THE MICHIGAN DAILY
SUNDAY, APRIL 5, 1931
THE MICHIGAN DAILY SUNDAY. APRiL ~. 1931
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Screen Reflections
IN TOWN
Gum-c h e w i n g, wise-cracking,
slow-moving Will Rogers is here,
as you doubtless already know, in
the talking version of Mark Twain's
"A Connecticut Yankee" at the Ma-{
jestic. It's reviewed below. 1
The Michigan deals with a more
modern locale in "Honor Among
Lovers" with chawming Claudette
Colbert, the captivating brunette of
"Manslaughter"-again co-starred
with Frederic
March.
Downtown t h e
W u e r t h offers
George Bancroft
and Kay Francis
in a supposed..
low-down on the **~
tabloid newspaper
r a c k e t spicingly
titled "Scandal
She et." Extree!
Extree!
OUT OF TOWN CLAUOETT c ArtW
Eddie Peabody, banjoist par ex-
cellence, masters the ceremonies at
the Fox while some 800 talented
lads and lassies from the theatre's
dancing school cavort on the stage
in ar Easter Follies. The screen
displays Victor McLaglen, Lew Cody,
and Fay Wray in "Not Exactly
" Gentlemen."
And it's Barbara Stanwyck at the
Downtown in the epic of the taxi
dancer "Ten Cents A Dance." Ric-
ardo Cortez and Sally Blane head
the supporting cast.
Bert
CONNECTICUT YANKEE"
For two hours of the inimitable
Will Rogers comedy,tthe "Connec-
ticut Yankee at the Court of King
. - Arthur" affords the
usual amount of a-
musement and is
well worth seeing.
Acting is by no
m e ans R og er s
forte. H is appeal
consists of his
shuffling, back-
country manners
and his flow of
Ichatter which is
Rogers typically American,
if such a thing may be said to ex-
' ist. And these characteristics fit
perfectly into the part which he
plays. As a small-town radio dealer,
. he is taken back fifteen hundred
years to the court of King Arthur,
and then proceeds to revolutionize
that country with his modern
methods. It has been said of this
picture than he so often forgot his
lines and substituted his own, that
the- directors let the script go al-
t o g e t h e r since the impromptu
speeches were much better. Wheth-
er this is true or not, he gives us
' a very good picture of the country
town Yankee, his shrewdness, and
ability to capitalize on every op-
portunity chance throws in his
way.
As to the picture itself, there is
admittedly nothing in the plot of
the play. Mark Twain originally
wrote his book assa satire on Amer-
Ican ideas and attitudes in his day.
The directors of the play have skill-
fully transferred l. -
those same points
to the present
picture, although<
of course most of
the finer subtle-
ties had to be left
out in favor of the
more obvious .
o n e s. Neverthe
less, the effect is / r,.r
most amusing,
and the general
idea has been car- MAURESN O'SULLIVAN1
ried out perfectly.
Supporting the main lead are,
! ,several minor parts, all of whichl"
.were admirably acted.aMerlin and
King Arthur gave especially good
characterizations. Fr a n k Albert-
son at times acted with an overdose
of affected naivete, but had very
little else to do. Maureen O'Sullivan
appeared on the scene very little,
and Myrna Loy performed very1
well the part of the usual high- I
pressure vamp who starts out to1
"get" Will Rogers.
The group scenes showed some
fine direction and good photogra-
phy. Perhaps the best and most
amusing shot of the whole show
was the "charge of the Austins.""
The finest bit of acting goes to Mer-I
4
&I ND DR~r
RONNY JOHANSSEN
A Review.
Miss Johanssen was entertaining
when inimitable; very dull when
imitative. Her accompanist was te-
dious all the time (seeming to nurse
an antagonism for the dancer's
tempos when she was accompanist
and opening the lid wide on harsh
tones unrythmically organized when
she was soloist). So that the eve-
ning was something of a come-
down after the fine evenings of
dancing we have had last year and
this at the Mendelssohn.
Within a very limited fieid, Miss
Johanssen is a delightful dancer.
She has a quite penetrative sym-
pathy for the pertness and levity
of the awkward rustic. When she is
merely translating this sympathy
(in "Polka"and "Rustic Dance")
by a piquant variety of pace and
some very charming miming, she
is very quaint and humourous.
When she is doing minor decorative
dances (her Menuet and Strauss
Waltz) she is also successful, though
very uncertain in execution.
But when she is imitating Yvonne
Georgi, the results are, I think, to
be deplored. She is utterly incap-
able, it would seem, of either Miss
Georgi's emotional depth,her un-
failing sense of design, or her pre-
cision of execution. The result is
such a dance as "Alla Marcia" in
which the peucliar approach to the
dance-art which Kreutzberg and
Georgi have perfected is dissipated
by seeming over-ambitious, over-
cryptic. There evidently was a nar-
rative to that dance, if one didn't
get it (as I didn't) the dance seem-
ed to have no continuity or coher-
ence. The "Javanese Impressions"
also seemed somewhat pointless.
RECITAL THIS AFTERNOON
Joseph Brinkman of tie piano
faculty of the School of Music will
continue the faculty series of reci-
tals this afternoon at 4:15 in the
Mendelssohn Theatre. Mr. Brink-
man is spending his first year in
Ann Arbor. Several years ago he
became prominent in the Chicago
Musical circles by winning the com-
petition for younger musicians that
meant an appearance as soloist
with the Chicago Symphony-a role
which he has duplicated several
times since. During the present
year, he has become familiar to
Ann Arbor audiences both as solo-
ist and as the pianist in the two
recitals of the School of Music Trio.
His program for this afternoon
will consist of the following num-
bers:
Toccata and Fugue ............
.Frescobaldi-Respighi
Ballade in D Minor ........Brahms
Ballade in F Major ......... Chopin
Toccata .......... Purcell-Sowerby
Sonata .................Brinkman
Prelude in C Minor .......... Bliere
Siluetas de la Calzada ...... Turina
Gargoyles ................ Goosens
La Marchande d'eau fraiche..Ibert
On Remembering a Child's .......
Tune .............. Lee Pattison
Caprice Italien ...........Poulenc
The public, with the exception of
small children, is cordially invited
to attend but urged to arrive on
time.
ART AND MRS. BOTTLE
Jane Cowl, the inimitable star
whom people enjoy in anything,
wil be seen Monday night at the
Whitney in a play "Art and Mrs.
Bottle" which was received very
well in New York and last week
got glowing notices (as indeed all
plays do) in Detroit. The author,
Benn W. Levy is a young English-
man who has another play "Mrs.
Moonlight" on Broadwayenow. In
"Art and Mrs. Bottle, Levy takes
as an object for pleasant satire the
various illusions of freedom and
utter beauty supposed to be con-
nected with the Bohemian life. His
Mrs. Bottle leaves a prosaic home,
husband and children to indulge
this life with a grand flourish. She
lasts, surprisingly long, staying a
"Bohemian" for some twenty years.
When she returns to her home she
squelches her children's illusions
and deftly re-establishes it as a
normal prosaic family.
Miss Cowl, who is inaugurating a
repertory, is said to have found this
role a very fertile opportunity for
her intricate and delightful comic
technique. Supporting her are two
very well-known men, Leon Quar-
termaine and Walter Kingsford.
The Whitney performances are
scheduled for 8:15.
MUSIC IN DETROIT
The Detroit Symphony program
in the regular subscriptions series
this week seems to be one of the
i
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qI. fil
it
lov1
IIC/
C,
We have long npted the progress pretty sad spectacle. From the
which the two largest representa- technical standpoint much of his
tines of our American civilization work might be analyzed as reiter-
have made in regards to their gov- word mahe analjzxasetes-
er~nnt.We hve n mid, ew1ated masses of juxtaposed tones
(tone clusters) requiring no ingen-
Y rk and Chicagd, both of whose uity whatsoever to write, plus quite
sp tendid and efficient administra- inocuous diatonic harmonic and
ti ns are undergoing investigations melodic progressions, mostly in a
b their respective states. different register. As for his count-
t is no secret that municipal, erpoint of rhythms, I can only say
gov rnment in the United States is that, although the idea is nothing
not ing but a history of graft, cor-- new, as employed by Mr. Cowell it
ru tion, political intrigue and a col- becomes musical mathematics, no
le tion of scoundrels and rascals more. To retain the same rhythm
be t only in managing their cities in the same voice, throughout a
no for the benefit of all the inhabi- piece for three voices is simply to
to its but just a few-themselves. multiply monotony. It looks as
Ci izens in municipalities for years though Mr. Cowell, when he con-
ha e been crying out against the ceives a technical innovation which
unjust and unfair methods which more gifted composers would simp-
have characterized their' govern- ly take for granted, proceeds to
ments. Citizen committees, reform write a piece solely to illustrate the
mbvements and all sorts of societies theory of it.
have in the past joined in to fight Musically his compositions are
Sthe governments of cities. Now, fi- scarcely above the elementary real-
nally, the states are acting. ism of such old-fashioned parlor
In New York, while Mayor Walk-- pieces as "The Burning of Rome"
r was vacationing in California and the "Battle of Waterloo." So
ying to appear healthier, espe- far I have failed to find anything
tally since he foresaw the brewing genuinely creative in his music, and
orm, an embroglio started by I am sorry that Ann Arbor has to
-Goyernor Roosevelt will perhaps re- hear it as representative of con-
sult in many drastic changes. Tam- temporary American music rather,
many hall is undergoing an em- than the work of such original and,I
C~od(gbrings the jog and glad-
T 1 US4 "
ul,
of the iWord I
-L ftly
very meaning
aster
... Spring,
expresses
the rebirth of
things new. At Eastertide the hearts
of
men
Make
renewed
interes
the highier
inspirations of
life.
t in.
At
for-
Eastertide We pause
and look
ward to
better
and
finrr
things to
come.
All the world
Welcomes3
this
Easter
with
its blessings
of happi-
ness.
U,,
Hilil l II II I I f11