FILM TOPICS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22391, 11 April 1936, Page 12 (Supplement)

FILM TOPICS

George Haft and Jack Oakie will be co-starred by 20th Century-Fox in "Dance Away."

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer have borrowed Sylvia Sidney from Walter Wanger to co-star with Spencer Tracy in ' Mob Rule."

Claudette Colbert, now appearing m Paramount's " The Bride Comes Home," believes that Hollywood's major studios should sponsor the little theatre movement in order to find new talent.

Fred Astaire is having another salary argument with Radio. If they cannot agree to terms shortly, Ginger Rogers will start work on a picture with William Powell instead of the projected musical with Astaire.

Eric Linden, tlio young actor who has recently made a great come-back in " Ah, Wilderness," has been cast opposite Lionel Barymore in " It Can't Happen Here." The two have recently played together in "The Voice of Bugle Ann."

Jack Conway, who made "Viva Villa," has been assigned to the direction of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's "Captains Courageous," based on Kipling's novel. A production unit has been collecting background shots off the coast of Newfoundland for the past four months.

Among the new Silly Symphony cartoons shortly to be released is one that introduces a new Walt Disney "star." His name is Elmer Elephant, with a heart as soft as his hide is tough and a personality that fills a room the minute he enters it. Disney considers his new find of such magnitude that he is naming the symphony after him.

Olivia de Havilland is to be starred by Warner Brothers in "Section 213" as a result of her work in " Captain Blood."

Ted Healy ha 3 found himself three new "stooges"—Pearson, Brewster and Lasky. The original three—Howard, Fine and Howard—parted from Healy over a question of publicity.

Ronald Howard, Leslie Howard's son, has ambitions to become a scenarist. So ho is learning the business by playing an extra role in " Romeo and Juliet," in which his father and Norma Shearer play the leads.

W. 0. Fields, a Paramount player, makes a hobby of collecting dictionaries. He has one of 18 volumes and has written one himself. He reads a dictionary in preference to fiction and knows the definition of more words, it is possible, than any other film player.

Josef Pasternack, famous musical conductor and composer, has been engaged by Columbia Pictures to supervise and direct the Fritz Kreisler music in the Grace Moore production, "The King Steps Out," now in work under the direction of Josef Von Sternberg. Pasternack served as conductor at many of Miss Moore's concert appearances last year.

A new contract has been signed b,v Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and the HarmanIsing studio under terms of which 18 colour "Happy Harmonies" will be made during the coming year. All of these short films will be filmed under the new three-tone technicolour process instead of the two-tone process formerly in effect. The series will be released exclusively through Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.