'MAN ABOUT TOWN’

Evening Star, Issue 21220, 29 September 1932, Page 7

'MAN ABOUT TOWN ’

WARMER BAXTER TYPIFIES A MASCULINE TREND ‘Man About Town*’ is not a masculine adaptation of ‘Girl About 'town," which, was an amusing but not very edilving revelation of the society golddigger’s technique, on a theme exploited by Anita Loos in ‘ Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.’* it is masculine, certainly, and that in itself is refreshing in a dramatic cycle, that has brought men to the front in a growing reaction against vampire types. How lar this reaction has been accelerated by the slower response of actresses to the demand for character in voice production is a matter for independent consideration, but the reaction is real, and not less is the effort to meet it halfway. Warner Baxter, the man about town, who is now appearing at the Regent Theatre, is a paradox. His secret service davs on the Continent have undermined bis fortune and latterly his reputation, for he has turned his old city home into a fashionable gaming house, ami it is merely for an evening’s relaxation from the sordidness of this night life that his host friend (Mr Conway Tearle) takes him hack to the old glitter of a diplomatic reception hall. Here, accidentally, he meets the woman that had passed dramatically out of his life four years before. This meeting is the base of a triangle in which a life-long friendship of two men is broken by their love for the same woman, whose loyalty is given to the now reformed gamester, turning his hack on the old life to re-enter the dangerous service of the State. In the very swift action of crime detection and its hazards, the story has more than its share of thrills, hut the principal actors could lift even crude drama to a satisfying level, and in Miss Karen Morlcy they have an associate who never over-acts the emotional scenes, and who, apart from a hick of mobility in the lips, reaches a more convincing plane of dramatic intensity than many of her contemporaries. There Is a very remarkable climax to the play, in answer to the question whether old' friendship, once turned to hatred, can ever be restored to an almost divine level of self-sacrifice. ‘ Man About Town ’ opens at the St. James 'J heat re to-morrow.