“I WANT TO SMILE.”

Waikato Times, Volume 103, Issue 17410, 24 May 1928, Page 9

“I WANT TO SMILE.”

BEPPIE DE VRIES ARRIVES. “Oh, and I did want to smile. Do take another.” A photographer on board the Marama on Tuesday last could not resist the delightful inflexion in the voice of Miss Beppie De Vries. The camera snapped again; Miss De Vries was wearing her best smile to greet Auckland. This charming little Dutch actress could talk of nothing but the Auckland Harbour. “It is so so lovely," she said, with the most delightful accent. “I do not know why," she went on in her precise way, “but this all reminds me of Switzerland. It is the sun and the clouds and the hills and the clouds.” s Miss De Vries, who in private fife is Mrs J. F. Lebret, always wanted to go on the stage. Her people lived on a lovely old farm outside Amsterdam, where they grew great quantities of hyacinths and daffodils and tulips for the markets. Dairying also occupied the family. i But Miss De Vries did not like either farming or growing flowers. At eight years of age she ran away from home and joined a circus. “I thought it was so lovely, the lights and the colour and the noise.”

But irate parents were soon on her track, and a tearful little girl was taken back to the farm.

Still the call of the stage insisted. “I think it must come from my grandmother —she was a Frenchwoman —I am tre only one of Ihc family, ; who ever’wanted to go on the stage,” confessed Miss De Vries.

Eight years ago, after gradually breaking down the religious opposition of her parents, Miss De Vries went into the chorus of a musical comedy, “Gri-Gri,” in Amsterdam. The leading lady took ill. • Miss De Vries, with the impetuosity of youth, said: “Oh I can play that part easily.” She did so, and has played leading parts ever since, in her own country, in England, and in Australia. Parental forgiveness came after her success was assured. “One night my mother came to sec me on the stage, but she did not toll me that she was coming,” said I lie btuc-clad figure. “When site heard the applause she felt so proud that she told the people that I was her daughter.” Miss De Vries is accompanied by her husband, She will play the leading roles in “The Student Prince” and "Madame Pompadour.”