THE MARRIED VOICE.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 21, Issue 89, 2 December 1910, Page 2

THE MARRIED VOICE.

ACTORS AND ACTRESSES PAIL TO REPRODUCE IT. “You can tell people who are married by the way they speak to each other.” This was the point made by a well known dramatic critic at an informal gathering of a London stage association the other night, when the subject of debate was—“ Does the stage mirror domestic life ?” 1 'The art of lovemaking on the stage,” said the critic, “is a highlydeveloped art, and reflects the lovers of real life almost exactly. “But I have never seen actors or actresses who could in any way catch the peculiar Intonation of the voice which marks the conversations of married couples, be they young, old, or middle-aged. “It must he apparent to anyone who studies or observes the people he mixes amongst that a wife, in addressing her husband, {invariably alters the tone of her voice, giving it a note or air of intimacy or proprietorship, just as a husband does when he addresses his wife. This peculiar change of voices our best actors and actresses fail to reproduce on the stage, even though .themselves they happen to be married. “At a stage garden-party or dinner party the stage wife addresses her stage husband in exactly the same tone of voice as that in which she speaks to the guests. This is never so in real life.

“'Even amongst brothers and sisters something of this peculiar- note of intimacy is to he detected. Between strangers such a note would seem almost casual, slighting, or off hand, hut the relationship existing makes it a domestic note, a sort of home tone, which is difficult to describe and, apparently, impossible to imitate.

“Whilst this is so, the stage can never hope to mirror domestic life. I have seen many, many stage scenes which were meant to reflect the home life, but I have never seen a convincing one, chiefly because husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, talk to each other in a way that no one outside the domestic circle can imitate.

“The accents of love, passion, anger, revolt, remorse, tragedy, and despair are all capable of reproduction on the stage, but the simple, familiar home conversation defeats our ablest actors and actresses.”— “Mirror.”