PLAZA THEATRE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 77, Issue 107, 8 May 1934, Page 10

PLAZA THEATRE

“THE MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM.” A triumph is scored by the technicolour film dra'ma, ‘ ‘ The Mystery of the Wax Museum, 0 which shows finally at the Plaza Theatre to-day. The story, taken from the play by Charles S. Belden, deals with a series of mysterious disappearances of both living persons and human bodies and the ap- ( peai'Ance of a terrifying monster. The plot centres about a wax museum which has on display exceptionally life-like figures of personages of history and notorious criminals. Ivan Igor, a modeller in wax, conducts a museum in London with his partner, Worth. It does not pay and Worth sets it afire to collect the insurance. Igor is badly burned in a vain attempt to save his beloved images of historical characters. Years later, Igor, seemingly a gentle cripple with a strangely immobile face, opens a museum in New York. Coincident with this, many persons are reported mysteriously missing and several bodies are stolen from the morgue. The latest body-snatching is that of a chorus girl, Joan Gale, whose wealthy sweetheart is charged with her murder. Florence, a sophisticated, wise-cracking newspaper woman, accompanies her chum, Charlotte, to Igor’s museum, where Charlotte’s sweetheart is employed. Igor is tremendously taken wdth Charlotte and presses her to visit him again. Florence amuses herself bylooking over the figures. She is startled to find a wax image of the Gale girl. Later, she trails Sparrow, an attendant whom she had observed watching her, to a dilapidated house, and gains entrance to the cellar. She discovers a casket which she believes contains thb Gale woman’s body, but she is frightened away by a terrible, indescribable monster, * ‘My Weakness." “My weakness,” the new Fox production that, presents the popular Lilian Harvey in her first film play, comes to the Plaza Theatre to-morrow. Miss Harvey, Europe’s most popular picture star, who created a sensation on these shores with her performance in “Congress Dances,” is one of the new array of stars now appearing in films i.om the studios of Fox. For her initial appearance in American, studios, Miss Harvey has one of the most popular stars of the screen as her leading man —Lew Ayres. He was selected after a thorough search among the stars of Hollywood, and the final choice was made with Miss Harvey’s own approval. The cast boasts some of the outstanding performers on the stage and screen, among whom are Charles Butterworth and Harry Langdon, comedians; Sid Silvers, the world’s most famous “stooge”; Irene Bentley, filmdom’s latest “find”; Henry Travers, popular veteran of the New York stage; Adrian Rosleye, and Mary Howard, daughter of Will Rogers. Combed for its most beautiful girls for minor roles in the production, Hollywood has yielded a number of actresses each of whom represents a distinct type of feminine beauty. Among these are Irene Ware, Barbara Weeks, Susan Fleming, Marcelle Edwards, and Marjorie King.