THE CHAMPION KISSER.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 1, 24 December 1912, Page 3

THE CHAMPION KISSER.

DOLLi T CASTLES

SCORES FORTY-FOUR NIGHTLY,

Following on the successes achieved by Australian representatives in the Northern Hemisphere, Miss Holly Castles is upholding the, honour of Australia in a.new way. She is the world’s champion kisser—that is, on public performances. There may be kissers who can beat Miss Castles in demonstrations given in camera, but the court of records 'would decline to issue certificates for these, and the Bendigo girl therefore retains her sprig of laurel. How would you like to be kissed 41 times every night? (asks the New York ‘World’). Even the most ardent lover will admit that 44 kisses in succession is strenuous loving. Yet that is the number of kisses that Dolly Castles and Joseph Santley exchange every night in “The Woman Haters,” a musical comedy playing on Broadway. They have a song called “Love’s Alphabet,” in which the refrain is punctuated by kisses. Immediately after mentioning each letter in the alphabet this pair of youngsters indulge in fervent osculation. It takes twenty-six kisses to go through the song once. At each, performance the song gets at least three encores of six kisses eacli, which .brings; the total to forty-four kisses at every performance. This is the minimum, it has been known to reach sixty-eight at a single show'.

Any first-reader pupil with a pencil and a piece of paper can prove that the following figures are correct. There are eight performances of “The "Woman Haters” every week—eight times 44 makes 352—the least number of times young Joseph Stanley osculates young Dolly Castles every week. They kiss each other promiscuously throughout the three acts of the piece, but we’ll let these other kisses go. The show has been playing now- five weeks. On a basis of this low estimate Miss Castles has been kissed by Mr. Stanley 1760 times since the opening night. This is not counting numerous rehearsals, where they kiss each other at the direction of George Marion, who put on the play. The piece rehearsed five weeks before opening, and both Miss Castles and Mr. Santley assert that during these five weeks they rehearsed the number about twice as many times as they now' do it before audiences. This would mak’e the number of kisses during live wmeks of rehearsals 3520, which, added to the 1760 above mentioned, brings the grand total to 5280. It is safe to assume that “The Woman Haters” will have a long run. Its season of forty weeks w ill bring the total up to 75,680.