There are two reasons why Rouben Mamoulian's "Applause" … is one of the most significant talking pictures that has yet been produced in this country. Its first claim to distinction is that rare thing the artist's touch, a quality which proclaims a cultured and sensitive mind attuned to the medium of its expression. Its second claim rests on its convincing demonstration of the ability of the talking picture to create drama which is not modeled after the stage….

Perhaps the most striking achievement of Mr. Mamoulian is the sustained sense of unity, of an atmosphere, with which he infuses his play as a whole. The sordidness of its realistic detail is not to be gainsaid; yet how mordant and spicy it is, how different in its imaginative treatment from the countless scenes of chorus girls on the stage as found in even the best of Hollywood's films! Particularly striking...