ACROSS THE FOOTLIGHTS.

Manawatu Times, Volume LXV, Issue 1820, 11 January 1913, Page 3

ACROSS THE FOOTLIGHTS.

By " Student." OPERA HOUSE BOOKINGS 1913 January 23, 24—, T. C. Williamson. February 3, 4—Connor Opera Co. February 18, ID—J. C. "Williamson. February 20—Harry Rickards. March 3, 4, 5, (i, and 7 —Great Mc Ewen Company. March 2i—Caledonian Society. April 17, 18—, T. C. Williamson. May I(5—J. . Williamson. May 2(5, 27 —George Marlow. June 20— J. C. Williamson.

PERMANENT PICTURE SHOWS. Opera House. His Majesty's, Fullers. The next event of any theatrical note here will be the visit of Williamson's Comic Opera Cov., which will produce "The Girl in the Train" and "Night Birds." Both operas have exercised a fascination over all audiences. The cast is a particularly good one even for a Williamson venture.

To-morrow night, little Miss Thelma Petersen will make another endeavour to raise a few pounds in Palmerston towards her going to London expenses. Miss Petersen will want all the money she can raise. The battle won't be over when she has finished her tuition. Kirkby Lunn is still in the Dominion. Napier is the last favoured place. One great picture, "Sweet Nell of Old Drury" $s in the possession of Messrs Fuller. We may expect it in Palmerston soon, lam given to understand. Nellie Stewart takes her original creation. x Adl the characters are taken by welj-known actors. It is reported to be a film in a thousand, which thousands have been witnessing evory day. The scenery is all the qriginal setting. When "Sweet Nell of Old Drury" comes to Palmerston everyone should see it.

Grand opera and skill in" 3languages usually go together, and in Signor Alberto Marini, the operatic tenor of the vaudeville company which Mr Hugh D. M'lntosh is sending to New Zealand in Februaxy, there is a singer who speaks fluently in practically all European languages. By birth Marini is a Pole, but he received his musical education in France, Germany, and Italy, and he is now a clever linguist, not only in the most commonly spoken European languages, but also in Polish, Hungarian, Russian and modern Greek.

A good story is told by Oscar A sche of a rehearsal incident in connection with 'Julius Caesar.' The forum scene was not going at all well. The supers who formed the stage crowd appeared to be steeped in slumber, and nothing could rouse them. Antony's oration even failed to stir them. "Here is the will, Marcus Antonius was saying, "and under Caesar's seal to every Roman citizen he gives, to every man, 75 drachmas." Still the crowd gave forth no animation iit the news. The stage manager grew frantic. "Good lord," he cried to the populace; "you might be so many wooden images. Can't you see what it means? You are Roman citizens, and Caesar has left each of you 75 drachmas. Think of it," he said, advancing to one of the supers, and shaking him by the shoulders. "You are to have 75 drachmas.'' The super gazed at the stage manager with a vacant expression, and, as he swayed slightly, murmured obstinately: "I don't know anything about that. The arrangements you made with us was 18 pence a night. " In Athens the woman who wears a large hat in a theatre is fined £lO, therefore speak no more about the decadence of the Greeks.

Nobody in Australia has yet succeeded in lashing together the thumbs of Arnold de Biere, the magician, in such a way that he cannot perform the astonishing feats he accomplishes with his thumbs tied. De Biere has been offering £SO to any local hospital if anybody can baffle him. No one lias succeeded in doing it. This magician, who is quite the greatest thing in his line that has ever been seen in Australia is coming to New Zealand with the all-star Vaudeville Company, which Mr George Portus is about to take through on behalf of Mr Hugh D. Mcintosh.

A reviewer writing of a recent work by J. B. McEwen "The Thought in Music" says: "His main argument is that great music can only be properly understood and interpreted by one who takes the trouble to get a the composer's thought and to create it, not by analysis but by a process of synthesis which builds]*up the music again from its simplest rhythmical elements. Hence Mr McEwen becomes r a powerful advocate for the thorough study of rhythm, and as such he deserves the gratitude of all who agree wth him in thinking that the future progress of music will be a progress along the lines of rhythmic development. Simple students, perhaps, will not be so ready as the author to dip into the future, but if they will read him carefully they will find much food for thought about present conditions. The principles lie lays down, for instance, about the employment of tempo rubato are as valuable as his insistence on the study of harmony. It is a pity that either should be necessary, but the advent of teachers like Mr McEwen, who strenuously preach art as against artifice, means the speedy dawning of a brignter day in the world of English music. " Speaking of the new play "Job" the Daily News critic says:* "I do not think there can bo any question of inipressiveness of this Biblical play, although certain things might luve been better done with more rehearsal, and the constant changing of lights was by no means impressive. 1 think if it were possible to deaden the sound of footsteps on the wooden stage it should be done |in any future performances of the work. The least impressive feature was the voice of God. I really cannot suggest how it should be done. Obviously, the mere rhetorical declamation of an actor would seem out of place, but Ido not think it would be as inappropriate as the conventional chanting of a precentor. That made a definite suggestion of cathedral worship, which seemed more out of place than the ordinary speaking voice would haveJ)een.''