DRAMATIC GOSSIP.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4739, 2 September 1893, Page 3

DRAMATIC GOSSIP.

• . £fEOM OUB OWN CO-RESPONDENT.] •London, July 14. Mr Herbert Standing, who has not bean fortunate since his return from Australia, had a complimentary benefit at the Gaiety, selections from Charley's Aunt, Mdllc Xitouche and other popular successes were performed to a fair house. Mr Standing leaves at once for the States. • When Mr W. - S. Penley started hia Charley's Aunt venture at the Boyalty, he tinluckily resolved not to run the whole riak Himself, but to get someone to put in jnOOO and go half shares. The lucky man who reluctantly agreed to do this has ever since been drawing JBSOO a week, and from present appearances will continue to do so for many months to come. Maßcagni'a I Rantzau formed the attraction at Covent Garden laßt Friday, the composer conducting. A number of Italians in the gallery made a great pretence of enthusiasm, but the houae generally did hoB "catch on," Certain numbers, such as the " Kyrie " in the second act, the water-drawers' chorus in the third and the passionate tenor air of the young lover aroused applause, but the •work generally the critics pronounce inferior to L'Ami Fritz. ' The season at the Garrick, Toole'a, the Strand, and the Criterion Theatres closes this evening; Next Saturday the lastnamed will ra-open with a revival of the renowned La Fille dc Madame Angoi, originally produced at the Philharmonic Theatre, Islington (now the Grand) about 1874. Soldenewasthenthe Madame L'Ange. Nest Saturday Decima Moore will, I .understand, act the role of Clairette, with Templar Saxe as Ange Pitou, and David James, jun., as Larivaudiere. It will be interesting to see whether this favourite -work, which twenty years ago had the longest run known up to that time in Paris, proves aamnch out of date as the majority ofe recent revivals. The long-talked of production of The Grand Duchess is also again in preparation, Florence St John being engaged to play Her Serene Highness. The Savoy management has given Jane Annie every chance, but the piece has failed t) catch on, and the theatre is to be closed at once till autumn, when Gilbert and Sullivan's opera will, D'Oyley Carta hopes, be ready. Mr Carte ia a remarkable instance of the ups and downs of theatrical enterprise. For ten year 3 fortune smiled on him (as chief of the Savoy Trinity) uninterruptedly. Then came the quarrel with Gilbert, the building of the gorgeous opera house in Cambridge circus and a season of six months in Which the accumulations of as many years •wtere swept away. Since then failures and nieces d'estimc have followed one another at the Savoy, failures (financially) predominating. The Savoy Provincial Companies (of which there are four) have, however, brought grißt to the mill throughout, and despite heavy losses, Mr Carte should still be well off. .Daly's new theatre in Leicester Square possesses a handsome but gloomy auditorium, the scheme of decoration being in crimson and dead gold. The scats, corridors, /retiring room's, «s=c.,_are aIL the perfection of" comfort^ and the staircases are of .etbne and fireproof. The Daly Company opened with their famous performance of The Taming of the Shrew, quite the best of their • Shaksperian repertoire All the -world has. heard of the Katherine of Ada Eehan, for whom the part might have been specially written. Her raging gusts of passion, her angry squeals, her furious trials of, strength with Petruchio, and her gradual eulky submission under the influences of fatigue and hunger, are : admirable. Throughout it all she is charming, so charming that the furore of the other men for the sweetly insipid Bianca seems incomprehensible. Mr G. Clarke, who succeeds John Drew as Petruchio, is of a larger build, and therefore perhaps more suitable in one way, but he over-acts the husband's brutal bullying /mocd. The rest of the cast remains the same as that of. 1891. Thelbad cold from which that pet of tfie Adelphi gallery, "gud ole Chawley "Worner," waa suffering on Ja)y 1, made htshursta of emotion 'even- more realistic tHan usual, notwithstanding somewhat grampus-like puffings and blowings resultant from the too too solid. flesh of fifty being tightly strapped up in the toggery of two-and-twenty. The piece now called A' Woman's Revenge belongs rather to the Bohool of East Lynne than to the later Adelphi type. The revengeful dame is an adventuress, enacted with grim ferocity by Gertrude Kingston. Charley Warner loved her onca "with a boy's calf love," but she heartlessly spurned hiß affection, so he promptly inherited a fortune, and transferred his attentions to Mis 3 Elizabeth Bbbins. This brings upon him a world of trouble, for Miss Robins, being an heiress, is courted by her wicked cousin, Herbert Fl9mming, who finds at his elbow two agents for helping him to a revenge which shall fall as heavy on the woman he loves se on the man he hates. Mists Kingston is, of course, one agent, and Charles Cartwright (a bad lot Charles), who enacts a wicked lawyer, the other. Between them they not only plot to ruin poor panting Charley, but induce Misa Kobins, who yields to suspicion with surprising facility, to leave her husband. When,

Mr Warner finds bia wife again it' is in Fiemming's company under seemingly compromising circumstances, and tha villain onlyeucapes with hia life at Miss Eobina' intercession. Nevertheless, later he returns to persecute the heroine, but she flies. Caitwright then appear?, and the two rogues quarrel. Cartwright ultimately kills Flemming, suspicion of course falling on the now chronically hysterical Miss Robins. Finally we have the trial at the Old Bailey, in which Charley Warner conducts hia wife's defence and exposea the guilty party. This scene was a great success, and the curtain finally fell amidst loud applause.