AMUSEMENTS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 10752, 27 April 1911, Page 6

AMUSEMENTS.

HUGH J- WARD SEASON. Mr Hugh J. Ward's production of the farce-comedy "Seven" Days 3 ' at the Opera House on Tuesday next will be vested with additional interest, seeing that the season will comprise his farewell visit to Oamaru as an actor. "Seven Davs" is the joint work of Mrs Mary Roberts Rinehart and Avery Hopwood. Mrs Rinehart is the author of a series of clever stories, including "The Circular Staircase," "The Man in Lower Ten," and "When a Man Marries," while Avery Hopwood affords an example of the journalist turned playwright, and represents the modem school of American dramatists. "Seven Days," the first fruit of their collaboration, is said to have yielded each coauthor a fortune, since the farce-comedy ran for -402 nights in New York, and for six months in Chicago. The general idea of the piece is that a lot of people who are wishing each other 1000 miles apart, are kept together in one house for seven days, through a rigid quarantine. The characters include a divorced couple, a burglar, and a policeman, a pair of jealous lovers, a "medium" (who is credited with producing occult results that are really the work of the burglar), and a wealthy aunt, who believes that in the place of future pnnishnipnt will be found divorced persons, whisky, and low-necked dresses. . • During Mr Ward's Sydney season, which only concluded' six' weeks ago, "Seven Days" played, out the last half, and the Sydney press, endorsed; the American as" regards'the' all-round attractiveness of the comedy.

.UNIVERSAL PICTURES. To-night in the Opera House the Universal Picture Co.■,will present a very fine series .of : animated pictures. The programme is varied, and as interesting ; as' it is varied. ; Views of the historic spots London -androf the winter ;sports at Cbamounis (containing pic- : tures of: siding, bob-sleighing, skating, together with a- new Pathe Gazette, should prove exceptionally in-teresting-and instructive. The dramas are also of an. extremely interesting and powerful character,' the most exciting being ''The Girl Spy at Vicksburg." "Foolshead," "Tontoline," "Fat Jack and Slim Jim" provide the comedies. The Pathe Orchestra will supply incidental music.