Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-09-14

T TOLLYWOOD, Calf, September
- IS (NA.N.A) There is no
such thing as a high-brow
story. Pitch any tale along a
certain human level and the whole
world will understand it,
had just asked Edward Griffith how
it had come to pass that such play as
Holiday" could interest rich and poor
and high and low alike. Aside from
having one of the best evenings I had
ever experienced in a movie theater,
1 had experimental quite lot with
this picture I had asked friends of
all classes and taste for their candid
opinions. They had enjoyed it thor
oughly and their verdict had been
unanimous. Yet the play is about rich
people-very rich people-and the trials
and tribulations of those who have
more money than humanity.
The man who directed Holiday
began his career in the old silentS some
seventeen years ago. He has directed
every one Imaginable, from Norma Tai
madge to Ann Harding. He worked ar
duously in the days when director
meant nothing to the public; in the
days when stars were in the nebulous
state.
And he claims that talkies have moth
ing to do with it. That all through the
history of the gelatin art human stories
pitched along the correct line have
registered with the public regardless OF
subject matter. :,
"The troubles of a rich man should
be as vital to a poor man as are his
own difficulties" says Griffith. If he
cuts his finger, it bleeds and he suffers
pain. If his daughter marries man
he (the rich mani doesn't approve. he
suffers the same type of agony which
any man endures under like c1rcum-
stances When his wife runs away, the
rich man misses her in much the same
way a man of lesser financial affairs
takes the tragedy of unfaithfulneSs.
1T is only when one deals in alb
stractions, in remote things exclusively
in financial problems, or matters OF per-
sonal ACKNOWLEDGMENT or ambition, that
the play becomes something for classes
and not for masses"
The explanation of this follows one OF
the most widely discussed ventures OF
the year When the play Holiday" was
suggested as a possible vehicle for Ann
Harding, that young lady's voice rang
out loudly in disapproval. There were
others also. Producer voices. And
supervisor and executive protests that
had to be talked down and stilled. The
chief objection to the story was that
it appealed to classes. Its about rich
people" was the complaint. and when
people are as rich as these. Loneliness
and a Wistful longing for simple pleas
ures are hard things for the average
person to comprehend.
The average person, Scrambl1ng IN
these days to make ends meet, THINKS
if such q fate we're his, he'd never COM
plain as to what the parties were like
or the people. Three meals day.
motor cars, mansions, country houses,
theaters-whew! How're you going TO
make them understand that such people
are lonely?
Grifiths could, and did. Ann Hard
ing played the part with protest on her
lips, and on her opening night reailzeo
that here was her greatest cinema Sic
cess to date. And Griffith became, IN
an instant, one of the outstanding d.
rectors of a colony where the day before
he had been one of the good directors.
The outstanding talking picture sue
cesses have been made by slient PIC
ture directors. Which proves beyond
doubt that this new art is perhaps more
a thing of the camera and pantomlme
than it is of sound.
"Talkies have all sorts of new devei-
opments, which will come so gradually
and logically that the Improvement IN
them a year hence may only be approx
mated by reshowing some OF the tnlnSs
made IL months before" says Grifntn
He has a few new ideas up MS OWL