THE STAGE IN AUSTRALIA. NOTES BY SCALFAX.

Otago Witness, Issue 1795, 17 April 1886, Page 23

THE STAGE IN AUSTRALIA. NOTES BY SCALFAX.

Mblbouhne, April 5.

How the weeks slip away unremarked is a mystery to me. We go plodding on in our usual nerveless ways until one day a date brings us up standing, and we wonder how the time has passed. It seems hard to believe that one quarter of the present year of grace is passed and gone, that another section of our lives has been crossed : that we are all three months nearer that Unknown Mystery which men fear and call Death. This does not refer to the man with chronic rheumatism ; he wants a chronology all to himself.

" The Mikado " still manages to fill the Theatre Royal every evening, and appears likely to continue doing so for an indefinite period. Mr Howard Vernon contributes materially to its success by the finished and careful study he has made of the role of Ko Ko, the Lord High Executioner. The cynical cynicisms of the part come with effect from him ; he appears to enjoy them. His acting is inimitable, and his voice is fully equal to the demands made upon it. Miss Alice Barnett deserves no less praise for her acting as Katisha ; you instinctively want to see her as Lady Jane, in "Patience." We will have another opportunity of gauging her talents when " lolanthe" is revived, as she is to appear in her original part, the Fairy Queen. Miss Nellie Stuart, Mr Woodfield, Miss Ida Osborne, and Mr Harrison all work hard and well for the success of the opera, and it is pleasing to see that their efforts are so suitably and enthusiastically rewarded.

" Falka " was not produced an Saturday last, and I missed that remarkable treat I so ardently expected. No date has been fixed definitely for its appearance yet, but I fully expect to see it next Saturday night. As it is, " Rip van Winkle " has to worry along for another week, and the sorrows of the poor old man nightly restrain the flying ginger-beer bottle from active exertion in mid air; and I am told that the acting in the demon scene was so realistic one night that, for the time, the gallery forbore to expectorate on bald-headed gentlemen in the stalls below. I never quite believed that myself. Our Opera House gods have invented a charming amusement to while away the intervals. They make a small, narrow cone of paper, and chew the end into a pulp. This is then carefully launched over the parapet, and descends with the regularity of a parachute, owing to the resistance afforded by the cone pabsing through the air. The sickening squelch, and the excessive surprise of the

bald -headed man who previously had been absorbed in his newspaper constitute the fun. It is a wise rule which prohibits bald men bringing shot guns into the stalls. We are expecting " Falka " with a good deal of interest, and want particularly to see how the new combination will shape. One thing I caunot understand about Colonial management is why ib always becomes necessary to play opera when someone else is doing it, and uot when there is no opposition. All the time that the Royal Opera Company was in Sydney, and when we wanted opera badly* none came. No sooner do we get the Royal company, which is enough for us at one time, back when opposition starts. When you compare " Rip Van Winkle " and " The Mikado," you wonder that anyone goes to the first at all. " Hazel Kirke " still holds the stage at the Bijou Theatre. Last Friday Miss Boucicault benefited in it. Between you and I, good reader, this drama is, vulgarly speaking, played out. We do not long for any more of it ; we could even behold the loss of all the MSS. of it with equanimity, and there are a good many versions of it. Of course the one under consideration is the real and original one. I have met three of them now, and they were all real and original — hall marked, and guarantee! not to shrink. If " Hazel Kirlcc "' had not been written by a iranager it would never have obtained a reading. The American drama as we have had it lately in " The Shadows of a Great City," " The Galley Slave," and " Hazel Kirke," is a weird and wondious thing, something to be approached gradually ; and, like the taste for olives, to be acquired. Mr Dot, Boucicault benefits on the 13th iiiht., in " The Colleen Bawn," in which he will repeat his very clever performance of Danny Mann, Mr J. 0. Williamson appearing in the part lately played by the elder Boucicault. On the 14th insb. " The Private Secretary " is to be revived and will play tho season out.

Mr Garnet Walch, an old and respected Colo^ nial author and dramatist, who has been seriously ill for a very long period, was accorded a matinee benefit at the Royal last Saturday. The programme opened With one act of '• The Magistrate," followed by tho operetta "The Rose of Auvergne," with Messrs Appleby and Vernon and Mios lvanova as principal.'.). Then Mr G. W. Auson appeared in his eccentricity, " Puppets/ a&sihted by the Royal company. A miscellaneous concert followed, Mibs Katu Lovel being the only unknown performer, at least to our public. Mibs Lovel is a good and reliable biu-lej-que actress, who is unfortunate in doing nothing. The performances concluded with Mr Phil Day making a large audience merry in "Trying It On." The attendance was good, and the pecuniary result satisfactory.

Mr Stuart Cumberland, the thought-reader, is over here, presumably for pleasure. At tho earnest request of several people who have written to the papers about him ho has been persuaded to give a seance at the Town Hall — and charge for admission. It makes me tired to read that people come all the way here only to do these things "in response to urgent requests." If no charge were made for admission there might be something in it. Sala was supposed to have come out here merely to write a book, and you may remember how angry he got when it was hinted that he came here to make money, I suppose that Mr Cumberland would feel equally hurt if anyone ventured to doubt that he was politely forced to accept the money received at the doors, less expenses. His main object is said to be an endeavour to place a dramatisation of his novel, " The Rabbi's Spell," on the Colonial stage. He had a fine opening in Adelaide, both theatres closed, but failed to take advantage of it. There is a certain good story told of a mind reader, whose name is not mentioned, which may be used as a set-off against his own marvellous advertisements. It appeared, curiously enough, in a little French paper, " Le Pbare dv Bosphore," published in Constantinople, and runs thus: The thoughtreader was showing his powers before your King Tawhaio and his suite. The king, desired to have a turn, and thought of a large pearl button which he concealed during the absence of the performer. On his return, the latter, seizing the hand of one of the Royal attendants, immediately pointed to the King's mouth as the place of concealment. His Majesty denied the fact, but the thought-reader insisted. Tawhaio, determined not to be beaten, swallowed the button. As the little paper remarks, " Louis XIV. could not have done better."

Mr Philip Beck, for many years manager of the London Olympic under Mrs Conover, arrived in the O.S.S. Iberia last Friday. He intends giving a series of " Anecdotal Recitals," principally of a Shakespearian nature and on Shakespearian subjects.

Leon and Cushman have abandoned their remarkable version of " Uncle Tom's Cabin," and have gone back to the ordinary minstrel programme. The Hugo Minstrels are still agitating the ozone of the Victoria Hall. An enterprising young man has taken the Apollo Hall, and proposes to turn it into a music hall after the fashion of those so well known to the Londoner. The curious liquor laws of this country, however, make no provision for music halls, and only coffee can be sold. This, and the fact that the hall is up two flights of htairs, militate greatly against, the bucce&s of tliß scheme. Even coffee-royal would be something; you might get drunk on ib if you tried very hard.

Beach, the champion rower, was presented with a purse of sovereigns at the Opera House last Thursday evening. Beach may be a fine rower, but he is not pretty to look upon in dress clothes, and it jars upon you to see him pull his forelock in reply to applause. Our dapper town clerk made a carefully prepared speech, in which patriotic sentiments were plentiful, and " federation," " Australian pluck," and " grand old land," were elegantly worked in. He only broke down once. Mr Deeble, Beach's trainer, also got a purse of sovereigns. Beach made his stereotyped reply about his gratitude, and hoping to come back with the championship once more, &c. Champagne was then indulged in until the welkin rang again, and wheelbarrows were in demand.

Some forty Japanese have arrived in Sydney, where they propose to form a Japanese village similar to the one created by Mi- Tannaker Buchicrosan at Knightsbridge, London. Such an exhibition of the domestic and work-a-day life of the most curious peoi^le under the sun should prove highly interesting to us.

The opera season at our Royal closes in May next, and we are to have a heavy dramatic season in which " Hoodman Blind " and " The Harbour Lights " are to figure prominently.

Miss Amy Horton's season at St. George's Hall opens on the 17th inst. with Byron's wellknown burlesque, " Little Don Giovanni." The pantomime season at the Adelaide Royal opens with " Cinderella " on the 24th inst. After that, a season of comic opera is to be tried.

Sydney. — " Girofle-Girofla "is doing well at the Opera House, and " Dark Days " is ditto at the Royal. " The Great Pink Pearl " was produced at the Gaiety, on Saturday last, with fair success. The Federal Minstrels still crowd the Academy of Music, and the Alhambra is given over to variety companies.