Musics Drama

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIV, Issue III, 20 January 1900, Page 128

Musics Drama

Heavy rehearsing is the order of the day with the Bland Holt Company, "ho ho]>e to put on a new play before leaving Auckland, where they are still doing what can only be termed holiday business, though the holidays were well over long ere this. Every evening standing room only is the cry. The "White Heather” was especially successful, and would have drawn audiences for another week had Mr Holt eared to try the experiment. Yet it is amazing how much of the smart dialogue, which rises now and again to the level of high comedy, passes over the heads of the average theatre-goer. Mrs Holt has especially many brilliant. lines which she delivers admirably, but which fail to meet with the recognition which is their undoubted due.

In the new play under rehearsal. Mrs Holt will, unless 1 am mistaken, play a eoster girl part; that she will do it as capably as she played a great aristocrat 1 have not the smallest doubt.

"The Absent-minded Beggar,” the war drama which Mr Holt hopes to present “all hot" to Auckland audiences shortly is evidently an exciting affair. A London critic says: “Gilbert Hay comes galloping into the camp at Glencoe, having ridden with despatches from General Yule to Ladysmith, and having returned amidst a terrific thun-der-storm. Hay detects the features of Van Buren, now a Boer spy, in a psendo-British officer, the Africander having donned the garb of a slain English captain, and having tried to frighten Kathleen from exposing him by threatening to have her child at Durban killed. ... A rascally,

braggart Boer, named Peter Hoch, intends to despoil his friend. Van Buren, of the expected fair booty. Kathleen. Hoch commands a party of Boers who attack the fugitive women and children under the strangely inadequate escort of three raw recruits from London.

. At the beginning of Act 4, Van Buren, sentenced to be shot as a spy, is allowed to have a farewell interview’ with his mother at her house at Lady-

smith. Disregarding his pledge to make* no attempt to eseape, tlw* villain robs his mother, half murders her. and non hl have got clear away had he not Is-en shot dead by the watching Kaffir whom lie had formerly ill-treated.

A change takes us to the enemy’s position on the heights which are being stormed by the English. This scene should be worked more slowly, and thus greater effect would be given to the treacherous use of the white flag by the Boers to procure the temporary cessation of tiring. The Boers use their quick - tiring gun vigorously during the brief respite thus afforded them, but their treachery mis of no avail, for the heights are carried in most splendid fashion.”

As the Sydney pantomime will eventually come over here under charge of a combined company of Pollard and Mr Williamson, some particulars will be of interest. Mr Williamson appears to have produced “Little Bed Biding Hood,” at Her Majesty's Theatre, with all the usual accompaniments of splendour. The Sydney “Morning Herald” enthusiastically describes it “as magnificently staged, rich in the contrasts of colour and period, at one time giving the audience a glimpse of rustic England under its most charming aspect. at another revealing a palace lifting to the eternal summer of an Italian sky. Little Bed Biding Hood is the central figure of the legend. Miss Dorothy A'ane looks the part admirably. Her seat-let cloak and glossy golden curls give colour and brightness to the weird scene wherein is depicted the phantom forest, where the gnarled and twisted branches of the shadowy wood assume an almost human form of angry menace. Red Biding Hood is captured by the Wolf, and the next tableau reveals a Moorish castle of solid gold, standing high on a mountain steep —a veritable kopje, with the Hag of the wicked Wolf daunting in the face of the entire British army, which assembles at its foot with the evident intention of storming the stronghold. The entrance of the different regiments, with their bands playing, is an exhilarating spectacle. There were diminutive .Tack Tars representing the Naval Brigade, then the Grenadier Guards,

the Royal Irish, the Gordon Highlanders, and the New South Wales Lancers, The Highlanders »nd Lancers, beautifully dressed, and smartly drilled, were cheereil to the echo, and after a number of picturesque evolutions, Prinee Valiant, in the person of Miss Carrie Moore, gave a spirited rendering of Mr F. W. Weirerter’s melodious patriotic song. ‘Children of the Empire. Hear Britannia Call.’ Miss Carrie Moore, in a marvellously well-fitting costume, made a dashing little lancer, and led her troops to the summit of the steep in gallant fashion, the advance being covered by the Naval Brigade. When the tiny tars nimblywheeled forward their mimic guns, whet a cheer rent the air. All hearts were far away upon a sterner field; and the curtain fell whilst the enthusiasm was still red hot.”

"How London JJves” was to go on at the Auckland Opera House this evening, mid will unquestionably prove a big attraction. It was a big success in Australia au.l the South, and is certain to repeat its triumphs in Auckland.