AMUSEMENTS

Camp News, Volume 1, Issue 13, 8 March 1940, Page 8

AMUSEMENTS

PLAZA THEATRE. It takes a lot of courage for. a star to change charactrizations at the peak of a successful —particularly if the change is from “sweet” to worldly roles. But lovely Myrna Loy found the courage to play the amorous Lady Esketh in Darryl F. Zanuck’s production of “The Rains Came,” the Louis Bromfield best-seller which co-stars her with Tyrone Power and George Brent, at the Plaza. After four years of playing the perfect wife and sweetheartit all began with “The Thin —Myrna made no secret of the fact that she was pretty tired of smiling sweetly and would welcome an opportunity to delineate a bit of celluloid wickedness for a change. But she admits that she was completely bowled over when Zanuck, production chief at 20th Century-Fox, called her up one day . and asked her

how she’d like to play Bromfield’s lady of many loves. She hadn’t expected to be quite that wicked! “I thought the matter over for almost a week,” Myrna said. “I had felt for months that I was being typed and thought that movie-goers must be as satiated with my exemplary cinema conduct as I was.” So she took the role and, according to advance reports, her portrayal of the woman who was regenerated by her love for the fascinating Major , Safti, played by Tyrone Power, will win Myrna a host of new fans. STATE THEATRE. Tempestuous Lupe Velez and her inimitable style ■ of comedy, combined with the laugh-making proclivities of the rubber-legged comic, Leon Errol, had audiences in a panic when “Mexican Spitfire” opened at the State Theatre. The feminine firecracker, Lupe, plays the title role in this laugh-fest which divides its locale between. New York and Guadalajara, Mexico. Plot of the story revolves around the efforts of Linda Hayes, as the groom’s jealous ex-fiancee, to break up the marriage so that she can marry

the personable young man. In this cause she has the support of Elisabeth Risdon, the groom’s snobbish aunt. On the other hand Leon Errol, the uncle, is heartily in accord with the marriage, although his blundering efforts to straighten out their marital troubles always boomerangs. As a result of one of their schemes which backfires, Lupe and the uncle find themselves fleeing to Mexico, Errol to avoid arrest for forgery and impersonation, and Lupe to obtain a quick divorce in the heat of jealousy.

Telling two absorbing stories in one, RKO Radio’s “Reno” proved itself a welcome addition to the season’s film fare at the State Theatre. As the title indicates, the setting of the story is in the famous Nevada city. And in parallel, and intertwined fashion, it tells of the progress of Reno from a stormy mining community. to a “ghost town” and from that to the bustling city that it is to-day, while at the same time it chronicles the stirring career and ill-fated romance of a young attorney who is pictured as one of the mainsprings of Reno’s renascence. Richard Dix and Gail Patrick are co-starred in the offering, Dix as the ambitions young lawyer, Miss Pat-! rick as the pretty secretary who marries him in the early days of Reno’s mining fame, watches him with growing anxiety as his love of gambling and his gusty chance-taking widen the breach between them, and finally, under the urging of a wealthy admirer, divorces him and ' takes their little daughter East with her. < Behind this human narrative lie the various changes through which Reno passes, while Dix, desperate as he sees his beloved'community deserted when the mines shut down, takes to selling the city to lawyers throughout the country as an ideal place to secure divorces. An odd. quirk in the

state laws facilitates this process, and Dix grows prosperous with his divorce clientele, only to find himself disbarred when Miss Patrick leaves him and he is forced to turn to gambling for a livelihood.

TUDOR THEA Trl . Elsa Maxwell’s “Hotel f I now showing at the ludo “'f -I his Cosmopolitan n IM 1 20th Century-Fox ma X H Elsa’s film debut and de«. and thrilling terms a N you’ve never seen-^ Oze M beautiful young things, girl I to your head, girls who’ll heart; office girls in l/l boses; girls on the make fl girls who want a -good a J a liberal education; girls J life in a penthouse— J ing for love in a cottage. 1 Production chief Darryl J I lined up a fine cast to be co' with Elsa, -including Ann d Linda Darnell (new screen diJ James Ellison, Jean Rogers. Bari, June Gale, Joyce C.ompJ herself, John Halliday, Kathan ridge, Alan Dinehart anti I Blackmer. “Whistle a Little Old Melonsong played and sung by well at the cocktail party she: in the film, (yes,- Elsa gives; typical Maxwell party!) w composed by her. In addition, the Jones,U “Quick Millions.” . I

. KING’S - THEATK “OVER THE MOOI

ALEXANDER KORDA’S ii TECHNICOLOUR PR® If the essence of romara weaving of day-dreams into! Alexander Korda’s Over 4 now showing at the King’s Ti the cream of romantic—the “stuff that ‘romantic’ dn made on” have found their I the composition of this gay ii story, which discovers Merle as an impoverished orphan, shire, and dances her as a nJ heiress across Europe. , The fanciful ingredients | important than the pace, hit comic consequences of Miss bewildered transformation!

Europe’s richest playgirl. Oil is not really bewildered. Sfel born, she’s pig-headed, sit shovelfuls out of her million; r ters them over her cavalcac ; ers-on, but all the time sb I head, and, in spite of cm her heart. That’s not $

may seem, because she £ lost it to Rex Harrison,** chance when she was poor, f '- | a little uneasily when she bK and threw it away when si f I intolerable. A good doctor 4 honest man can find someth- ! to do than romp about as H ] Benson. Miss Jane Benson l young woman whom Miss j trays. . Instead he contracts j paradoxically, to adulation a-. piaess in a pretentious Swj s ;, I home for wealthy feminine driacs. . That begins the grand P ll cause Merle is determined I her man, and he is equally to be recovered-on his