NOT EQUALLED

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 19959, 17 November 1934, Page 20

NOT EQUALLED

THE IRISH AS ACTORS There are no actors to equal the Irish. I have long held that opinion, and after seeing the new play at the Westminster, “The Moon in the Yellow River,” I am more than ever confirmed in my judgement of them, writes Sydney Carroll in the “Daily Telegraph.” Nor would I qualify this by saying that for an Irish play Irish actors are essential if the true spirit is to be caught, and that it is impossible for players of other nationalities to capture anything like the genuine Hibernian character, though, quite between ourselves. I am inclined to hold that such is really the case. Ycur Irishman seems to possess a sincerity and devotion to his part and his play unequalled, except perhaps in a Jew. He seldom or hardly ever betrays tha t consciousness of his audience evident all too frequently in players of other countries. There is a quality that for want of a better term I must define as “exhibitional” and apparent in a good many English, French, and German actors that seldom shows itself in an Irishman. It has its virtues, this exhibitionist tendency. It makes the player self-reliant, full of confidence, and less dependent upon either the play or his fellow-players. But as against the absorption of the Irish tn their job, their complete subservience to the ideas and purpose of the dramatist, the exhibitional player must cut generally a poor figure. Few Irish actors are devoid of a rich sense of humour, none of them lack the keenest appreciation of the dramatic; there is a combative virility about every one of them that in itself makes for drama, and is of the stuff that ail great plays are composed. The performance and production of “The Moon in the Yellow River,” as the dramatic critic of this journal has justly observed, scarcely did justice to this fine bit of work, but that, apart from the producer-author’s share, cannot be attributed to such Irish people as were in the cast. Generally speaking, I am not in favour of authors producing their own plays. My experience leads me to believe that, like many mothers, they know less about their offsprings than do the rankest outsiders. There are exceptions, of course, but they are very few. I could not help thinking how vastly this peculiar Irish product would have gained with a cast almost exclusively Irish, except for the one German played so cleverly and consistently by Mr Godfrey Kenton. It was not that the alien members of the company did not try very hard but they never to me suggested sons of the soil. What is there about the Irish that makes them such fine actors? It it their happy-go-lucky, free-and-easy quick-witted readiness for every emergency? Is it their instinctive “spoiling for a fight”? Is it the music, the clearness, the rhythm of their voices? Is it. perhaps, their complete immersion in" their art. their finish and polish, always coupled with breadth and strength of a technique that never reveals itself and is always skilfully concealed? How often are we tematud when watching a first-class Irish player, to say, “This is not art, but Nature”; and how dreadfully wrong we should be if we came to that conclusion. Of course, there are Irish players who are not worth the snuff of a candle. When an Irish actor is bad he is very, very bad, and nothing can save him. But taking them on the whole “there is no denying it” the Irish are the best actors in the world.