told Maitland is stricken down with a heart seizure. For months he fights for his life, and when at last restored to health —as he, years later, tells Everard—“He found it was so easy to go on, in silence.”