"WHY MEN LOVE WOMEN.”

Waikato Independent, Volume XII, Issue 1020, 3 June 1911, Page 5

"WHY MEN LOVE WOMEN.”

The Allan Hamilton Dramatic Co. produced the drama in the Town Hall on Wednesday evening, entitled “Why Men Love Women.” The playwright answers the question himself in the first act, going back to Adam for the solution of his problem, but the question asked by way of title to the play after all doesn’t so much matter, ’for the story might just as well be called “Strange Adventures in India,” or anything else, “What’s in a name?” Everything in this instance, for the title catches, though it has no more bearing on the play itself than it would have on dozens of good old melodramas in which similar have done duty before. So much for the title. It is an attractive play, full of the customary melodramatic situations that appeal so dearly tb the average patron of the theatre, mounted in a style befitting the romantic surroundings in which the plot is laid, and capably presented by a company that includes several old favortites. “For the insult you have paid me today I shall have your life,” is the villain s declaration early in the opening scenes, and thence onward there is a succession of sensational happenings well calculated to stir the feelings of those who watch with such intense interest the vicissitudes of the hero and heroine. The opening scene is picturesquely set. It is in India, and there a gallant Englishman finds his way to a woman s heart. Mis emotions have lain dormant, like aneglected and uncultivated rose that blossoms under gentle nourishment, until it blooms in all its radiance. And so it is with Gerald h eliding, but before he can realise all his ideals he is called upon to go through three acts of vicissitudes that include pretty well the whole gamut of melodramatic sensations. The villain of the story is Captain Staniloff, a Russian soldier, who stops short of nothing, not even murder, in his desire to ‘accomplish Jhis ends. There are the marriage of the hero and the heroine at the prison bars; the calling back to life of a woman who has been the victim of the villain’s machinations. accomplished by the heroic efforts of a Hindu hermit who has solved the secret of counteracting the effects of a deadly poison; the escape of the hsro from prison and the noble sacrifice of a woman in securing his freedom and so on, the interest being highly sustained throughout the various scenes. The usual comedy element, whilst not altogether in harmony with the genera! thread of the story, such for instance as the introduction of harem skirts and girls in tights on the Himalaya mountains, is sufficiently diverting to soften the more serious moments in which the audience is called upon to concentrate its attentions on the ssensations. Miss Frances Ross, Mr Conway Wingfield, and Mir Hilliard Vox fill the principal characters. Miss Ross has "a part as Violet Livingstone that gives her scope for some good work. In the more emotional scenes she acted with adequate strength and womanly dignity, and received generous applause for her efforts. Mr Wingfield handles the hero’s part very effectively. He is a talented actor, who knows how to make the best use of the opportunities which the playwright affords him. Mr Vox’s performance of Captain Staniloff was quite above the average standard of such parts, and played very consistently throughout. There was a merry vein of humor in all that Mr Fred Cambourne did as Orlando Piggins, The other characters were well taken.