ENTERTAINMENTS

Southland Times, Issue 23680, 1 December 1938, Page 7

ENTERTAINMENTS

STATE THEATRE “MUSIC FOR MADAME” The world’s greatest livmg tenor and one of the screen’s most recent discoveries—Nino Martini and Joan Fontaine—are linked in sparkling romance in “Music For Madame,” which shows finally at 2.0 and 7.45 today at the State Theatre. The picture features a cast that includes Alan Mowbray, Billy Gilbert, Alan Hale and Grant Mitchell. Specially selected featurettes complete the programme.

TOMORROW 2.0 AND 8 p.m.

FRED ASTAIRE’S LATEST

Sparkling with catchy Gershwin tunes and with one of P. G. Wodehouse’s most hilarious stories of English social life as its basis, RKO Radio’s new “A Damsel in Distress” comes at 2.0 and 8 p.m. tomorrow to the State Theatre to present Fred Astaire in his first picture with George Burns and Gracie Allen. The film has been planned throughout to afford the wingfooted favourite exceptional opportunities for sensational novelty dances and comedy, and with its brilliant cast, its unique and uproarious plot, and its tuneful melodies, the offering is said to be one of the real screen events of the season. Joan Fontaine has the title role and Reginald Gardiner, Ray Noble, Constance Collier, Montagu Love, Harry Watson and other celebrities head the cast of the musical romance, which deals with a fantastic love affair between an American dancer and a titled British girl, .Astaire is the dancer, bashful and retiring man who has been given a great build-up in the London papers as a “heart-breaker’ through the efforts of his publicity agents. Burns and Allen, and who is heartily sick of the whole thing. Miss Fontaine plays the girl, who is trying to avoid a distasteful marriage, while her servants at Totleigh Castle are violently divided on the question of whom she should marry, and have organized their own sweepstakes on the event. The two principals meet in a London cab, and then, thanks to a page boy who has his own ideas about romance, are brought' together again at the castle. By this time Astaire has been led to believe Miss Fontaine is secretly in love with him, and the story immediately spreads. Burns and Allen devote their efforts toward getting Astaire out of the entanglement and back on the stage, while Montagu Love, as Miss Foritaine’s indulgent old father, secretly backs Astaire’s prospects. State featurettes, a show in themselves, include the most provocative issue of the famous “March of Time,” “Arms and The League,” which traces the movements of the League of Nations up to the present day. The second special support is Walt Disney’s Silly Symphony cartoon, “The Old Mill.” the coloured featurette that took London by storm and was the forerunner of “Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs.” Patrons are specially reminded that, as from tomorrow, Friday, the State evening sessions during the summer months will commence at 8 o’clock instead of 7.45. Box plans are at Begg’s or State (telephone 645).

CIVIC THEATRE

“EAST OF JAVA” OUTSTANDING DRAMA Packed with action which went from gunplay to shipwreck and from typhoons to battles between _ human beings and wild beasts, Universal’s “East of Java,” is now showing at the Civic Theatre. In this exciting screenplay, which opens in the East African port of Simba Sao, Charles Bickford is cast as an American gangster fleeing from relentless “G” men. Knowing that a warrant is about to be served on him, he flees the port on a Chinese tramp steamer, which is hurled against the reefs of a jungle island, with a beautiful girl, played by Elizabeth Young. The developments in this tense and startling, primitive and yet modern drama come thick and fast. Supporting Bickford in “East of Java” are Elizabeth Young, Frank Albertson, Leslie Fenton, Clarence Muse and others. “The Calling of Dan Matthews,” Columbia’s picturization of the famous novel by Harold BeH Wright, with Richard Arlen in the stellar role is also shown. Charlotte Wynters plays opposite Arlen and Douglass Dumbrille, Donald Cook and Mary Komman are included in the cast.

MAJESTIC THEATRE

DOUBLE PROGRAMME FINALLY The Universal crime drama, “State Police,” starring John King and Larry Blake and the Western romance, “Justice of the Range,” with Tim McCoy and Windy Hayes in the leading roles, will have their final screening at the Majestic today. WEEK-END ATTRACTIONS TW O PARAMOUNT FEATURES A splendidly varied Paramount double-feature programme has been arranged Tor screening at the Majestic Theatre for Friday. Whether patrons like tender, heart-warming romance or spine-tingling thrills and chills “The Great Gambini,” the feature picture at the Majestic tomorrow, should send them home pleased and thrilled “The Great Gambini” features Akim Tamiroff in the title role and it is primarily a thrill-packed mystery. Tamiroff is the star attraction of an exclusive night club, where as a clairvoyant, he reads sealed messages sent him by the audience. When Tamiroff (the Great Gambini) prophesies that Marian Marsh will not marry her fiance the next

day, it is at first merely considered a bad joke, but when the fiance is found murdered the next day, the case takes on a more serious turn. Everyone in the film is under suspicion—Tamiroff, Miss Marsh, the disappointed suitor, John Trent, her father, Reginald Denny, and her stepmother, Genevieve Tobin. Tamiroff calmly takes delight in pointing out clues to a pair of stupid detectives, Edward Brophy and William Demarest. The picture reaches its climax with one of the most novel twists ever brought to the screen, in which the murderer is revealed and the romance between Miss Marsh and Trent is brought to a happy end. The other Paramount picture, Zane Grey’s “Forlorn River,” is an outdoor Western romance with Larry Buster Crabbe, June Martel, John Patterson, Syd Saylor and Harvery Stephens in the leading roles. Some of the finest action pictures of wild horses in their native haunts ever caught by the camera form some of the high spots of the show. These scenes which are many are calculated to satisfy the most rabid horse lover and to more than satisfy the casual filmgoer, who is after novelty, action and robust story. The story deals with the depredations of a band of desperadoes determined to outwit a buyer from the army remount service and steal the horses consigned to the Government. How they do this and how they are frustrated by Crabbe and his pal, Saylor, is the best of this thrilling story. Considerable comedy is supplied by Chester Conklin, who will be remembered as Charlie Chaplin’s partner in many of the latter’s pictures, while romance is supplied by beautiful June Martel and John Patterson. Latest Cinesound news will also be screened and intending patrons are advised to reserve without delay at H. and. J. Smith’s departmental store box office, Rice’s Majestic confectionery or Majestic Theatre (telephone 738).

REGENT THEATRE

“TEST PILOT”

Acclaimed as the most authentic aviation story ever filmed, ‘‘Test Pilot,” starring Clark Gable, Myrna Loy and Spencer Tracy, will close a successful season at the Regent Theatre today. Thrilling flying sequences, filmed with nine ground cameras and nine aerial cameras, provide the background for a new type of triangle. Clark Gable, in the title role, is divided between his love for Myrna Loy and his love of flying. The conflict between his wife and his job is the basis of a plot which incorporates scenes from air races, testing of new aeroplanes, riotous night club sequences and touching romantic scenes between Gable and Miss Loy.

“EVERYBODY SING”

THE REGENT—TOMORROW

Such stage and screen headliners as Allan Jones (the singing star of “Show Boat” and “Firefly”), Judy Garland, Fanny Brice, Reginald Owen, Billie Burke, Reginald Gardiner and Lynne Carver join hands to contribute a wealth of musical and acting talent to “Everybody Sing,” one of the most original and infectious musicals yet to reach the talking screen and which comes to the Regent on Friday. Under the deft direction of Edwin L. Marin, it literally swings across the screen with a lilting, ingratiating and happy-go-lucky quality which establishes a warm intimacy with audiences which some of the more elaborate musicals have been unable to achieve. The plot involves a madcap theatrical family whose husband is jealous of his wife’s leading man, whose daughter is constantly expelled from school because she disrupts her classical music lessons by “swinging” the most serious music, and whose servants, particularly the chef, pay more attention to their theatrical aspirations than to their household tasks. When it looks as though the father’s play will be a “flop,” . the daughter and servants take the situation in hand, get up a successful play themselves, and save the day. Of course, in a comedy like this, it is not so much the plot that matters as it is the performances, and in this respect “Everybody Sing” is - superlatively equipped with a wide variety of talent. Allan Jones as the musical chef has a made-to-order role and lends his superb voice to such songs as the “Quartette from Rigoletto,” “On With The Show,” “Cosi Cosa” and “The One I Love.”

ST. JAMES, GORE

Showing Robert Montgomery and Rosalind Russell together for the third time, with Robert Benchley featured in one of his funniest characterizations, the new Metro-Gbldwn-Mayer romantic comedy, “Live, Love and Learn,” begins at the St. James Theatre, Gore, today.

REGENT THEATRE, GORE

A happy blend of comedy, tense drama and young romance, filmed in a country village setting. Universal’s “Young Fugitives” begins at the Regent Theatre, Gore, today. Harry Davenport, Dorothea Kent, Robert Wilcox and Clem Bevans are in the feature roles. Also showing is “Danger Patrol.”

LATER STARTING TIME AT STATE THEATRE

So that people might have more leisure before attending the theatre the management of the State Theatre has decided to advance the starting time of the evening sessions by a quarter of an hour in the summer months. The programme at the State Theatre will therefore begin at. eight o’clock sharp instead of 7.45 p.m., as in the past. This new arrangement takes effect as from tomorrow, Friday. So that patrons may have no transport difficulties, the evening performance at the State Theatre will conclude about 10.15 p.m. whenever possible.