MIMES AND MUSIC

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 29, 2 August 1913, Page 11

MIMES AND MUSIC

(By "Orpheus.") THE SHOWS. OPERA HOUSE. Marlow Dramatic Company, in season. i J. C. Williamson, 27th August to 6th September. J. C. Williamson, 16th October to Ist Noyenv ber. "The Geisha," 22nd to 29th November. TOWN HAM,. The Smart Set, 26th July. Royal Choral Society, Ist and 12th August. THEATRE ROYAL. Bfenuan-Fullers' Vaudeville Company. HIS MAJESTY'S. Fullers' Pictures. THE KINO'S THEATRE, Royal and Weit'i Pictures, BTAE THBATEI. Star Picture Company. EMPRESS THEATRE. Continuous Pictures. THE NEW THEATRE. Continuous Pictures. aSORTT'B THEATBI. Continuous Pictures. PEOPLE'S PICTURE PAIACS. Continuous Pictures. In one of Chicago's theatres vaudeville has been given. Recently at one cent (a halfpenny) admission. Hie tickets are sold at a department store and no more than two can be given to a customer. Miss Madge M'lntosh, when the last mail left* London, had appeared in the leading part of "Dropping the Pilot," a comedy by Keble Howard, which was produced at the Croydon Repertory Theatre. In Italy they speak of the Cinematographia. In England and France the term has abbreviated into the Cinema. In Germany they speak of the Kinos. The Americans call the pictures the Movies. It has been suggested that the phenomenal success scored by "The Grafters" in Australia will probably induce many similar companies that are touring in America to ( cross the Pacific and try the Antipodes for themselves. They may be the pioneers of an American invasion, which may spell competition, a good thing for theatrical Australia. There are 750 theatres in Chicago and 76 others in the course of construction, according to figures made public by the Building Commissioner. One-half of the amusement houses are used exclusively for the display of moving pictures and have a seating capacity of 300 or less, but the average capacity is 400, or a total of 300,000. There will be an added seating capacity of 300,000 when the new theatres are completed shortly. An itinerant player, well known in the West of England a century back, when playing in Bigg's company at Barnstaple, one evening performed for j his benefit Boniface and Sir Charles Freeman in the "Stratagem," between the acts of which he sang Dibdin's "Jolly Dick the Lamplighter" ; played a solo on the violin, and danced a hornpipe at the end of the play ; then recited Collins's "Ode on the Passions," played Shift, Smirke, and Mother Cole in the "Minor," and concluded with & poetical address to the audience ! . . The members of the American section of players in "Within the Law" at Melbourne Theatre Royal have formed themselves into a species of club or society, and its title of "A.W.L.A." appears exceedingly puzzling, until it is explained by Lincoln Plumer, the president, that it means "Americans Who Love Australia." Mr. Plumer, who is Police-Inspector Burke in the play, says that the American members of the com- | pany are enraptured with Australia, and simply don't want to go home any more. Somebody worked a cruel joke on one of the members of the Banvard troupe before they came to Sydney. The victim was the lady who hangs by her teeth to a strap hooked on to a trapeze. She was practising the trick, and the joker, to demonstrate that a woman will | always answer back, suddenly exclaimed to her. "You're holding on with your hands." "I am, not," replied the lady, and at once came flying to the floor in a heap. She had released the hold of hei teeth in order, to icpeak, and disaster followed at once. Wnat she said to the joker when she got on her feet made him feel that the demonstration had, after all, been a, failure. Among the coming productions in London is a new play by G. B. Shaw, regarding which the author remarks— -"It is absolutely nothing but the old child's story of 'Androcles and the Lion'— ~the man who pulled the thorn out of the lion's foot, and then became a Christian martyr and was tin-own to the lion in the arena. Of course, the lion was the thorny] one, and would not eat him. The piece is in three scenes, which Witt be played through in Granville Barker's beet Shakespearean manner, and is, like most of my plays ? an excellent humanitarian and Christian tract." Fifteen grand opera stars sailed on the liner Kaiser Williehn 11. from New York in June tor Europe, taking with them £126,000, representing their salaries for the 23 weeks' season which has just closed, plus the royalties received from phonograph -records. Signor Caruso is far ahead of the other stars with £42,000 to his credit. Mmo Geraldine Farrar netted £17,000 during the season, Mme. Emmy Destinn £15,000, Mies Mary Garden £14,010, Arturo Toscanini (chief conductor at the Metropolitan Opera House), £8400, Charles Delmoree £6400, and Signor Gatti Casazza. (manager of the Metropolitan Opera House) £6000. She other B tars averaged £2866 each. Recruits from the legitimate stage continue to enlist under the flag of the cinema theatres. Among the latest are Mr. Charles Hawtrey, who is shortly to be seen on the screen in "A Messenger from Mars," and Mr. Gerald dv Maurier. Mr. Seymour Hicks and Miss Ellaline Terris are stated to have entered into an agreement with a British film company to appear in its productions for a period of five years. The first subject to be produced is "Richard III." Many playgoers have been eagerly looking forward to the day when the opening date of the long-promised season of Gilbert and Sullivan's comic operas will be announced. When questioned in Sydney regarding the prospects of an immediate fulfilment of that promise, Mr. Hugh J. Ward replied :—"lt: — "It is the intention of J. C. Williamson, Ltd., to give the theatre-going public of Australia a season of Gilbert and Sullivan some time next year. I am firmly convinced of the everlasting drawing power of these wonderful works, and I intend to revive them on the earliest possible occasion, with specially engaged artists, new dresses and scenery; and, in fact, to present each comic opera in a way that will exceed in lavishness and perfection anything that has yet been seen in this country." No principal singer could sing every night in the v/eek. Star tenors sel* dotn sing more than twice in one week, and at rehearsals they sing for the most part in a falsetto (says the Manchester Guardian). It is said that the great Tamagno used to take such care of his voice that he never even spoke during the day when he was singing at night. He carried on conversation by means of a elate hung round hit neck. Some ban-

tones, on th« other hand, hava been habitually careless about their voices, and Berlioz speaks of a splendid bass singer who tramped about the mountains in the snow all day with hi* throat exposed and sang magnificently the same night. But in the wings a* Covent Gar* den you may see Siegfried in shining armour with a woollen muffler round his throat. According to the Auckland Herald the price paid for moving picture films is generally about 4d per foot, at which pi ice it costs roughly £160 to screen an ordinary programme. When these go the rounds of a circle of theatres the cost to each one is considerably re* duced, and may be set down at about £30. The biggest price yet paid for the Australasian rights in any film is the £4000 paid for "Quo Vadis?" Several others have netted large amounts in royalties, as for instance, "King Henry VUL", which cost £800 for the New Zealand rights. Quite an industry has been created in New Zaland by the public, patronage of moving pictures. The best films are sent Home. Of these some scenic subjects have been great successes, such as "The Mokau River," thirty-three copies of which were sold in the Old Country. Other similar films that have sold well at Home include "Rotorua," "Wangamii River," and "Auckland Day by Day." The stirring adventures through which the heroes and heroines of the cinematograph screen pass are thrilling enough, by they are not half so exciting as some of the real adventures of the actors and actresses whose performances are depicted. Miss Florence, Turner, the wellknown "Vitagraph Girl," who has^played the heroine in hundreds of American picture dramas, has had some hairbreadth escapes from serious disaster. "Once," she said to a London interviewer, "I played the part of a heroine who went up as a passenger in an aeroplane. We were just circling up when something went wrong, the biplane tilted, and I fell out— luckily on to the sloping roof of a tent. Several times I have had my clothes in flames when playing fire scenes, and twice I was nearly drowned, through my 'rescuer' missing his cve — and I cannot swim !" Only the other day an actor who was taking part in a colossal representation, for cinematograph purposes, of the battle of Waterloo at Irthlingborough, in Northamptonshire, was seriously injured. During an incident in which eleven horses fall into a river the actor fell into the water underneath one of the horses. He was taken to hospital in a serious condition. It may be mentioned that four thousand players, 3000 cavalry horses, and fifty large cannon were employed to secure a realistic film of the battle. Arthur Tranton, a popular though not widely advertised member of the Asch« Brayton Co., died the other day, while on the way back to the Cold Country. Tranton, who was Oscar's understudy, appeared for a time in the Melbourne production of " Kismet," but soon had to go into a private hospital, where he was a prisoner for months. Then ho made an effort to reach England and his wife, but did not get as far as Port Said. Cancer was the trouble. Asche behaved in .a most generous manner from start to> finish of the sad buisi ness — without taking his press agent into his confidence either, — Bulletin. "Uller, the Bowman," the new work composed by Mr. W. Arundel Orchard, of Sydney, to the poem of Mr. W, J. Curtis, and performed for the first time at the Liedertafel concert last week, is based upon Norse mythology, wherein the eternal conflict between good and evil is rpresented by the constant struggle for supremacy between the gods and the 'giants. The gods dwelt peacefully in_ Asgard, each in a golden palace, rejoicing in their power, while the Walkyries, clad in shining armour and mounted on white chargers, kept watch. Oiler, the sturdy god of winter, who, heedless of winds and storms, made long journeys on his wondrous snowshoes over seas and lakes, lived in Ydalir, or "'Yew-dale," where grew the pliant yaw-tree, from which were made his deadly bows and arrows. The present episode tells how Uller, while hunting in the forest, meets and falls in love with Skadi, the beautiful daughter of the storm giant, Thiassi, whom the gods Had relentlessly destroyed. It is considered that the atmosphere thus created fittingly lends itself to musical treatment for baritone solo and male chorus, in complete contrast with the music of the lone huntress (soprano), of whom the gods decreed that she should meet her lpver a-hunting in the forest. After a brief prologue, in which the voice of the present invokes the spirt of the past, and bids the god live once more, the main part of the work begins with an indication of an approaching storm. This soon leads to Uller's arrival on silvery, snow tipped shoes, attended by the elements, of which he was lord and master. He then narrates his prowess in the forest, his protective care for the flowers and plants during winter, and his disregard of the raging storm. Ultimately hi* followers attend him, at the hunt. On they go to the chase, when suddenly the beautiful vision of Skadi appears. Her pitiful narrative (soprano solo) transforms the sympathy of Uller into fervent love. A description of a Norwegian sunset (male chofifts) precedes the awakening of the 1 storms and winds, who dance in honour of the marriage of their sovereign lord. The dance music begins with a dainty measure interspersed with subdued rumbling of the storm and weird murmuring of the wind, intermingled with the voices of the air. Later comes a movement of greater intensity and wilder in character, which is soon abruptly terminated by the imperious i filer, and immediately leads into the testive banqueting scene, with which | the work concludes. Miss Euna Mocara. a member of that excellent company, the Fisk Jubilee Singers, paid a visit to Wellington this week, and left on her return to England yesterday. v Miss Mocara came out to see her mother, who resides here, but her engagements in England made her stay here compulsorily short, as she is due to take up her work in September. Memories are still fresh of the excellent entertainments given here by the Fisks, and their negro melodies and choruses are not yet forgotten— "Steal Away to Jesus," "Climb up Ye Little Children," "Mother, is Massa Going to Sell Me," "Brother Michael," "Peter, Go Ring Them Bells," "Who Builfc the Ark," and the many others sung as only the Fisks could sing them. The Jubilee Singers, which were instituted in 1867 for the express purpose of raising funds to endow schools for the sons and daughters of freed slaves, and met with phenomenal success down the years and their object was achieved. The Singers became a private concern and split into two parties, one being brought out to Australasia by Orpheus M'Adoo. When Mr. M'Adoo died most of the members returned to America, but Mr. Eugene M'Adoo, Miss Mocara, and Miss Laura Carr remained and decided to still keep the old name. They went to England in 1904, and since then have" been continuously engaged. Miss Carr died recently, and her place in the party was taken by Miss Elsie Hobson. The trio have engagements running into 1915, and Miss Mocara does not think that the* party will be able to return to Australasia for some years yet. The party do not give their entertainments in the "halls," but work purely as a concert party, retaining all the features of the Jubilee Singers' programmes. Mr. M'Adoo and Miss Mocara have many friends in these parts who will no doubt be pleased to know that they are meeting with such gte*t succmi.