STAGE JOTTINGS

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 136, 11 June 1927, Page 22

STAGE JOTTINGS

Paulino Frederick has the distinction of being the only actress who has a large and enthusiastic public for both the legitimate stage and the screen. For many this gifted dramatic star has appeared on the screen in some of the foremost productions. So insistent were demands.froon the theatrical managers that she left the screen for a time and appeared in the leading theatres of Australia and New Zealand in the repertoire of her famous stage plays. After a year's absence, Pauline Frederick went back to Los Angeles, where she immediately opened in the famous stage success, "Madame X." She is now appearing at the Lyceum In "Josselyn's Wife."

"Madame Pompadour," the new Williamson production, for which some artists have been engaged from the Continent, was put on for the first time in Brisbane a week or two ago. The piece has drawn crowded audiences, attracted largely, the notices show, by the performance of Miss Beppie de Vries, the new Dutch singer, who is written of as achieving an emphatic success in the name role. Mr. Frank Webster, another newcomer, is praised for his acting and his tenor singing. Mr. Arthur St.iga.rit (well known here) appears as Callcot. a wondering poet, who has a considerable chare of the comedy. One of the adapters of the book is Frederick Lonsdale, well-known for several recent box-office successes as a playwright. The show is due here about the end of the vear.

Judith Anderson has made her last appearance in Melbourne, and she will conclude her Australian season in Adelaide, her birth-place. Miss Anderson says she may never play again in Ausralia. She certainly will not return for aany years. The delasco star has to je in New York by the beginning of August. London will ce Mist Anderson in due course, and she ; also hopes to | play in France. Miss i Anderson's contract lg? . , with Belasco will not MU. Anderson, expire for two years. She had several offers from London managers, but as Mr. Belasco would not release her for a sufficiently long time, these had to be declined.

The next New Zealand tour of J. C. Williamson Celebrity Vaudeville will •tart in a few weeks time. As yet, the actual personnel of the company has not been definitely settled, but the acts from which it will be chosen are such that it will be one of the finest all-vaudeville combinations ever brought to the Dominion. Every act will be chosen for its success on the Australian circuit, and the headliner will be a specially rare attraction.

Gladys Moncrieff has found that nothing succeeds like success. As a result of her performance in "The Blue Mazurka" at Daly's, she has had two offers, one in London and another to come back to Australia, at a salary even bigger than the one she was reoeiving before she went away. So far, she hasn't decided what to do. Last year Frank Lehar, the composer, wrote to Mr. A. Allum, of Melbourne: "I am completing a new light opera, "The Blue Mazurka." Would it not bo nice if your friend, Miss Moncrieff, were engaged to play lead in London ?" The letter was sent on to Miss Moncrieff in London, who replied: "Xo such luck. I know that a Viennese actress has already been given the part," But the lady in question was unsuitable, and it aJI ended exceedingly well for Gladys Moncrieff.

The Auckland Little Theatre's next production will be "The Cassilis Engagement," by St. John Hant-in An excellent cast has been selected, and the play, under the able directorship of Mr! Kenneth Brampton, is now veil on the way in the matter of rehearsals. That propinquity is a cure as well as a means for matrimony is the theme of this most diverting play. The story surrounds the engagement of the son of '•highbrows" to a bourgeoise. The tactics emploved by the mother of the boy arc to bring the girl and her vulgar mother to the country home and satiatt them with gutter boredom in country societv. She" treats them with ultra" cordiality and insists on a long engagement.* The comedy of the piece is entirelv in the hands of the vulgar mother, and some extremely funny episodes ensue.