AMUSEMENTS.

Press, Volume XLIV, Issue 19387, 13 August 1928, Page 7

AMUSEMENTS.

"The wizard."

'♦honesty the best policy.**

CRYSTAL PALACE, TO-DAY. J Tha «creen at Crystal Palace Theatre this week deals, in the first part of the programme, with propounding the Bound doctrine that honesty is the best policy; and in the second, with revealing the fruits that come to the in crime and the occult. Tho combination of picture is ingenious, and the situation is not without its humour. "Tha Wizard' 1 is the title of tha weird and incongruously humorous melodrama which heads programme. Edmund Lowe plays the lead, that of a reporter of abnormally "pushing propensities, who feels a holy urge within him to impersonate. Murphy, the detective, who is bemoaning the slump in the crime market. At the moment of the Murphy person's jeremiad a mysterious 'phone call comes, disjointed sentences come over the wire, and the newspaperman takes it upon himself to unravel the mystery, earn the plaudits of the public and? the commissioner, and scoop a marvellous Btory. Eventually, of course, he does (hem all, but it would not be surprising if his hair turned white in the process. For "The Wizard" is the most exquisitely taut mystery-play ever written; it holds secrets of dark and deep meanings, and it steadfastly refuses to give the audience a hint of what they are all about; it makes one scream with delighted mirth, then shiver with dim forebodings. It introduces a pretty girl, and even if it does set her down in a mansion of sinister aspect, it puts the reporter in her path, and what more can a pretty, girl want i Qustav von Seyffertitz is also in the cast, leering and creating just that disagreeable atmosphere at which he is the past-master. "Tho Wizard" has everybody guesßing; not until .the finale is th? secret told, are people revealed in their true colours, and not till then does the reporter kiss the pretty girl, and remember to give his editor a call. Leila Hymans is the pretty girl, and she is a charming foil to Eddie Lowe's buoyant personality. / ..I. That honesty is the best policy everybody is taught by his copy-book; but now Johnnie Walker, a nice young actor with a beautiful name, and Pauline Starke, helped by Rocklitte Fellowes, repeat all that was learned many .years ago, but with a great deal of action and amusing things thrown in. "Honesty the Best Policy" ,may be another "crook drama viewed superficially, but the audienco is scheduled for a surprise at the climax. Mr Alfred Bunz directs the Symphony Orchestra in the following numbers: —Overture, "True Friend" 'Blankenburg), "Symphony in B Minor" (Schubert), "Allegro Spirit, oso" (Mozart), "Canto Doloroso (Fnocko), "Andante con Moto (Mendelssohn), "Suite Miniatures" (Karganoff), "There Comes Springtime" (0 "Dainty Miss" (Barnes) 1 , "Rose (Brill), "Sweet Sixteen" (Home). The box plans are at The Bristol Piano Company, whero seats may be reserved.