MAJESTIC THEATRE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 80, Issue 300, 18 December 1937, Page 11

MAJESTIC THEATRE

•THEY GAVE HIM A GUN.” At least live outstanding names of the New York stage, present and past, have joined hands to bring to the screen the picturisation of last season’s’s best-seller by William Joyce Cowen, “They Gave Him a Gun,” which commences at. the Majestic Theatre to-day. The names are those of Spencer Tracy, Gladys George, and Franchot Tone. These three have the leads in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s film version of the Cowen novel. Among the featured players are Cliff (Ukulele Ike), Edwards and Horace MacMahon. Tracy is the Fred Willis of the Cowen story, circus barker and owner who enlists as a private; Tcne is the small town bookkeeper, Jimmy Davis, who faints at bayonet practice and out of whom Tracy tries to make a man; Miss George is Rose Duffy, the Red Cross -nurse whose life is tangled by them both. Edwards plays Laro, Tracy's ticket butcher in his travelling carnival; MacMahon is Convict 457139, killed in the gaol break with Tone. For the training camp sequence, a cast and crew of 60 travelled to the U.S. Marine Rifle Range at La Jolla, California, where, through Government co-operation, uniforms, rifles, trucks and other accoutrements of 1917 vintage ensured authenticity, and army regular officers took charge of the raw recruits, some 300 extras picked up in San Diego and taken to the location by bus.