THE THEATRE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8101, 29 August 1904, Page 1

THE THEATRE.

MUSICAL AND DRAMATIC NOTES. An ingenious gentleman living r.t Pressburg has conceived and carried out the idea of making his piano into a kind of glorified harmonium, the strings being set into vibration by strips of leather, which act apparently like a violin bow, and are moved ' by . some sort of machinery when the reI quired nots is pressed down. It has this j advantage over the harmonium, that an inI crease of finger pressure on the note makes th© leather strip go fastsr, and so produces a crescendo, and vice versa. Ifc will clearly b» quite unadapted for rendering pianoforte music j whether any new style of composition will b» evolved to suit its capabilities remains to bo seen. Apropos of Paderewski's visit (remarks the "Australasian"), the following handbill I issued at Bristol, when Paiganini visited I that city in 1831, is worth' reading, if only I to show "how insular prejudices have broken down during the last century: — "Fellowcitiaens, do, not allow yourselves to be itnposwl upon by the payment of. charges which are well worthy of the najna of ex- ' tortion j, rath«r suffer under the imputation j of a M'ant of taste than support any of the [ tribe of foreign music-monsters, who collect j the cash of this country, and waft it to their. own shores*, laughing at the infatuation of John Bull." There are many tales going around of the strange doings of those hidden workers of the : gtageVhOi known as "hands,"' will not be found named with, the actors and the dressmakers on the programme. That was an amusing seen© . once at the London Gaiety, where Mr Lionel Monckton, passing through the dres'a circle in the interval of a- rehearsal, discovered one of the sceneshifters giving an imitation of Letty Lind in the song, " A Monkey on a- Stick," to the piano accompaniment of another sceneshifter, -who was making a very respectable job, by ear, of the composer's music. When Charles Brookfield heard from Mr Monckton of the liberty the stage hand had taken with his corn-position, he turned seriously to the musician and said, with mock sympathy in his voice, "No! Did he? And what did you do? Shift some of his scenery?" A hew peril has been added to play-going (writes a London correspondent). Ladies who go to matinees, and, out of consideration for those behind them, take off their hats, have a pleasing little nabit, it seems, of sticking their Kat-pins into the backs of the seat;s immediately in front of them. ; Sometimes the piiis ore stuck ia a little too fir, 1 with the result that the occupant of the seat stands an exc-sllent chance of receiving an inch of cold steel in the small of his or her baok. If this sort of thing becomes at I all general it will be necessary to introduce an armour-plated matinee coat or to line j the backs of theatre seat* with- a pin-resist-ing material of some sort. " That's the coming genius," said a Royal Academician when the name of Henry Irving still occupied a small place upon the playbill. And one or two others, Dickens, ! his friend and admirer, among tnem, agreed, i Another— rand more practical — was the late Thomas Purnell, who one day stepped into the manager's room a-t the Lyceum. "Do you know the next piece you're going to put oil at the Lyceum?" he asked. " No," replied Bateman, the lessee. "It is ' Hamlet,' " replied Purnell, "and Henry Irving will play" the Prince." Bateman thought there might be something in the idea. There was. He produced "Hamlet," and Irving wae the Prince. His portrayal of tie part aroused a controversy in which, opinion was acutely divided, bufc the play raii for 200 nights, .and scored an unprecedented success. A well-known English actor tells the following "yarn" about an incident which happened during the run oi a pantomime in th« north of Englamd. There was an elaborate bunting scene in a wood, in which an intelligent fox-terrier, most carefully made up as a fox, ran across the etage with the hounds after him in. fun cry. On the first night, directly the " fox " nui^e his entrance, he took Timbrage for some unaccountable reason at tho energetic movements of the conductor of the orchestra, and instead of scampering across the wood, ran down, to the footlights and began to bark furiously. To say the people shrieked feebly expresses the " fox's reception, but when the hounds presently appeared, and he calmly joined them and 1 trotted awtay in, their company, the actors realised that if the success of a- pantomime artist i« shown by the loudntss of the audience's laughter, Dan Leno himself never made such a hit. as their barking "fox." The. production eff the Hoo Mrs Alfred Lyttelton's play, "Warp and Woof," by

:• Mrs Patrick Campbell, suggests that ther* [■ is still one book unwritten : its subject > "Women Playwrights." Nothing wortl 1 noting has been written about them bul i an article in the "Theatre" for June, 1896. There is the material for a book. In th< list I have (says a writer in the " P«?Ii Mai: > Gazette "), much the fullest I know of, Mrj . LytteltoTi conies one hundred' and third; and no doubt many more might be found. | Of these, more than kulf are English. W< have to-day forty women playwrights 01 | thereabouts, of whom it may be said that some are titled and others admirable. And ' of the latter's plays some are for th© stage, * like Mrs Clifford's " Likeness of the Night," which shows Mrs Kendal at her best; and some to be read and kept, like the late Miss Bannby's '* QisAi Swisson," which the late ' Professor York Powell declared to bo "as ' good as Ibsen." But these are fsr above ■ the average. The most successful financially was probably a farce, Mrs Musgrove's "Our Flat." The literary history of Mr W. S. » Gilbert (says tie " Pall Mall Gazette ") is peculiar and interesting. He began with a classic, "The Bab Ballads." He next, wrote extravaganzas, rich in happy ideas ■ and well worth reading. Some might even repay revival. He then tamed his attention to comedies in prose and sentimental verse- plays, which laefc for a time enjoyed more esteem than perhaps they deserved. Three plays coming under these h-eads, however, merit special mention. " Dan'l Druce" is the moet dramatic play to Mr Gilbert's credit. " Sweethearts " is his only play of genuine feeling. It is, moreover, one' of the very few good tyro-act plays in the language. *' Pygmalion and Galatea" is always effective, though some will resent the vulgarisation almost inevitable'in the modernisation of a savere and beautiful classical story. ''Comedy and Tragedy," which came coiiffidev&bly " later, may also be instanced as an effective, if stagey, little drama. These were followed by "Engaged" and "Tom Cobb." two of the most brilliant and p^rfpet farces of English growth. They are literature, and a. collection of the twelve best English farces would be defective if wanting either. Up to this point, however, Mr Gilbert, though a f-iirly Pucce-Efiful playwright, had never established any rsal a.scend<?ucy over the public. That came with .hie association with Sullivan in what is conveniently called Savoy opera. Here he fell back on " The Bab Ballads " which, writ largo and set to admirable and sympathetic music, went round the world, and are going round it still. It is as a " Bab BaHadiEt " that Mr Gilbert ig at his best.