The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 89

CAST, TECHNICAL MARVELS SCORE 9- v. 9 rgy Somethi tit 'I 7 i -A j. i 4 Bess." Film's cast of Negro actors and singers is one of the greatest ever assembled for the screen. wyn's masterful pirture production of George Gershwin's classic folk-opera, "Porgy and WHERE'S MY Sirfney Poitier scores im-preutve acting triumph as Porgy in Samuel CoW- BY PHILIP K. SCHEUEB Films Stage Music Art Books Travel Samuel Goldwyn has been quoted as saying that he is against inter I missions during a film snowing because people might not come back.

Yet he has permitted "Porgy and Bess" one break in its two-and-a- half -hour running time. I think this is significant of Mr. Goldwyn's faith in it. I think, too, that he has nothing to worry about 1 It is a rare bird who will not come back for more. In "Porgy and Bess," Sam's got plenty somethin'.

1 1 Call it what you will musical play, native opera, grand opera this unique and uniquely American work by George and Ira Gershwin and their esteemed associates has been given the production it so justly deserves on the screen. Visually it is lushly magnificent in Todd-AO and Technicolor; audibly it is recording perfection. But the praise must go much beyond these technical marvels. "Porgy and Bess" would not be the masterpiece it is if the 70-mm. film and the Eevenchannel sound were not equaled by $he human element.

Goldwyn has populated, Catfish Row in old Charleston with some of tha greatest Negro actors and singers of our time, and they in turn have responded to the director, Otto Preminger, with the limitless vitality and gutty teamwork of a company wholly attuned to the implications, both tragic and comic, of this now classic folk tale. For DuBose and Dorothy Heyward's play (first done without music as is a love drama, or melodrama, at Its most elemental; and, the -amazing thing is the way in which it grips the imagination and the heart. It is impossible not' to feel for the crippled Porgy and the Bess he calls his -f part SUNDAY MORNING, JULY 5, 195? FRESH ACTING MATERIAL Luana Helps Meet SPIRIT OF EVIL Sammy Davis Jr. portrays sly Sportin' Life, who jauntily prou-ls byways of Cat' fish Row, tempting unwary with' happy dust." Limitless vitality and' gutty teamwork of com' pony of characters are wholly attuned to implication of tale, both tragic and comic elements. Demand New-Faces BY JOHN L.

SCOTT Getting tired of the same old faces Jn motion pictures? Becoming disgusted with middle-aged male stars romancing teen-age girls on the screen? If so, don't give up hope filmdom's sudden awakening to tha dire need for young talent has resulted in another (it happens periodically) search for fresh acting material. At MGM, Sol C. Siegel and Edmund Grainger, who are filming William Humphrey's turbulent novel, "Home From the Hill," do their bit to an-swer public and exhibitor cries for new faces by selecting a quartet of youthful actors for roles important enough to establish them as potential PIei Turn to Tf 2, CoL 1 woman now, not to be fearful of the hulking Crown or wary of the jaunty, catlike Sportin' Life and his "happy, dust." And when, at the last, Porgy mounts his little goat cart and heads for New York, "the heavenly and the Bess he never doubts he will find there, he becomes a figure of heroic proportions in the finest opera tradition. 20 Gershwin Melodies Come Tumbling Out One Over A nother During Film "Porgy and Bess" lends Itself to the bravura treatment it receives, the big screen and all the rest; and I am prepared to disagree with those who declare that its larger-than-life aspect tends to obscure and obfuscate a basically simple story line. This may have been true to an extent of "South Pacific;" "Porgy and Bess" is a subject that can take it.

The Gershwin melodies for which I am such a pushover come tumbling one over another some 20 of them, from the lovely "Summertime" to the rousing "I'm on My Way'! with scarcely a key-change pause between them. You know them as well as "A Woman Is a Sometime Thing," "My Man's Gone Now," "I Got Plenty o' Nothing "Bess, You Is My Woman Now," "It Ain't Necessarily So," "There's a Boat Dat's Leavin Soon for New York." i "The Buzzard Song" is heard only Instrumental- ly and is replaced by the sung "I Ain't Got No Shame" (used on the road but later omitted). It neither adds nor Poitier, Gentle Yet Strong and Manly, Just Right for the Part Acting performances are matched by the singing performances, four of the voices, including Sidney as Porgy and Dorothy Dan-drldge's as Bess, being dubbed. Poitier is just right in the part, gentle yet strong and manly, compassionate while knowing bitterness. Miss Dandridge ts a beauty; she Is learning to act, though she has noftcned the defiant outlines of Crown's kept woman.

Sammy Davis sly Sportin' Life and Brock Peters' lustful Crown are Incarnations of evil, but In different styles, The latter pair do their own vocalizing and Sammy gets an Interpolated opportunity to hoof. Robert McFerrin makes a powerful singing Porgy and Adcle Addison a passionate Bess. Teari Bailey plays cheerful Maria, who sings riisM tnra fag 3, CoL )- A 1 LEADS Sidney Poiiuir, Dorothy DatulrM? hat- till roles in "Porgy and yet nntlurf star's voir is hnrd in film. Principal roles in th Sam ui Goldwyn production or sung by and Add Addison reached awlward grete to maturity, i CAM Fit FOIUIUIA When child film charmer Luanm Fatten tg the didn't fight it, Iql stayed out of th movies until sh A A J. at mm A 0 ,1 j.

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