The best thing in the movie is Laughton simply reading from the Bible. He was a MASTER at reading a great text and drawing immense power from it. Check out on Youtube where Laughton reads The Gettysburg Address in the film Ruggles of Red Gap. I could listen to him read the phone book.
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Quite right! On Laughton's reading tours he would just choose a random scattering of great texts. Sometimes Shakespeare, Bible passages, stories. Must have been a great experience to hear them. In fact, I believe there some records of them on vinyl.
There's also a story I heard about Laughton appearing on something like Ed Sullivan and being told that just hearing him read a tax invoice would be a pleasure and Laughton obliged by reading one Sullivan had in his pocket and managed to almost touch the audience with his rendering, proving Sullivan right.
Laughton's ability to read all those text movingly was just a trick - its called genius.
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