DOUBTFUL HUMOUR

Greymouth Evening Star, 1 July 1933, Page 12

DOUBTFUL HUMOUR

INTERPOLATIONS BY COMEDIANS. LONDON, May 19. Summonses were heard at Westminster yesterday against Albert V. Vasco, manager of the Victoria Palace Theatre of Varieties, Victoria, S.W., and the Victoria Palace Co., Ltd., at the instance of the Director of Public Prosecutions, for causing to be acted a certain part in a stage play called “The Signalman’s Daughter,” -which had not been allowed by the Lord Chamberlain. Mr. Cairns imposed a penalty of £25 and £5 5s costs on both the manager and the company, and added: ‘‘May I express my appreciation of the action of the Lord Chamberlain in this matter, and in deciding that the public shall be spared these interpolations.”

Mr. Lawson Walton , prosecuting, said the proceedings were taken under the Theatre Act of 1843. In consequence of a complaint a representative of tho Lord Chamberlain went to tjie Victoria Palace on April 24.. was being enacted oh the stage a short play, “The Signalman’s .Daughter.” It had been licensed by the Lord Chamberlain, but it was found that the script of the play in three important items.was not adhered to. What was substituted would never have been passed. Mr. W. G. R. Saunders said he was instructed to express defendants’ profound regret that unauthorised interpolations should have been made. No authority whatever was for I hem. Immediately the attention of the manager and the company was called to the objection of the Lord Chamberlain the use of the words was stopped. i Mr. Cairns: Do I understand that

the particular’ artists interpolated these words? Mr. Saunders: Those are my instructions—'interpolated entirely by the comedians themselves and absolutely unauthorised. Mr. Cairns: It seems lamentable that in a place of public entertainment the average decent citizen should have filthy innuendo served out. Numbers of decent people I know will not patronise some places of entertainment in the West-end without first making inquiries as to the performance being distinctly clean. The magistrate also remarked that he failed to see where the humour came in in the lines counsel had quoted. He hoped the manager would see that the woman and man who interpolated that filth into the play would be black-listed and would not be employed for a time after having put the theatre in such a position. Mr. Vasco, in reply to the magistrate, assured the Court that he was in no way a party to the interpolation.