AMUSEMENTS.

Colonist, Volume LVII, Issue 14143, 21 July 1916, Page 7

AMUSEMENTS.

PERMANENT PICTURES.

"M.V OLD DUTCH."

At the-Empire Theatre to-night "My Old Dutch" will be shown. The principal parts in this delineation of London coster life are taken by Albert Chevalier and Florence Turner. The play opens on a Whit Monday, down by the Welsh Harp, with costers in great force, j Joe and Sal, have their courtship, and i soon are married. They lose their first! baby, but another child comes to com-' fort them. There is something of re-j finement in Sal's face that haunts one from' the start, and one day a newspaper reports that sho has inherited £5000 from a 'branch of her family yot higher social standing. What, terrific excitement there is in the coster household when the news is brought! What a time they give the lawyer, all speaking together! But what a heart fhey show behind their Tincouth exterior. Will they take the money and spend it ? "Every penny of that 'ere money," i says^ Joo, and Sal agrees, "is going to be spent to turn our nipper into a gentleman." The picture traces the young hopeful with private tutors through his college life and among the flash set of London bloods, and keens a fine artistic balance. The truth "is made known to Joe and his wife of their boy's behaviour. "You have broken your mother's heart," Joe'exclaims, "and I could curse the day you were born." But Sal just kisses and pats the lad. "I am done with being a gentleman," he says; "I am-going to try and be a man." Gradually the poverty of Joe and Sal increases—only one friend remains, 'Erb, who bestows what comfort he can. Sickness brings the hospital, and eventually the workhouse. The son is at the goldfields, and fortune is smiling upon him. He has written home to his parents, but they have not received the letter. He j returns'to-find-the old home deserted, his parents Heaven knows Avliere. How fate places him on the road of their whereabouts, and what he does to arrange their happiness is -magnificently told. The Permanent Pictures Orchestra will be augmented for the occasion. During the closing scene of the picture the words of the song "My Old Dutch" will be ,recited by Mr Sid Bush. The box plan is open at the Empire Theatre all day. Motueka will be visited as usual tomorrow night