"The Wind and the Rain”

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19668, 9 December 1933, Page 12

"T he Wind and the Rain”

SUCCESSFUL COMEDY BY NEW ZEALANDER

According to English newspapers received this week, one of the most successful plays produced in London last month was written by a New Zealander. This Is a comedy entitled ‘The Wind and the Rain,” written by Dr. Merton Hodge and produced at St. Martin's Theatre on October 18. Of his play the “Daily Telegraph" said:— ‘ ‘The Wind and the Rain,’ by Merxm Hodge, produced at the St. Martin's ast night, is a most refreshing play, [t has humour. It has humanity. It has vitality. It paints a lively picture of \ corner of the world which has not oeen staled for the siage. Finally it introduces us to a set of people who *re extremely good company. Scene of Play “The scene is the lodgings of a group 3 f students in a Scottish university Lown. The story tells how one of :hese students, Charles Tritton, missing , :he close companionship of his mother and of the girl she wants him to marry, ?oes to Anne Hargreaves for consolation throughout the long five years of tils training. “When Charles qualifies, Anne gives tiim up. Not till she has done so, and tiis mother has died a rather arbitrary death for the author’s convenience, does Charles realise that Anne Is the real love of his life, and bring the day to its appropriate happy ending. “Much of that cheerfulness ls provided by one of Charles's room-mates, a gay young spark, whose singleminded pursuit of every woman he sees causes him years of delay on the road to qualification a.s a doctor. This Is a peach of a part for any comic actor, and Mackenzie Ward, realising his chance, brings of! a peach of a jierformance.” Newspaper Comment Or the same play “The Times” said: “Le cocur a scs raisons . . .; and It is the merit of Dr. Merton Hodge's ostensibly simple little story that It successfully dramatises .1 conflict of

:hese reasons in the heart of youth Reason itself may suggest that th( medical student has done no more thar prefer a woman of his own finding tc me chosen for him by his mother; but >o well is the youth’s character realised so persuasively are the crises of hii formative years suggested, that we become aware of a spiritual struggle underlying his love affairs. He ii called upon to decide, not merely be:ween one woman and another, but t>etween his past and his future. I: he cannot abandon the one he must sacrifice the other. “He is, as we first see him, a timic freshman setting down a lttle uneasl] in a student lodging-house in Edln burgh. Though sensitive and talented he is dei>endent. His nature is on< which needs a source of strength tha Is not to be found within Itself. Thi spiritual need a girl sculptor comprehends and can satisfy, but somethin! deep in the student ties him to hi; mother, whom we never see. and bid him please her by marrying the frlent of his childhood. His struggle t< make himself independent of a pas that is already ceasing to feed his spiri makes the pattern of the play. It 1 an unobstrusive pattern and is once o twice In danger of being lost in th pleasantly youthful fun of student life which ls given its full value by M Mackenzie Ward’s lighthearted slacker Mr Ivan Brandt's strenuous simplicity and the sympathetic fatalism of M Deorge de Warfaz The timely deatl of the mother seems to be a weaknes in the pattern itself. If the studen were forced during his mother's life time to face the full implications o his dc{>cndonee on her the dramatt l>oint of the piece would, to our think lug. be sharijcr.” Women are replacing men jus tele graphists in live post office. In Lon don there were 1100 men and 95 women In 1914. now there arc 100 women and 650 men.