PLAY SEASON OPENS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 139, 13 June 1936, Page 14

PLAY SEASON OPENS.

NOVELLO COMCDY TO-NIGHT

Auckland playgoers will this evening see j the initial performance of Ivor Novello's ' much-praised comedy, "Fresh Fields," I which has enjoyed seasons amounting almost to the sensational in London, America and Australia. The new comic-dramatic company which Messrs. J. C. Williamson, Limited, is bringing over has staged this play in several New Zealand centres. On the opening night of the New Zealand season in Wellington (May 9) the audience included Mr. and Mrs. J. E. Hamill, of Taihape, parents of Mihs Elaine Hamill, and Mrs. Quirk and Miss Ida Maginnity, sisters of Miss Ethel Morrison. Miss Hamill and Miss Morrison are two of tha three New Zealand actresses who head the company. Miss Morrison .brings a Marie Tempest humour to the role of Lady Mary Crabbe, one of the Mayfair ladies to whose mansion come the vulgar Australians—the Pidgeons—to stay. Her unaffected dignity and lively sense of fun made Lady Mary a genial, if money-snatching, aristocrat. Miss Hamill brings .her beauty and elegance to the role of Lady Lilian Bedworthy, Lady Mary's romantic sister, -who succumbs to the wooing of Tom Lareombe, rugged Australian, played by Harvey Adams. The play is further responsible for some fine work by Katie Towers as the plump Mrs. Pidgeon, a lovable, adorable commoner; Phyllis Baker, as her daughter; Connie Martin, as Lady Strawholme, mother of Lady Crabbe; Arthur Lane, as a young English nobleman; Norman Shepherd, as Ludlow, the butler; and Enid Hollins, as Miss Swaine. Keith Winter's drama, "The Shining Hour," Rachel Crothers' comedy, "As Husbands Go," and Emlyn Williams thriller, "Night Must Fall," will be staged during the Auckland season.