ARTHUR C. tI NI CE. CLARKE on NI Spoceships A of Fiction V F -, o FORREST J. ACKERMAN oN .DESTI NATION MOON' Hollywood Puts Space-Flight on the Screen o THOMAS SHERIDAN on HUGO GERNSBACK Pioneer of Scientifiction ONB SHILLING fn Canada, & U.S,A.: 25 CENTS a F0RREST J. ACKERMAN reports on . DESTINATION MOON ' Hollywood. soles of spacemen's boots, suction cups The cinemagicians of Celluloid City were employed. The spacs.suits they have completed a 240,000-mile trip on a wore'! weighed about 100 lbs. And to Hohman orbit to the crater Harpalus, show the effect on the passengers of a a pock-mark on the forehead of the rocket in free fall, a giant gimbal rep- man in the Moon- In semi-documen- resenting the vessel's interior. was built tary style, and in Technicolor, this for' $25,000 and so operated that walls space-flight of 1960 has been filmed for and ceiling could become floor'. Hein- audiences of 1950-and the greatest lein took particulal care with the miracle of all is that Hollywood seems weightless sequences; he wants no to have done the job right. There is wlong-moment laughs from the audi- no girl stowaway, no sabotaging villain, ence when they see them. "If, in spite no bug-eyed monsters on the Moon- of all our precautions to keep the pic- and no atmosphere there either! ture serlous and sober, they still The picture is "Destination Moon," snicker," he said, "I'm leavinE for the adapted by the author and Fl,ip van Moon-on foot !" R,cnkel from the boy's book, "Rocket Another clever trick tvas worked out Slip Galileo," by Robert A. Heinlein to give an illusion of the spacemen (Scribner's: '48). The juvenile element labouring under six gravibies. Trans- has been completely eliminated from parent gauze was placed across the the film, for which Heinlein himself actors' mouths, then pulled taut with was engaged as technical adviser. He invisible thread, thus distorting their kept cigarette smoke out of empty features to give the efiect of strain. But space and candy wrappers ofi the sur- the best illusion of all, to my mind, is face of the Moon; tre also designed the the use of midgets for perspective pur- rocket-ship, one beautiful l5-foot model pos€s; in duplicate, smaller-sized space- of which took ten days to construct ab suits, and carrying equipment to scale, a cost close to $600. For more than they subsritute at times for the normal- nine hours a day, six days a week for size actors to give the appearance of six weeks, he kept a watchful eye on the Moon explorers at great distances. the scientific accuracy of the enterprise. Eventually the figures were reduced to puppets on table-tops; but if George When the white stars in the back- producer, cloth of space (miniatu-re bulbs PaI, the famous for his wrapped in cellophane and strung on Puppetoons, has nsed his skill suffi- net) photographed with a red halation, ciently, the transition from live action they were covered with green so as to to animation will never be noticed. shine white. To simulate the magnetic MOONSCAPE BY BONESTELL Chesley Bonestell, the astronomical artist whose painted products antici- pate the effects of the camera's lens, SCIENCE.FANTASY rvas secured to create the Lunar. land- scape. He first made a lemarkable model, thirteen feet long, aftel which REVIEW stndio technicians reproduced his work QUARTERLY: ONE SHILLING on a grand scale-l?3 feet long, 120 feel across and 25 feeb high. Bonestell is a Editorial, Advertising and Pub- kindly, modest, grey-haired man who lishing Ofrce: 115 Wanstead Park Road. Ilford, Essex. * To make them more easilv dis- tinguishable againsL the Lunar landscape, EDITOR: WALTER, GILLINGS the suits are of different colours. The cowr photo shows Tom Powers as Gen- eral f[pyer (lefl,) and Warner Anderson Vol. 4, No, lE SPRING '50 as Dr: Charles Cargraves, leading atomic physicist of 1960, inside the Moon rocket. 3 was olten to be foirnd on the sets of the fllm. Viewers were also intrro- duling the trlming of the live action; duced to producer Pal, director Irving and he gave me some interesting side- Pichel, Heinlein and Bonestell, whose lights on his part of the book, "The book was well in sight; while Heinlein Conquest of Space," which has caused had something to say, in authoritative such a stir both within and without tones, about the imminence of space- astronautical circles in two countriesi. flight. '"I began my work as a hobby, to amuse Veteran director Pichel, too. takes the ^children. Now a netv encyclopedia. film and its subject quite seriously, 'wants to buy some of it. My wife helps though he expressed to me Lris private me by making models, which are opinion that "aU of us will get to the photographed and then painted," Moon-simultaneousiy and in a million Naturally, all the science f,ctionists pieces, propelled by an atomic explosion in the vicinity ',vanted to take a look at of the Earth-befor€ a rccket-ship gets the film in the making, and Heinlein there." -was able to arrange for many visitors Producer PaI, who years ago made 'Kuttner,to the nominally closed sets. Henry "The Ship of the Ether" in Holland, has his wife Catherine Moore, A. said that he intends to make a whole E. van Vogt, and several members of series of scientifilms, and has indicated 'both the Los Angeles Fantasy Society that he will consider the perennially 'and local rocketry organisations were popular Gernsback novel, "Ralph- admitted. Photographers came from l24O4l+":i. His attention has also Life and Mechanix lllustrated, and on been called to other stories which may one occasion William Cameron Menzies, prove suitable for fllming, including 'director of "Things to Come," was there Heinlein's "Space Cadet" (FR, Feb-Mar. to watch tlle rescue-in-space takes. '49). Meanwhile, the release of "Des- The television feature, "The City at tination Moon" will be rushed, "to keep Night," also visited the sets to make a ahead of reality," and its successful plogramme which was broaclcast over reception will result in the early fllm- EILA and lasted the whole of an hour. ing of the Balmer-Wylie classic "When ft opened with a view of the Earth fail- Worlds Collide." Thele is a possibility 'ing away beneath the spaceship, that this wiII be given a four: followed by a shot of the Moon as the dimensional climax, thanks to a pro- vessel nears the satellite preparatory to cess being perfected by a Los Ang€les ,landing. In this case, the visitors were inventor well-known to iocal s-f fans: the man-and-wife interviewing team of and, again, it will be in Technicolour. the programme, who on arrival (with- At last, science fiction will beCln to 'out spacesuits) m€t the four explorers fulfiI its destiny on the screen. i See Walter Gillings' "Fantasia," this See page i$sue. i L -And GE0FFREY GILES sees SPACE.FLIGHT ON THE STAGE Although Hollywood has risen to the of the former Teddington Cosmos Club ,occasion at last, to expect the stage to who has written science fiction and a 'utilise the dramatic possibiiities of few one-act plays, it was not too space-flight rvould seem like crying for formidable a task to write a three-act the Moon. So far, no established drama which would put the idea of a 'dramatist has dared to exploit the journey into space on the stage for the idea, probably because no producer in flrst time. Thr€e years ago, while on tfs right mind would take kindly to a the way over to America on a business theme which not only bristles with trip, he settled down to "Goodbye To- dificulties of presentation but de- morrow," which he finally completed rnands very careful treatment if it is after eighteen months of sparetime to be taken seriously bv an audience industry. Nor did he trave to look far which naturally associates it with for a compeLent group of players ''Flash Goldon" and "Super.rnan" wiUing and able to present it, once they movie ser'ials. were sold on the idea. Although not But to F" Fh'ank Pal.ker, a member one of them had evel encountered the 4 subject outside of the comic strips' his TheaLre CIub fellows of the Teddington SKYTARKS SPACE were prepared to take a chance. OF In facb, their Producer, Edward Sin- The world's flrst interplanetary clair. became quite enthusiastic; soon travel bureau has been started by comrirunicated his enthusiasm to the a New York business man, accord- cast, and got them rehearsing fhe "in- ing to facetious accounts which triguing new play" with as much gusto appeared in London newspapers. in Said the Evening Standard: "AI- as they had shown over "Alice ready more than 200 atom-age Wonderland," their fufthest previous flight pioneers have rushed to book departure from tradition. With the passages (on) spacs'cruisers when result that the three perforrnances they go to the Moon. The bureau they gave at RonaYne Hall, Hampton has time-tables worked out for the Wick, marked one of their biggest suc- rocket ships Lunarian, Martian, cesses in twentY-three seasons, of Saturnia and Solar Queen (which) which their supporters, no less than will leave every day, except Sun- many days and holidays, from the New themselves, will be talking for York'space port' in central Park, more seasons to come. starting in March 1975," The drama, of course, was noc Prices, said another report, wiII gr€atly concemed with bhe technical be announced 'later.' The time- niceties of rocket-flight, nor even tables include a provision that the with a particular destination for the spaceline 'cannot be responsible spaceship in whose control-room all for delays caused by meteor show- the action took place.