HIS MAJESTY’S

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 417, 27 July 1928, Page 15

HIS MAJESTY’S

BEN TRAVERS’S FARCES “ROOKERY NOOK” For pure, joyous farce, “Rookery Nook,” which opened at His Majesty’s Theatre this week, takes all th© laurels of a decade. Based on the well-known book by Ben Travers, one of the best of English humorists, the play is full of deliciously funny dialogue and daring incident. In this rich story a lovely young girl dashes into a house which has just been rented by a young married man whose wife is not expected until the following day. She spends the night in the house, alone with the young husband, and several relatives and a “day woman” with a nose for scandal are involved in the complications which follow. Mr. Hastings Lynn makes a splendid Gerald Popkiss and Mr. Basil Radford shows his real ability as Clive Popkiss. Miss Minnie Rayner, Miss Donalda Warn© and the other players fit admirably into the piece.

“Rookery Nook” will be presented to-night and to-morrow and there will be a matinee on Saturday afternoon. On Monday evening the New English Comedy Company will produce

“A Cuckoo in the Nest,” which has been called “the bedroom comedy without a single blush.” The book of that name is probably the best-known and most widely-appreciated of Ben Travers’s comedies, and the play ran for more than two years in England. It was to have been the first production of the company in Auckland, but some difficulty arose in getting the scenery here in time. Mr. Hastings Lynn has even better opportunities in “A Cuckoo in the Nest” than he has in “Rookery Nook” for the display of his capacity as a first-class comedy star, and so has Miss Minnie Rayner, who takes the part of Mrs. Spoker, landlady of the “Stag and Hunt.” Mr. Willie Clifton and Miss Willa Lyndberg are two London artists, who will make their first appearance here in “A Cuckoo in the Nest.” Only four representations can bTT staged of “A Cuckoo” and on Fridaynext and three following evenings “Thark” will be produced here for the first time.