NEW FILM ACTORS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19720, 20 August 1927, Page 9 (Supplement)

NEW FILM ACTORS.

A DEMAND IN BRITAIN. The film industry—which is no worse ihan many other industries and is even better than some —is extremely gregarious, perhaps because it is so young. Jt is liable to be stampeded in any 'direction, and just as liable to lie stampeded back again without warning. Just at the moment the craze is for new blood, according to Mr. C. M. Hep;worth, one of the pioneer Briiis'h film producers. " Film faces " are being searched for everywhere and film brains are at a discount. The choruses are being combed for beauty " irrcgardless " •—as one agent put it—of ability. Boys and girls with little but their cheeks and their clwek to recommend them are being hurried into a superficial acquaintance with acting, while those ■who really know the ropes stand sadly by, unnoticed and unemployed. Disregard of Experience. Of course this always has been the. *la int of the old actor. Long before the film was thought of the supplanted mummers have railed bitterly at the inexperienced youngsters who have taken their places. Always they have been partly /right and partly wrong. A stage peopled entirely by old-time actors, swamped in tradition and inimical to chango or progress, would speedily become unutterably dull. But then the opposite condition, with youth ungnided by experience and revelling noisily in its <own ineptitude, is equally unpleasant. For it is not only the actors and actresses who have been thrown over in ihis rush for new blood. The cry for new faces on the screen is understandable if not completely sane. Directors—as they are now called in deference to the 'American overlords —are set aside as oldfashioned without thought as to the new ones are to come from.

This impatient sweeping aside of the tones who?have been taught in the hard school of experience is very natural, very human, and in some respects very healthy. It may be a bit hard upon the sweepings," but none but fools would condemn the eager search for novelty because it may involve disaster to veterans. Less worthy is the secret fear ~*>f the young captains of industry that lieutenants may know more of the campaign than they do themselves; this, too, "is very human. The Need for New Blood. Many of these young and ardent officers vptvlio have so recently joined the service ■sre, quite naturally, vastly more com cerned with their own safety and promotion than with the good of the industry. Altruism has never been conspicuous in trade; least of all is it to be found in the film trade. Also, they ■ .are quite right in discarding the people who are not necessary. New blood is of paramount importance, and the old must give way before it. But they are like timid bridge players: they often "discard from fright,." and thus they lose many a card which might save them the game, perhaps the rubber. The craze for " new blood " is, for reasons which are very similar, sedulously fostered by the film critics of the Daily Press, who have not necessarily any special aptitude for film-making and may find a fearful joy in sitting in judgment upon those who think they have. That situation is perfectly right and proper; no one expects a critic to be able himself to do" the things he criticises. A man who has an unpleasant egg for ibreakfast is permitted to express himself freely about its qualities without regard" to the fact that he couldn't lay ono himself if he tried. But critics lave tremendous power, and there is a fcorresponding obligation to use it with great and /even merciful discretion. Meanwhile those among the makers of pictures who have done good and worthy work in the past—some of them showed themsel% r es to be rather before the times in which they worked—should not allow themselves to be embittered by their supersession, which is probably only temporary. The time will cbme —perhaps it is not far-distant —when knowledge and experience will again be valued. The Place for the Artist. And while we are waiting, we who love this new young enterprise and are watching its early struggles with something of sadness but much of hope, may we wish that the great ones who control it will also awake to another matter ? It- is that the making of moving pictures lays upon them the burden of making not- merely things that move but things that are pictures, too. There is a chance in the films for sheer soul-stirring beauty which no stage can ever hope for—a chance as great as that of any of the established arts. There must be a place for the artist in this business of picturemakinc, whatever the commercial magnates may sav to the contrary.

And quite frequently this search for fresh talent brings to light an artist. Such a one has been discovered in Mr. Hal Sherman through his performance in " The Glad Eye," a British picture which was shown in London recently. It is just" one more proof that, now there are more films beyig made m Britain, and consequently a demand for fresh filmactors and actresses. Talent which has been lurking unsuspected in the background all along at last gets its opportunity.