Music and Drama

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XL, Issue 12, 21 March 1908, Page 16

Music and Drama

When Melba left Melbourne after her (Visit four years ago, her departure was almost unnoticed. This time there were a thousand people at the station to say farewell. By far the larger part of this crowd was concentrated outside the barriers, the number of platform tickets issued being strictly limited to personal friends and members of the Women’s Exhiuition Choir. On more than one occasion Madame Melba has declared emphatically that she considers this choir nothing short of wonderful. A great many of those present had returned from the hills and seaside to take part in the Bend-off to the prima donna. The gathering was a thoroughly representative one, among those present being the majority of Melbourne’s best-known musicians, a number of politicians, professional men and business men and women. Mrs. Palmer led the choir in the singing of ‘’Auld Lang Syne.’’ That Madame Melba was genuinely and deeply touched Was amply evidenced, and as she boarded the train in a heavy shower of rose leaves she had no voice left to respond to the warmly expressed wishes for her speedy return. She was the recipient of many flowers and mementoes. Two or three times the choir repeated “For She’s a Joiiy Uood Fellow,” “Auld Lang Syne” being repeated just before the train moved out. Accompanying Madame Melba were her son and daughter-in-law. '<s Jl It is reported that engagements are already being entered into for the Nellie Stewart Australian tour, whenever that commences, says “The Critic.” There are so many reports flying round about Miss Stewart that it is risky to say anything at all save that she is on her way out from England. When she arrives she will clear up all doubts and misunderstandings in a moment. ' ’ Jt J* Mr. George Homan Barnes, the manager for Messrs. Meynell and Gunn, has had pleasing proof of his popularity among those with wnom he does business. (When at Broken Hill recently managing the Maud Hildyard Co., the staff at the theatre there presented -ur. Barnes with a very handsome beaten-silver frame for two photographs, to be handed on to Mrs. Barnes as a mark of their appreciation of his ready courtesy and consideration, and on the last night of Meynell and Gunn’s Co. in Adelaide the staff at the Uueatre Royal made him a present of a beautifully-inscribed gold medal. „ J* jt ’A roll-call of the Paris theatres shows that the male element in theatres is elowly, though surely, marching on to the conquest of hats and feathers. Out of twenty-four playhouses eleven have either totally or in part proscribed the hat in the stalls and “balcon.” The “loges,” of course, are left untouched, as (Well as the empyrean circles, where all Van do as they please. The three official theatres, the Opera, Opera Comique, and Comedie Francaise, have long been giving good example, and have proscribed hats entirely. The Sarah Bernhardt Theatre is the only other theatre where the same rule has been strictly enforced. In theatres where they are allowed, the ladies Beem to take a great pleasure in wearing more voluminous hats than ever. Fursy, the manager of the popular hall of that name, tells a pathetic story. At the beginning of the season, he says, he implored the ladies to diminish the size Of their hats. The men sympathetically approved of his request. But w*nat was the result? The ladies paid no attention to it. He adds: “Every night now I have to listen to embarrassing protests on the part of disappointed men. I also have the pleasure of hearing the 2j-yard bat complain of the 2 f-yard hat. As things go I am encouraging the progress. I hope that next year I shall see a hat six yards in diameter. Once the extreme limit is reached there will be a reaction, and then—well, I shall be too happy to think of the results.**

John F. Sheridan (“Widow O’Brien”) will commence his New Zealand tour at Wellington on Saturday, April 18. In addition to a revival of that successful musical comedy, ’The Earl and the Girl,” several new pieces will be played, including “The Money Makers” and “The Girl from Venus.” JU Jl Many ways have been tried to damp the enthusiasm of the encore fiend, but Mischa Elman, the brilliant violinist, adopted a telling method at Leipsic recently, where he had been recalled six times. He came on the platform in his overcoat—thus dumbly expressing to the audience that he was “off.” Jt Ji Wirth Bros, are due in Auckland this month with their big show. They open at Freeman’s Bay on March 31st. New features have been secured for the circus, menagerie, museum, vaudeville entertainment, and hippodrome, and there is also a large herd of elephants and a “grand Oriental parade.” It is stated that there will be several items which in themselves should be well worth witnessing, and which in the South have been referred to as novel and astounding. One of the chief of the star items on the programme is that described as one of the greatest wild beast acts yet seen in a circus. This will be introduced by Herr Batty. It is the greatest turn Wirths’ have ever imported. The Company includes, amongst others, John Welby Cook, the great jockey-aet rider; also Sampei Osado, a celebrated contortionist and master of equilibrium; Captain Rose will appear for the first time in charge of a troupe of lions, bears, and jaguars; and Signor Herbertino, from the Palato Circe, Madrid, will demonstrate his ability as a table and a barrel manipulator. Then there will be Fraulein Hertzog, an equestrienne who is described as ’’the Queen of the Circus”; and a trio of acrobats who perform their feats in a dog cart. "Jl jl “"Carter, the Magician,” has been attracting large audiences to His Majesty’s, Auckland, during the week. His season closes this week. The MacMahon Bros, open a season at His Majesty’s, Auckland, on Monday next with a biograph programme, which is well spoken about. jt jl Maud Hildyard is puzzling Melbourne people—she is making her acting such a medley of herself and the character she is supposed to represent, says the “Referee.” There is much of Miss Hildyard in the book. One night, in “A Beautiful Fiend,” when she had twice clingingly kissed her lover ere parting, a patron of the gallery called out, “Give him another one.” “Yes,” said Miss Hildyard, with outstretched arms, “come back, Fedor, and give me another one!” George Laurl couldn’t beat that. '■* Jl Florence Young, who for some weeks lias been under medical treatment, is now fully recovered from a throat operation, which has in no way impaired her voice, and is at present rehearsing in “The Lady Dandies,” in which she will re-ap-pear at Her Majesty’s, Sydney. . JI Miss Rosina Buckmann and Mr. Howard Vernon will be the two professionals in the cast of “ Erminie,” which is to be produced by the Dunedin Society on April 6lh. Miss Buckmann plays the name part, and Mr. Vernon that of Ravennes. Mr. Vernon will act as stagemanager, and will coach the amateurs in their parts. "Jl Jt A telegram received in Christchurch from Madame Clara Butt just before she left Wellington for Sydney states that Mr. Rumford and she intend paying another visit to New Zealand in about two years.

Mr. Bernard Khaw, it has been discovered, once wrote the following verse on the fly-leaf of one of his early plays, which he presented to Miss Janet Achureh (Mrs. Charles Charrington), the Nora Helmer of the London production of Ibsen’s “Doll’-s House":— This book henceforth belongs to Janet, The greatest actress on this planet; ’Twas written by a fond adorer Who saw her first as Ibsen's Nora. Mr. Shaw should certainly enter for a Limerick competition. JI A couple of Melbourne weekly papers refer to “Kate Douglas Wiggins’ great play. ‘Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch,’ ” which is coming out to Australia this year. As a matter of fact the creator of “Mrs. Wiggs” is Alice Hegan Rice, another of whose books, “Lovey Mary” (the sequel to “Mrs. Wiggs”) has had an immense sale. Mrs. Alice Hegan Rice has already drawn £50,000 in royalties from the two" books and the play. It was at the suggestion of J. M. Barrier that the books were dramatised by Mrs Anne Crawford Flexner, a neighbour and friend of Mrs Rice. Mrs. Wiggs is a droll feminine philosopher, the apostle of that optimism, which has made America so great—a bright-faced little woman who “always kept the dust off her rose-coloured spectacles,” and whose constant prayer was: “Oh, Lord, keep me from gettin’ sour.” Mrs Madge Carr Cook, who plays Mrs Wiggs, is the mother of Eleanor Robson, and a prominent New York critic recently expressed the opinion that Mrs Cook’s name would be as inseparably connected with Mrs Wiggs as that of Joseph Jefferson with Rip Van Winkle. Here are a few of Mrs. Wigg’s optimisms:— “I jes’ do the best I kin where the good Lord put me at, an’ it looks like I get a happy feelin’ in me ’most all the time.” “It looks like ever’thing in the world comes right if we jes’ wait long enough.” “I’ve made it a practice to put all my worries down in the bottom of my heart, then set on the lid an’ smile.” “It ain’t never no use puttin’ up yer umbrell’ till it rains.” “Somehow I never feel like good things belong to me till I pass ’em on to somebody else.” “If you get knocked out of the plan, you want to git yerself another right quick, before yer sperrits has a chance to fall.” “The way to git cheerful is to smile when you feel bad, to think about somebody else’s headache when yer own is ’most bustin’, to keep on believin’ the sun is a-shinin’ when th» clouds is tXck enough to cut.” ■ - . 'Ji jt Mr. Tom Pollard has purchased from Mr. Thomas Humphreys the Australasian rights of the latter’s musical comedy, “The Tea Girl.” Mr. Pollard will produce the piece in Christchurch in April. “Ptah-Ptah,” a comic opera in two acts, the scene of which is laid in Egypt during the year 323 8.C., has so pleased Mr. Pollard that he has commissioned Mr. Humphreys to finish the work for him. Ji Jt The licensed capacity of the new Christchurch theatre is as follows:—Stalls 568, circle 265, boxes 28, gallery 498; total, 1359.