STAGE JOTTINGS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXV, Issue 217, 10 September 1904, Page 10

STAGE JOTTINGS.

Mr Allan Hamilton has given up the management of Sandford's American Dramatic Company, now appearing in Sydney. Apparently the Pitzmaurice Gill Dramatic Company is a thing'of the past, as Miss Gill and Mr Blake arc appearing in ,a comedy sketch at the Melbourne Gaiety. The Stephen son Musical Comedy Company are due in New Zealand in October, opening their tour in Wellington. So far as can be seen, we shall have three large companies at least touring New Zealand within a couple ot months. Harry Rickards is said to have arranged to take over the "Fiddle-de-dee" Company, now appearing at the Palace Theatre" Sydney. The American ion so far (says an Australian contem porary) has served largely to provide Rickards with decent artists without his having to take the trouble to select and import them.

Cuyler Hasting (says an exchange) is said to have accumulated considerable wealth since he came' to Australia, and unkindly adds: "That he might devote a portion of" it in learning to act."'

I understand that Madame Lilian Tree has been offered the principal role in Mr Alfred Hill's latest comic opera. .Vir Hill is actively engaged in conjunction wit-h his librettist (Mr J. Y. Birch) .n putting the finishing touches to the work. The collaborators hope to have the completed opera rea-dy to put into rehearsal at an early date. Considering the enormous success of "Tapu," this the second work from Mr. Hill's pen will be looked forward to with intense interest, particularly as it is th-e joint effort of two young New The subject of this work is entirely 'istinet from that of "Tapu."

Charles Pope, the coon comedian, who used to show with the smileful Sayles, has joined Sanford's American Players for their production of the weatherbeaten "Uncle Tom's Cabin" at Sydney Lyceum.

"The Dandy Doctor," the latest production of George Stephenson's Musical Comedy Company, did not meet with the approval of the Melbourne critics, one of whom remarked:—"ln the lowest deeps a lower deep" is an expression which may most fully describe '"The Dandy Doctor." "The Rose of the Riviera" had no pretension to quality, but its successor, "The Dandy Doctor," is a conglomeration of trivial and wearisome absurdities which ought, to exhaust, even the phenomenal pa- j tience of a Melbourne audience, in the way of farcical exaggerations.

Miss Beatrice Day will be leading lady of the. comedy company which Mr Herbert Elemming is organising for a tour of the Commonwealth and New Zealand.

Mr Rickards is getting together a strong companj- for a tour in New Zealand in October. The company will include Marzella. whose clever birds now present a new sketch entitled "The Shipwreck." and Nat Clifford: Mr Allan Hamilton will probably have the management of the tour.

The American invasion of England is to be followed by an English invasion of America. Mr Chas. Frohman states

that he has engaged 400 English actors and actresses for his American ventures.

Williamson's Comic Opera Company will put on "The Orchid" in Melbourne , rb Cap time. Mips Clara Clifton,

member of Mr George Edwardes 5 I»:i----duii >~ oinpany* now appearing in Sydney, will have a leading role in "The Orchid," and it is probable that Mr W. S. Percy will also be included in the Cast.

Mr George Edwardes 60 urgently needs the' members of his company now playing in Sydney- that no time will be lost by them in hastening back to London at the conclusion of the season there. The company . will conclude their season on the 16th September, and on the following day the majority of the members will leave for London by the Himalaya. Mr and Mrs Huntley, Misses Maud Hobson, and Elsa livan will return to England by way of America, leaving Sydney by the Ventura on September 19.

When Cuyler Hastings this month severs his connection with the company which for a couple of years has born his name, Miss Tittel Brune becomes the star. The scope of the company will in a measure be altered, for such plays as "L'Aiglon,"' a great success of Sarai\ Bernhardt, and "Theodora," another of this actress' plays, are to be produced. With this object in view Mr Roy Redgrave, Mr Gaston Mervale, and, latest, Mr A. E. Greenaway, strengthen the company. The last-named should not be altogether forgotten by an older generation of theatoe-goers here, for m 1894 or s—l forget which—Mr Greenawars Orlando to the Rosalind of Hilda Spong proved a good sound piece of work. Recently this artist has been acting in the United States.

1 When little Dorothy Swift was ill in ■ Wellington the other day, and unable to appear at the evening performance as Max in "Counsel's Opinion," Master >Sid Halliday "was allowed by the management of the Williamson Comedy Company to fill the breach. He had played the part with Hawtrey in AustraliaMaster Halliday, who is only twelve years of age, is considered by the Australian press to be one of the cleverest »hilti artists ever seen on the colonial stage. Mascagni's new opera. ''Arnica, -, is to be produced at Monte Carlo during the winter season. There are only five characters in the cast, and three of them will be played by Mme. Calve, M. Kcnaud and M. Alvarez. The libretto is by Paul Berel, and. is in French, and the one-act opera is calculated to take an hour and a half in performance.

London, within a ten-mile radius of Charing Cross, has 7C2 places of amusement, frequented nightly by approximately 140,000 people. Of these, 27 are West End theatres, and 32 theatres in outlying districts: 61 are music balls, where performances are given regularly; 630 are halls and assembly rooms (for concerts, dramatic entertainments, and the like) ; and 12 are special places of entertainment. It is estimated that the theatres attract 47.000 persons; the music halls 59,000, and the rest 34,000.

The one great sensation of last year's season in America was the production of Wagner's "Tarsifal" at the Metropolitan Opera Hooee, New York. The representation was preceded by a long argument between Herr Concried and Madame Wagner, who, for sentimental reasons, persisted in declining to sanction the production of the work outside of Bayreuth, but Concried at last prevailed, and produced "'Parsifal" with a great cast at the Metropolitan Opera House. The public excitement and enthusiasm were absolutely unprecedented. The performance commenced each day iv the afternoon, with an interval for dinner, the 'same audience assembling again in the evening. The already high prices at the Opera House were greatly increased for this production, and the receipts for each representation of "Parsifal" averaged over £6000, thus establishing a record which has never been approached in any other theatre in the world for a number of consecutive performances. The story of the Holy Grail has now been put into dramatic form as a "stage consecrating music play," with Wagner's music, and it is now being presented with enormous success at the Alcazar Theatre in San Francisco. In all probability Australian playgoers will have an opportunity to witness this great work at an early date, as Mr. J. C. Williamson is negotiating for the American dramatic version. About unlucky things on the stage (writes a "Bulletin" correspondent). When the Melbourne was designed, Williamson insisted on those flaunting peacocks on each side of the proscenium, merely because- in the general view of the profession, it was the. most unlucky tiling he could do. All sorts of woes were predicted for Williamson, Garner, and Musgrove, but they were as obstinate as Henry Irving and his friends, many years ago, when Irving arranged the unlucky dinner. There were 13 guests, everybody came in under a ladder, they had a cross-eyed waiter, and every possible theatrical bogey was accumulated. When the Melbourne Princess , was redecorated, nearly everything was changed, except the peacocks! There they remain. Sarah Bernhardt, Toole, Warner, Leslie, Nellie Farren, Mrs. Potter. Barrett. Madame Melba, all Tjve their various shudders as they exclaimed, "Peacocks!"

A .well-known English actor tells the following "yarn" about an incident which happened during the run o* a pantomime in the north of England. There was an elaborate hunting scene in a wood, in which an intelligent fox-ter-rier, most carefully made up as a fox, ran across the stage with the hounds after him in full cry. On the first night, directly the "fox" made his entrance, he took umbrage for some unaccountable reason at the energetic movements of the conductor of the orchestra, and instead of scampering across the wood, rani down to the footlights and began to bark furiously. To say the people shrieked feebly expresses the "fox's" reception, but when the hounds presently appeared, and he calmly joined them and trotted away in their company, the actors realised that if the success of a pantomime artist is shown by the loudness of the audience's laughter, Dan Leno himself never made such a hit as their barking "fox."

"Well," said the musical-comedy young lady, "it's quite true, Cecil has proposed to mc. Don't you believe it?" "Oh, yes," replied she who dressed next to her, "'I quite believe it. You see, when I refused him he said he'd do himself an injury." They don't dress in the same room now. An energetic German professor was conducting a musical society in Durham City. They were studying Mendelssohn's ."'Elijah," and had reached the chorus, "Hear us, Baal." The men's voices were booming out sonorously when the conductor cried out: "Mo-dc dreadful vowel! Don't say Bale; soften a little, give de more musical sound, Bal." Whereupon the chorus took up thr strain again: "Hear us, bawl!" But they quickly realised the peculiar fitness of the sentiment, and broke down in laughter, to the great amazement of the little German, who never saw the joke, but who returned reluctantly to the old pronunciation. THE DEADHEAD.