march to the scaffold, and the concluding Walpurgisnacht scene, the witches' sabbath, with its revels of two-horned goats, mephitic necromancers, and writhing pythonesses, would be another matter. Nijinsky and his Russian nymphs should film l'Après-midi d'un faune, as they danced it. The Russians might also give their effulgent interpretation of Balakireff's Thamar. Debussy's La Mer is a superb movie subject, and so is César Franck's Le Chasseur Maudit. In Saint-Saëns's Le Rouet d'Omphale, I see Francis X. Bushman as the subjugated Hercules spinning for. Theda Bara as Omphale. Phaëton would be more difficult to photograph, but the Danse Macabre[1] would be easy. Wagner, of course, when performed in concert, should be filmed. During a rendering of the overture to Tannhäuser, one should see a vision of the Venusberg and the march of the pilgrims. To illustrate the march from Götterdämmerung, the moon should shine on the cortège of Siegfried, as the body of the hero is borne slowly through the mountain passes. The picture illustrating the
- ↑ In 1922, this was actually done under the direction of Dudley Murphy, with Adolf Bolm, Ruth Page, and Olin Howland as the pantomimists. I saw and heard a performance at the Rialto Theatre in New York during the week of July 23, 1922. I have been informed that Mr. Murphy arranged a similar picturization of l'Après-midi d'un faune, but I did not see this.
