STRICT CENSORSHIP IN SOUTH AFRICA

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLIV, Issue 20966, 19 February 1938, Page 16

STRICT CENSORSHIP IN SOUTH AFRICA

Among Hollywood’s major headaches is the variety of taboos imposed by censors all over the world. The British Empire is no less difficult than touchy I nations like Italy and Japan. 1 One of the sternest censorships, and | one which Hollywood finds hard to follow, is that of South Africa. During I last year they turned down 38 films altogether, and committed major operations on 217 more. Here are some of the 20 subjects taboo in South Africa: ridiculing tin? king’s naval or military forces, illustrations of night life; passionate loving, reference to controversial or international politics, antagonistic relations of capital and labour, juvenile crime or criminal methods, brutal fighting, drunkenness, rough handling or mistreatment of women or children, scenes ridiculing or making contemptible any section of the public.

ARTHUR TREACHER PLANS VACATION IN SWITZERLAND Arthur Treacher, 6-foot, 4-inch comedian now working with Deanna Durbin and Herbert Marshall in “Mad About Music,” is going to Switzerland at the finish of the picture. Treacher has become very interested in the country of the Alps and Cantons through his past three pictures. “I played a secretary to Tyrone Power in ‘Thin Ice,’ which has a Swiss locale; I played a butler in ‘Heidi’ with Shirley Temple. That had a Swiss locale also. Now I’m a confidential secretary to Herbert Marshall in ‘Mad About Music’—which is laid in Switzerland. Darned if I don’t want to see that country. I’m curious to know whether it’s like its various Hollywood versions!” I Treacher, however, expressed anxiety over his anticipated visit. “They’ve seen me so often as a butler on the screen, I’m afraid they’ll insist I sleen in the servant’s quarters!” “VOICE PERSONALITY” If ten world-famous figures had cho’sen motion pictures instead of other | careers, they would have attained screen prominence, even stardom, according to a “voice personality” vote cast by three film notables. Ballots were filed by Carole Lombard and Frederic March, co-stars in David O. Selznick’s technicolour production, “Nothing Sacred,” and by the director, William A. Wellman. The impromptu vote was the result of a discussion on tl.' screen value of “voice personality, ’ during which it was agreed that no one who lacked it could hope to become a star. Unanimous choice of all three for the No. 1 position was President Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose vocal charms are well-known. Next in line followed the Duke of Windsor, Aimee Semple McPherson, the evangelist; Ted Husing, radio sports commentator; Dorothy Thomson, journalist; Richard Halliburton, author adventurer and lecturer; Sir Anthony Eden, Britain’s foreign secretary; Hiram Johnson, senator from California; Arthur Vandenburg, senator from Michigan and Al Smith, of political fame. “These choices,” explained Wellman, “were on the basis of voice alone. No one has ever mathematically figured how much ‘voice personality’ counts in motion pictures. To judge its importance, however, one needs only to point to the crashing of stars when talkies came into the film industry.”