GAIETY'S BRIGHT NEW FEATURE —"SUNNY SIDE UP."

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Volume 59, Issue 72, 28 April 1930, Page 2

GAIETY'S BRIGHT NEW FEATURE —"SUNNY SIDE UP."

Seven bright musical numbers are introduced in Fox's latest uroduction, "Sunny Side Up," which has opened for a season of six nights at the Gaiety Theatre. "Sunnv Side Up" is the first original musical coinedy written for the talking screen and it delnoiislrates, perhaps more successfully tlian any previous screen musical production, the possibilities of sound pictures. Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell, the pair who were teamed so successfully in "Seventli Heaveu" and "Street Angel" are co-starred in their first "talkie" in "Sunnv Side Up." Miss Gaynor has the role of a girl living in a low quarter of New York, and Farrell appears as the son of a wealthy woman. The story woven round these two characters is simple yet appealing. Jack Cromwell (Farrell) is engaged to marry a girl who really cares very little for him. - In a fit of melancholy he drives aimlessly through New York and meets Molly (Janet Gaynor). He liears her sing at a carnival lield to celebrate the Fourth of July, and invites her to appear with him at a big charity fete at Long Island. To this end, he rents a home for the girl and her three friends. "Mrs Grundy" gets busy and the girl becomes the subject of an unpleasant scandal, which causes her to leave Long Island. It is onlv young Cromwell's realisation of wliat has happened that brings the story to the necessarily happy ending Janet Gaynor 's role calls for the singing of three of the most attractive musical numbers. These are "Sunnv Side Up," "I'm a Dreamer," "Aren't We All?" and "If I had a Talking Picture of You." Uiis last, which is quite the most popular hit, is sung as a solo and also as a tluet with Charles Farrell. "You've Got Me Pickin' Petals off of Daisies" is one of the comedy numbers ; others are "It's Great to be Necked" and "You Find the Time. I'll Find tlie Girl." A piece of brilliant production is seen in "Turn On The Heat," which is presented as one of the sequences at the charity fete. A stage set with snow and Eskimos' igloo huts is transformed hefore the audience into a tropical island. The auclience, (New York's "400") are seated at tables round a glassy pond set in structures of dazzling white marble. The performers- appear at oue encl and are screened by a novel curtain-'-sprays of Avater from a flowerv fountain. De Sylva, Broivn and Henderson, a combination whose hits are known all over the world, composed the musie and lyrics for "Sunny Side Up." Farrell and Miss Gaynor are supported by a strong cast of well-known Fox artists. Frank Richardson. Marjorie White and E1 Brendel are responsible for some unusually clever comedy. "Sunny Side Up" is accompanied at the Gaiety by well-selected supports which offer a pleasing variety of entertainment. Among these are a speech by ihe Prime Minister, Sir Josepli Ward, recorded at Rotorua; an interestiilg number of Fox Movietone News and another Paramount Neivsreel._ An Australian and New Zealand edition oi Fox News is also presented. ;