a Saint Joan” Coming

Manawatu Times, Volume LVI, Issue 7066, 27 January 1933, Page 3

a Saint Joan” Coming

DAME SYBIL THORNDIKE’S MAGNIFICENT PRODUCTION

The following excerpt frSm tlie Brisbane Courier’s authoritative criticism of Bernard Shaw’s' masterpiece, “Saint Joan,’’ which is to bo presented for one performance only at the Palmerston North Opera House on Thursday, 'should be of interest to followers of the legitimate theatre: — “O-God, that madcst this beautiful earth,' when will it be ready to receive ./Thy sditls-L How long, 0 Lord, how long!” These last words of Joan came across in a tone of infinite patience and yearning, as the curtain fell on the.last scene of all in ‘Saint Joan,’at His Majesty’s Theatre last night. There was a hushed silence for a space, and then the applause burst out, and Dame Sybil Thorndike, with the members of her company, had to take many curtain calls.

“If George Bernard Shaw has increased his reputation as a dramatist in the writing of ‘Saint Joan,’ then Dame 'Sybil must have equally increased hers in the acting of it. She succeeded in her performance in revealing that the "whole strength of the Maid of Orleans lay in her faith. "Without faith she could never have been a leader.

“The play is a most remarkable work. It is not merely the story of the peasant girl who was burnt in the market place at Rouen, in the loth century, but is also the story of humanity to-day, and of all history. It begins with the simple girl who heard •voic.cs,’ telling her to raise the siege of Orleans and to crown the Dauphin in. Rhcims . Cathedral, and it ends in the Epilogue wherein she appears in spirit form, at the. bedside of the King -of. France 25 years after her body had been reduced to ashes, all but her heart, which would not burn. ‘Are you a ghost-?’ asks the King. ‘Hardly even that, lad,’ she replies. ‘Can a poor burnt up lass have a ghost? lam but a dream that thou’rt dreaming.’ But here she learns that her sentence of death' by burning as a heretic has been annulled, and that she has been canonised.

“Dame Sybil Thorndike’s beautifully modulated voice disclosed the spirit of 1:ho girl, the motive that was in her. To wear armour to lead men in battle to face odds would have been impos-sible-but •for-her faith. The Joan of Dame Sybil was not that of the story books. Her Joan was untutored and somewhat uncouth. Her gestures, except devotion, were awkward, her attitudes unaffected, and her manner had the directness of utter guilelessness. She was no sculptured saint, but a lively peasant girl blessed with plenty of common sense, and utterly unable to comprehend the tortuous arguments of tthe men of the church, when they (jog-

flicted with the messages from God that came to her in the ‘voices.’” The box plan, opens at the Central Booking Office Mesffiw.