'TILLY OF BL00MSBURY'

Evening Star, Issue 17484, 15 October 1920, Page 7

'TILLY OF BLOOMSBURY'

The second performance of lan Hay's charming comedy 'Tilly of Bloomsbury' strengthened the wonderfully good impression made the previous night, when as fine a company a,s we have had here-for many a day scored an immediate triumph in a play that grips the heart-strings and attunes them to laughter and tears. The, human aspect, the battle of types, and the ultimate victory that love attains over the great social barrier is all-absorbing and convincing. Last night there was- a very large audience, who followed Tilly and her Richard along the path that never did run umooth with alternating feelings of joy and sorrow, and demonstrated their keen approval at appropriate intervals with warm applause. One is unable to put his finger on a weak spot in the whole cast,' and so cannot name any particular member as excelling the others. Mr Frank Freeman (Richard), Miss Dorothy Manvilla (Tilly), Mrs Robert Brough (Lady Mamwaring), Mr George Blunt (Mr Stillbottle)—these, by reason of greater opportunities, are perhaps the most prominent, but it is an astonishingly even lot oKtaU ented players who portray the various characters, and most of the supporting ac£ ing is uncommonly well thought out. Take, for example, the representation 6f Lucius Welwyn (Tilly's father) by Mr Percy Rhodes. We have a feeling that our first notice hardly did this actor justice. _ His presentment of the decayed Cambridge man, conscious of his weakness ashamed of his dependency upon the wife whose lowliness he deplores, but quite content to go on profiting by her labors, is a true study from life. One has met such men, and so has Mr Rhodes—he is probably familiar with the type, which abounds in the Old Country and is sometimes met with here, mostly in the ranks of remittance men. ' Tilly of Bloomsbury' is a kind of English comedy, that we are privileged to see all too rarely, and as such deserves, and will undoubtedly obtain, the support of our playgoers. It will be staged again this evening and to■morrow evening.