Dramatic and Musical

Free Lance, Volume IX, Issue 456, 27 March 1909, Page 14

Dramatic and Musical

By Footlight.

ON Monday evening the Pollard Opera Company became a vaudeville company, and put on a programme of very nearly three hoars' duration, which delighted those who attended the Opera House. Th<> vaudeville programmes are, to occupy lihe remainder of the season in Wellington, which closes on Saturday nignt. If the subsequent programmes ■are up to the standard of Monday night's, bumper houses should Be asBUTed. After witne^ing the remarkable versatility of the company, ono can only suppose that the standard of excellence set on the first night will be maintained. Let this be said for it straight away — the entertainment was absolutely clean, crisp, and catchy. Nothing better of its class has been seen this way for a long time. • » • The programme contained thirty items, and the juveniles — the very juveniles — of the company seemed to vie with their elders in putting their very best into their work. In the first part of the programme, Miss Tririe Ireland gave an acrobatic song and dance, and a few inches of budding humanity, named Norman Denitice, dressed in full regimentals, with a drum slung over his shoulder, fairly brought down the house with his capitally sung "Drummer Boy.' 5 Miss Cissie O'Keefe was in good voice, and sang "The Orange Blossom Land" and "Sea SheEfc" with good effect. The other contralto, Miss Ethel Hems, scored heavily with her vocal contributions, and Miss Minnie Topping sang sweetly "The Land of Nod" and "My IKinois." • • • Mr. Charles Albert, in addition to a couple of capital songs, was associated

with Miiss Minnie Topping in- an amusing sketch, entitled, ''A Mock Drama.'' Another funny sketch., entitled, "Chaos," was given by Mir. Jock Willis and Bert Nicholson. Mr. Jock Willis was certainly at his best in his comic songs, and his "Foo the Noa" and 'Pilgrims of the Night" came in for demonstrative applause. Miss Gertie Edmonds has a pleasing soprano voice, sweet, but not strong. Her singing of "A May Morning" was a very acceptable item. Of a thirtyitemed programme those were about the "cream items." The best thing you can do is to drop in at the Opera House before the company pack their trunks. They are distinctly worth, hearing in vaudeville. • • • Fullers' Pictures are not palling on the public taste. Tlie programme is changed too often, to let anyone get tired. On Saturday last th© usual weekly complete change took place, and this tame there was a specaal novelty m the form of th© Cinephone. A gramophone projects its glittering brass funnel through the picture screen, and, while the film shows some musichall artists at the other end of the world doing their "turn," the 'phone brings you within range of their voice, or of the strains to which they are dancing. Thus you may go down to Fullers' any night and witness a turn, at the Empire in London. By and by& you won't need to cross th© seas in order to do London. You'll be able to turn it on, without leaving Port Nick. • • • Still, the Cinephone isn't the perfect article. The tone was neither full nor melodious enough. But it's an interesting auxiliary to the pictures, and the audience showed by their applause that they liked the immovation. The selections given were "My Little Eva," a. Oosfcer song by Mr. Stanley Kirby, "Daddy," sung by Madame Deering, the "Apache Dance" as nightly given by Fred Farren and Beatrice Coflier, at the Empire London, and "Christmas Eve in the Barracks." « • • Other good items in. tihe living picture line, but without the 'phone, are scenes from Rider Haggard's "She," a railway ride- in Rhodesia, seeing tlhe ruins of Ancient Egypt, and a day in Kentish hop-gardens. Then there is a large variety of comic films to keep things lively, such as the Electric Policeman, the Page Boy's Joke, the Witch's Donkey, Miss Trot the milliner, with the inevitable chase, and

Archie going shopping with the Ginls. A 1 together, there is capital fun' in these pictorial shows. And the state of the house shows how they hit the popular taste. There will be another complete change to-morrow night.

Exported that Ernest Fitts, the vaudeville baritone, has given up the stage for a farm at Ringwood, Victoria. There are more dollars in raising crops than in. raising encores. • • •

Evelyn Greenwood Sutherland is dead. Who is she, anyhow?. Well, under the name of John Rutherford, she fitted "Monsieur Beaucair<?" for the stage, and also wrote "The Breed of the Tre&hams," a strong drama whiclh Julius Knight recently produced in Sydney.

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