“JUST AS YOU SAY, DEAR.”

Otago Witness, Issue 3862, 20 March 1928, Page 76

“JUST AS YOU SAY, DEAR.”

(From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, January 25. It is a rare thing for a New Zealadner to have a play accepted in London, and when this does happen it is an event worthy of notice. “ Just As You Say, Dear,” is a three-act farce by Mr G. H, R. Young, of Wellington. The producers, Alessrs J. and D. de Leon, have accepted this for production, and the play was put on for the first time at the “ Q ” Theatre, Kew, last night. The audience was a, large one, and let it be said, at once, that the play was received in a way that •should have been most flattering to the author.

“Just As You Say. Dear,” was written in New Zealand, and played by ths Victoria College students for four nights in Wellington. Ten months ago Air Young came to London, and one of his ambitions was to place this play. No doubt he could tell a tale of tireless effort and dis--appointment. He has probably learned a great deal about the personality of producers and the methods they have- with young playwrights. His confidence in the article he had to sell was strong, however, and at last he was successful.

Nevertheless, it was rather a depressed author one met at “ Q ” Theatre before the play began. One gathered that the “cuts,” alterations, and interpretation had been a blow to him—that just those passages which, ’the author considered, gave it rare distinction, had been mutilated or omitted, and that the play had been ruthlessly conventionalised. Mr Young washed his hands of it.

Without knowing what was the original form of the play one may venture the opinion that from the point of view of popular appeal and box office receipts the producer has arguments in his favour. Even when the enthusiastic audience called for the appearance of the author and afterwards for a speech, Mr Young was apparently not convinced that the best had been produced. It was a strange little speech. He said he had not anticipated a success, he had not been satisfied with the way it had been produced, but, evidently, judging from the “ noise ” that came from the audience he was mistaken.