ENGLISH LETTER.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5581, 3 June 1896, Page 4

ENGLISH LETTER.

LONDON, April 10. | The Gay Parisienne, successfully produced at the Duke of York's Theatre on Easter Monday, is an olla podrida of the Shop Girl and Artist's Model school. The plot is of no consequence, but songs and dances are. If the piece catches on, it will probably be because people -want to hear Lionel Eignold warble "Tweedledum and Tweedledee," to see Frank Wheeler dance, and to laugh at Louie Preear's droll rendering of "Sister Mary Jane's Top-note." The latter will be all over London in a week. Miss Freear is a tiny little dwarf, got up as a "slavey" out for a holiday, and wearing a huge hat and what she calls "f ewers "as big as herself. She describes with true comic gusto the inception of " Sister Mary Jane's Top-note " — She let it go one evening, and the organist, poor man, Went flying through the window, and away like mad he ran. It twisted nil the organ pipes, and the boy who blew the wind Got jammed into the bellows hole, and left his boors behind. ' But Mary sat so saintly, for the poor girl didn't know — She cleared her tliroat to sing again, but every one said "No!" The Star of India at the Princess Theatre is an Anglo-Indian melodrama by George E. Sims and Arthur Shirley, based in the main on the sensational Manipur episode of a few years back. Captain and Mrs Grimwood are not, of course, introduced in person, but the hero and heroine, Captain and Mrs Stanmore, are colourable imitations. The historic incidents of Manipur have, in fact, their counterpart in the new piece, this section of which begins with a scene in which the British are attacked at the Eesidency, at their Christinas dinner, and the subsequent episodes of their escape by the Jungle Eiver are realised upon the stage with full dramatic effect. We have seen nothing like it before, and these vivid pictures of Indian life appeal to the imagination not through the sense of the eye alone. In the purely pictorial ele--ments of the scene particular pains have been taken to assure accuracy, and in the military details, correct to a button,' the management have had the assistance of a military expert, who is himself much esteemed as an authority on theatrical matters. But the domestic interest of the story is not dissipated in scenic effects; a desperate plot, affecting the lives of a young married couple, is developed amid the stress of stirring events. Captain Stanmore, who seems to be standing- near the brink of bigamy, is about to marry Kate Arniger, when her first husband, long since reported dead, returns to England. He returns, however, not to claim his wife, but to extort money from Mark Stanmore, a villainous impostor, who has succeeded in passing himself as the elder brother of the gallant young officer. To none but the returned wanderer is this secret known, and the errant husband is murdered by an Indian servant, at the instigation of Mark Stanmore, just in time to establish the legality of the marriage^between Kate and her lover. The young captain is at this fateful moment ordered off to India, and his wife, whose interests were so clearly served by the niurder, remains to face a criminal charge. If the authors followed the ordinary proceeding in the courts of the drama the heroine would be straightway sentenced to death; but cdmmdn sense and strict laws of evidence are ' allowed to prevail, and Kate is acquitted. There the matter, it seems, is allowed to drop, but we come back to it again, as the audience not .unnaturally expects, in the last act. In the meantime Mark has succeeded to the baronetcy to which Captain Stanmore is the rightful heir, and Kate has found her husband, and is beside him in all his perils. And such perils ! She gets free of the Eesidency. at Manipnr when it is attacked by the natives, and beside the Jungle Eiver she rejoins her husband, who is on the point of being done to death by the murderous Aleem Khan, when the British, troops come to their rescue. In a breathlessly exciting scene, Aleem Khan is shot down, and Kate carries him off, wounded, through the rushes, to their boat. Her kindness toxtches the black-faced rascal's black heart, and he makes full confession of his crime, and on their return to England enables them to prove the infamous Mark's guilt. Careless of his own life, the Indian dpnounces his confederate, anil cheats the police, who have already secured Mark, by stabbing himself with the very knife with which he had committed the murder in the early part of the play. The theatres are nearly all doing good business just now, the biggest crowds, perhaps, besieging The Sign of the Cross, The Grand Duke, Trilby and Tlie Shop Girl. Mr A. H. Gee, who, as Mr Albert Gresham, completes his twentieth week at the Palace Theatre to-day, has not had any specially good luck so far as other engagements are concerned. Yet wherever he sings he is well received, and the only explanation I can give of his not finding employment in plenty for his undoubtedly grand voice is that the public do not care so much for baritone, as for tenor vocalism. Next season, however, I have hopes that Mr Gee will bo more, frequently heard in public, for Ihearthat he was given an opportunity to display his talent before the wellknown concert director, Mr NY. Vert, and favourably impressed that acute judge. Miss Ethel Haydon surrendered the part of Bessie Brent in the evergreen Shop Girl to Ellaline Terriss on Wednesday evening, when Mr Edmund Payne, Mr George Grossmith, jun., and Mr Seymour Hicks also resumed their original roles. Mr Payne had been away from the cast at the Gaiety nine months suffering from typhoid fevev and dangerous sequelw,; which threatened at one time to< leave him permanently in the same sad condition' as Nellie Farron. •Howeveiylie made a marvellous recovery at Margate, and on Wednesday evening reappeared apparently qtirfce in his old form. When the young actor came upon the stage liis reception was the loudest and longest that perhaps has ever .' greeted any comedian even at the Gaiety. A reverberating roar that seemed to continue for minutes is the only description that can be given of the greeting that kept him bowing upon the stage. Even the actors joined in the welcome, and when at last the piece was allowed to proceed, it was soon interrupted when Mr Arthur Williams, as the " Universal Provider," Hooley, called his shopman Higgles and greeted him with, "Ah, are you about again?" and shook him by the hand. Another burst emphasised this impromptu. From that point the piece ran merrily. Mr Payne Avas apparently in grand form, droll and vivacious, and laughter rewarded his quaint sayings and doings until about the middle of the act. Here occurs a love song addressed to what appears to be a milliner's dummy, which Mr Payne had to lift and bring down the stage. It is really animate, and the process of carrying so heavy a weight may have accounted for a painful incident which shortly occurred. Mr Payne began to sing to the figure, when he was observed to pass round it and clutch at its back. He then stopped singing and made signals to the* "prompt" side of the stage.These were net understood at first, and tho ...audience wondered in dead, silence. In a "few moments, however, an attendant walked upon the stage, and taking the little man in his arms earned him off. The curtain fell for a few moments, and tliett an understudy continued the part. At the conclusion of the act, Mr George Edwards, pale and very much upset, explained what had happened. Mr Payne had over-taxed his strength, the feeble limbs had given way, and he had been carried crippled and in great pain to the Charing Cross Hospital. It was quite impossible to say when he would be able to appear again. What an end, what a terribly sad end to the invalid's long and eagerly looked forward to return to work. Even the most frivolous amongst the axidience must have got a glimpse of the shattered hopes, the grim tragedy in real life this seemingly trivial incident involved. There were neither recalls nor encores, and all the " go " was taken out of tho performance, the actresses especially being quite uimerveii, Mr Payne's condition is very serious.