AUSTRALIAN NOTES.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1612, 21 January 1903, Page 31

AUSTRALIAN NOTES.

SYDNEY, January 9. Dear “Lorgnette,”—The Sydney shows are pretty crook. “Dorothy” at the Palace. Florrie Young is really splendid; the rest fade away till they actually hum! Lauri never was anything but a Four Flush as a comedian, and lately he carnnot happen, even amongst the third-raters. “The Thirty Thieves” at. the Royal rnly require one-armqd ticket-sellers and checktakers, and not enough work for the one arm to do.' J. F. Slieridau is struggling with a few bits of odds and ends at the Criterion. The. play bills call.it a pantomime. Well, you know, “Lorgnette,” “it ain’t the playbill’s fault; 'e don't know.” Anyway, Flo Lockwood, May Elliot, Ada Page and a few other sweet things are in it, so we will say it is a panto.! - Mind you, I am driven to say so, but it is under protest, and on suspicion ! The Tivoli is at - its worst. The star turn is a farce, and a vefy weak one. The best one in it is a woman who looks like Johnny Sheridan as The Widow; talks like him, too. And the farce is also a kind of "Fun On the Bristol.” An old Irishwoman marries a young man, and her daughfer marries an old Professor. The young man is caught kissing the daughter, and the professor chases j them around with an axe and the Irishwoman joins in, firing a revolver. No one gets shot —and it's a pity! I think if they shot the two men the world would run smoother. As an attempt at acting the males take all the dough? that was etwr made. The two women are pretty good. Bland Holt is packing the Lyceum from door to orchestra, from floor to ceiling. The play is a bad one, but the scenery is glorious. The story of the play: A spieler gets a country chap to deal with. The “Country” goes to Sydney and mixes with, all the <£s for the night mob. “Country” then forges his father’s name. The father says at,, the end of the act that “I, not my son, wrote the cheques !'* Of course, the family proceed to starve. Then “Country’s” sister thinks that if she went into a brothel, and her brother heard of her living there, it would make him go to work honestly for his daily crust. She joins the swell brothel, and her brother see s her, and says she won't do this thing. Then the man she loves corner in, and she faints. Then the father gets .a job managing a station out back, and after seeing all that fun in Sydney, they, are supposed to become happy amongst

the crows in. the desert. I think end of the play says something about a son being saved by a mother's love I The mother is a cripple; her son, whom she speaks of saving, once pushed her under , a t Paddy & Market. Oh! MSSfiTin; youra truly, MAGRILANDER,