OUT OF WORK ACTORS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21118, 27 February 1932, Page 10 (Supplement)

OUT OF WORK ACTORS.

REDUCED TO " SUPERS." / ' FORMER GOOD STANDING. A number of out-of-work actors of former good standing, some of whom once drew as much as £4O a week, are apE earing as supers in " Cavalcade "at •rury Lane. Their engagement is due to the initiative of Charles B. Cochran and Noel Coward, asked the leading actors' organisations if there were any such performers on their books who would care for the " pocket-money " it would bring them. There were 200 vacancies and Mr. Cochran got 800 applications. • The usual rale ot pay for tin's work is 2s 6d a performance, which works out at £1 a week for eight shows, but he is paying them, £1 10s a week. They are also free to accept " crowd work " for the films as well, which some of them are getting, at the rate of a guinea a day. No fewer than four of the cast of •' Ca.valcade," by the way, are playwrights, past or present. Arthur Macrae, who plays the boy drowned in the Titanic sinking, is the author of " Flat to Let," now running at (he Criterion. Edward A. Wilson, who understudies for Edward Sinclair as the father of the family, wrote " King Coal," staged at the Everyman in 1930. Diana Morgan, who plays one or two small parts, has had two plays broadcast and a review produced at the Arts Theatre. Another small-part, actor, Allan Thorpe, has had a play called " Too Much Lady " presented at Brighton.