Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1935-03-03


as follows:
THIS is the story of a soldier of
fortune. a professor of chemistry,
o designer of stage sets, fellow
named Whitney-and a very per-
sistent idea.
Ten years ago, in the Fall of 1925,
Merriam Caldwell Cooper, film pro-
Queer, director. cameraman and SOL
dier of adventure appeared suddenly
from out of the tangled mass OF dank
Malay jungle, dragging with him sew
eral tin boxes containing a number
of reels of exposed motion picture
negative. The film was Chang"
which proved to be probably the most
amazing and by far the most success
full wild animal story ever projected
upon a motion picture screen.
For IL long months Cooper and
his co-partner. Ernest Schoedsack.
had made the tangled, tropic thicket
their home. Twelve monotonous
months of drudgery and deprivation.
with nothing to do but work and
dream.
And the harder he worked the more
Cooper dreamed.
What a pity that Chang" couldn't
be created in natural colors. What
a shame that the real beauty of
the jungle couldn't be transformed
to the screen in its true state rather
than In its drab gray. Each time
he looked into the ground-glaSS screen
to check the focus of their solitary
camera the fact was brought home
to him with greater force.
Some day, he decided, he would
make a picture in natural colors.
And thus the persistent idea was
born.
TEN years ago, in the Fall of 1925,
- DR.. Herbert Thomas Kalmus,
scientist, business man and former
professor of chemistry at the MaSsa-
chusetts Institute of Technology, was
clustered in tiny Hollywood lab
oratory, where. with a group of his
inventors, he labored to improve an
idea conceived in 1915, an idea to put
color into motion pictures.
The name of the laboratory was
Technicolor. 1t was started by a
group of physicists who were grad
yates of the Massachusetts Institute.
Technicolor was still young COM
pany, comparatively unknown. Its
first commercial picture, Toll of the
Sea-" starring Anna May Wong, was
made in 1921. Unfortunately, Tech
nicolor had only been able to create
a two-color process which was far
from perfect in its color producing
function. Only two colors we're regis
tered on the film-red and green.
1t Is not possible to get an accurate
reproduction of all the colors in the
spectrum when only red and green
are used. A certain shade of blue
is, for instance, impossible to cap
ture. And blue is one of the three
component colors that 60 to make up
all other colors.
Thus 1t was that in the Fall Of
1925, in his tiny laboratory in Holly
wood, DR.. Herbert Thomas Kalmus
and his handful of technicians were
laboring to bring their process to
perfection.
TEN years ago Robert Edmond
= Jones, artist. poet and a mas
ter designer of stage settings, took
over the Greenwich Village Theater
for the production of better stage
plays. With him was Eugene ONeill,
the playwright, and a young pro-
ducer. Kenneth Mcgowan. Jones
saw in the venture an opportun.S
to express his creativeness as he had
never before been permitted. To the
people on the stage Jones was always
known as master of light and color,
a craftsman as well as an artist.
Shortly before, he had done the
settings for the production of Ham
let," starring John Barrymore. in
which Barrymore played more con-
secutive performances of "Hamlet"
than had ever been done before.
Now Jones, with ONeill and Mac
gowan. was going to create the the
alter which lies in the back of the
mind of every artist of the stage.
Now, for the first time, he was going
to be able to express himself as he
felt, to rise to the top of his power.
TEN years ago John Hay Whitney
was in his senior year at Yale
University.
Now let's jump back to Merriam
Cooper and his persistent idea.
1t is still the Fall of 1925. Cooper
has returned to America with his be-
loved Chang" The negative is final
~ developed, cut, edited and printed.
At its premiere in New York it is
acclaimed by audience and critics
alike.
For his next. Cooper plans color
picture. The picture most certainly
must be done in natural colors. But
after weeks of planning the idea is
abandoned. Color photography is not
yet far enough advanced for so dar-
ing q venture.
It Is now 1928. The technicolor
process has improved with leaps and
bounds. Much of the fuzziness and
blurriness that marked the initial
color trials has been eliminated
True, it is still only two-component
process, but the colors are better set
Sound has come in, 1.-THE Jazz
Singer" 1.-THE Lion and the Mouse,
an Old Arizona" Interference. To
Cooper 1t is significant that color in
motion pictures is all the more neces-
sary. "Galloping gray ghosts that
Tit eerie-lke over the screen and talk
cannot by themselves long endure.
One of the men who listens is Jesse
L. Lasky, whose organization, Para
mount Famous-Lasky, has released
"Chang." For hours on end Cooper
pours his color enthusiasm into Las
ky's ready ears. Lasky has been sold
on color, but color in a studio and
color on location are two different
things. After weeks of debate. 1t Is
finally decided to wait while longer
Again the persistent idea suffers q
setback. However, Cooper has lost
none of his enthusiasm.
Comes the day when Warner
Bros, still happy over their success
as the sponsors Of sound, take ur
technicolor as the next great motion
picture advance. Immediately othel
producers follow.
Technicolor tries hard to keep ur