AMERICAN COMEDY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20218, 1 April 1929, Page 12

AMERICAN COMEDY.

PREMIERE OF "THE PATSY." "CINDERELLA" UP TO DATE. TRIUMPH FOR LEADING LADY. Anyone who enjoys ai good comedy and has no anti-American bias may bo heartily recommended to see " Tho Patsy," which opened its Auckland season at His Majesty's Theatre on Saturday evening. There are three hours of it—much more than the usual allowance—and not a sinele dull moment. This is tho moro remarkable because tho piece boasts only six characters, or rather five, for one has littlo to do.

It is the story of Cinderella over again, but twisted about to suit the modern taste. Cinderella does not go to tho ball; she trails down Prince Charming without leaving home, and captures him in the best twentieth century fashion. Fatricia is introduced as an awkward and unattractive young thing of 19, much down-trodden by ;ii mother and sister with social ambitions and no human qualities whatever. Acting on tho slogan (not quoted in tho play), " You can't keep a good girl down," she buys a book of "wit and wisdom for every occasion," to fit her for society. Tho aphorisms from this, which she deals out at intervals, some of them many times, keep tho house in a roar through the first two acts. She passes from one adventure to another, finally making love successfully by means which it would hardly he fair to describe, but which give some of the best fun in a riotous evening.

The picco is a triumph for Miss Irene Homer as Patsy. She gives the girl a whimsical grotcsqucrie that has not been paralleled, on the local stage for many years. The part roquires her to use a curiously half-strangled diction for three long acts. At first Patsy is hard to understand, and might even ho thought a little short in hor wits, but the method in it appears after a while, and sho ends in the first ranks of popular heroines. Mr. A. S. liyron takes second honours easily as Patsy's kind-hearted vulgarian father, who travels in groceries. lie makes a full and rounded character, and there is high comedy in the last act, when tho long-suffering head of the family raises a first-class domestic row and threatens to wreck the home and leave his wife for good. Miss Vera Gerald, as his wife, and Miss Eileen Sparks, as (lie wild-cat elder daughter, are given completely " unsympathetic" parts, without the faintest trace of any likeable quality, and tho dramatist leaves them unreformed at tho final curtain. Both ladies gave excellent performances, and obtained their full share of applause. Mr. Brandon Peters made tho young man in tho easo an attractive fellow, although at times ho had to appear more than a little dense, as a foil to Patsy's perverse cleverness. Mr. Sam Wren, as tho older sister's contented suitor, played a small part well. On its merits " Iho Patsy" deserves a record Auckland season.