SONG, STAGE, AND STORY.

Auckland Star, Volume XXV, Issue 149, 23 June 1894, Page 11

SONG, STAGE, AND STORY.

The Monbagu-Turner Company open their operatic season in. Auckland shortly with ' Maritana.' Of the firsb of the second series of the very successful Chamber concerts given lately in Christchurch by Mr F. M. Wallace, a reporb from Christchurch says : ' Mr Wallace played as a violin solo A. C. Mackenzie's " Highland Ballad." Here and bhere the idea of the composer comes oub in bhe pathos of the ballad music of tho Highlands, and Mr Wallace interpreted the music /ith considerable skill of execution. The opening piece of the concert was a quartette by Rheinberger for piano, violin, viola and violincollo. The four movements were most artistically interpreted by Mrs Wilding, Mr Wallace, Miss- Gordon Rich and Mr H. H. Lough nan. The greatesb treat of the evening was the suite by Bornand, for piano and violinj played by Mrs Wilding and Mr Wallace. Mr Wallace ably seconded Mrs Wilding, and the suite was, as has been said, one of the boat numbers on bhe programme.' • Hans bhe Boatman' is at Chriatchurch just now. Who aaya thab the passion for the theatre does nob exisb in bhis country?, writes ' Biil of the l'lay ' in ' Man of the World.1 •On Saturday there were people at the entrance to bhe pib of bhe Lyceum, it is said, as early as nine o'clock in bhe morning. They spent the day there, bringing food with them, and playing cards to pass bhe time away. As if bo try their patience the weather took a change for the worse in the afternoon, and there was rain to add to the enjoyment of the day. For ib was all in the day's enjoyment, of course. People would not endure this sorb of thing except for their pleasure—no, nob if they were paid for it. Vet ib was nob the play so much as tho actor thab they had come oub bo see, Ib was nob Faust bub Henry Irving. This desiro to be among the firsb to welcome him back again to his own theatre is a proof of the extr.ftordJ&ary personal popularity of the actor. Certainly there is nob another man living—actor, politician, prize fighter —who could command such a demonstration of public fueling. 3 M. Paderewski, says the • Puijy News,' holds by bis determination not to give a recital in London this summer. Ho will, however, in all probability, give ab least one recital in the winter before he sails for the Unitod States, where his third tour begins on January 2nd. During his present sojourn in England M. Paderawski has gpent a good many hours with hia little godchild, the infant daughter of Madame Amy Sherwin and Mr Gorlitz, and the only young lady who is allowed to tug at, and confiscate, locks of that wonderful hair. A Cbristchurch paper gives the fol? lowing account of ' Charley's Aunb ' ab the Theatre' Royal:—• Tho development—or perhaps more correctly speaking, the evolubion—of farcical comedy is like that of opera bouffe, of modern origin. The tastes of playgoers, tending aa they do nowadays towards something thab will take them oub of themselves, and enable them to forgeb bhe worries and cares of business, playwrights have endeavoured bo meeb this, and the farcical comedy is the result. Tho dayß of the good old legitimate may be said to be numbered, though in the case of melodrama ib is dying hard. The latest and mosb up-to-date production was submitted tp a large and appreciative audience on Saturday evening by the Thornton-Arnold Company. On that occasion 'Charley's Aunt' was introduced to Cbriabchurqh playgoers, and proved a mosb entertaining lady. There is this aboub the piece thab unlike mosb farcical comedies the situation?, which are really screamingly fanny, come aboub naturally, and bhere is an entire absence of that Btraining after fun seen in some pieces of this class, which, es the 'Americans put it, "makes one tired." The dialogue is eniart and the interest is kepb up to the last moment. Indeed, one is sorry when Charley's Amjb who comes from Brazil, the habitat of the nuts, disappears, and Lord Fancourb Babberley, otherwise Babs, reappears. So much for the piece itself, which, it may ab once bo Baid, caught on wibh the audience immensely. Nob only was the house a record one for Saturday night, bub never have such roarß of laughter been heard as was bhe case on Saturday. Speaking generally, tho company which Messrs Arnold and Thornton have brought with them are all good, and fit the parts they play mosb admirably. The female characters in the piece are eomewhab subsidiary to the male, bub still there is enough even in them to show that the ladies bt the company, when more favourable opportunity ia afforded, will come to the front. Mrs Walter Hill, to whom the enthusiastic warmth of her reception must have been mosb gratifying, lasbing as ib did some seconds, played bhe parb of the real Donna Lucia wibh her usual care and finish. Mr Thornton's Babs is worbhy as a piece of character acting to stand alongside hia Rev. Mr Spalding in •The Private Secretary.' It is nob only that he makeß themosb of bhehighly comical situations which abound in the piece, but he enters so thoroughly and completely into the spirit and humour of the part and his facial expression js so inimitable, that from the time he comes on> the stage till the curtain falls he has the audience in roare of laughter. Nothing could be funnier, for instance, than his look at the two young fellows who have gob him to personate the aunc when their respective h weetheats embrace and kies him, of course in his assumed character. Then, again, the scones with bhe two elderly suitors, who are after the reported fortune of the Brazilian lady, were full of humour, Mr Thornton's bye-play being excellent, Bub the scene in which he scored the greatesb success was the scene in the draw-ing-room afber dinner, where Babs is left alone wibh the ladies. This was most cleverly worked out, Mr Thornton's facial expression being excellent. Throughout the impersonation is one of a very high order of artistic ability. The piece was nicely pub on bhe stage, the set of the Collego quadrangle in the second act being specially good.' In 'The Cabinet Minister,1 which the Broagh-Boacicaulb Company are playing at Sydney Lyceum, • Pinero has followed the plan he adopted 60 successfully in ' Dandy Dick' and ' The Magistrate' of silhouetting a, dignified personage againist a quaintly complicated Beb of incogruowß surroundingaf Ib ia in this case a Cabinet Minister who Buffers, the Right Hon. Sir Julian Twombley, G.C.M.C., M.P., Secretary of Sbate for the Department. Lady

Twombley's extravagance has brought her within the financial grasp of Joseph Lebanon, a moneyleader, who shares wibh bia sister—'a widow or something, 1 a fashionable lady by night and a milliner by day—an overweening desiro to geb into whab the, gentleman }n, 'Lady Windermere's Fap ' speaks of as ' this de,md thing called society.' This causes conditions nob unlike those of < The Private Secrebary,' where bhe tailor climbs up op his bills to fashionable life,. Lebanon apd, his sister findbhemaeivesab, Drumdurriei Castle, Perthshire, with bho salb of thab part of the earth,, and bring themselves into prominence, by their solecisms. Lebanon, howevpr, doesn't} largest business ih the pursuit of pleasure «nd. induces. Lady Twombley to ascertain from her husband'a paper" what the Government are gQing to do \ , h re? specb t<? c«rta.K canal conceßsio" But the Minister lav. -reseen this eve>i L,ady TwqiflbJey gets „ memorandum wiuich has been paipoaely lsit bandy to mislead, her, and Lebanon, speculating on this false hjpb, ''feoUJs, the baby,' while her ladyship puts money, pn the other way a,nd wing,