OPERA HOUSE.

Auckland Star, Volume XVII, Issue 135, 11 June 1886, Page 2

OPERA HOUSE.

" In the Ranks " was repeated at the Opera Houee last night to a good audience, and with tho customary success. To night is the occasion of its final performance, and those who miss eeeing it dony themselves a treat of very high order. To-morrow evening 'Called Back" will be produced on a very complete scale. The good luck that has attended the famous novelette, " Called Back," from the outset, has unquestionably followed it from the bookstall to the stage. The dramatised version that is to be piesented to the local playgoore is by the author, Mr Hugh Conway, and hia valuable collaborator, Mr Comyns Carr. It had a most successful run at tho Princes Theatre, London, under tho management of Mr Edgar Bruce, and every-1 where else that it has beon staged it has croated quite a furore. It is an elaborate drama, ingeniously constructed, full of striking dramatic incidents, and charac torised throughout by great freshness, both of details and tho manner in which these materials are handled. A matter which will astonish those who know tho book, not only by tho ingenuity with which the authors havo acquitted themselves of ti.eir task, but by tho wealth of dramatic incidont they havo imported into a seemingly simple, though interesting story. Each scene ia so cleverly constructed, that it leads up to a strong dramatic eilvation, the whole drama being arrat.ged in a remarkable series of picturesquo tableaux. Tho "London Times," in criticising the piece, says : "It may afford some faint idea of tho dramatic excellence of ' Called Back' to 3ay that it combines the tragio intensity of M. Sardous' ' Fedora ' with tha romantic and refined grace of Mr Hermann Merivale's ' Forget Me Not.' " It was first produced in Australia at Her Majesty's Opera House, Melbourne, on April sth, 1885, and proved such an unqualified success that it ran for nine weeks, and prior to tho departure of tho present company for New Zealand (and which is, aa matter of fact, theoriginal company), it was placed on tho boards of tho Theatre Royal, Sydney, for a short season of thiseo weeks. Its aucctS* there was co enormous that hundreds of pfoplo wore turned away from the doors of the Thoatre every evening during the eeaeon. Mr Rignold'H disinterested generosity in offering tho receipts of the first night in aid of tho sufferers by the cataatrQDhe at Kotorua should alone wurnce to nil the house to overflowing, ana to win him most liberal patronage during the remainder of the season.