ENTERTAINMENTS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 318, 6 July 1912, Page 6

ENTERTAINMENTS.

"BEN HUR." On Monday night, at the Theatre Royal, Mr. J. C. Williamson will present, his splendid dramatic organisation, which includes over 100 travelling members, in a production of the stupendous religious spectacular romance, "Ben Hur." Although the hooking is excellent, there are still a large number of seats in good positions in both the dress circle or reserved stalls which can be selected at Collier's. There is hardly a doubt that never before lias greater interest been shown by playgoers over the production of a play as that in the representation of General Lew Wallace's famous drama, and it will probably be received with the same enthusiasm as elsewhere. In "Ben Hur" the rising of the curtain slowly uncovers a scene of the groat desert, in which the potent majesty of an awe-in-spiring stillness makes itself vividly felt. Here the "Three Wise Men" of Biblical fame meet, and, as they gaze towards the East in infinite lonely splendor rises the "Star of Bethlehem," the guide that shall lead them to the lowly cradle or the ,new-born Christ. Like the novel, the drama is instructive, and makes quite clear 'how impossible it was for the Jews of that period to look for a meek and lowly Saviour. The loader of such a people, oppressed by fortune, yet great by tradition and talent, must be necessarily in their eyes a king to make armed conquest of the earth, and to right the wrongs so hardly wrought on Judah's sons by proud, imperial Rome. This central idea of indicating the conditions of the very birth of Christianity forms part of a story of love and revenge. The music, which is of a classic character, was composed by Edgar Stillman Kelley, who first claimed attention in Australia by his fine incidental numbers for "Macbeth" when staged there by Nance O'Neill, Mr. Eric Maxon created quite a sensation in Auckland as Ben Hur, and he has established himself as one of the best actors who has yet visited the Dominion. Mr. J. Hazlitt, the producer of "Ben Hur," arrives here today to supervise the final trials of the chariot race, and the other big features. Everything is already prepared for Monday's representation.