" PAID IN FULL."

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1038, 30 January 1911, Page 6

" PAID IN FULL."

| A FINE ACTING PERFORMANCE. i "Paid in Full," a play by Eugene ! Walter. Cast: ! oui.iDXiJUH ssij£ S3{oojfl -emmg; I UOS9DIO OOUDJOIJ SU-lUft" ipog i unqSnuA oisnfi i>3U'£ SI-MEH ; jopu anso'x M]{ : o|L'g lurAMff oiIJDDO *.ijf snruiiifAV ! Wjoojff aof puomsoQ MK xnjuis Xsmtj When Captain Clinton, buccaneer, gunrunner, scaler, Soutli Sea Island trader, had amassed wealth, ho drifted into semi-respectability as the owner of a line of steamers. He was a savagely rough man, with tho' salt grime of tho ocean rubbed well into his nature. A hard life had begot hardness, but it had' not dulled tho llinty edge of his wits. He was a prosperous savage, who had never hesitated to kill, when his own life was threatened—his judgment in such and other matters was his bible. Joe Brooks, his cashier, hated and despised him as gutter capitalist, a gilded excrescence forced by an unnatural process fron\ tho ocean's .scum. Joe, who was married to a fine little woman, maintained that Clinton was still squeezing the life out of men and women as he did actually when a sea-rover. Joe did not think he got enough salary, and, being a high-strung, nervous, sensitive type of Socialistic prig, he found an outlet in eruptions of violent abuse of his employer. "Jimsy" Smith, who was also in the office, reckoned that the "Cap'n" was all right, though a hard, tempestuous man, who had always come when ho ("Jimsy") called, but then "Jimsy" was a philosopher, who played a strong hand soundly and most affably. "Jimsy" had loved Mrs. Joa before she became so, and after —well, he was just her big-hearted brother, waiting round to do her and Joe good turn?. Mrs. Joe had a mother and a to whom Clinton was attentive on occasions, and such attentions the old sea-wolf would have pressed on to Mrs. Joe, but she would have none of them. The sympathy that was extended to Mrs. Joo because she had to do without a help and drudge sent Joe crazy, and, coming upon the whole lot, including Clinton, telling his wife how ill she looked, Joe called Clinton down and told him in impassioned words that it was .his grinding, slave-driving methods, that kept them where they were. Clinton looked murder, but the woman hold him back, and Joe retired white and spent with his frenzy. Clinton, mastering himself, told Mrs. Joe that it would be all right —he would uot dismiss her and "Jimsy" just drifted lound with the oilcan, projecting drops of kindness into the jarred bearings of the troubled group. It was after Mrs. Joo had refused to go'to a theatre party becauso she had no dress, that Joe fell, Clinton, with "Jimsy," had gone off to Guatemala, and Joe started in on the firm's Telling' Mrs. Joo that his salary had been doubled, and the increase dated back six months, he took a suite at a good hotel, and lived. To Mrs. Joo the change from drudgery was delightful; :to Joe it brought blue rings round eyes j that had a hunted look. He tried the I race game, as a means of getting back I what he owed his accounts, with the inevitable result. One day "Jimsy" lounged in from Guatemala, and getting Joo by himpelf, said that Clinton knew all, that the Captain had returned to New York thrco days before, and had been going through the books at_ night. Joe, admitting all, becomes panicky, abject, terror-stricken, and is just shaken to pieces when there is a knock. It is Clinton.- He is grimly pleasant, sardonically humorous, jabbing his distraught cashier with allusions barbed with hooks that tear him to pieces. "Jimsy" attempts to soften the blow, as far as Mrs. Joo is concerned, by accounting for the Bronkes's change of habitat by a reference to Joe's rise in salary, signing t-) Clinton to back up Joe's lie for the time being. Clinton takes up the cue, but anyone but a blind, trusting little woman would, notice tho inenaco behind his clumsy sarcasm. At tho Captain's departure, Joe collapses completely, and horrifies his little wife with a full confession. Tho detectives are watching the house, the prison gate yawns—the shame, (he everlasting disgrace—what, is to be done? "Jimsy"? No, ho hadn't enough money. Who then—what on earth was to be done? Then the light of a defepdown devil leaps out of his dilated eyeslie would have her go to Clinton alone that night, and plead for him. .. No one would ever know. Clinton liked her. Joe was sure—that is why ho was forever hanging round. After all, it was for her he had stolen—to keep her in luxury. When she recovers from tho stunning blow dealt her in tho meaning of her husband's suggestion, ; and overcomes the nauseating horror brought about by Joe's exposure , of his real self, Mrs. Joe, after a 'scene of the highest tension, resolves to go to Clinton that night, and rings up to tell him so. There is. fight in 1 the little woman. She has no thought of dishonouring herself, and at the close of an intensely dramatic scene she defies Clinton, and tells him she will die first. The glorious grit of the woman he had always admired lit a kindly light in tho Captain's eye. Besides, his vanity was tickled—he had banked on her as a good woman, and she was nil good and close up to Heaven. It would bo all right about Joo and th'e 10,000 dollars. Mrs. Joe returns home to denounce and renounce her wretched husband, which operation is most convincingly effective. "Paid in Full" is not a pleasant play. There is something abhorrent in tho suggestion which gives such strength to tlio central motif that is the reverse of the thought that should be encouraged in the dramatist. It is generally conceded that the art of the actor and dramatist is to -hold tho mirror up to nature, but it is contrary to the fitness of things to hold it up to the unnatural. "Paid in Full"' follows the trend of 'the present-day brutally realistic in American drama, and is a contemporary of such vivid and coarsely clever plays a 9 "The Easiest Way," "Salvation Nell," and "The Wolf." Technically it is a tine piece of dramatic writing, and it grips like a hungry octopus. "Thero is beauty even in ugliness," wrote W. S. Gilbert. That is tho type of beauty which makes so strong an appeal in "Paid in Full." It is a magnificent acting performance. Mr. Cyril Mackay as the nerve-shattered Joo Brooks piles up honour for himself in fa performance that would surely earn him starhood elsewhere. ll© is the unprincipled, egotistical neurotic to tho finest hair, and his virile acting' in tho big scene of the second act with Miss Grey acclaims him a dramatic actor of very high rank. In tho deliverance of his torrential speeches he displayed a magnetic force, a clarity of enunciation, and an artistic polish which mado his characterisation one that will be difficult to efface from the memory. Miss Katherinb Grey, tho newest disciple of perfect repose and absolute naturalism, was movingly effective as Mrs. Joe Brooks, and acted with that instilling conviction which compels the interest and sympathies of tho audience. It is pleasing, too, to note the excellent quality of Mr. Wm. Desmond's • performance as easy-going "Jimsy" Smith. Played with a Western drawl, and more or less of a lounge instead of a walk, "Jimsy" is made to stand out in bold contrast to Joe Smith. Mr. Desmond suggested to a nicety the strength underlying the quiet affability of troubled's friend. Mr. Geo. Bryant splashes round in bold colours as Captain Clinton. No finnicky light-lino impressionism for him. He makes a Clinton an awkward, coarse sea-wolf, devoid of sentiment and rough-tongued, and yet deep down ono has to think with "Jimsy" that he is "all right." There is no gainsaying tho power of Mr. Bryant's delineation—it is a valuablo addition to his gallery of stage "roughies." Miss Susie Vaughan was well suited as Mrs. Harris, and Miss Glccson was vivacious and snappy as Betli Harris*. Mr. Leslio Victor appenrs in the third act as Sato, Clinton's Japanese servant—a sketch of cameo perfection.

Tho drama is admirably mounted, and the orchestra, under Mr. Leopold, renders a programme of acceptable music in firstrato style. "Paid in Full" will bo played this and to-morrow evening, and "on Wednesday Clydo Fitch's play, "The Truth," will bo performed.