 |
| Richard Tauber as Canio in the British Chemicolour Prologue |
Its trade world premiere was in London on 11 December 1936. At its public world premiere in Vienna on 14 January 1937 as Der Bajazzo, it was shown simultaneously in four cinemas with Tauber appearing in person at each cinema. The UK public premiere was at the Carlton Cinema, Haymarket, on 18 March 1937. Its US premiere, as A Clown Must Laugh was on 11 October 1938.
Tauber's costume is that worn by Enrico Caruso for the production at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in 1913. It was specially loaned by the British Museum.
Cast
Canio Salvatini, head of the troupe ... Richard TauberNedda Salvatini, married to Canio but in love with Silvio ... Steffi Duna (sung by Angela Parselles in the Play)
Trina ... Diana Napier
Tonio, the fool ... Arthur Margetson (sung by Robert Easton in the Play)
Silvio, in love with Nedda ... Esmond Knight
Beppe, a comic trouper .. Jerry Verno
Leone ... Gordon James
Coachman ... Ivan Wilmot
Coachbuilder ... John Traynor
Officers ... Daley Cooper, Jnr., Ambrose Day, Harry Milton, Roy Findlay, Joe Roncoroni
Director: Karl Grune
Libretto: Ruggero Leoncavallo (original Italian libretto)
Story adaptation and dialogue: Monckton Hoffe, Roger Burford
Lyrics: John Drinkwater
Dialogue supervisors: Leon M. Lion, Rosse Thompson
Writers: Bertolt Brecht (uncredited), Fritz Kortner (uncredited)
Music: Ruggero Leoncavallo, arranged by Hans Eisler
Conductor: Albert Coates, assisted by Boyd Neel
Choreography: Wendy Toye
Cinematography: Otto Kanturek
Camera: Alfred Black
Art direction: Oscar Friedrich Werndorff
Film editor: Walter Stokvis
Production manager: Fritz Brunn
Sound engineer: Bert Ross
The Era
Wednesday 1 January 1936
In 1936 WE / BELIEVE / EXHIBITORS / WILL LEARN TO / LOOK FORWARD WITH / KEEN EXPECTANCY TO / EACH NEW MAX SCHACH / PRODUCTION MADE by / CAPITOL
PAGLIACCI
(A Grune-Tauber Picture.) KARL GRUNE, Director; RICHARD TAUBER, Star.
The Era
Wednesday 1 January 1936
Coming plans include I Pagliacci to be directed by Grune, with Richard Tauber as the star. Max Schach acquired the sole rights of Leoncavallo’s opera, and intends to make the film version in an entirely original way.
In securing these rights, it is now common knowledge that American and British producers have had to alter their plans.
Daily Mirror
Friday 17 January 1936
For his next story, Pagliacci, Karl Grune is going to try Swiss locations. I gather RICHARD TAUBER and Co. will start work on the story of the famous opera in the vicinity of Wengen, up on the Scheidegg. At that height they should be assured of sun and snow.
Daily Herald
Thursday 6 February 1936
NEW FILM UNIT
WILL MAKE PAGLIACCI WITH TAUBER
From Our Film Correspondent
A new British company, Trafalgar Films Ltd., has been formed with guaranteed world distribution by the United Artists combine.
Its first two pictures will be Pagliacci, Leoncavallo opera starring Richard Tauber, and Elizabeth of England, in which Flora Robson and Robert Donat will probably appear.
Chairman of the new company is Mr. Max Schach.
The Era
Wednesday 19 February 1936
Max Schach’s Latest Plans
MAX SCHACH, the go-ahead presiding genius of Capitol Films, has recently concluded agreements for the production and distribution of a fresh batch of films. Apart from those announced some time back, the current arrangements bring his commitments up to twelve pictures, all of these to be finished within fifteen months. Trafalgar Films Productions, the newly-formed unit, will be responsible for three. They will be released in this country and the States by United Artists. Schach has just signed a contract with London Films to rent a block of their Denham studios for a period of three years. The rent to be paid over that time will amount to £350,000. The first film to into production there will be Pagliacci.
A Film Of "Pagliacci"
Date: Tuesday, Aug. 11, 1936
Publication: The Times (London, England)
Work began at Elstree yesterday on the production of a film based on Leoncavallo's opera Pagliacci. The cast includes Herr Tauber as Canio, Mlle. Steffi Duna as Nedda, Mr. Arthur Margetson as Tonio, Mr, Jerry Verno as Beppo, Mr. Esmond Knight as Silvio, Miss Diana Napier as Trina, and Mr. Arthur Chesney as the Coachbuilder. Mr. Monkton-Hoffe and Mr. Roger Burford have prepared the screenplay; Mr. John Drinkwater is responsible for some of the lyrics; and Mr. Albert Coates, assisted by Mr. Boyd Neel, has undertaken the task of preparing Leoncavallo's music for the screen.
Falkirk Herald
Wednesday 15 April 1936
GRAND OPERA AT LAST
Does the British film goer want opera on the screen? For years this burning question has exercised the great minds of our film magnates, keeping them awake o’ nights and turning their scanty locks prematurely grey.
One British producer, more courageous—or more reckless, if you like—than the rest, has acquired the film rights of Puccini's I Pagliacci, and will shortly put the operatic problem to a practical test.
But, alas! once again America has forestalled us, for within the next week or two there will presented, positively for the first time on any screen, Mickey’s Grand Opera, co-starring Madame Clara Cluck, the world-famous coloratura soprano, and Signor Donaldo Duck, "tenoro robusto" of great power and range. M. Miki Mouse, the celebrated maestro, whose brilliant conducting of the William Tell overture in The Band Concert will long be remembered, will wield the baton.
M. Mouse’s business manager, Walt Disney, declines to divulge the name the opera concerned, but declares that it is definitely not I Pagliacci. "Signor Duck," he says, "is a tenor of considerable promise, but 1 am afraid he is not yet capable tackling 'On with the Motley'—but for heaven’s sake, don’t tell him I said so.”
Daily Mirror
Saturday 18 April 1936
RICHARD TAUBER TO MARRY IN LONDON
BY OUR FILM CORRESPONDENT
RICHARD Tauber, the tenor, and his fiancee, Diana Napier, the film star, are to be married in a London register office late in June, when Tauber's decree against his Austrian wife is made absolute. Part of their honeymoon will be spent in Brighton, where Miss Napier's mother lives. When I saw the couple last night, on their return from Vienna, where the tenor has been singing in the State opera season, they were radiantly happy. They have come back to London to appeal in two new films, I Pagliacci and Land Without Song, which will both be made at Denham by Trafalgar Films. The wedding will take place between the making of these two films. "We would rather forget the past and look forward to the future," Miss Napier told me. "We are planning the wedding to take place immediately after Richard and I have made the I Pagliacci film."
Nottingham Evening Post
Monday 20 April 1936
£20,000 OPERA FILM STARRING TAUBER.
AMBITIOUS PLANS ANNOUNCED BY MAX SCHACH.
WELL-KNOWN PRIMA DONNA TO TAKE PART.
Ambitious plans have been announced Max Schach which, if realised, will make him one of the most influential forces in British film-making.
The first of these projects is the filming of Leoncavallo's opera, I Pagliacci, with Richard Tauber, which is to start in a few days. This is believed to be the first time that a whole opera has been adapted for filming.
A considerable amount of additional incident leading up to the situation depicted in the opera is to be introduced, it is learned, but the story will be substantially adhered to and most of the original music retained. Negotiations are proceeding for a well-known film prima donna to play opposite Herr Tauber.
PROBABLY A RECORD.
The rights of the opera were obtained for the sum of £20,000, probably a record price for British company to pay for a subject. Mr. Schach learned that Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer had been buying every available opera, and had an option on I Pagliacci for £20,000. If they wished to take it it was necessary for them to hand in a telegram of acceptance at Los Angeles before two o'clock on a certain date.
Mr. Schach cabled a deposit of £5,000 to the agents for the sale, and asked that the opera should be sold him if Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer did not accept. The latter handed in their telegram at 2.35 p.m., and the opera became Mr. Schach's by 35 minutes.
Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette
Saturday 25 April 1936
To Be Married in June
Diana Napier, the Bath-born film star, and Richard Tauber, have returned by air from Vienna, and are back in London, making plans for their wedding in June and for the honeymoon in Brighton. "Half a year for a divorce, an endless struggle with authority, and at last we are free," Miss Napier said in interview on Friday night. "Through it all, Richard has been singing in Italian opera and teaching me German. He succeeded so well that he is to take the title role in Pagliacci, his new film, and I am to speak German in Vienna next Christmas."
After the Pagliacci film they will take love-sick, but tragic, roles in another film, Land Without Music. The only thing Richard cannot teach his Diana is how to sing. "Not a note in her head which might be accurate," he said in despair. Asked if he had acquired anything abroad, his only answer was, "a good figure," for Miss Napier has been taking the chocolate and sausages out of his diet. He has retaliated cutting down her cigarettes.
The Era
Wednesday 29 July 1936
Steffi Duna, the Hungarian brunette who danced in Radio’s Technicolor La Cucharacha and Dancing Pirate, arrives on the Berengaria to-day. She will play Nedda opposite Tauber in Capitol’s Pagliacci.
The Era
Wednesday 12 August 1936
TAUBER IN PAGLIACCI
Trafalgar’s Screen Opera
PAGLIACCI, Trafalgar's screen opera, has gone into production at the B.1.P. Studios. It is being produced by Max Schach as his first subject for United Artists’ release.
Richard Tauber is playing Canio, and is directed by Karl Grune. They call it an "operatic film" as distinct from a "filmed opera."
Monkton Hoffe and Roger Burford have prepared the screen play whilst some of the lyrics have been devised by John Drinkwater. Albert Coates, assisted by Boyd Neel, will be responsible for putting the Leoncavallo music on the screen.
The cast also includes Steffi as Nedda, Arthur Margetson as Tonio, Jerry Verno as Beppe, Esmond Knight as Silvio, Diana Napier as Trina, and Arthur Chesney as the Coachbuilder.
Belfast Telegraph
Thursday 20 August 1936
OPERA ON THE SCREEN.
There is good news for opera lovers. and particularly those who find Covent Garden prices beyond their means. It is that the first of what may well prove to be a cycle of films based on the world's greatest operas has gone into production in a British studio. The first shots of Pagliacci have been taken at Elstree, and Karl Grune, who is directing, has under him a cast of considerable talent. Richard Tauber is Canio, and Steffi Duna is Nedda, Esmond Knight is taking the part of Silvo, Nedda's lover. and Arthur Margetson, Jerry Verno, Diana Napier, and Arthur Chesney have leading parts. The all important task of putting Leoncavallo's glorious music on the screen has been entrusted to Albert Coates and Boyd Neel. and I am told that it will he played by the most carefully selected orchestra which has ever been employed in a film studio. Several of the lyrics have been written be John Drinkwater, and it is altogether a very ambitious project.
The Era
Wednesday 2 September 1936
COLOUR FOR PAGLIACCI
Chemicolour Process
At the Elstree Studios last week I saw a colour film that carries us a stage nearer perfection, writes an Era correspondent.
It was a demonstration of the British Chemicolour process, the joint invention of Otto Kanturek, Karl Grune, and Viktor Gluck.
Technically described as a subtractive process, Chemicolour is based on the colours of the colour spectrum—yellow, red, green, and blue —and is produced by a photographic galvanochemic system.
It is claimed that not more than 12 to 15 per cent more light is needed than in black and white films.
The actual printing of Chemicolour copies is carried out, as in the case of black and white films, by mechanical means, and can be shown on the screen in colour within forty-eight hours of shooting.
No additional projection light nor any kind of adjustment to the projector is necessary.
The first film in which the British Chemicolour process is being used extensively is Pagliacci, the Trafalgar Films production, now being directed by Karl Grune at Elstree, for world release by U.A.
The pictures shown ranged from sea scenes to interiors, shots of Ann Harding and Steffi Duna being particularly pleasing. The colours are as "natural" as any that have ever been seen on a screen, and, to my mind, their composition is more successful than in other systems.
The Stage
Thursday 10 September 1936
The mechanics of film-making.
The theatre compère of the Evening News relates that he went to Elstree to see Richard Tauber doing some scenes for the soreen version of I Pagliacci. Tauber was seated on a property caravan as Canio, and a loud speaker on the floor was giving out "On with the Motley," from one of the tenor's records. Tauber was not singing, only making lip movements to the song. Then he began rehearsing, acting in unison with the words of the song. The record, it is stated, was repeated twenty times or so, Tauber accompanying it with his acting. We are told that Richard Tauber is going to be "a revelation as an actor in this film." Perhaps; but there are things that, as Dundreary said, "no fellah can understand."
The Tatler
Wednesday 30 September 1936
Richard Tauber, who is in the big group with his clever young wife, is also amongst the toilers at Denham, and has just finished a picture of I Pagliacci there.
Linlithgowshire Gazette
Friday 9 October 1936
PAGLIACCI NEARS COMPLETION
Rapid progress in the production of the Max Schach-Trafalgar subject Pagliacci has brought the film version of Leoncavallo’s most famous opera, under the direction of Karl Grune to its final stages of shooting.
Work has been concentrated during the last few days the filming of the play within the play in which the tragic climax of the drama of jealousy is reached.
As in the opera, a strong dramatic effect obtained in the film in this sequence by the juxtaposition of comedy and tragedy, the climax being reached during the performance of a traditional Italian comedy known to now as a Harlequinade, into which a delightful ballet sequence is introduced, with Steffi Duna, Tauber’s leading lady in the film, dancing as Columbine.
For this sequence a lavishly mounted and beautifully designed set has been constructed representing the stage and the auditorium of a travelling Italian theatre of the beginning of this century.
Linlithgowshire Gazette
Friday 16 October 1936
RICHARD TAUBER BUYS A CARAVAN
Succumbing to a persuasiveness reminiscent of the car salesman's tactics to-day, Richard Tauber has bought a a very nice caravan, too, with sliding panels revealing bed complete with a model of brunette to add to the persuasiveness.
This delightful scene at Italian caravan vendor's at the beginning of the century, has been one of the many taken during the last few days by Karl Grune, busy completing the Max Schach-Trafalgar screen version of Pagliacci starring Richard Tauber, and with Steffi Duna, Diana Napier, Esmond Knight, Arthur Margetson, and Jerry Verno in other principal roles.
Considerable interest has been aroused in the trade since Max Schach's acquisition of the film rights of Leoncavallo’s great opera was announced, to the possibility of this production leading to a cycle of screen of the classic operas. Discussing this possibility in a published interview the other day, Karl Grune stated his belief that the successful film opera can be achieved I only when the original abounds in real human and dramatic situations, as does this famous drama jealousy. Screen audiences, continued Grune, are accustomed to films being true to life, and the artificial conventions of the stage opera must be dispensed with before can become, acceptable film fare.
This principle he has applied in Pagliacci. Leoncavallo’s music is used in its entirety, mostly as background music, but wherever singing has been introduced it has been done in logical and convincing manner.
Belfast Telegraph
Monday 19 October 1936
TAUBER SAYS "AU REVOIR."
Mr. and Mrs. Richard Tauber (Diana Napier) have left London and will be away for six months. Twice during that period they will fly back from Vienna to London—for the premieres of the two Max Schach films, Pagliacci, and Land Without Music, in both of which Tauber stars and Miss Napier plays a leading role. After its trade-show last week. Land Without Music was hailed as Tauber's finest film yet. Mr. and Mrs. Tauber will spend a week in Switzerland, with Tauber concerts in Basle and Berne, and two or three days in Salzburg, where he is to sing again. Then they will have a holiday in the Austrian Tyrol before going to the furnished house they have taken in Vienna for the opera season. Tauber opens the season on November 12 in 'Don Juan. Early in the season he will sing I Pagliacci, which was a tremendous success at the same opera house last winter. At the close of the season Mr. and Mrs. Tauber will go to Cairo, and in April will return to the flat they have taken in Culross Street, Mayfair.
The Australian Woman's Mirror
FILM FLASH FROM ELSTREE!
Steffi Duna, most attractive young Hungarian actress from Hollywood, over here to play Nedda to Richard Tauber’s Pagliacci, likes us all very much and London in particular, because it was at Grosvenor House four years ago that she met John Carroll, the six-feet of American manhood, to whom she engaged herself two days before leaving New York.
The pretty Hungarian can act (I dare say you saw her in La Cucuracha and Dancing Pirate, Hollywood’s color films), but she is leaving all the family singing to husband-to-be. He was the singer who appeared with her in the American film Hi, Gaucho. In the Pagliacci film Nedda’s operatic airs will be recorded, and Steffi Duna will just open and close her mouth prettily to suit the music. Sounds simple, but you just try it! Australian singer Angela Parselles provides the voice. They predict here that it won’t be long before she’s a film star in her own right.
The Era
Wednesday 25 November 1936
NOW COMPLETE By F. S. JENNINGS
(“Era" Studio Correspondent)
It is announced that, following a special viewing of I Pagliacci by the directors of Capitol-Trafalgar Productions, it has been decided to include those scenes which were shot in colour.
These scenes comprise about one third of the action, and all of the material will be used in the final copy of the film.
The process utilised was British Chemicolour, and, outside of certain studio executives, it will be the first time that it has been seen by an audience.
It is the joint invention of Karl Grune, Otto Kanturek, and Victor Gluck, who have been working on it for years.
Pagliacci is the first film in which Chemicolour has been used, and following the premiere, about which an announcement is expected shortly, it will be available to other film producers.
Optimistic claims are being put forward about the future of colour in films, and I do not wish to cast a pre-preview damper on the possibilities of the process mentioned.
It is doubtless all that is said about it, but from the all-colour films I have seen during the past two years, and from what I have heard as to the public reaction, I should say that colour is going to mean considerably less than stereoscopy, which, when it does arrive in perfection, will provide the final and lasting touch to illusion.
The Era
Wednesday 9 December 1936
CHEMICOLOUR PROCESS
Pagliacci First Big Show
Friday night at the Hippodrome Theatre, when the Capitol-Trafalgar Production, Pagliacci is shown, the trade will have its first opportunity of viewing the British Chemicolour Process.
Karl Grune directed Pagliacci, which stars Richard Tauber and Steffi Duna, and about one-third of the finished production is filmed in Chemicolour.
The colour sequences were photographed under the supervision of Otto Kanturek.
The Era
Wednesday 9 December 1936
Trade Show Diary
Look Before You Book
London
December 11 - Pagliacci, United Artists, Hippodrome, 8.45
Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette
Saturday 12 December 1936
Courageous British Production
A FILM has just been completed in London which may start a new "cycle" and open the eyes of the world’s producers a wealth of new material. To have this effect, of course, it must a pioneering effort and the courage of the British company who made it is to be applauded.
The title of this film is Pagliacci and its star is Richard Tauber. It is a screen transcription of Leoncavallo's opera.
Will it be successful? ..... Tauber and Karl Grune, its director, are sure it will, but they are artists. Max Schach’s company, Trafalgar Films, is not quite so sure, though it naturally feels considerable pride in its product. Company chiefs regard it more as an experiment than a probable money-maker. This film is the first screen opera. It is quite distinct from the previous operatic ventures of Grace Moore and Lily Pons, because they were films of contemporary and conventional life, introducing , by a back-stage story, several operatic excerpts.
But Pagliacci is not a series of excerpts and not a film of modern life punctuated by a few song recitals. It has the story of the opera as its story basis and Leoncavallo's music as its only music.
Changes In Score
There has, of course, been necessity to reduce the original piece to the running time of a modern movie, but nothing of importance has been omitted. The residue of the music, if serving no purpose in the story, has been used for background accompaniment.
Before commenting on the production's chance of success, I should describe to you what changes have been made in the original score.
Opera in the form presented on the stage will be realized by everyone to be unsuitable for the screen. This is especially so in the case of Pagliacci.
Those familiar with it will know of the intense emotion and melodramatic characters. Even its story has a base of unstinted melodrama concerning a man who experiences such an extreme jealousy that he stabs his wife during a stage performance and then, emotions still uncontrolled, stabs his wife’s lover, who is among the audience.
It was a difficult subject to bring to the screen without spoiling the music, which will always be its greatest charm, and its fiery emotion had to be accommodated to the more realistic and restrained needs of the cinema.
The opera is a play within a play, and for the film the inner portion—the performance during which Canio commits the murders—has been retained in its entirety.
John Drinkwater has translated it into English in rhymed couplets, and it serves its original purpose as the climax of the story.
Action Introduced
The outer portion, which leads to the climax, has in places been abbreviated, in others extended, to allow the cinema audience to follow in greater detail the events that cause the terrible jealousy. In this way the essential screen action has been introduced. Karl Grune has aimed at making a good film and, with the eager assistance of Tauber, has worked hard in attempt to show the world that his belief in opera as a screen subject is justified.
But film-goers are interested only in the entertainment with which they are presented, and the aims and ideals of the men behind the scenes are often the objects of shattering criticism.
That is why there is doubt about the success of Pagliacci and also why, if you are discriminating in your taste for films, you should try to see it.
If drama and music which, incidentally, was directed for the film by Albert Coates, are both efficiently transcribed, there will be satisfaction for the enthusiasts of both arts, but if, for instance, a film-goer were more interested in drama and found in this film it was weak, his reaction would condemn, despite the possibility that the musical part was excellent.
Divided Audience
That is the inevitable fate of a film which provides for differing minds. There is always a divided audience and conflicting opinion.
To succeed, Pagliacci must be well acted and sung and must possess action, which is the primary qualification of a modern film. With this, there is no reason why it should fail.
But in Heart's Desire, there was a Pagliacci-like portrayal by Tauber which was intensely painful to watch. You will remember this embarrassing scene - when the star staggered in the wings of the theatre because of disappointment in love.
If the realism in the new film is not better than that it is a certain failure.
Until the film is seen no criticism can be made, and meanwhile I applaud the courageous scheme of Trafalgar Films and wish it success.
With developments in interpretation opera could be made interesting film-fare. It would be joyously welcomed by some, who are growing tired of entertainment and will accept it even if it is utter rubbish.
Dundee Evening Telegraph
Wednesday 16 December 1936
LEONCAVALLO'S Pagliacci, the first classic opera to be transferred to the talking screen, has just been completed. It was shown privately to the film trade last Friday. Part of the picture has been made by new colour process—British Chemicolour.
If the experiment is successful—only the picture-going public can decide that —it will open up a wide new field of screen material.
Richard Tauber, Steffi Duna, Diana Napier, and Esmond Knight are principals. Hans Eisler, famous continental musician; Albert Coates, and Boyd Neel were responsible for the musical side of the work.
Tauber has a rich sense of humour, and made Mr Coates his butt while production was in progress.
The tenor was going over one of his songs softly between scenes, and ' Mr Coates was standing by when he noticed that on the piano was a little packet of throat lozenges.
Interested to know what kind of lozenge Tauber considered suitable for his valuable throat he opened the packet —to find an assortment of tin-tacks and steel screws.
With a fine show of anger, Tauber snatched the packet from him. Tauber then shrugged his shoulders resignedly.
"What is the use?" he said. "I can hide it no longer. You have learnt the secret of my voice."
The Era
Wednesday 16 December 1936
PAGLIACCI IS GREAT BOX-OFFICE
TAUBER’S FINE SINGING, by G. A. ATKINSON
STEFFI DUNA'S uncommon name attracted some attention when she was launched in films by Cecil Lewis, at Elstree, some four years ago. Since then it has been in the Hollywood news, but her performance in support of Tauber in the Max Schach production of Pagliacci is Miss Duna's first real screen justification.
She is a trifle too young for the role, and fails to convey a full sense of the tragic destiny of the femme fatale. There is also a slight misunderstanding over the gestures required from her in the scene with Punchinello at the finish.
Otherwise, it seems to me, this young woman establishes the qualities that make for box office appeal, a tribute, one may suppose, to the directorial skill of Karl Grüne.
Mr. Grüne also seems to have been exercising his persuasive powers on Richard Tauber, whose acting improves as he slims. He is quite surprisingly well-cast as the tragic clown, strikes just the right note of fatuous geniality as the uxorious husband, and also conveys a substantial impression of impending doom, though there is little left for any player to say or do or sing on the subject of the clown with a breaking heart. He has been dramatic currency since drama began.
In the Italy of Leoncavallo the tragedy could but end with the death of all three principals, because that satisfies the bloodthirsty demands of vendetta, but in Anglo-Saxon countries one imagines that the girl would elope with the other fellow, and that the husband would be called some years later to her death-bed repentance after her lover had deserted her.
Many people, perhaps, will be inclined to think that the best single performance in the production is that given by Esmond Knight in the “co-respondent” role of Silvio.
It is marked with an intensity of passion that is Latin in fervour, though Latins, of late, have not been getting away with all the passion, and there is a topical ring in the line: "Which is more important, Love or Duty?"
Arthur Margetson reveals appropriate menace in the role of the rejected suitor, Tonio. Diana Napier’s personal appeal is distinctly formidable in the role of the slighted Trina. Jerry Verno has some deftly handled comedy opportunities that slacken the too keen tension of tragedy. Apart from the tragic climax, in which conventional treatment is unavoidable, there are two episodes that stand out.
One is the disaster that overtakes the touring company in a mountain pass, when one caravan is seen to run backwards and topple into the abyss. Another, the best, shows the company breaking into song as their caravan descends from the snow line into the valley. This is in the happiest vein of cinema, and atones for much that is fragmentary and disconnected in the scenario.
Opening and closing sequences are photographed in British Chemicolour process, and, as colour, are as good as anything we have seen.
Whether colour can do anything to strengthen dramatic values is open to question. In some aspects it is definitely distracting, but Miss Duna at least gained 50 per cent, in beauty when she turned into a Chemicolour star.
Pagliacci, in my judgment, is a film that blends popular favour and prestige appeal to a degree unsurpassed by any production in sight. It is a notable addition to the films that strengthen the industry’s morale. Now stand by for a moment, and Mr. Betts will tell you about the music.
PAGLIACCI MUSIC
By EDWARD BETTS
(“Era” Music Critic)
In adapting Leoncavallo’s opera Trafalgar began with the advantage of having two of the most famous tenor solos in the whole of music, the Prologue and On With the Motley.
This effort goes a long way towards what some of us think would be the ideal marriage of opera and film. It is, indeed, the first real attempt to reconstruct opera on the screen and adds a new pleasure to the cinema.
Though the music has had to undergo considerable change in order to allow for explanatory sequences in talk and action, Karl Grüne has directed the picture with a view to the best presentation of the outstanding numbers, and he has obviously had keen co-operation from his singers and orchestral conductors—Albert Coates and Boyd Neel.
Richard Tauber’s voice is ideally suited to the part of Canio. The Prologue has, I think, never been better sung, and his On With the Motley is a really artistic achievement. It is more subdued than is customary—its tone, and the suggestion of pent-in emotion give the performance a power of actuality that enthralled the trade show audience. The famous sob which with Caruso seemed to shake the stage was suggested as the involuntary heart-cry of a strong man broken by an unexpected sorrow. Tauber’s singing in the rest of the play did not always reach this unusually high level, but it was always extremely good.
An interpolated lullaby was beautifully done. In the rearrangement of the musical score, the other characters have not been too well served, though most of them have good opportunity to show what they can do as actors.
Orchestral playing and its recording were kept on a high plane, and the added portions of the music had been artfully contrived. There was, I thought, one production mistake. Canio’s last The comedy is ended was not nearly so effective when taken from the stage and said in front of the curtain.
The Era
Wednesday 6 January 1937
TRADE SHOW DIARY
Look Before You Book
Birmingham
January 7 - Pagliacci, United Artists, Futurist, 10.30
Cardiff
January 6 - Pagliacci, United Artists, Empire, 11Leeds
January 12 - Pagliacci, United Artists, Scala, 10.45Liverpool
January 6 - Pagliacci, United Artists, Paramount, 11Manchester
January 7 - Pagliacci, United Artists, Piccadilly, 10.45
The Era
TRADE SHOW DIARY
Look Before You Book
Glasgow
January 13 - Pagliacci, United Artists, Paramount, 10.45
Newcastle
January 19 - Pagliacci, United Artists, Queen's, 10.30
Forthcoming British Films
Date: Thursday, Feb. 11, 1937
Publication: The Times (London, England)
Mr Max Schach has arranged for the Capitol Corporation to show in New York during the next few months Love From a Stranger, Dreaming Lips, with Miss Elisabeth Bergner, and Pagliacci.
Linlithgowshire Gazette
Friday 12 February 1937
UNUSUAL WORLD PREMIERE
Vienna has been the centre of an unusual world premiere this last week. The Max Schach production, Pagliacci, directed Karl Grune, was given simultaneous premieres at four Vienna’s finest cinemas and drew record crowds to each one.
Richard Tauber, who is currently singing in the opera season in Vienna, made personal appearances the stage all it cinemas during the evening. He received rousing ovations from the packed houses, and at each cinema he was called on to say few words of thanks.
Vienna—city of music, musicians, and music-lovers—has not restrained itself offering praise for the screen brilliance Leoncavallo’s beautiful opera Pagliacci. They say that Tauber’s voice is ideally suited to the role of Canio, that the Prologue and On With The Motley are great artistic achievements, and that the film blends true opera with popular cinematic entertainment, the latter being high praise for the director, Karl Grune.
These four simultaneous premieres attracted a great many Viennese music-lovers, many of whom are notoriously suspicious of mechanical reproduction of singing, and who were at once converted by the faithful recording and the fidelity of reproduction in in which (they said) Tauber's voice was as perfect they were accustomed to hearing it in the Vienna Opera House.
It is reported that the Duke of Windsor has been acquainted with the fact that Pagliacci now showing in Vienna, and a visit from this royal patron of music is confidently expected in the near future.
Linlithgowshire Gazette
In a few weeks' time, Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci, with Tauber as Canio, will be presented at a West. End cinema, whilst the incomparable Paderewski will soon be seen and heard in a specially written film called Moonlight Sonata. In this the great Polish musician plays several compositions besides the name piece, including Liszt’s second Hungarian Rhapsody and his own very popular minuet.
Whitstable Times and Herne Bay Herald
Then there is Richard Tauber in airs and songs from his new film, Pagliacci, from the famous opera; he sings in English. There is the Prologue (R020329), and On with the Motley and Such a Game (RO 20330). I know the opera, but not the film; these records suggest that the latter is thrilling, or is it Tauber's tenor voice?
Sunday Mirror
Sunday 7 March 1937
Pagliacci With the Eternal Triangle
Tauber Good as Ever
I suppose that nothing can be achieved in films without experiment, And I again suppose that Pagliacci, presented at the Carlton, is a wholly commendable effort. It is, in a way, interesting, since so many filmgoers have shown by their absence from cinemas that they do not want to see opera in pictures.
This film answers that objection in two ways.
The lesser of these is that it adds to the opera a meaty melodrama of a troupe of strolling players getting embedded in a storm You know that there is not one character on the Elstree Alps and working out a triangle drama with gusto.
The greater of these is the presence of Richard Tauber, who is one of the most popular stars in Britain and who, at least, will not imperil that position by his acting in Pagliacci.
The film starts in colour and ends in colour.The process used is something new which Karl Grune, director and producer of Pagliacci, has introduced to Britain.
These colour sequences are taken from the opera as shown on the stage and are very good asl far as the colour is concerned and entirely marvellous as far as the singing of Richard Tauber is concerned.
Between this colourful beginning and this colourful ending there is the bulk and body of a spicy triangle drama played somewhere in the aforesaid Alps.
It is not bad. I think Karl Grune had an idea when when he started this film, which is more than can be said for most, but the charm of the film to me is not any directorial experiments but the personality and the singing of Richard Tauber, who is one of the best fellows in films and who made Blossom Time one of the greatest successes that was ever made in London.
Richard is a Dick anyone would welcome in films or in fact.
And I give a lot of the credit for that to about a beautiful young man who was im- s cheerful, practical and charming wife, whom you used to know as Diana Napier.
New British Films
Date: Monday, Mar. 15, 1937
Publication: The Times (London, England)
Herr Karl Grune, who directed Fritz Kortner in Abdul the Damned, is the director of Pagliacci, a new British film which is to be shown at the Carlton Theatre next Thursday. Parts of the film are in colour, and the leading players are Mr. Richard Tauber, Miss Steffi Duna, and Miss Diana Napier.
Opera And Ballet
Date: Wednesday, Mar. 17, 1937
Publication: The Times (London, England)
CARLTON, Haymarket.To-morrow! RICHARD TAUBER in "PAGLIACCI." STEFFI DUMA, DIANA NAPIER (A).
Concerts & c.
CARLTON, Haymarket. (From 12 o.c.) RICHARD TAUBER singing the World's Greatest Melodies in "PAGLIACCI." STEFFI DUMA, DIANA NAPIER (A).
Sunday Mirror
Sunday 21 March 1937
Cinemas
CARLTON, Haymarket - Richard Tauber in PAGLIACCI with Steffi Duna and Diana Napier (A.) Tnt. 5.45 & 8.30
New Films In London
Date: Monday, Mar. 22, 1937
Publication: The Times (London, England)
"PAGLIACCI "
Few operas combine sadness and song more generously than Leoncavallo's Pagliacci, and in numerous films scenes of tragedy have been rounded off with an aria taken from it. It is not surprising therefore that an attempt should be made to make more of the opera and to produce a film under the title of Pagliacci. The title is not a fair reflection of the content of the film, which has Mr. Richard Tauber in the part of Canio, Miss Steffi Duna as Nedda, and Miss Diana Napier as Trina, and is to be seen this week at the Carlton Cinema.
CARLTON
Pagliacci
It would certainly be exasperating if a more serious opera than Leoncavallo's was converted into a film with sporadic songs. As it is, there is not enough contrast between the occasional music and the long passages of incident or dialogue to exasperate either those who go to this film for the music or for the story. Contrast there is, because the songs are harshly and abruptly inserted in the narrative, but there is no very obvious incongruity of value. Mr. Richard Tauber has, of course, a flexible voice and can use the most conventional and purely decorative aria as a medium for lavish and melting sentiment. But though the opera has ceased to exist as such, the fragments that remain are not enough, at any rate as they are treated here, to suggest the mutilation of a work of art. Only at the close, in the play within a play with which Pagliacci ends, is there a little continuous opera, and this is certainly more attractive than the rest. But it is photographed in colour. Unfortunately an operatic flavour has penetrated into the passages of purely cinematic storytelling. The conversation often has the unconvincing diction of recitation. Passionately warbled in Italian, the lines might do very well and suggest the quick ardours of the South; spoken in English and by actors who are accustomed to the indirect and half-articulate expression of emotion, the result is absurd.
Entertainments Index
Date: Thursday, Apr. 1, 1937
Publication: The Times (London, England)
Carlton - Pagliacci
The Australian Woman's Mirror
TECHNICOLOR!
Britain Can Equal U.S.A. in This
KITTY GWENN Writing from Denham
TECHNICOLOR is getting a grip on British studios these days, prompted no doubt by the success of Wings of the Morning, which, although it proved a difficult proposition to photograph on account of the many outdoor scenes and the vagaries of the English climate, certainly warranted the trouble.
Some of the shots are unbelievably lovely, and Annabella (as I have already mentioned in previous letters) is an excellent choice for the leading role, playing her dual (or should one say treble?) role with great charm. The rest of the cast acts well up to her, too.
Following that initial venture into color we have a second example of it in the opening sequences of Pagliacci, Richard Tauber’s latest film, introduced to bring out the carnival spirit at the beginning of the story, but it rather disconcerting to jump from color into black and white for most of the story, and then back into color again for the operatic sequence which forms the climax.
Tauber admirers will want to see Pagliacci because it gives the singer his best singing role. Music-lovers will appreciate it because it is the first real attempt to adapt grand opera - the whole opera not excerpts - to the screen, but the average filmgoer will probably be critical about the acting, which frequently falls short of dramatic value and the slowness of direction which seems characteristic of all Tauber films.
Taken all round, however, it is pleasant entertainment. The singing is excellent, and Steffi Duna, Hollywood’s first technicolor actress looks most attractive as the fickle Nedda.
Entertainments Index
Date: Monday, July 19, 1937
Publication: The Times (London, England)
Stoll - Pagliacci
Entertainments Index
Date: Wednesday, July 21, 1937
Publication: The Times (London, England)
Stoll - Pagliacci
Entertainments Index
Date: Saturday, July 24, 1937
Publication: The Times (London, England)
Stoll - Pagliacci
Everyones in Queensland
An Evening in a London Picture House
READERS might like to know how a picture house in London, outside the West End theatres, puts over an evening's performance. In Tottenham Court Road, just on the fringe of Oxford Street, Paramount has an immense picture house. There are other theatres in the locality but they are not to be compared with this theatre. It is modern in every respect, seating about 11,000, and has attached to it a restaurant and a dansant. In London theatres cater for the masses and the classes, and there is a decided class distinction. This theatre I refer to is built tor the masses...
I noticed an announcement that next week Richard Tauber would make a personal appearance on the stage, one of the pictures to be screened having him as the star performer, "Pagliacci".
ABC Weekly
3 November 1945
 |
| Angela Parelles, who sang the role of Nedda |
Western Mail
Saturday 11 November 1950
Opera on the screen
On with the motley and out with the big drum. Pagliacci (director Mario Costa), Italian screen version of the Leoncavallo opera at the Globe Cinema next week is, in my opinion, as perfect a translation of opera from stage to screen as we can fairly ever hope to see.
It is no small comfort to know, too, that the advent of this important picture will help to lay the poor, miserable ghost of a prewar screen Pagliacci with Tauber, which must have haunted every studio planning to tackle another screen opera ever since.
The Leoncavallo opera ("twin" of Cavalleria Rusticana, which, Mario Costa might get around to filming one day), is, of course, eminently filmable.
It is a turbulent tale of passion and jealousy, shot through with violent oaths and love's gentlest cadences. Wisely, Signor Costa has taken no liberties with the music or action.
What he has done is to tear down the three constrictive walls of the stage, extend the scene of an from the narrow streets of little Italian market town to the wooded countryside around it, and bring the emotions of the four principals into vivid close-up.
Sandwell Evening Mail
Tuesday 1 February 1994
Channel 4, 2.00 FILM: Pagliacci (1936) Tragic opera starring Richard Tauber
Crawley News
Wednesday 16 April 1997
Channel 4, 2.35 FILM: Pagliacci (1936, Musical) A film version of Ruggero Leoncavallo's opera. Starring Richard Tauber
No comments:
Post a Comment