" THE OCULAR PROOF."

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XXXIII, Issue 8412, 14 November 1912, Page 6

" THE OCULAR PROOF."

GENIUS CUNN9NCLY SNTERPRETED.

THE DRAMATIST AND THE PLAYERS. REFLECTIONS ON MR ASCHE'S "OTHELLO." (Contributed.) Though the womb of time has delivered many events, and its fruitfulness shows no sign of abatement, it would seem that the very fecundity of the past must mean dearth of conception in the future. Such a thought must have passed through the minds of the many lovers of the "Sweet Swan of Avon " as, at the Christchurch Theatre Royal last night,. Oscar Asche and Lily Brayton grafted them into the warp and woof of what isl perhaps the most humanly realistic and woecompelling tragedy' William ,Shakespeare ever dreamed of, evolved, formed, and gave breath to. One day perhaps we shall see a goodly Earth, justly proportioned and righteously governed, and, as a corollary, a great play perfectly played; but at this present, "even now," just as we have to take the good with the bad in the world,: so we get the ridiculously uneven in conjunction with the sublimely even on the stage. The production of "Othello" last night left much to be desired—but what would you? If lago was not, the Moor of Venice and "The sweetest innocent that e'er did lift up eye" suffered reincarnation: they rose again, they lived and walked and loved and suffered and died, even as if but newly born of that incomparable genius " who was not of an age, but for all time." My purpose, however, is not to criticise the - minor characters, or point out the blemishes of a triumphant production; I would exult, rather, in the Master conjurer and in his true interpreters. Verily it may be said of Oscar Asche that of his histrionic talent and his justice to Shakespeare and Shakespeare's Moorish child, "The world hath noted, and your name is great In mouths of wisest censure." Of Lily Bray-ton, too, nothing better can be said than that of Desdemona she has given "the ocular proof." And what a conception, what a masterpiece; to give proof of—to give the reality of life to! What a hero! What a heroine! What a love! What a tragedy!.'■/■■. First tho hero—the noble Moor, the alien in the proud State of Venice, but | its chief soldier withal. The honest, ) great-hearted man who could a " round unvarnish'd tale deliver," and whose life was as bis speech. The hero of "...., most disastrous chances, Of moving accidents by flood and field, * . '. Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly breach." The blunt, true lover, knowing not deceit nor subterfuge. The simple, credulous, soul, given even as a prey to the greon-cvyed monster, Jealousy. The tortured man, driven to, and writhing in, a frenzy. '' It works! The venom doth corrupt his soul! And he,, who was all goodness, will become An instrument of Hell, —most terrible Because most virtuous." The self-murderer and the homicide, through the awfulhess of whose actions yet shines clearly the honesty of his motives.—" It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul." The creature of terrible, agonised remorse and awful despair. " Whip me, ye devils, From tho possession of this heavenly sight! Blow me in winds! roast mo in sulphur! Wash me in stoep-down gulfs of liquid fi.ro'!' O Desdemona! Desdemona! dead! Oh! Oh! Oh!" Killing himself to die 1 upon a kiss— the man who has loved much and suffered much and lost much—" O lago, the pity of it, lago!"—but to whom assuredly much will be forgiven. And Oscar Asche was Othello—even to the last: "When you shall these unlucky things relate, Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate, Not set down aught in malice; then, must you speak Of one that iov'd not wisely, but too well; Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought, Perplex'd in the extreme; of one whose hand, Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away Richer than all his tribe; of one whose, subdu'd eyes Albeit unused to the melting mood, .Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees Their med'cinable gum." In all and with all Asche did tho noble Moor justice—-profound justice—" and it was .very good." He was dignified with a dignity that cannot be described, courteous and. tender and loving to Desdemona, impressing on the audience throughout the innate nobility of his character. The critic of the "Lyttelton Times" puts it well:—"Coming to the. technique of Mr Asche's achievement, one is compelled to admit that last night he stood revealed -as an actor of powers hitherto undreamt of by the people of this Dominion Mr Asche has the genius of the true actor, and looking at him last night one's confidence in the ability of the stage to-day to equal and to excel the tyrannical traditions of the past was buttressed and made impregnable. Mr Asche is the greatest Othello New Zealand has seen, and perhaps it would not bo going too far to hazard that to most playgoers in this country he is the greatest Othello of their time._ His performance definitely stamps him as one of the great artists of his day, and, unless one has seen him in Othello, one has not fully felt the grip of his power. Eulogies frequently become wearisome, and probably the best commendation that can be uttered is, to. desire that all those with any appreciation for the stage and its possibilities

should see 'Othello' or count themselves guilty of an irremediable omission." And then the heroine^— " A maiden never bold; Of spirit so still and quiet, that her [ motion Blush'd at herself." I Desdemona, the loving child of a devoted father, and the fairest daughter of Venice, gives herself in marriage to the Moor. • "She loved me for the dangers I had passed, .-\ And I' loved her that she did pity them." ; Rare, pure, chaste she is, and in her wifely duty true, while her love to her husband burns always and for ever as an unquenchable beacon. She lives the life of her lord, ; she gladdens the Venetian State, she glorifies the Isle of Cyprus, and well may Cassio welcome her in the lines so familiar yet so fine: " Hail to thee, lady! and the grace of heaven, Before, behind thee, and on every hand, En wheel thee round." But gross slander does its slimy work, the insidious and foul suggestion of the execrable ancient pierces the armour of the general, arid she dies what seems the cruellest 'of deaths—her lover-puts out the light of the " cunning'st pattern of.excelling nature." She is the virtuous woman,, faithful unto death, and she carries her virtuous love even unto the unseen. ". . . . . Unkindness may do much; And his unkindness may defeat my . life, •. ■ ■■-■; . But never taint my love." ■ She dies: she fears as she cries— ,j " . ... .For you are fatal then When your eyes roll so"— but the constancy of her love survives the awfulness of the throttling hand of her lord; she realises his terrible mistake and forgives, commending him to the world as she passes from it. "O, insupportable! O heavy hour." She is gone, she is gone! " Are \there no stones in heaven But what will serve for thunder?' What a love! What a tragedy! How prolific the imagination, how comprehensive the conbeption, how realistic the setting-down, how time the plot in the holding "as 't were the mirror up to nature." How superb, how majestic, how truly great the play! Shakespeare, always the inimitable genius, ever the nian eternal and immutable— "Not marble, nor the gilded monuments , . Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rime; . But you shall shine more bright in these contents , Than unswept stone, besmear d with sluttish time. When wasteful war shall statues .■, overthrow; ;, , f And broils root out the work ot masonry, * x , "■ • i Nor Mars his sword nor, war s quick 1 fire shall burn The living records of your memory. 'Gainst death and all-oblivious enmity Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room Even in the eyes of all posterity That wear this world out to the ending doom." ■ i '■