ENTERTAINMENTS

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 153, 31 May 1937, Page 3

ENTERTAINMENTS

STATE THEATRE. “CAN THIS BE DIXIE?” Laughs from the land of .cotton, songs with Southern charm and Harlem pep and romance under the moonlight and magnolias highlight Jane Withers’ hilarious and tuneful Twentieth Century-Fox triumph, “Can This Bo Dixie?” screening at the State Theatre to-night in conjunction with the Coronation film. With the irrepressible, peppery and ever dramatic Jane demonstrating her versatility and winning new laurels in a picture that surpasses oven the best of her past hits, the film is a combination of hilarious fun, lilting music, fast-moving dances and rollicking comedy and the fun really shines all the time. Sinn Summerville heads the outstanding cast and the picture opens with Slim and his niece, Jane, putting on a medicine show for the darkies on Claude Gillmgwater’a run-down plantation. They arc selling a hair-straightener which goes over big, but the darkios have no money with which to purchase it. Gillingwater saves Slim and Jane from the sheriff and they, in turn, save him from Donald Cook, who holds a mortgage on the plantation which he threatens to foreclose unless Helen Wood, Gillingwater’s grand-daugh-ter, marries him. There the scene Thomas Beck, a young Northern lawyer, and he and Helen' go for each other in a big wa. Gillingwater expects to recoup his fallen fortunes by winning the fortcoining 50,000-dollar Derby with his racehorse, Stonewall Jackson, ' But Cook orders the sheriff to attach the horse, Jane persuades Slim to draw a phoney cheque on the “Bank of England” for a supposed interest in the horse, which Cook accepts. In order to raise money to cover the chequo Jane takes the plantation darkies to New York where they click on an amateur programme. In the meantime Helen despairingly agrees to marry sCook and the ceremony has started when Jane rushes in with the money to cover the cheque. Beck replaces Cook as the bridegroom. To raise money to enter the racehorse, the plantation house is turned into an eating place with fine Southern food and featuring Gillingwater’s famous juleps. But Stonewall Jackson loses the race and Cook starts his foreclosure. In the nick of time Beck arrives with a Northern millianalre who wants to sell the juleps in cans. lie pays Gillingwater an advance of 10,000 dollars. Just how this arrangement works out provides a tuneful and hilarious finale.

REGENT THEATRE. “BORN TO DANCE.” “Born to Dance,” the eagerly-awaited smash musical succccssor to “Broadway Melody of 1936,”’ with Eleanor Rowell, “Queen of'Taps,” in the stellar role surrounded by practically all of the stars and the executive, production and technical crew of the earlier hit, comes to the Regent screen tonight as one of the outstanding pictures on the new Mctro-Goldwyn-Maycr schedule. Twd favourites not seen in the previous musical are featured in “Born to Dance’” in the persons of the jaunty James Stewart, who plays Miss Powell’s leading man, and lovely Virginia Bruce, making her first appearance since her huge success in “Tho Groat Ziegfeld.” Familiar faces from “Broadway Melody” who sing and dance their way through “Born to Dance” include Una Merkel and Sid Silvers, now recognised as one of the screen’s most hilarious comedy teams. Frances Langford, of radio fame, and the long-legged Buddy Ebson. Tho musical hits from “Born to Dance” were written by Cole Porter, known as the most sophisticated composer and lyricist in America. “Born to Dance” is a picture with a navy backgrbund and a swift, delightful story by Jack McGowan, Sid Silvers and Buddy do Sylva. There ’is a lively plot—but this brilliant group of players gives you v the story largely in music and dancing and laughter. Folks, you’ll love it —at tho Rogent Theatre to-day.