SYBIL THORNDIKE SEASON

Evening Star, Issue 21315, 20 January 1933, Page 12

SYBIL THORNDIKE SEASON

DUNEDIN SEASON OPENS TO-MORROW 1 CAPTAIN BRASSBOUND’S CONVERSION ' Auspiciously opening Dunedin’s theatrical season, the curtain goes up at His Majesty’s Theatre to-morrow night, introducing the distinguished English actress Sybil Thorndike and her London company in Shaw’s adroit and sparkling. comedy ‘ Captain Brassbouhd’s Conversion.' Critics the world over have heaped the superlatives of praise in i assessing the_ charm and skill of Dame Sybil’s acting. She is the direct descendant; of the great company of English actresses who have extended their sway even to foreign lands, and Dunedin is singularly fortunate in being able to see Tier in some of the roles that have given her her peerless standing. Following the brilliant bravura portrait of Lady Cicely’in the opening eiece, Dame Sybil will give ns her aint Joan in the play of that name written by Shaw expressly for 1 her; then Lady Macbeth (the most starkly tragic of her great roles), and finally an entrancing comedy part in ‘ Madame Plays Nap.’ The action of ‘ Captain Brassbound’s Conversion ’ (the first offering) takes place in Morocco, and opens in the garden of a missionary’s house near Mogador. Lady Cicely Waynflete and her brother-in-law, a crusty old English judge, make their appearance as tourists who purpose visiting the Atlas Mountains. With the. entrance of the swashbuckling Captain ■ Brassbound, who kills two birds with one stone by smuggling contraband into the country ns well ns acting as an escort for tourists, the plot develops. He is the son of the judge’s dead brother, and, believing that the judge has fraudulently seized his inheritance and brought about the death of bis Brazilian mother, seeks vengeance. The tourists are taken to a lonely Moorish castle, arid Brassbound plans to hand the iudge over to the justice of the sheik, jady Waynflete, armed, only with her charm and a most illogical but wholly delightful imethod of reasoning; leaves the audience pleasantly bewildered, and the captain convinced that he is doing an injustice. But when he is about to set the judge free the tables are turned on him by the arrival of a cadi empowered with, authority from the captain of an American cruiser to take Brassbound into custody. In the final scene in the missionary’s house Lady Waynflete again saves the, situation for Brassbound. Acting as a most unconventional prosecutor, she succeeds in defeating the ends of justice, and makes the judge accessory after the fact by telling the truth, but not the whole" truth, and makes everybody happy. Captain Brassbound’s conversion is effected; from a rascally swashbuckler he becomes a respectable sailor steering a straight course and guided by the star of his destiny. She is saved from marrying him, however, by the providential booming of a signal gun from his ship. The dialogue of the production shows Shaw at his best. Into the mouth of the lady, who prattles so unconcernedly in the midst .of danger and threatening death, mending clothes and nursing sick brigands, Shaw has pub some of his finest lines, crystallising the pungent satire that has made him famous. Particulars of the season’s programmes, box plan, prices, matinees, etc., are advertised.