Life’s Strange Tricks

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 7196, 30 June 1933, Page 12

Life’s Strange Tricks

FAMOUS JESTER’S ILL-LUCK POVERTY AFTER FIFTY YEARS After 50 years of stage fame both in England and America, Fred Evans, brother to the late "Will Evans, now ekes out an existence in his old age by playing an accordcon in the streets of London. When a Sunday Chronicle correspondent spoke to Air. Evans recently he was standing on the kerb outside a teashop just off the Strand. .Despite his 70 years his fingers flew nimbly over tho accordcon keys, and he played with all his old skill and verve. A sheet of cardboard disclosed in a few words Air. Evans’ identity and tragic history. Attached to the card was a photograph of a laughing clown —himself in the heyday of fame. V hat pathetic irony lay behind that striking contrast! One of the public’s favourite jester wearing his grotesque, mirthmaking mask of’ grease-paint. The other, a handsome old man, with tired eyes, neatly-clipped grey moustache and a wealth of well-brushed silver hair. “I never thought I would come to this,” Air. Evans said. ‘ ‘For the last two years my luck has been ‘ dead out.’ Before I had to come on the streets I managed to'get a few bookings for concerts and small shows. Jiut to-day. . He shrugged his shoulders wearily.

“You sec, I’m an old man now, and the public get tired of seeing the oid faces. Yes, i was ‘on the boards, continuously for 50 years. My father was Ered Evans, the famous clown at Drury Lane. My late brother VVill and 1 used to work together. But when wc both got married we separated and started companies of our own. “I founded the Florador Musical Quartet, which became quite famous. Eventually I wont to America anu worked there for 14 years. I should not have returned had it not been for my eldest son, who induced me to come over here and work with him, but things did not pan out as we expected, and from that time my luck, cnanged for the worse. Life and luck! They play rum tricks!’’ The accordeon blared a quick, jerky tune, like a man laughing defiantly at fate, and the silver-haired old trouper resumed his kerbside “act.’’