STAGE JOTTINGS.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIII, Issue 251, 19 October 1912, Page 14

STAGE JOTTINGS.

HIS MAJESTY'S THEATRE. October /4 to 26—Plimmer-Dennison Co. October 29 to Not. 9—Auckland Amateurs, 'The Mikado." November 18—Grant Melodrama Co. TOWN HALL. October 19 —Hen , Pechotsch Concert. October 28 and 29— Rudlinc Kioling Recital PICTTJKES. King , * Theatre. Hoyal Albert Hell. Lyric Theatre. KJng George—Durham Street. Newton Picture Palace (continuous). Queno's Tbeatre (contlnnoae). Umpire Theatre—Dominion Roftd. VAUDEVILLE. Opera Home—Nightly. Mr. William do Veer in his novel, "A Benedict's Escapade," makes his heroine, a typewriter, give views on play-going which would certainly t«e endorsed by the great majority of theatre patrons. "The playwright's task is to give mc pleasure, to entertain mc. He must invent a strong story, with a good, clear, interesting plot, and lots of excitement. .. . From first to last the play must be witty, entertaining, fascinating, and, if the story is tragic,'make my flesh creep, give mc the shudders. How the writer U to accomplish this is bis affair, not mine, but when he succeeds I give myself up to him entirely. Who cares, as long as the illusion is perfect, how a conjurer produces his rabbits and canaries. If a playwright keeps mc interested and amused, that's all I ask of him. Let him make mistakes—they won't worry mc! Hie business is to carry mc off into another world, to make mo forget my troubles. When he does that, I bless him; I don't set to work to dissect his piece to find out whether, according to some silly rules, it is beautiful or no. Of course, it is all ;i dream I have to awake from. Never mind! I have had my treat! Whatever it may bo in your ryes, for a few hours sut , h a play as that has borne mc away from—what cannot be altered."

Arising from a recent controversy in England about the morality, or want of it, of Mr. Stanley Houghton's "Hindle Wakes,' , a correspondent to the "Era" asks, and evidently queries seriously enough, if an actreag disagrees with the morality of a character "can she honourably undertake to voice it across the footlights for the sake of her salary?" If actresses and actors, too, were to refrain from playinjj any parts save those that squared with their ideals of morality, surely much of the world's greatest drama would be immediately relegatpd to oblivion. To take Shakespeare alone: Goneril, Regan, Lady Macbeth, Cleopatra, Richard 111., lago, Macbeth, and a host of others, including even the rotund FaLstaff, would disappear from the boards, since assuredly no normal exponent could accord them moral sanction. In a word, the millennium would have been ushered in, and there would be no need of drama, or, for that matter, anything else at all, Even in the old religious morality plays, predecessors of the drama legitimate, the evil principle was always seen warring with the good, although inevitably discomfited in the last scene of all. When "Get-Rjch-Quick Wallingford" finishes its Sydney season on the 31st inst., it will 'have registered a run of 89 performances. Melbourne playgoers will see the farc«-coaiedy on November 2.

Under the heading "My View of Our Profession," in the current number of "The Theatre," Mr. W. S. Percy has some interesting observations to make. Among other things, he says:—"Our status as to the last 20 years been so enhanced as to almost become a source of danger. To my thinking the actor should not allow himself to be socially lionised. In the first place, he cannot afford the calls upon his time that this involves; and, secondly, it is not fair to his manager. The actor is. in nine cases out of ten, expected to bo interesting and amusing at functions to which he is invited. He is supposed to take his rewj.nl in fluttered vanity. As against this his manager pays him salary, and naturally expects to get his exclusive services as an entertainer. It in quite a mistake to believe that social junketing brings business to the theatre. Only ona thing does that—a good performance." The epigrams, proverhs and paradoxes that abound in Oscar Wilde's "A Woman of No Importance," which will be produced at Hie Majesty's .by the PHmmcr-Denniston Company next Monday nijrht, have been much quoted, such as: "There are only two kinds of women —the plain and the coloured"; "My husband reminds mc of a promissory note— I'm tired of meeting him"; '"Nothing succeeds like excess"; and, again. "The book Ojf life ■began with a man and a woman in the garden—it ends with ro.vehitionß." This play is said to combine the very essence of intellectual merriment with a drama-tic basis intense in the extreme. The cast in the revival of "Dorothy," at Sydney, includes Florence Young (Dorothy Bantam), Sybil Arundale (Lydia Hawthorne), Dorothy Brunton (Phyllis Tuppitt), Celia GhUoni (Mrs. Privctt), Molly Bcarde (Lady Betty), Reginald Roberts (Geoffrey Wilder), Tallcur Andrews (Harry Sherwood), Victor Prince (Squire Bantam), Edmund Sherras (John Tuppett), Edward Wynne (Tom Strutt), and W. S. Percy (Lurcher). Sydney is to have the most artistically satisfying theatre in Australia. This will be Her Majesty's, under a newscheme of alteration and renovation. Outwardly and inwardly the theatre will be newly decorated. Tho contracts run into nearly £5,000, and provide for a new system of ventilation which will make the auditorium the coolest summer house in Sydney. Haydn Beck, the boy violinist, accompanied by his father and his younger brother Harold, who is a promising musician, left Wanganui for Wellington on Tuesday. From Wellington they will sail by the Remuera for London en" route for Brussels, where Haydn will complete liis musical education. A large benefit concert was tendered him in the Opera House, Wanganui, on Friday night.

Mr. Frank Gerald, who was associated with Mr. Nat Gould's eporting play, "The Chance of a lifetime," and who "is now the agent in London for the Bert Bailey Dramatic Company, writes in the "Daily Express":— "I am now in quest of a London theatre for the performance of 'On Our Selection,' an Australian play which has been successfully running through the Commonwealth for many months This is particularly interesting as the first piay to be sent over complete— with the original company and scenery from Australia to London." The Palace Theatre, Sydney, from October 26 will be occupied by a new dramatic company, under the management of Talbot. Limited. The season is to be -opened witli '"The Unaren Kye," a new play of Australian city life, by Mr Randolph Bed-ford. MLss Madge McIntosh ie the leading lady of the new company, and Mr. George Bryant is the producer. Miss Mclntosh was prominent in the recent .performances of "The Blue Bird" and "You Never Cma Xell."

Mr. J. C. Williamson and Mr. George T.-Ulis have been visiting Paris and other Continental cities, and London, gathering new ideas for the firm's nest pantomime. Mr. Andrew MacCunn has been devoting- toimeelf to the musical portion. Mr. Hickory Wood, Mr. Frank Dix and Mr. Cornell have met in London in the interests oi" the libretto, the general production, and the costumes, respectively, while Mies Minnie Everett, who at present as in New Zealand with the "Sinbad" Company, is well up in all that appertains to the ballets. In Melbourne the ■scenery, under the direction of Mr. W. R. Coleman, is well advanced, and so also are the mechanical effects and the properties. What are reckoned as the two outstanding dramatic successes of the London season-—-"Milestones" and "Bella Donna"—have teen secured by J. C. Williamson, Ltd., for production in Australia. "Milestones" is particularly k novel and interesting, in that it shows • the mode of life and fashions prevailing lin three generations. "Bella Donna" is ! James Bernard Fagan's dramatisation of ' Robert llHohin'e novel of the same name. ' Another feature of special interest in k connection with thie dramatic season is ' i the fact that Mr. Julius Knight wall •! make hie reappearance in Australia in • the leading roles of the respective pro- ' ductions. The supporting company will ! be drawn from the ranks of the bestI known and most papular artists in > Australia. > • i David Belasco'ft production of William ~ C. de Mille'e play, "The Woman," ran t two hundred and fifty performances at I 1 the Republic Theatre, New York. ! j The Sydney Theatrical Employees' Union won the first prize for the best \ spectacular display at the Eight-hour procession. Lueguardemen, gorgeously J attired, rode in front of a galley holding a juvenile cTew armed with tin swords ! and shields. Then came Noah's Ark, filled with comical-looking animals. Gro- \ tesque masks with long necks and animated legs below completed the street show. The galley, mounted on a lorry, ' was liko the one which was used in ; j"The Blue Bird."

When "Ben Hur" returns to Sydney— on November 2—three chariotp wall be raced in the circus at Antibch. One team of horses will be blacks, the second greye, and the third bays.

Somebody has found a Imck number of the "Saturday Review" in which Bernard Shaw, then its dramatic critic (1895), wrote: "I really cannot express myself politely on the subject of Mr. Charles Ooghlan'a performance (as Mercutio). Shakespeare never leaVes one in doubt as to when he means an actor to play Sir Toby Belch and when to play Mercutio, or when he means an actor to speak measured verse and when slipshod colloquial prose. Mr. Forbes Robertson (as Romeo) is very handsome, very well dressed, perfectly well behaved. This Romeo was a gentleman to the last. He laid out Paris, after killing him, as carefully as if he were folding up his best suit of clothes. One remembers Irving, a dim figure, dragging a horrible burden down through the gloom 'into the rotten jaws of death,' and reflects on the differences of imaginative temperament that underlie the differences of acting and stage managing. In Mrs. Campbell's Ju.'iet there is not a touch of tragedy, not a throb of love or fear, temper instead of passion—in short, a Juliet in whose death you don't believe, though you couldn't cry over it if you did believe." Jennie Pollock, who on August 31 became the wife of Ross B. Simpson, a well-known and widely-liked Sydneyite, and for many years a fat stock salesman with the firm of Maiden Brothers, was born in Auckland (N.Z.). There she won a junior scholarship, and for three years was at the Auckland College. Miss Pollock was with Bland Holt for a long time. Later, she was with George Willoughby ; and just now she is a member of the Marlow company that includes Hugh Buckler and Vioiet Paget. Miss Pollock expresses the highest regard for Bland Holt and (ieorge Willoughby. The marriage took place at 3 o'clock in the afternoon at the residence of the bride's mother at Neutral Bay. Miss PollocK. had to appear at the A del phi the same night in the production " The Girl Without a Home." It was intended to keep the affair .is quiet as possible (says "The Theatre"). Somehow the information leaked out early in the evening, with the result that when on the stage in the last act, or just as the curtain was coming down at the end of the play. Miss Pollock was showered from behind the wings with confetti and flowers, with old shoes attached to the flowers. The audience — for it was in full view of the audience that this was taking place—took in the situation at a glance, A great favourite at the Adelphi is Miss Pollock, and those present on this particular night gave evidence of the fact in a way that she is likely to long remember. To such an extent did they enter into the spirit of the occasion that they refused to ease off in their cheering until the curtain had gone up seven or eight times. Meanwhile, things were being made all the merrier by the OTchestra chipping in with "The Wedding March." The members of the company afterwards gathered round Mr. Simpson and Miss Pollock on the stage. Through Mr. Buckler (Mr. Buckler and his charming wife. Miss Paget, are always to the fore with a warm and generous hand) they presented the newly-wedded couple with a beautiful gold and silver chatelaine. Mr. Buckler declared Miss Pollock -was loved by every member of the company, and that these all joined with him in wishing Mr. Simpson and Miss Pollock the fullest measure of health, prosperity, and happiness. Miss Pollock will remain with the George Marlow Co. till her present contract expires. She will then withdraw from the stage, and settled down permanently in Sydney—at her pretty little home,"" Aroha," Cremorne.

Elopements on the stage are not nearly so interesting as those in real life. In the one there is always a striving after the romantic ; in the other the romantic springs naturally. When tne other day Pietro Mascagni, the erratic Italian composer, eloped with an Italian chorus girl in Rome, it was only what many managers, opera singers, and others, who have a knowledge of his varied exploits, were prepared to accept. But when they learnt that he.was indieerect enough to advise his wife of his intended diversion, and then go home to pack up his travelling kit, they experienced something- of a surprise. So, too did his wife. She flew into a temper* fell upon the composer and assailed him with n knife. He and the girl got away by rail, and the injured spouse pursued in an automobile. As Maseagni's rise to fame was due to his wife's early faith in his genius, it is only natural that she should have livened things up a bit while the c-hance was yet with 'her to do so The little romance should furnish the composer with excellent raateriaJ for a new musical play, and inspire him with a feeling to which he could give genuine expression when writing the love scenes between himself and his accommodating chorister. THE DEADHEAD.