COMING EVENTS OPERA HOUSE.

Evening Post, Volume LVI, Issue 74, 24 September 1898, Page 3 (Supplement)

COMING EVENTS OPERA HOUSE.

Pollard Opera Company, 26th September to sth October. Wellington Orchestral Society's Concert, lOLh October. Professor Dante, 21st to 28th October. Wellington Physical Training School Exhibition, 31st October and Ist November. The Thespians, 28th to 30th November. Bobert Henry Bramatio Company, 3rd to 17th December. Williamson & Musgrove Company, 26th December to 21st January. RECLAIMED LANS. Harmston's Circus, opens Ist October. Bristol's American Circus, about 21st November. The genial Allan Hamilton sends me a icLter from London under date of August sth, in whioh he announces that the Australian season of the Broughs will b?gin at Melbourne on Saturday, October 20th. The opening bill will be Mr. H. A. Jones's now comedy ' The Liars' (a sketch of which I published some time ago from my London correspondent), whioh ran for 1 v months at the Criterion Theatre, London, and will be revived after the midsummer vacation. Mr. Brough' s acquisitions for the colonies, as a result of his London trip, comprise the following plays: — 'The Liars,' 'Lord and Lady Algy ' (R. O. Carton), ' Madame Sans Gene ' (Sardou), ♦ One Summer's Day' (H. V. Esmond), «A Happy Life' (Louis N. Parker), 'The Adventures of Lady Ursula ' (Anthony Hope, ' A Bachelor's Romance,' ' The Master' (J. S. Ogilvie), 'The Derelict,' 'The Haven of Content,' 'Jedbury, Junior' (Madeleine Lucette Ryley). As to the coinpmy, it will comprise Mr. and Mrs. B rough, Miss Temple, Mr. M. Majeroni, Mr. j M 'ln tyre, Mr. Hards, and the following now members : Mr. W. T. Lovell, Mr. Joseph Came, Mr. Reginald Dartrey, Mr. W. H. Rotheram, Mr. Leslie Victor, Mr. Percy Brough (who has been in the colony before), Miss Vara Renny, Miss Italia Conti, Miss Evelyn Martheze, and Miss Bessie Thompson. We are promised that the pieces will be staged as Mr. Brough saw thorn in London, and the dresses and appointments are being brought out with the company for that purpose. Mr. and Mrs. Brough are on board the Britannia, which left on 25th August, and Mr. Hamilton followed iv the Orizaba on the 2nd of September. The now opera, 'La Poupee,' has been produced by ' the Firm ' in Sydney. This is how the Bulletin sums it up: — 'The whole piece hangs on the shoulders of Dorothy Vane, and she rises up like an Atlas and supports it without a falter. There isu't an epithet from A to Z too good for her impersonation. Every movement of the doll is life-like, so to speak. The stiffened lingers, and automatic jerks, and mechanical walks, and the honeymoon conversation, -and the swear, and the cracked songs, are \itterly doll-like, and yet subtly invested with her own humour. Charles Kenningham, as the worthy Launcelot, acts up to every freak of his doll bride. His smooth round face is just the sort of innocent fullmoon couutenance a baby might see when it looked into a drop of water. And his voice and dancing and vivacity work well for him. George Lauri, as Hilarious, the toymakei 1 , makes all the fun possible out of his part, which isn't laid on the extra broad lines of other roles of his. Carrie Moore gets in a clever little sketch of a boy apprentice. P. B. Bathurst is out of sorts as Father Maxime. Howard Vernon and George de Lara do some giddy old boy business in cut-away coats and with white bows on their calves, and Mrs. Bracy and Miss Frances Adler and others play "their little parts without a murmur. Several catchy songs are scattered through the piece, but the music isn't startling, nor is the dialogue cuttingly witty. In short, as hinted previously, the piece depends entirely on the doll, and if her joints wouldn't work, and the squeak wasn't forthcoming, there would be very little left of " La Poupee." ' Mr. ' Jack ' Lohr has taken up the reins for Professor Dante the conjurer, and will guide him in the remainder of his New Zealand tour, and also through Australia. A new theatre is in course of erection at Groymouth, which it is stated will be half as big again as any hall on the coast. It will be finished in about three months time. The much-maligned (by the English Ceusor of Plays) stage version of ' Joseph of Gaauau.' written by a Sydney parson, the Rev. George Wuters, was produced in Auckland by the Alf . Woods Company on Monday night. The Herald fails to Bee anything in the drama as pi'esented by the Woods Company to which strong exception could be taken, and speaks of it as being tli9 strongest yet staged by the company, being full of dramatic situations and well staged. Mies Maud Williamson is credited with giving a clever impersonation of the character of Ayesha, wife of Potiphar, but Mr. Woods's Joseph is pronounced weak and superficial in - , everything except the prologue. Actor George Darrell (' Never mind the girl— turn the light on me') has managed to stage his drama ' The Sunny South ' at the Surrey Theatre, London. Miss Florence Menkmeyer, a Melbourne pianist, who has been touring all over the Continent, is on her way out tc Australia for an extended concert tour. Mr. Bland Holt is reviving * The Fatal Card ' in Sydney, and making much money. The first Australian production of ' Under the Red Robe ' is billed for to-night at Melbourne, by the Knigbt-Ferrar plyMr. Wilfred E. Shine, formerly of the Brough Company, is appearing with the J. L. Shine Company in ' An Irish Gentleman,' at the Theatre Royal, Dublin. After the recent publication by, Madame Meiba of autobiographical notes, a writer in the Freeman's Journal said a lot of nnsfcy tilings about the famous prima donna's want of interest in Australians in England, charging her with ingratitude aud snobbishness. Mr. John Lemmone, the well-known flautist, contradicts the sta'emenLs. His experience, and that of many others, has been that Molba is exceedingly kind, and anything that lays in her power, within reason, she will do. But, an he points out, it is impossible to help ever y body — or, as it would seem, please everybody. Mr. Pinero is at work upon two new plays — one a light comedy for Mr. John Hare, and the other a serious play, in which Mrs. Patrick Campbell will probably appear. Poor old Johnny Toole is again in the wars. For some time he has been threatened with blindness from cataract. A successful operation was recently performed, but according to yesterday's cable message another is now necessary. A lifeboat service has been established at Eisfcbourjiie, England, in memory of the lute William Terria, the well-known actor, who was killed a few months ago by a lunatic named Prince while leaving the then Ire. Mr. Percy Lyndal, who was for some time in Australia as a member of the Brough and Boucicault Company, was recently engaged by the American manager, Mr. Frohman, for the Duke of York Theatre, London. A very curious development of gambling at Lloyd's has taken place recently, none other than tho insurance of the success of a play, ' The Dove Cot ' in connection with which Mr. George Edward es provided against loss by taking out a policy on its iiffc. Nothing comes amiss to members of Lloyd's nowadays.