KING’S THEATRE

New Zealand Times, Volume XLII, Issue 9678, 5 June 1917, Page 6

KING’S THEATRE

“INTOLERANCE” TO-NIGHT. To-night at the King’s Theatre will mark the first presentation in Wellington by the J. C. Williamson management of “intolerance,” the colossal picture spectacle by D. W. Griffith, whose previous masterpiece, “The Birth of a Nation.” came as a revelation in moving picture art, “Intolerance” will introduce once more two favourites of the screen who had previously been seen in “The Birth of a Nation.” These are Lilian Gish, the woman who rocks the cradle (the rocking cradle marks the chanifo from on© storv to another), and Mae Marsh, who is the Dear One in the modern story Though but forty people figure in the cast in the programme, thousands of performers enact the tour stories that make up the one big theme. The magnitude of the spectacle may be gauged from the fact that 6i,000 people were concerned in the acting part alone, whilst many more thousands were associated with the working side of the production. Those who have seen the him consider it on a more stupendous scale than even “The Birth of a Nation, which is saying a great deal “Intolerance'' is the first and on y production made by Air Griffith since “Tfie Birth of a Nation.’ and it is the universal opinion that itlar surpasses that great masterpiece There are lour parallel stories, flashing back rnd forth, tracing a universal theme through various periods of bistort' in Babylon, Judea. Paris and America, ihe modern storv is a thrilling presentment of the evils that follow misguided attempts ot so-called reformers to regulate the lives and actions of those who are less tortunate. The battle scenes in ancient Babylon before and at the time of its tall are the most marvellous ever depicted. It 6 does not seem possible that human agencies in these times could so realistically reconstruct that ancient city and olace before the camera such, scenes, ol conflict and carnage. The irresistible sween of the multitudinous noste of Gyrus the Great towards the doomed city, the attack on the walls where the besiegers use great towers and catapu.rt, the hand-to-hand fighting on the walls, in the streets and in the palace Go scenes at the feast in the great hall a mile long, are reproduced with an efi-ct that is positively startling. Throughout the whole production runs, a complex musical score, winch is highly illuminative of the action, played bj a largo symphony orchestra.