£250,000 STUDIOS.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 365, 5 March 1932, Page 24 (Supplement)

£250,000 STUDIOS.

Big Scheme Two Years in Preparation. Plans have been completed for the establishment of new talkie studios at Stanmore, England, which will be the largest and most up-to-date in Europe. With equipment, they are to cost £250,000. According to present arrangements, building will be begun this month. The studios should be completed at the end of July, when an immediate start is to be made with productions. 1 European Sound Films. Ltd., the company sponsoring this ambitious scheme, has at its head Mr Archibald Forbes, an Englishman with a wide experience of acting and producing both in England and the United States. “ My plan is to produce about ten or twelve pictures during the first year,” Mr Forbes explained. “ I have no intention, at the moment, of launching out on super-productions, but we are prepared to spend £20,000 to £25,000 op each picture. Later on, if things go well, I shall challenge Hollywood with a super-picture, probably costing £BO,OOO. “ I have no intention of going abroad for my producers. I feel certain from experience that, among the young ’varsity men working at festival theatres up and down England, I can find material which can be moulded into talkie directors second to none in the world.** Played with Chaplin. Stan Laurel (partner of Oliver Hardy) went to America in the old Fred Karno Company with Charles Chaplin. Laurel was born in England.