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Now to what I haven’t seen, but would like to
Prince Edward Theatre, Sydney
Although organ use continued in some theatres The film was Samson and Delilah and, for the meant a dimmer image, so the carbon arc lamp
up to about 1970, the last knowledge I have of first two or three weeks, a stage prelude on the intensity would need to be increased by
a stage act making up part of the film show was film content was presented. Unfortunately, I increasing the amperage to it.
at the Melbourne Kings Theatre in 1951, didn’t see this, although friends commented on
when it went back to films after a couple of the novelty of it.
years of live shows.
Below: Diagram showing regular screen (white), inside the potentially full size Magnascope screen. Note occasionally revived during the 1930s and 40s,
that both the top and the side masking is fully adjustable.
have. According to Arthur Knight’s 1957
book, The Liveliest Art, in 1926 there was a
large screen process which was used to
emphasis certain scenes, adding to the overall
impact. A standard size screen was masked
within a huge screen, usually filling the entire
proscenium. At a climactic moment in the
storyline, the image could be magnified
several times by raising or expanding the
masking around the standard screen, whilst the
projectionist switched to a special enlarging
lens on the projector.
The process was called “Magnascope” and
generally in use only in Paramount controlled
theatres. Several films were made with scenes
especially composed to make use of the
process in properly equipped cinemas. These
included Old Ironsides (1926), Wings (1927)
(Academy Award winner) and Chang, all
silent, and Moby Dick (1930), a sound film.
Magnascope had no fixed aspect ratio, a
theatre could have shown the Magnascope
scenes as wide as its proscenium would permit,
in what we would call today wide-screen
format, or could fill the entire proscenium area
by lifting the top masking.
While the projectonist switched to
Magnascope, stagehands would slowly open
up the screen masking, which gave the illusion
of a gradually enlarging image. For audiences
of the day, used to, even in the largest of
cinemas, generally quite small screens, this
process must have made quite an impact.
One can only surmise that the projectionist
would have had his hands full with this
process, as not only was there the image size to
contend with, but a larger image would have
As exhibitors had already been put to the
expense of sound, and the Depression was in
full swing, the process was abandoned, but was
generally for specific scenes to add excitement
to a climax or action scene.
Stage presentations and projection novelties
put bums on seats and they continued for
around 40 years, perhaps as an antidote to the
poor quality films an exhibitor had to take to
get a few A-grade films due to block booking
requirements. If the film didn’t entice a ticket,
perhaps the stage entertainment might. This
situation may well have applied in Union city
theatres in the early 1930s when their only
reliable film supply was from Universal. ★
Images:
CATHS Archive
Magnascope image:
sfsilentfilmfestival.blogspot.com
/2016/02/enlarged-history-of-magnascope.html
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