MUSIC AND THE STAGE

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18091, 26 February 1927, Page 23

MUSIC AND THE STAGE

The Humphrey Bishop company will shortly appear at the Theatre Royal in a delightful mixture of song, mirth, music, and dancing. A feature of the company’s performances will be a burlesque on “The Arcadians,” entitled “In Arcadee,” specially written by George (“Scratcher”) Ross, in which he takes the leading role. There is also to be a fascinating Eastern extravaganza, “Nile Nights,” in which part singing coincides with the appearance of a bevy of prettily frocked girls, and dancing. “Scratcher” Ross in association with Fred. Webber, will also be seen in a comedy sketch. “The Old Lighthouse Keeper.” While comedy is the keynote, the vocal side is in the capable hands of Walter Kingsley, the eminent London baritone, Thelma Trott, a gifted young soprano, who will make her first appearance here; Fred. Webber, “the versatile tenor,” and John Montfort, the well-known English tenor. Lovers of the terpsichorean krt are catered for by Mark Leslie, Elaine Maye, Allan Kitson, Dorothy Ryder, Charles Albert, and the ballet, while Dan Flood will be heard in new comedy at the piano. Speaking at a public meeting at Hawera, Mr L. O. Hooker said it was probably unique for a town in New Zealand and Australia to have had three scholarship winners in connection with the Royal Academy of Music, London, and that for nine years a Hawera student would be at Academy—Maida Hooker, then Walter Fenell, and now Leah Haughton. New Zealand will not see “Abie’s Irish Rose” as soon as expected, as the company’s season in Australia has been extended for several weeks. The New Zealand season will probably start on March 29, in Auckland. Many plays that are outstanding successes in London fail miserably in New York and vice versa, but the play that can please both Broadway and West End London theatregoers rarely fails in Australia and New Zealand. Such an one appears to be “ The Best People/’ In fact, Axerv Hop wood's comedy is an all-nations success judging by the fact that it has been running simultaneously in England, America, France, Belgium, and Australia since early last year. Some of the folk who do the world’s grand tour say that the company now appearing in Australia compares more than favourably with some of the companies they have seen abroad. This is the company' which is to come to New Zealand in March under the direction of Mr E. J. Carroll. It may be mentioned incidentally that “The Best People” has made a comfortable fortune for its author—so that tributed altogether to the artists. A noted continental artist. Beppv de Vries, has been engaged for an Australian and New Zealand tour by J. C. Williamson Ltd., to appear in the title role of “Madame Pompadour” which she created in the European production. Beppy de Vries is a Dutch girl, who has only recently mastered English, having originally played the part in French. This, comic: opera is to be staged on an elaborate and brilliant scale by J. C. Williamson Ltd. Judith Anderson, the Australian star, who is to be seen in New Zealand as the “vamp” in “Cobra,” says that her message to any Australian and New Zealand girl of talent who wanted to make a career on the stage was, after a thorough grounding on the local stage, to go to America. “They are great-hearted folk, the Americans.” she says, “They give everybody a chance, and if you have the goods, you are right.” Miss Anderson starred in “Cobra” for two years in the United States. “Ruddigore,” which has never been staged in Australia or New Zealand, will be included in the repertoire of the Gilbert and Sulivan Company, which has been re-engaged for a further Australian and New Zealand tour. The company is expected in New Zealand in August. It is a coup for E. J. Carroll to introduce Pauline Frederick to London, and it seems a foregone conclusion that she and London will fall in love with one another (writes the Sydney' correspondent of the Auckland “Star”). Many of our Australian managers have desired the fame of London production, and except for George Musgrove, in the dim past, E. J. Carroll is the first to attain it. There are rumours that Hugh J. Ward is very anxious to join forces with some of his managerial friends in London and branch out there in a big way, i and for a time there was talk of the Taits doing so. Carroll first turned his I eyes towards that horizon when he j made overtures to launch “Gappy I Ricks” in London, and no doubt that I would have come to something if the star had not died in Perth on his way to England to rehearse this play.

Nothing has been more remarkable than the reappearance of Paderewski (says a Sydney writer). A man of outstanding genius, if provocative of ribald | comment to bus drivers and their kind on account of the amazing fluency of his hair, he retired to a Swiss chateau a decade or more ago, ostensibly to brood on new interpretations of the masters and put a few commas in his 1 memoirs. The end of the war saw a striking resurrection. The former somewhat effeminate maestro of the Steinway turned out to be a courageous patriot and man of affairs, who served his ancient country (Poland) with great acumen as flrst President of the Republic. Now lie is back fit the piano a greater man than ever, and proposes to invade us soon, bringing four special instruments and a tuner to keep them in order. * * *• Diana Watts, whose unique art delighted London and Paris fifteen years ago, and who toured America, South Africa, India, and Australia last year, is on a second tour of the world. Her itinerary will include New Zealand. For her first recital, “The Principles of Greek Poise," is an attractive title. “An original scholar," says the “Pretoria News,” “she has attained to that perfection of physical development and control which she describes. In her recitals even if her clear voice and admirable phrasing were not singularly pleasant to the car, the eye would yet comprehend her purpose.” With simplicity and directness she unfolds the story of her researches, illustrating as she goes in plastic series. Her movements are so fundamental they appear as the very essence of Ihe drama and bring to life those models of the Greeks believed by archaeologists and critical athletes, to be the sculptors' dream of gods moving. She reaches Wellington about March or April. Gustave Slapoffski, conductor of the Gilbert Sullivan opera company, in an interesting interview in a Sydney paper, pleads for a revival of some of the triumphs of the French comic opera stage, such as “Madame Angot,” “Tambour Major,” “La Belle Helene,” “The Grand Duchess" and other works of Lecocq, Offenbach, Audran, etc. “Melodious as these operas are,” says the Sydney paper, “some are woefully handicapped by a weak 'book.' Referring to Little Tich’s cancellation of his Melbourne season owing to coppers being thrown on the stage during his turn, and to the action being a London music hall custom, a Sydney writer says: Throwing pennies is not the orthodox London method—at least, not in the best family circles. This is the Cockney way. The comedian has paused before a silent auditorium waiting for the applause he doesn’t deserve. None comes, but a loud, penetrating voice from the gods cut the air asking Liza the time; and Liza supplies the information in the same tone and with decorative trimmings. A discussion then ensues whether the quickest way to get home is by ’bus, tram or tool), and is renewed earnestly at every pause in the comedian's performance. That settles him. Sir Arthur Sullivan wished to direct a musical friend to a house, of which he’d forgotten the number. But he indicated the block. “It faces the river,” he went on. “It is on the righthand side. The door-knocker resembles a crotchet, and the gate-hinge squeaks E flat.” The searcher picked it in one.

“ Who is London’s ‘most promising young actress? I have asked several people that question recently- (says a London writer) and I wasn’t surprised to find that nearly all of them who had seen her plumped unhesitatingly- for Miss Jean Forbes-Robertson. Besides being naturally nice to look at, and possessed of a charming personality, she has inherited to the full the dramatic powers that one would expect to find in the daughter of two such famous stage personalities as Sir John Forbes-Robertson and his wife. Miss Gertrude Elliott. When she appeared in a play along with Lady Forbes-Rob-ertson last year, it was most fascinating to watch mother and daughtre together. The theatre teaches—or should teach —the people white it amuses them. That is the theory held by Max Reinhardt, European director in a stagecraft whose production, "The Miracle,” one of the brilliant episodes of the modern theatre world, is drawing capacity houses in California. The theatre can have an extraordinary educational value and elevating influence. Reinhardt contends. He points out that the Greeks and Romans understood this value of the theatre, which was a state function to them, and that the early Church understood it. Reinhardt began his theatrical career as an actor in Vienna in the early ’nineties. He. gives evidence of combining the. soul of the poet, the talents of the dramatist, and the ability of the stage director in all that he produces, said an American writer. It is periodically alleged (says a Sydney writer) that Arthur Sullivan was really Solomon, a H'oundsditch Jew. As a matter of fact, he was the son of Thomas Sullivan, an Irish violinist employed in the old Victoria Theatre; his mother was also Irish, Coghlan by name, with an Italian strain on her mother's side. Arthur was born in Lam-

betli. His dad became bandmaster at the Roj’al Military College, Sandhurst, and was afterwards appointed first professor at the Royal Military School of Music at Ivneller Hall. Unlike our great masters of jazz, Arthur underwent a thorough musical training from childhood. For a time he was a choirister at the Chapel Royal and in later years he studied at Leipsic, where he composed his score for “The Tempest.” j.j j.j One of the past season's real successes in New York was “Young Woodley,” written by John Van Druten, a young Englishman, who has just arrived in America. This play, which ran the whole of last season on Broadway, and which is now to travel “on j the road” through America, with the author himself lecturing a week in advance at each town, has been refused production in England by the Lord Chamberlain. The reason given was that the play attacked a subject too close to the Englishman’s heart—the public school system. As a matter of fact, the play belongs to the “Fata Morgana” order of plays, for it really deals with the inevitable heart-break of adolescence. It is a much more innocent play than the Hungarian one, for there is nothing more than some passionate kisses between a schoolmaster's young wife and “young” Woodley, a prefect of romantic leanings. A vivid tribute to the work of T. W. Robertson, the playwright, is to be found in a comedy by one of several (authors who benefited by study of his methods, aiid carried them further in their own early pieces. This is Sir ' Arthur Pinero, who in his delightful play “Trelawny of the Wells” has taken Robertson model for the character of Tom Wrench, the dramatist. Pinero makes it clear that many of the plays which Robertson displaced were well worth losing. Another dramatist. Sir William Gilbert, who wrote comedies without music before he was the Savoy librettist, has expressed the opinion j that Robertson was the beginner of natural production on the English stage. In a term of 60 years, of course, others have built on his work, and others still on theirs, and changes in life, in speech, and in point of view have made many changes necessary on the stage. Phrases that were fresh in Robertson’s time seem worn now, and bits of business or devices of construction that he invented have been made stale because of their development bv many, others, but his historic importance is visible still. Those conventions which he found it necessary to retain are verj- ably used; humorous soliloquies and even ' asides,” are made to contribute much to the scheme of the playShould singers be able to sing? “Certainly,” may be the. reply; but on the light musical stage for some vears the singing of “singing parts ’ has been going out of fashion (says “The Australasian. ) How far this has extended is indicated by the statement of the musical critic of a leading English review—that in a recent London revival of a Gilbert and Sullivan opera there was very little true singing to be heard, except from the chorus. Some of the principals appears to have “talked their songs cleverly, and others to have got through them with singing of a kind, but the real singing was strictly limited. This, if the statement has justification in the facts, is indeed j a change from Savoy opera as given ,

when its authors were alive. Both Sullivan and Gilbert went to much trouble to find men and women who could both sing and act the parts. There were limitations in the voice of the chief of the early comedians, but he could sing well enough, and he was a rich humorist; and always there were plenty of others in the cast who were fine singers. Several of these from the original productions were known after wards in Australia —such tenors as Bracy, Courtice Pounds, and Kenningham, such baritones as Wallace Brownlow'. and such soprano singers as Leonora Braham and Marion Hood. There could be no doubt about the vocal ability of these players in their prime, and they knew also how to act. Gilbert and Sulivan opera was Veil sung in Australia, as in England, and the tradition that these productions should be musically good is still usually respected in this part of the world. At times there have been musical lapses, both on the stage and in the orchestra, but there as been much to be thank-

ful for. as in the recent fine work of Miss Stella Wilson. Miss Winifred Williamson, and others.

SIR HENRY IRVING.

WORLD’S GREATEST ACTOR In “Pearsons Weekly,” Mr .! Pitt Hardacre. the well-known English actor and manager, gives some personal recollections of Sir Henry Irving: Looking down upon me as 1 write are two photographs, one almost life-size and absolutely life-like, and on it is written: To Pitt Hardacre. from Henry Irving. With kindest greeting and every good wish. On the other is: Yours sincerely, J. L. Toole These two actors, the greatest of their time, the one in Tragedy, the other in Comedy, were life-long friends, and about these two photographs runs a story. They are the work of my very old friend. Warwick Brookes, of Manchester, who was not only a celebrated photographer, but, like myself, was also a personal friend of these two great actors. I possess another photograph of Toole, taken in 186$, when Toole was performing in one of his favourite parts in H. J. Byron’s “Dearer than Life.” and in this picture are four whom I knew personally .1 L. Toole. Lionel Brough. Henry Irving, and Charles Wyndham, all celebrated, and to show the difference between the days that are past and our own times, their salaries were—Toole £25 a week, Brough £-4 10s. Irving £3 10s. and Wynham, I believe, less than that! Irving’s early theatrical days were spent in Edinburgh, in the stock company of the Theatre Royal, and his salary was 25s a week. In these “good old times” every member of a stock company had to play anything. 1 know of an actor who later on

, achieved considerable success and became a minor star who played in one ! of Chas. Calvert’s pantomimes, in which the main thing he had to do was to cut off the tails of Little 80-Peeps sheep! . By the same rule living had t play Harlequin in one Edinburgh pantomime. So much for the early training of the j greatest actor ol his day. He was locked up to by ministers, statesmen. : clergymen, and al! whose names and positions command respect; he had the almost unparalleled honour < 1 burial in Westminster Abo?}', and Ins 1 statue stands outside the National | Gallerv Trulv a remarkable career. I don’t think any of the honours showered on him affected him so much ! as they gratified his wish to make the i profession he loved stand higher tiu-.n j it had ever done before. | His personal wants and tastes were ! very simple. When he first came to j London his apartments consisted of I two rooms, and at the height of his success he retained the same apartments increased to four rooms. I Irving’s generosity was boundless. It came to my ears that a certain wellknown actor, who years before had acted with Irving, was, to put it plainly, on the rocks, down and out. 1 wrote to Irving and at once this dear old chap was put on the Lyceum salary list, and received iuJ each week to the end of his life. Almost everyone on Irving’s r.tai;e was an old actor or actress, doing work generally given to supers and drawing salaries better than many actors re reived in those days. This was tot only charity in its best form, but also conduced to the perfection of the productions that made his reign at the Lyceum historical.