Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1935-08-04

artistic revolution was brewing in Holly
wood last winter, Reuben Mamoullan
A should have been directing it. His career
has been like that - a succession of quick.
decisive marches across alien Theatre terri
tory, which have invariably crashed into
sharp victories. Becky Sharp is no excep-
ton. For whether the color campaign is going
to be one of slow conquest or galloping ami
hilation OF black and white, in his pioneering
with this, the first full-length feature picture
to use the new three color process, Mamoulian
has fired the shot which will ultimately be
heard in every moving picture studio in the
world
Just as this year, Becky Sharp" done in
an undisciplined medium, established color as
beautiful and living and necessary accom-
paniment TO dramatic action on the screen, so,
back in 1928 when the talkies were still in
the experimental stage, the first picture he
ever directed, Applause" with Helen
Morgan, touched new high in sound pro-
lection. Up to the time he put Applause"
into production he had never even owned
camera, and his entire moving picture expe-
renee consisted of five weeks spent hanging
around the Paramount Studios in Astoria,
watching the directors. actors, camera men;
asking questions. seeing how the electricians
handled their lights. When he started work
his methods were so revolutionary that he
had to beat down the opposition of every
technician on the set; but after Applause"
was finished it was discovered that Ma
mouian had used sound more creatively, more
effectively, than it had ever been used before.
The year before that, completely unknown
on Broadway, he had taken the script of
"Porgy' and a band of fifty unframed
Negroes and made for The Theatre Guild one
of the most important and haunting produc-
tons the American stage has seen. The re-
cording of the rhythms Off Charleston slum-
carpet beaters. brooms, knife-sharpeners,
kettles, hammers, bells, saws, voices, con-
Quoted from the wings with baton, the beat
shifting -four flour, two-four six-eight, syn
copateD; the wake with the swaying bodies,
the frenzy of spirituals, the supplicating
shadows, have become classic legends of our
theatre. "Porgy" ran for two years and half
on Broadway. Ravel pronounced it the finest
opera he had ever heard; and, overnight, it
established Mamoulian as one of the great
directors of the world.
The unique contribution of his genius, how
ever, has not been his superb technique, his
fair for detail. his quick mastery of new
Theatre forms, or his painstaking method,
important as these have been. 1t has been his
poets reverence for the color and drama and
rhythm of an ordered universe. Instead of
using the medium of words this gift has mani
tested itself in terms of theatre; universal
and living theatre which became splendid
reality for him during happy and excep-
tional childhood.
Mamoulian was born in Tif1is, in Russian
Caucasus. baked, picturesque, sprawling
on both banks of the Kura. under the harsh
crags of the Swam Mountains, Tifis humslike
an East Indian bazaar.
Reuben was taken often to see plays when
! he was child, but even more than the or
gained performances he remembers the
drama and color and staccato rhythm of the
city streets. He remembers, too, his grand