The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1929-06-13
By P. ATTASHEVA.

NOlL:-MarJha LapkIna is the
leading actress" in S. Eisen-
STEMS ,st production, THE
General Line" The article here
printed shows what the Soviet
directors are doing to get closer
to life in their films. Unlike Holly
wood, the Soviet cinema grapples
with life, not as it is sugar-coated
and adulterated in studios and
with the aid of an elaborate star
system, but rather invades the
factories, the villages and the
streets for its material. Attasheva
is a co-wOrker of Eisenstein in the
Sovkino. The example she gives in
this article holds true generally in
all major productions in the So
Wet Unions. b.
Martha Lapkina's face is that of
a person accustomed to gazing down
at the ground; mot from any
surliness, but. from professional
habit.
Martha Lapkina had been hired
worker from her ninth year. From
her ninth year she worked on the
land. She locked after the farm ami
mails. She suffered want. She
toiled. But she never lost heart,
and in her work and all her duties
she was quick and alert. After the
revolution she worked on the Soviet
farm at Konstantinovka And there
Martha would have passed the rest
of her life but for chance incident,
but for the fact that chance led to
Martha's humble back being re-
quired.
Martha had never thought about
the cinema. She had no time, and
she was SO ignorant. When photo
graph was taken at the Soviet farm,
Martha came because they all came,
and they were all flattered at the
thought of taking part in it. And
this was what happened.
They started taking the photo
graphs, but there was no heroine for
the picture. The directors of The
General Line for two months ran
sacked the railway stations, the
lodging houses, the factories. They
toured the villages. They summoned
the women for inspection by pealing
the churchbell. They examined them;
they looked at thousands of faces.
Reduced to despair, the producer,
Eisenstein, even resolved upon
step utterly repugnant to his nature
he resolved to try using an actress
for the part. Now began an in
spection of actresses. Nothing came
of it. The actresses were insulted
when the first question put to them
was: "Can you milk COWS, plough,
guide a tractor?" Proudly they
answered "No."' And there the mat
ter ended. The directors again be-
gan to search far and wide. Finally,
from WEAKNESS, no doubt, they
thought that they had found what
they wanted. They began to take
the photographs. And they saw that
there was something wrong. At all
events they took the photographs
by preference from the back.
And finally, one fine day, the
heroine -. got tipsy, and did not
turn up for the photograph at all.
And then there entered the Soviet
Kino, with her humble back, the
modest and homely worker, Martha
Martha had no wish to leave her
home and go away with strangers.
But she agreed for the sake of the
She took her little boy, and
set off on her wanderings together
with the film company. What places
one has to go to!
From the first photographs it was
clear that Martha was extremely re-
sponsive and easily adapted herself
to the requirements of the cinema.
Eisenstein considers the most i'm
portant part of the work with the
actor to be the observa-
ton of the details of his or her
natural behavior. The important
thing is not rehearsing, but study
ing what the actor does instinctively.
Afterwards these studies must be
pieced together in the context re-
quired for the particular task in
hand. Something like the classical
example of Dourof* with the hen
which played the either. It was not
to teach the hen to play
the either. The difficulty was to
grasp and to turn to account the
ordinary movements of the hens
feet when it was scratching up rub
bish.
But Eisenstein is not Dourof, and
Lapkina is not a hen. And the re-
kt Al