Word: opera
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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...those movies which is significant not only for what "couth" Samuel Goldwin has put into the show which bears his name, but also for what he leaves out--namely, a plot. Rows of chorus girls, silvery glitter, and shiny floors are here replaced by the ballet and the opera, both excellently handled. Added to this are Charlie McCarthy, making his full-length movie debut, and the whacky Ritz Brothers, who, as usual, hold their own on the comedy side. Nevertheless, when all the ingredients of the pot are stirred up into one soup, the "Follies" lacks unity, chiefly because...
...golden age" which all operagoers ever 50 recall with sighs, the famous Rodolfos of Puccini's La Boheme (Bonci, Caruso, Gigli) had powerful voices and rotund figures. Today's cinema-bred audiences demand smaller bellies, and get, as a rule, weaker diaphragms. Old-time opera fans do not mind the drop in avoirdupois, but they sniff contemptuously at the comparatively microphonic murmuring that goes with...
Therefore, last week when Manhattanites thronged the Metropolitan Opera to hear & see a new Rodolfo, Polish Tenor Jan Kiepura's exploits as Central Europe's cinema idol were no particular recommendation. But they found before the performance was over that a virile figure was not Kiepura's only asset. Tall, handsome Kiepura overacted at times, flopped melodramatically upon the prostrate corpse of Mimi. But his singing was agreeably robust, warm in tone quality. Applauding oldsters agreed that there was nothing the matter with Kiepura's diaphragm...
Romance in the Dark (Paramount) is like most other attempts to hitch the Hollywood wagon to a grand opera star. Its heroine is brunette, oval-faced Mezzo-Soprano Gladys Swarthout, prettiest and most adaptable of the cinema-minded opera singers. Most singing stars by this time walk blindfolded through the story of the girl who has to submit to subterfuge, disguise and heartache to get her chance. Miss Swarthout's version of this old story is pleasantly ingenuous. But with aging John Barrymore pitting his serrated profile against John Boles's open-mouthed full face in a battle...
When Romance in the Dark was in the making, considerable fuss was made over a sequence in which Singer Swarthout was pelted with tomatoes by an opera audience. Previewers greeted the scene with no enthusiasm, and it was cut out. Now the only tomato thrown squishes over the Latin features of Tenor Fortunio Bona-Nava...