THE HISTRIONIC BEAUTY CURE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17837, 4 May 1926, Page 9

THE HISTRIONIC BEAUTY CURE.

By

STELLA HARLEY.

In the course of discussing audiences, a theatrical manager assured me that women still flock to the play* that will ensure them the luxury' of a “good cry'.” His theory is that, our sex feels better after an orgy of tears—idle tears; and as we face our own individiial problems so manfully these days—as we are, in general, dry*-eyed—we have to get our traditional ageold beauty' cure by other means. Women—said my theatrical friend—* are still unable to resist the appeal of sheer histrionic sob-stuff when it is “put over” by some favourite actress or god-like hero, caught in the net of unrequited love. They have to suffer vicariously* in the sorrows of the stage, where voices with tears in them can start their own lachrymal glands working; a feat that real life cannot compass, because women are too busy to bother. But when they dd permit themselves leisure, a theatre is their goal; their Mecca the play with the maximum number of sobs. Though I flouted the managerial theory to his face, I couldn’t help remembering that of the feminjc friends who flocked to see “Romance” and the incomparable Doris Keane, the greater number of them confessing to regular attendaces for .the entire run of the peice, were logical, stern-minded, Amazonian careerists. So perhaps there is something in the masculine idea after all!