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Trier, enortb shore Wednesday stad's appearance in Ne' iun will be ber only sol: Kirst*.u Flagotad engagement in the Chicago area duriig, thé 'fortbcoming "season. Mme. Flagstad bas.the advantageo growing up in an intensely musical en- vironment. Hers was a family for wbom miusic. was tbe staff of life. Her f atber is a conductor in Oslo. Her mother is a pianist and coach for both' individual singers and chorus groups. She bas two brothers-one a conductor, the other a. concert pianist. Her sister, like herself, is a singer. Studied Piano Kirsten began to stucly the piano as a child. She remetribers that ber mother made it celar to ber that there was no escape f rom practicing, althougb ber parents had no intention of ha'vig their daugbter make music a profession. In- deed, tbey had ambitions for ber to be- come a doctor. Practice sbe bad to, bowever, and. practice shedid. But theory, barmony and counterpoint she shunned as mucb as possible. No compulsion could make the. cbild pay any attention. to. these aspects, of music. To this day she bas retained a -distaste for tbem. Her beginning as a singer. was large- ly accidentaI. At the age of ten,' on ber own volition and for ber own amuse- ment, she began studying the rlo :, further stucly under Dr. Gillis Bratt Y, On the side she studied dancing anc "plastics," the closest definition ol ýw which seenis t'ô be wbat' not to do wit bthe bands and f eet. This, training ha: siaîce stood bier in good stead, she says, Shie returned home the -following yea.i for bier second role-Gerinaine in "The Chiines of, Nornriandy,"."ThereWCiý< three roles the following year. She bas kept a record of ail bier ap- pearances, written in Norwegian in, à meticuilous hand 'in -a little notebook. By lier own account she has sung sixty- eight rolesw-thirty-eigbt in grand ,opera and. thirty in operettas and' coinic operas. Th is doesrnot take into con- sideration innumerable song recitals and appearances as soloist with, orchestras and in o.ratorio performances. Singa at Bayreuth *Until 1933, however, ail of lber sing- ing was done in the Scandinavian coun- ftries-mainly in Osto and.'Gothenburg. In the summer of that year she was in- vitéd to sing at Bayreuth, and again in the summer of 1934. [t was news of her singing at that great festival cen- ter that moved Mr. Gatti-Casazza and' Artur Bodansky to ask lier to corne down at St. Moritz for an audition. The audition was held in. a small hotel- roorn witb beavy drapes - a difficult' background for any singer. But Mr. Gatti and Mr. Bodànsky were impressed by lier voice and mùsicianship, and signed. ber, up for the leading soprano Wagnerian roles at the Metropol'itan for the winter of 1934-'35.' Prove& Sensation What bas. bappened since then is miusical history. Arriving quietly in New York without any preliminary fan- fare, she swept an unprepared audience comnpletely off its feet at ber debut as Sieglinde in "Die Walkure" on Feb- m.rary.2, 1935. At ber second perform- ance as. Isolde a few days later tvery inchof standing room was taken. The Sam e condition existed. at ail of behr subsequent eighteen appearances during the season. Coming at a crucial time when the Metropolitan was f acing seri- ous, financial straits. shiewas alda t. which I believe you wilI tïnd infor- El mative. f One of the measures proposed is h the Pettengili Bill. This bill prohibits s tbe, booking, of motion pictures at group prices, thus attempting. to pre- r vent what is notbinig more than, the e wbolesale selling of, pictures. If the ebill were to become law, e very film would bave to be sold at a retàil price,:regardless.o f whether the pur-ý chaser took one or fiifty pictures. Tbe second feature of thle Petten- guil Bill requires thae in advance ýof production a> complete synopsis of each picture must be submitted -and that this. synopsis. must thereaftet be rigidly, followed. under penalty of fine and imprisonmient. The producers unanimously de- clareý that the tecbniical significance, of this provision wilI make. it virtually impossible *to continue the present fine -,flow of photoplays. The tech- riical and artistic requiremnents of in- dividiial films make constant revtsiôn of plot and formi vitalIly necessary.1 This- is true of practically, every film that is made, but to cite some of the prime examples "of films radically cbanged during the course of pro- duction there might benamned "Thej Covered Wagon," "The Big Parade"1 and the more recent "Les Miserables," l "David Copperfield" and "It Hap- t pened One Night." In each instance1 dozens of scenies and episodes had tot bel discarded; characters were1 changed and the treatment of the f material was altered ýfrom day to da-y. "The Covered Wagon," wbich started out as a western grew in scope until' it. became an epic of the frontier h days. "The Big Parade" started out to be a small program picture. The greatness and bitterness of war soion a emnerged out of an unpretentious film si necessitating a complete change of It cast, a complete re-write of the be- ài ginning and the ending,, and other tt changes. The result was a great is picture. .t] Sincerely yours, .tu C. C. Pettiinhn. curiosity about mnen and manners. W e go to other sources to answer our questions. Sornetinies we ask others, but more often we search for our an- swers ini books. Innumerable men and women read about Henry the Eighth, went on to his daughter Elizabeth, and sidestepped to Mary of Scothmnd. The âanswer to the puzzling question "Did the castaways of the Spanisb. Ar- mfada, have any ra 'cial- influence on the Irish.?" 'is stili being sought as a re- sguit of séeing the beautiful. movie "Man" of Aran." Sources consul ted have been Synge's "Aran Islands," Colum's "Road Around *Ireland," and Irish histories. Other have been curi- ous about the Irish' temperarient .and --baveread "Twenty Years, a-Growing," by O'Suli'vàn, followed by the "Thxe Crock of GoId,'ý by Stephens, "Ne.st of Gentle Folk," by O'Faolain,. and "The Sea Wall"' by Str0-g. Those' R.d Gaj2i Stones "Ruggles of Red Cap" iýs a homely Aerican story, illuminated by the superb acting of Charles Lauighton.'The' Red Gap stories are: "Ruggles of Red Gap," "Somewbere in Red Gap," and "'Ma Pettingili," by Harry Leon WVil- son. Other books about: Westerners, and their ways flot to, be missed are: "The Desert Wife," by Faunce (the, mcst taciturn man in America is in this book); "The Virginian," by Wiste;~ the classic of ail Westerns; "Happy Hawkins," by Wason, which deserves to be a ,classic, and "A Cowman's Wife," by Rak, a deligbtfuiI accotant [rom a woman's viewpoint.' Siagg.t iRich History TIiere were two roads leading fr-oni "The Scarlet Pimpernel," and one hesitated at the fork., Shouldone pur- sue the broad road of the French Revolution, lined on both sides with adventurous history and striking per- sonalities, or follow the quieter, but no less colorful, road, tbrougb the life and n.anners of the English Eigbteenth cen- Éury? Leslie Howard's excellent acting is responsible for the latter, for he, is le only actor that has worni the cos- tme of another century as thovgh it were, his own. l3aroness Orczy wrote the stories o<f tore, uougnr a score of the airs., Marshal bas already won gave it to ber caughter, tell- recoglition as a poet; lier verse is Lat if she learned it in two. now appearing 'in the Saturday Re- n ruld try out for the role. view of Literature, Scribner's, Poet-, was the thirteenth candidate ry, The New.Yorker, etc.c courage to live." Charles Boyer, personable French- mnan, is the maàn of the bour ini Holly- wood as la resuit of bis brilliant suc- cess in "Private Wb.lds."1 ca7e UTi(. WthoVuIOM Endl, t il an account of the marvels of the sky, wtritten i delightfully clear and read- able style. It sbould take a place with Eddington and Jeans on the sheif of the best popular science. (Scheduied. for Fal publication.)