THE OPERA HOUSE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1190, 21 December 1894, Page 16

THE OPERA HOUSE.

“LADY WINDERMERE'S FAN.” It is a fan with a wonderful' history, which on the surface is comedy . and beneath is deepest tragedy.; A thing- it is of rare and precious beauty, which ’in the hands of the master who invented it is a whip of scorpions to lash the wickedness of the world. For there j;s no . mistake about the fact that Oscar Wilde is a master dramatist. No one . would have thought of the possibility when he was making a name for himself as,an aesthetic fribble. Even when he took to his pen and wrote criticism, daring, brilliant and capable, no one : suspected his power. But when lie . wrote two plays, this one (“ Lady -Windermere's Fan”) and “A Woman -6f\ No . Consequence,” it was at once generally acknowledged that Oscar Wilde-'was not one of those who had taken to criticism because they are literary failures. 'With him criticism was preliminary discipline, not subsequent envious, outpouring/' . After seeing “ Lady • Windermere’s Fan ” we readily share the opinion that Oscar 'Wilde has got into the front rank of modern English dramatists. That opinion did not come at first, especially to those acbiistoined.to be at half sword with him. No one conld deny the brilliancy of this play, but the doubters of its dramatic power were voiced' by Whistler when he said, “ Pretty thing, by Jove ! Wilde; why don’t you get some fellow to dramatise it for you? ” And certainly the play is exceedingly brilliant. It sparkles with epigram, is rich in repartee, the points of wit—cynical, daring, sharp-rare so frequent that the audience is almost afraid to spoil its amusement by being .amused, and laughs boisterously notwithstanding, with its ears strained all the time. - But, the brilliancy is the least thing in the play, the other qualities of which, quickly lived down the sneer of the fighting painter by keeping possession of the boards. " It is a strong play, finely conceived, wrought out with mastery, and thoroughly consistent. Its story will interest always, and its characters will live, and its sharp wit-will tell for many a year to come. It is the story of two people; of- a mother who begins by being sinned' against, - and ends by sinning, and of a daughter whom she saves from the same terrible fate by an act of heroic self-sacrificef Vtlie action turning on the necessity of / keeping the relationship from' the knowledge of the daughter. The mother sets the machinery in, 'motion by forcing her child’s husband? to give her money to enable her to retrieve her position in society. The husband to further the scheme asks his wife to receive the woman at a ball she is giving, and, thaiiks to the gossip of a scheming old Duchess, finds himself horribly compromised: That gives the sensation to the first act. The woman’s reception is the sensation of the first part of: the second act, which closes with the flight of the young wife to the rooms of a scoundrel who . has taken advantage of her outraged feelings to urge his suit. The third gives us the mother pleading with her daughter to return to her husband, resolutely keeping her secret the While. Nothing. more noble than that pleading could be conceived. When it is successful, after, a scene of intense pathos, the owner of the rooms comes in with his friends fromr the club, among them the husband- of the young wife, and the man who lias just proposed to her mother. The women hide, and the men settle down to" cigars, whisky and talk, of the jibing, cyfiical order. Presently the husband sees- his fan, demands an explanation, insists on searching the rooms. The mother discovers herself.' “I took : that fan by the merest accident as I came away from Lady Windermere’s,”' she says. All eyes are upon her, and in'that moment Lady Windermere slips out of her hiding place, escapes unseen, and the certain falls. It is the dramatic situation of the act. In the last act mother and daughter meet once more to part for ever. The terrible sorrow of the one, the loving gratitude of the other, with the secret- remaining between them.unrevealed, make a touching scene. The parting comes at last, abruptly somewhat as the only possible solution of a terrible difficulty. It is covered by the outward show of comedy, complete even to the marrying and giving in marriage, with which comedies are apt to end, for, in spite of the discovery in the batchelor rooms, the elder woman recaptures her lover, fiat beneath it all there is the tragCdy-of the mother’s grief. The parting' over, Lady Windermere and her husband are, together again as they were when the play began. It is an ending of rare power wrought with the finest skill and the most delicate touches. When the curtain falls one feels as if there ought to:', be something more, and one feels at the same time that there cannot. The right thing has been done, and the moral that for. sin there must be punishment is complete. As Mrs Erlynne, the mother in the aforesaid story, Mrs Brough had a great part to play, and played it well.. Nothing finer could be desired than her passionate pleading in the gieat scene in the third act; nothing more touching than her struggle

■with Her-grief in the parting scene. Bright face and spre'heart -were never put better together before an audience. It is a very well drawn ; ’oilaracter. Imagine Becky Sharp without the evil bringing up, and with a heartland you have Mrs Erlynne. Lddy Windermere found in Miss Noble a capable representative, who dressed the part tri perfection, looked charming, and stamped- herself as a rising actress. Miss Romer %as&£he Duchess of Berwick, a wicked old woman of the type of Mrs Candour, with a dash of Thackeray’s Dowager Lady Kew, and a tongue of daring sharpness who never forgets that all youngs persons are under the special providence of Mrs Grundy. An admirably drawn, character it is, sharply defined, clever in the extreme, unscrupulous and cynical to the last degree, with the lowest opinion of ipankind. “ All men are bad ; the only way to manage them is to feed the brufes,” she calls out, summing up her philosophy!. Miss Romer played the scheming old wordling to the life, most admirably, with just the necessary touch of caricature. Mr Titheradge played Lord Windermere with hjs customary nicety of finished detail with the deep feeling and manly bearing which go with the part. Mr Ward’s . impersonation of Lord Darlington, the unscrupulous lover who “can resist everything but temptation,” left nothing to be desired.;; hlr Dorrington’s Cecil Graham, one of those useful cynics described by someone---ip. the play as “men who know the price of everything and the value, of nothing,” was very clever and polished, and Mr Brough was simply perfect as-Lord -Augustus Lorton, the blase man of the world who insists on falling a victim teethe much compromised Mrs Erlynne; v . . ■ . . The piece; was staged from first to last with perfect-taste, which is more than can be said of'sbme of the language. Much license is claimed by every satirist ; of manners, : and allowed, especially when the satiri§ki*t-as in this case, brilliant and witty'and daring, as is the case in the “.School for Scandal,” for example. But the line should be drawn a little more firmly than.it was on Friday in the first act, the. dialogue of which would be the better for > little judicious pruning. With the dressing of the piece no fault could be found. Correct the costumes were 4n every case, and the dresses of the ladies in the ballroom scene were simply; magnificent, Lady Windermere’s --being specially remarkable for richness of material and refined ladylike taste. The piece had a crowded house, His Excellency the Governor and his Aide-de-camp being presents ; ; -

“THE SECOND MRS TANQUERAY.”

It; has. been written that “ The Second Mrs TanqqflO»y ” falls short of the highest levei* (in a very small degree) it is unnecessarily strong in a dramatic sense; because, in fact, the craftsman has got-the upper hand of the thinker, a mistake;from which, it has been at the same' time added, “only the very greatest, the Shakespeares, Molieres and Balzacsr,- are wholly free.” The meaning of which is that the tragic denouement ought to have been found in the “-logical evolution of the nature of the Magdalen who is the centre of the piece, . and not ‘J by the intrusion of an accidental übncidencey” We take leave to think that the accidlutal /ioncidence (the unexpected appearance of an old lover) is the very - touch of genius which enables' the play to achieve - the very highest success. Evolution! , There is not time for evolution within the compass of two and a half hours. The Chinese system which keeps a play on “the stage’;for weeks, like a serial novel which is* “continued in our next,” may or ;.may 'not be remarkable for feats bf! .evoltttjbn. We do not know the Chinese- 'drama sufficiently to give an and frankly, we don’t want to. As evolution requires in nature millions of. yeU-s, it : IS; obviously not a “property” which dramatists can use with a too free hand.; Situations ” are the things with which evolution is, after the necessary indication, .anticipated. If it were not for the “ situations,” the drama would be a thing of dullness and a bore for ever. ' If it were mot for the terrible and most

awful situation caused by the entrance of

the lover the play w6uld be a recurring "■'Series^second act, which as it stands is quite sufficient for the patience of the average ‘audience. This talk of evolution is the cant of critics who are too small to say “Bravo” with a whole soul. The story it a tragedy of the deepest found in ordinary-life, and worked to its final catastrophe w|fch/ implacable logic, the most delicate tact, and the nicest knowledge of human nature. A hundred years hence men may-say asthey say now that they dislike the awful-remorseless study. But they will say withoutuniversal consensus of opinion that the man who put it on paper was a genius —a thing contemporaries are for various reasons /always shy of saying. The character of Paula is conceived with the highest attributes of genius. Mrs Brough has/therefore, a great advantage. But her art takes "inost full advantage of her perfectly v unique opportunity. She is the woman who joins with a light heart in the experimental solution of a hopelessly insoluble social problem with a man who, with the'best motives, is utterly unable by natural temperament to help her in the least degree.; She finds her. mistake early, she frets and fumes, she is consumed by jealous passion, she wastes visibly!:before our-eyes, she struggles, pitifully against fate, she .neatly succeeds; at the critical moment sheis overwhelmed. Not the least of the admirable strokes with which this character is drawn is the end which comes Tout of sight.' • It --is? a touch worthy of the Greek "tragedians who never shocked their audiences byThe sight of death; a touch superior .. even to Shakespeare himself. Theactingwas superb^/.nothing like it, has ever been seen in that Opera House, and if its walls stand for a thousand years nothing /better can ever be seen inside them. The

part of Ellean, the foil to the other, has been cavilled at. Can a girl so brought up in the secluded atmosphere of a "convent, have such an insight as is here necessary to the development of the story? To that the reply is that history proves that the natural insight of human nature is illimitable The dramatist has every right to avail himself o 1 • part was played by Miss Noble with a touch of real greatness. As Aubrey Tanqueray Mr Titheradge was admirable. As Cayley Drummle, the sympathetic, tactful man of the world, who says he views society as from a theatre stall, but is m truth actively, friendly painstaking and loyal to the highest degree, and finds the situation too complicated for his philosophy, Mr Brough contributed enormously to the pathos of the piece. It was heartbreaking to see his failures. Miss Romer gave us a beautiful presentment of Mrs Cortelyon, the old lady, so strong,, sensible, kindly, and worldly-wise withal, and all the other characters were m proportion. A most strong play, a man s play, rather than a woman s play; a play which warns men powerfully of the terrible evil of making playthings of women with souls —a great play is “ The Second Mrs Tanqueray,” and it ,w a | acted, and a great success. ■ - '■