THE THEATRE.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 199, 16 May 1908, Page 12

THE THEATRE.

By Sylvius,

"Tho world's a theatre, the earth' a stago."—Hey wood. Tho Julius Knight-Ola Humphrey Season. Oil Saturday evening next the Julius Knight-Ola Humphrey combination will commence a season of drama, new and old, at the Opera House. As has been trumpeted forth previously the "star" piece of the repertoire will be "The Scarlet Pimpernel," which has proved as groat a .success on the stago as it has as a novel. It makes a very presentable play indeed, but if the writer were asked to nominate tho "best play of the roportoire it would not bo "The Scarlet Pimpernel," which 1 had the pleasure if Booing in Sydney. The " Pimpernel" has a distinct interest of its own on account of tho popularity of the Baroness Orczy's novel, but as a playgoers' play it does not compare with " The Prisoner of Zenda," a costume high comedy of literary and whimsical charm, which made a bigger impression 011 its recent revival in Sydney than it did when originally produced seven or eight years ago. But all theatrical ontertainment is purely a matter of taste. Some would sooner sit out a variety show than see the latest of Barrio's creations, and would rather see "The Face at the Window" than "Lady Windermere's Fan:" But the gulf between the "Pimpernel" and "Zenda," is, of course, not nearly so wide as - the instances quoted, and my opinion is that both bills will be welcomed eagerly and enjoy equal favour with the average audience. " Claudian " is a shot at a classical melodrama, which even includes tho conventional sensation in the form of an earthquake. My feelings are too harrowed to allow me to writo anything about the other two plays in tho repertoire, " The Lady of Lyons," and " A Royal Divorce " —they come and go with Julius Knight, and as long as that actor' can make money for the management, so. long will the public have to endure "The Lady " and the " Divorce." It is^only fair to the present company to say that its personnel differs vastly from tho company headed by the Julius Napoleon Melnotte last year. ■ ' • ' '

"The Prince Chap." • Mr. Albert Goldio, who is to be tho advance representative for "Tho Prince Chap" Company, writes to say that the new comedy, in: which Mr. Harry Roberts "starred" so successfully at Home, and which is to. be produced in this country shortly by a new English company headed by Mr. Roberts, is' a charming piece, simple, wholesome, and abounding in fine comedy, and not without intense and novel situations. So struck was the author, Mr. E. H. Peple, with Mr. Roberts's impersonation, that he wrote him as follows: —"My dear Mr. Roberts,—Believe me, it is a matter of great self-congratulation that I hear you are to present my play 'TIIO Prince Chap,' in Australia. It is rather a remarkable coincidence that, in writing both tho play and tho novel, I should liavo described the leading chracter as a man whose personality and temperament are so eminently in accord with your own; and, indeed, had I called upon ypu originally, as a model for tho man himself, I could not have been more accurate in pourtraying tho spirit and individuality of my hero. iMorcovor—if you will pardon the compliment—your personal magnetism and beautiful voice will lend to tho role that indescribable charm of tho true Southern gentleman. I heartily wish you every success, which I feel in advance will bo yours, and beg to add tho author's genuine regards." ■

• The company includes Mr. Frank Lamb (comedian), Miss Mary Keogh (character actress), and Justina Wayne (leading lady). A feature of "The Prince Chap" is that the leading girl character grows up as the comedy progresses. : In the first act it is played by little'. Vera Huggott (four years old), in the second by Beryl Yates (oight years old)', and finally by Miss Wayne. Other members of the company are Mr. A. E. Greenaway (lato of the Scarlet Pimpernel" Company), Miss Vera Remee, and Miss Florence Rcdfern. Tho tour, which is under tho joint direction of ; Messrs! Harold Ashton and Allan Hamilton, will commence at Christchurch on June 1. • Raisull's Warriors. A very realistic "turn" has been provided at tho London Hippodrome in tho appearancc of twelve of Raisuli's warriors from Morocco; The barelegged mountaineers entered tho qrena armed with long muskets and headed by Moors mounted on Arab horses. Tho warriors performed the .desert pastime called "Powder Play." It is not only thrilling, but extremely wild and noisy, and consists of a war dance, in which the warriors twirl round on their toes, charge each other, and firo their muskets into the ground. The wedding dance which follows is of a more humorous character, but equally barbaric. With the party of twelve is a Moorish dancing boy—Sadik—who executes, a strange tripping dance to the accompaniment of a weira instrument known as the " raita," which bears, in its sound, a strong resemblance to the Highland pipes. Raisuli's nephew, El Machtar, who is of the party, is a young, man of 21, of fine physique, and his war-whoops are louder than those of any of his companions. Mr. Trussell, the manager of the Hippodrome, who secured the services of the warriors after many negotiations, showed on a screen an excellent photograph — which he- had taken himself—of Kaid Maclean.

"The Man on the Kerb.;* Mr. Sutro, the author of "The Walls of Jericho," has written a particularly realistic one-act play that we should see one day. Tho play is callod "The Man on the Kerb." The scene is a squalid cellar, tho "home" of tho out-of-work clerk, Joe Matthews, and his wife, Mary. Their 1 little child is asleep on a wrotchod mattress, level with the floor. The

unfortunate couple. are literally starving. Joe, shivering and in rags, afflicted >vith a hacking cough, has had no luck "on the kerb." A pitying policoman lias given him a pipeful of tobacco —and that is all. Yet he is steady and willing, and anxious to work. It was 110 fault of his that his employers "went smash.'? ■ He is well educated, too; able to conduct a correspondence in three languages. To-day he lias " dined off tho kitchen smell of the Cafe Royal," and now he is reduced to smashing up the remains of his rickety furniture in order' to obtain a fire. "I'd givo Gibraltar for a sausage-and- . mashed,'j he exclaims, "and Russia could take India to-night if I could get a clerkship of ,-Cl a week."

The picture of Joe and Mary warming their shaking-hands in the glow of the crackling furniture is not a comforting one to tho lux-uriously-clad spectator. But Mr. Sutro is pitiless. Ho will not have their agony alleviated a jot. No good fairy arrives in the nick of time, to relievo their suffering's. Tliis is 11 real life,"' and we must go through with it. Mary, distraught .with hunger, pleads with Joe to end their miserablo existence once and for all. He resists the appeal now —but how long will his fortitude last? Falling on his knees, with hands uplifted, he cries aloud in his torment, "Oh, God! Give Us bread!" And then the curtain falls. " Paid in Full." Although he had had one play of his, " The Undertow," produced at. an East End Sido theatre, Mr. Eugene Waltor as a playwright was practically unknown to New York when his " Paid in Full" had its first performance at _ tho Astor a few weeks ago. In his production, Mr. Walter stamped himself as one of the rising young dramatists of America. It might further and truthfully bo said that in his graphic, vivid, and interesting study of a certain plntso of contemporaneous metropolitan life Mr. Waltor arrived, and with both feet, too. 11 is seldom that a play is received by both i'ross and public with the same unanimous expression of approval as attached to this drama. Tho first, night audience was interested, surprised, and thrilled, and thoso who have attended the subsequent performances of the piece have cordially endorsed tile verdict of that evening. In tho praiso of this- play particular commendation must bo awarded to Mr. Walter

for tho skill he has displayed in the. toeing of his story. Tho construction is wellnigh perfect. Tho exposition is outlined with a simplicity that at once commands interest, tho story is advanced with logical directness and an ingenious regard for dramatic detail that insures both strength and surprise, while the conclusion, however disstasteful it may be to those who insist always on a happy ending, is consistentlv logical and not without its insistent note of pathos and hope. The characters tho author has drawn are living types of tho overy-day. With tho exception of the mother and sister, slightly overdrawn for stage purposes, his dramatis perspnae talk like the people they represent and voice the sentiment of those m similar situations. It is a veritable human document, and in its reflex of contemporaneous lifo deserves to tako a lasting place in the altogether too limited library of permanent value. '

Joseph Brooks, a young married man, is a collector for a steamship company. With his wife, used to better things, they scratch •along in a Harlem flat. Joe does not seem to advance very well, and in a moment of pique and dissatisfaction uses isomi of the company's money for an evening out. He continues to embezzle, and they move to a hotel, where his wife, of course, remains unconscious of his delinquencies. But the hour of his undoing is at hand. Captain Williams, a former South Pacific trader, and president' of tho company, learns liis disquieting secret. He seems a brute, in its every sense,. and the now completely demoralised youth suggests- to his wife that she Visit Williams in liis apartment and purchase liis immunity at any price. She visits the captain, hut after an act delightfully ingenious in its picture of alternating Hope,dospair, courage, faint-heartedness, and moral worth, Brooks is allowed to go free and the wife unharmed. But Her eyes are opened to the utter selfishness and worthlessness of Joe, and tho wife, after a fine scene of scornful indignation, leaves him for ever. ,

A National Property. • Mr. Bernard Shaw, who favours a State theatre, is, as usual, characteristic, and suggests " that if, the State, in the name of the nation, were to assert our national property in Shakespeare's plays, and levy royalties on performances of them, the revenue so gathered might be ear-marked for the national theatre, provincial and metropolitan (for we shall want more than one public theatre). Another source of revenue-presents 1 itself opportunely in the pageants which are becoming fashionable.'' Pageants, lie says, cannot be carried out without the co-opera-tion -of theatrical artists; and "if these artists > respect and value their art, they will insist on the profits going to nourish and dignify it. There are, in short, a'dozen ways of raising a harvest from the Shakespearean seed if we really wish to honour his art, instead of making his reputation the means of 'working' a commission for a sculptor, a job for a contractor, an introduction to the King for a committee, and a knighthood for a chairman." • The Art of Acting. "The question if .the art of acting has gained or lost -ii a delicate one," says Sir John Hare, in an interview in the "Tolegraph," and a little difficult to answer off-hand.-.I appears to me that, on the whole, there is a very decided increase of talent; that the number of clever young artists is much larger now than it was in my early days.' But, at the same time, I feel that tbo talent-nf I may so express myself—lacks concentration, that it is spread over too vast a surface, that it is a changing instead of being a stable quantity. Fifty years ago a theatre was largely known by its company. One know exactly what to expect at, .say, the Hay market, tko old Prince of! Wales' s,' or the Adelphi.. To-day all this is, to a great/ extent, altered.' There, is a distinct loss m—the most fitting word I can find at . the moment, is—locality. The young actor drifts from house to house, and in the process his education necessarily suffers. Histrionic talent .in the .youthful ..ranks .undoubtedly dxist<s;,.iij!,' l abimdancel ;,;But. it is not made enough of, .'and, consequently, it remains in a crude and undisciplined state. The remark is peculiarly applicable" to actresses: . Where are we' to find our leading actresses of the next : gerieraj-ioti? Anyone who remembers the London stage a quarter of a century ago must be conscious of the marked difference, in point of all-round 1 ability, between them and thoso of .to-day. And'if the theatre is to attract, it must be by virtue of capable acting. The play may be tho thing, but unless its merits are brought into relief by adequate treatment it must inevitably fall to the ground. My belief is that we have too many theatres, and that too many of these theatres are under control of commercial syndicates. The management of a theatre—l am speaking now of the ideal management—should be entrusted to the hands of ono man, and of one man only. It is impossible for a .committee, composed perhaps of half a dozen poople all holding diverse views, to run a playhouse successfully. If the leading'spirit of' such an enterprise is to be trammelled by the thought of financial considerations, if his. attention is to be continuously diverted from the business of production, if he is to be worried and harassed at every instant by outside advice, how is it possible that lie should,succeed? • Let us nave a .national theatre as soon as practicable, for I feel Assured that when we do, it will, if properly controlled, form the finest trainingground for artists and for dramatists that oan possibly be conceived. Commanding talent, histrionic genius, will always find an outlet for itself. There is no need to create schools,for its development,'or to lay down rules for its governance. It is of the rank and file of thp profession I am thinking now, and it is to them, as it must eventually be to the stage at large, that the creation of a national theatre will bring-a real and en-, during gain."

Notes. "Sherlock Holmes" is being revived by Mr. J. C. Williamson in Melbourne, with Mr. Thomas Kingston as the drug-taking detective, Mrs. Brough as Madge Larabee, and Mr. J. B. Atholwood as Moriarty. Something unique in the way of "charity matinees" was planned by . the J. C. Williamson management in connection with"Peter Pan," when on Saturday, May 9, the whole of tho Princess Theatre was packed with; children who are at present inmates of the various charitable institutions in and around Melbourne. The' germ of tho idea may bo credited to W. T. Stead, who, writing a foreword to a "Peter Pan" souvenir iu London last year, said: —"I wonder why some of our wealthy men could not lay up for thomselves treasures in Heaven by taking uj) the theatre and packing it with the poor children of London—each houseful would make a thousand kiddies happy." Miss Tittoll Brune saw this foreword, and it was lier own suggestion that tho scliomo should bo carried out, she and the whole company gladly volunteering their services. The public was not admitted to the performance.

In tho Australian repertoire of Miss Margaret Anglin when she commences her tour under tho J. C. Williamson direction next month, "Tho Redemption of Heleno Ritchie" is likely to bo a strong draw. She made an immense impression with tho part when she toured with'it last year through tho United States—so much so indeed that instead of devoting the whole of her 'farewell season to a revival of "The Great Divide," as she loriginally intended, she shortened the run of that (hitherto her star piece in Amcrica) in order to give her new success tho other half of tho time at her disposal. The Julius Knight Company established a now record in theatrical money-getting during tho recent season in Auckland. The company, which appeared in Napier last 'ovcnjng, is to play, across country to Wellington, opening hero on Saturday evening next.

It is hardly necessary to comment on the following message from tho St. Petersburg correspondent of tho London "Daily Mail," which appeared in that paper on February 15 last:—"Such is the popularity of 'The Merry Widow' that on Sunday it will bo given at tho State subsidised Grand Opora House. All tho seats are booked already, and tho performance will bo witnessed by tho grand dukes and [eaders of society.' "For a box on tho grand tier £100 has been refused, and £5 is tho price of tho humblest seat." "Tho Merry Widow" is to bo produced for the first timo in Australasia at Melbourne this eveuing by the Royal Comic Opera Company.