CHORAL HALL.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XIV, Issue 853, 12 July 1906, Page 16

CHORAL HALL.

MISS AMY MURPHY. Miss Amy Murphy, whose portrait we publish to-day, is announced to give two song recitals in Auckland, at the Choral Hall, on Monday and Thursday next, 16th and 19th inst. Miss Murphy is a New Zealand girl, but her reputation as a vocalist is by no means confined to this colony, for she has appeared with conspicuous success in the sister colonies, and her musical career, whether in opera, oratorio, or concert work, has been one long series of triumphs. Miss Murphy is an artiste of the highest rank, and both Press and public have united in proclaiming her one of the most gif ted singers that Australasia has yet produced. Some of her most recent engagements include “Faust” (Christchurch), ‘ ‘Cavalleria .Rusticana’ (Christchurch), “Cavalleria,” again (Wellington), “Faust” (Dunedin, last month), “Samson” (Wellington, her last engagement, two weeks ago), and she returns to Wellington immediately to sing the “lead” in two performances of “Cavalleria,” going on at once to Feilding under special engagement to sing the soprano part in “The Creaton.” She is also engaged for a special performance at Napier for Friday, 27th inst., and later for the opening of the new Opera House at Invercargill. Miss Murphy has ap-

peared at all the big musical festivals held in the South during the time she has been professionally before the public. She has appeared on the same platform as Madame Melba, and has sung with Belle Cole, Watkin Mills, Gerardy, Friedenthal, and all the visiting stars, and always with conspcuous success. Her concert engagements are numbered literally by the hundred, and her popularity with the public is unbounded. Miss Murphy will be supported here by a speciallyselected company.

Judging from what we have already seen of Signor Antonio’s troupe of performing dogs, monkeys, and parrots, Opera House patrons are in for a good treat on Saturday evening. The troupe comprises some of the cleverest animals that have yet been seen on the stage, and their performances are certainly wonderful. With such an attraction in sight the house on Saturday evening should be a bumper one. » * * . * Miss Elsie Bates, the clever serio and dancer, now appearing at the Opera House, is a most versatile artiste, and recently scored quite a big success as one of the musical Gardners. She will no doubt give Opera House patrons a taste of her capabilities in this direction at a later date. * * * * In our issue of May 25, 1905, appeared a paragraph which was taken from the “ Critic,” and the source of information acknowledged, which stated that Mrs. Sims Reeves had been placed under restraint in Kalgoorlie on a suspicion of being insane. It has subsequently transpired that there was no truth in the allegation made by the Australian paper mentioned. We greatly regret having published the paragraph, which, however, was done in all good faith, believing that the matter was of interest in the dramatic world, and that the “ Critic” must have had good authority for the statement. We desire to apologise to Mrs. Reeves, and trust that she has suffered no annoyance from such a baseless report. * * Mr. J. Nevin Tait is due by the incoming mail steamer from America. * * * * A production which should prove of considerable interest will be seen during the present season of the Anderson Dramatic Company, when Ambrose Pratt’s version of the exciting story “ Thunderbolt” will be staged at His Majesty’s. It should prove a great success. * * * * Mr. and Mrs. Fred. Graham are now having a short but well-deserved holiday at Rotorua. Mr. Graham was very unwell during the pantomime season, and it meant a big effort to rise from a sick bed to undertake such a trying role as Mrs. Sinbad. His legions of friends will be glad to hear that the popular comedian is himself again. * * * * Signor. Antonio, who appears with his wonderful troupe of performing dogs and monkeys at the Opera House on Saturday, was born near Genoa under blue Italian skies, and came out to Australia during the great gold rush of the early days. After roughing it on most of the big goldfields and passing through many adventures, he finally decided to take up the training of animals, a thing which he had always been fond of and which he has now carried to such a successful issue. He had a faithful dog with him all through the goldmining days, and in his spare time he taught it all manner of tricks, and in this way became finally decided in his course of action. A visit to his well-trained animals now shows how wise was his decision, for they can do anything almost except talk, and not only that, but go through their performance with evident enjoyment. Signor Antonio places the intelligence of dogs far in advance of that of the monkeys. The latter he obtained from the Straits Settlement islands, and says that they took most constant and careful training before they became at all efficient. The dogs, on the other hand, learnt what was desired of them much more rapidly, and with kindness, which Signor Antonio considers absolutely necessary in the training of all animals, havereached the high standard that they now show. Constant and unremitting attention is the only way to perfect animals in anything, and this must be carried on in the face of many minor failures and disappointments, according to Signor Antonio,

who seems to have trained his troupe to as near perfection as possible. His dogs consist of a fine collie, a Japanese poodle (a merry little chap), a half-bred Irish terrier, and a partbred Italian greyhound, and all we need say further about them is that they are the cleverest troupe without doubt that has been seen in New Zealand. * * * * My Christchurch correspondent writes: —Animated picture shows are becoming as common as broken teetotal pledges. They fairly tread upon each other’s heels. Any yet the people of this dusty, gusty metropolis never seem to tire of them. “ The World’s Pictures” have just gone after a most successful season at the Theatre Royal, and already “ Edison’s Popular Pictures” are announced for next week. Meantime “ The Fatal Wedding” Company opens a season to-night at the dingy old Royal, when local playgoers will have an opportunity of renewing their acquaintance with at least two oldtime favourites—Mr. Oily Deering and Mr. C. R. Stanford. There are so many “fatal weddings” in real life that the “ counterfeit presentment” of one on the boards is pretty sure to attract crowded houses. I shall hope to have more to tell you anent this show after I have seen it. . People of an optimistic turn of mind still speak hopefully of Christchurch possessing a new Theatre Royal “ some day.” Possibly their hopes may be justified in the sweet by-and-bye. But just now the prospect of our getting that new temple of the drama is, to put it mildly, remote. The City Council (the members of which body were declared the other day to be suffering from “ the sleeping sickness’ by a local rag) refuse to pass the plans submitted for their approval by “the syndicate,” because sufficient exits are not provided for, and matters are now at a deadlock, the chances being that the aforesaid syndicate will see the city

fathers jammed (or some word rhym ing with that) before they will commit themselves to further expense. Meanwhile the conversion of the Canterbury Hall into His Majesty s Theatre is proceeding apace, and, in a week or two now the new “ gaff” will be an accomplished fact. . . Stand-ing-room only will be the order of the night at the Opera House this evening, I expect, when Madame Lydia Yeamans Titus makes her first appearance under what a local scribe is wont to call “ the Fullerian Banner.” Madame L. Y. T. (name is too long for repetition) is an expensive artiste, and will doubtless prove a trump-card for J.F. and sons. Frank King is making a great hit at the Opera House just now, and the Driscoll boys are as popular as ever, while our old friend Les Warton gets so many encores he doesn’t know what to do with them. * * ♦ * The rehearsals of the “ Lady Typist” are, to use a turfy expression, “ going strong and well.” The chorus is rapidly getting into shape, and should be perfect before the time for producing the piece. lam told that some of the songs are extremely beautiful, and having heard one or two of Mr. “ Humphrey’s” previous compositions I can well believe it. * * * * The favourite play, “The Mariners of England,” will follow “ The Orphan Heiress’ at His Majesty’s. In it Mr. Harry Diver makes a great hit as Lord Nelson, this being perhaps the best of all the roles he has undertaken. » * * * Mr. H. R. Roberts has obtained the Australian rights of “The Prince Chap ” a great American success, _ and will probably bring it to Australia at the end of this year. Owing to engagements extending into 1907, it is unlikely that Mrs. Roberts (Maggie Moore) will be able to accompany him.

The S.A. “Register” gives great credit to the Brough-Flemming Company’s production of “Dr. Wake’s Patient” at Adelaide. The Theatre Royal was packed to the doors, and the piece went splendidly. , The cast was as follows:—Andrew Wake, Mr. Herbert Flemming; Dr. Forester Wake (his son), Mr. Carter Pickford; the Earl of ..St. Olbyn, Mr. Norman McKeown • Duff Winterden (his nephew), Mr. Phillip Leslie; the Bishop of Selby, Mr. John F. Forde; Mr. Murdoch, Mr. John Paulton; the Rev. J. Brown, Mr. Stuart Clyde; Precott (Dr. Wake’s butler),Mr, H. Bennett; Antony (a farm hand), Mr. Dundas Walker; a waiter, Mr. Higson; the Countess of St. Olbyn, Mrs. Brough; Lady Gerania Wyn Chateret (her daughter), Miss Beatrice Day; Harriet Bronson, Miss Winifred Fraser; Mrs. Wake. Miss Bessie Major; Mrs. Murdoch, Miss Emma Temple; Janiter (a farm servant), Miss Kate Gair; a gipsy, Miss Mary Milward. * k * * The following dates have been secured for the MacMahon company on its return to New Zealand in September next: —September 1 to October 6, His Majesty’s Theatre, Auckland; show week, Opera House and Zealandia Hall, Palmerston North; November 17 to December 8, Opera House, Wellington; Christmas and New Year, West Coast, including Greymouth, Reefton, and Hokitika. A new drama has been produced at the London Savoy entitled, “The Shulamite.” It has been written by Messrs. Askew and Knoblanch, and appears to have attained a considerable measure of success, Miss Lena Ashwell doing excellently as the heroine. The story opens at a farmhouse on the lonely veldt, which is occupied by a Boer farmer, stern, bigoted, and brutal, his young and beautiful second wife, and a young Englishman, who has sought in South Africa a refuge from the miseries of his ill-fated union with a drunken wife. The farmer is Boer of the kind that Olive Schriener has depicted for us in her “Story of an African Farm.” In the light of which he reads his Bible he finds himself justified in ruling his servants and his home with a rod of iron. He has a cast-iron sense of obedience and order, and he maintains authority with the fre quent use of the whip. The servants taste its correcting influence upon the slightest excuse, his wife only when she forgets that her whole duty is to obey her lord and master. That she should fall in love with the Englishman was inevitable, and under his influence she rebels against her husband’s cruelty. When next he raises his punishing hand, she pleads for mercy for the sake of her unborn babe, and the old man, whom death has robbed of the five children of his former

marriage, drops the whip and folds her in his arms. * * * * In the second act the farmer is leaving home on some business, which will cause him to be absent for a few days, and the Englishman, realising the danger in which he stands with regard to the young wife if he remains behind, volunteers to go in his stead. He has no sooner departed than the old man discovers, through the well-worn device of a forgotten diary, that he is deceived in his wife and guest, who are in love with one another. To the primitive mind of the Boer this is treachery, punishable with death. But while he is gone for his gun, the Englishman, whose trap has been struck by lightning, returns and faces the angry husband. As a result of this encounter, it is reported that the farmer has been killed by lightning, and nobody discredits the story. A letter from England brings the news that the Englishman’s wife is seriously ill, and his reurn is the only hope of saving her life. The struggle between love and duty which ensues is conducted on the see-saw principle. First he declares for returning, and the widow pleads with him to remain. But for the moment duty is master, and he goes, to be drawn back again presently by his great love for the girl, and to find her pointing out to him the way of duty. This time the man departs for good, and the girl is left behind and alone in the desolate, haunted house on the pathless veldt. * * * * The latest sensation at the Sydney Tivoli is the sensational juggling of Brinn, whose original act, entitled, “Pastimes on a Battleship,” is said to be very clever. * * * * Mr. George Titheradge has returned to London after concluding his American engagements, which included a thirty weeks’ tour with “A New Magician,” an adaptation by Mr. Hartley Manners. * * * * • According to the “British-Austra-lasian,” Mr. Auguste Van Biene, who last year toured Australia with “A Broken Melody,” has entered a suit in the American courts against Mr. George Musgrove for alleged breach of contract, claiming £2600 damages. * * * X “Leah Kleschna” is the subject of two law suits, about to be brought in London. Mr. Charles Hannan, an English writer of stories and melodramas, is proceeding against Mr. McLellan, the author of “Leah Kleschna,” for plagarism; and Mr. McLellan is retaliating by suing Mr. Hannan for libel. A fine cast of wit nesses has been secured, and crowded audiences are expected.

Mr. George Edwardes, the wellknown manager, asked what he would do if he had his life to live over again and had £lOO with which to begin, answered “If I had to start life on £lOO capital, I would go to New Zealand, and if I had all the wisdom I have accumulated during my career I would keep out of all theatrical matters.” One would have thought Mr. Edward ea had mot a great deal to grumble at, whereas, if he had come to New Zealand with £loo—well there’s no knowing. * * * * The latest Australian juvenile musician to show more than average promise is Miss Leila Doubleday. She has just given a concert in Sydney, and concerning her the “Mail” says that the talented little lady comes from Melbourne, and studied in that -ity, winning two scholarships at the Marshall Hall Conservatoire. In order to enable her to cultivate her gift in Europe, a concert was arranged in Melbourne for that purpose, and £6OO was the result. In addition thirty gentlemen have promised to subscribe one guinea each for five years. This

exceedingly generous treatment of a child whose future cannot with any certainty be predicted, and who, whilst gifted, is not in the ranks of prodigy children, speaks well for the spirit of art-appreciation in our sister city. * * * * Antonia Dolores, the favourite soprano, leaves San Francisco on July 14 and opens in Sydney on August 11 next. * • « * According to the Otago “Witness,” Mr. George Buller, representing Mr. Allan HamUton’s latest venture, th,e celebrated London society entertainer, Mr. Leslie Harris, who is assisted on this occasion by the talented New Zealand soprano, Miss Rosina Buckmann, arrived by the last Melbourne steamer. Mr. Buller, who was last through these hospitable parts with the John T. Sheridan Company, advises that the New Zealand tour of the London Society Entertainer commences in Invercargill on July 10, for three nights. Gore will be visited on July 13, and a season of five nights—commencing July 16—will be put in the Garrison Hall, Dunedin. Timaru and Ashburton will be taken en route to Wellington, where the season com mences on July 28, and extends to August 4. Christchurch will be visited on August 13 for five nights, thence a season in Auckland, commencing on August 25, and extending to the 31st. A tour of the Thames and Lake districts follows, thence down the coast of the North Island to Wellington, where the tour will probably terminates.

A very effective plot is that belong ing to “The Squaw Man,” by Mr. Edward Milton Boyle, which Mr. J. C. Williamson’s new dramatic organisation was introduced to Australian playgoers on July 7, at Her Majesty’s Theatre, Melbourne. The various scenes are laid in the Western States of America and in England, the latter locale, however, being only used for the first act. In it we are shown the country seat of the Earl of Karhill, a wastral who, in order to cover his losses on the Stock Exchange, has misappropriated money belonging to a crack yeomanry regiment, of which he is the honorary colonel. But the name is saved from disgrace by his cousin, Captain James Wynnegate who takes the burden upon his own shoulders, and as a natural consequence has to leave the country. In the next act he becomes plain Jack Carston, a resident in a little Canadian township. There a man who has a grudge against him attempts his life, but is killed by a young Indian girl. Out of gratitude Jim marries her, and five years later (the interval between the second and third acts) he has risen to be the owner of a cattle ranch in Utah, and the father of a sturdy little youngster. It is here that a solicitor finds him with the intelligence that the Earl of Karhill is dead and that Jim is heir to the title and the estates. With a fine resolution, however, he refuses to desert his squaw, and will only con sent to his son being taken to England for an education. The Indian pleads hard, but unavailingly, for her boy, and when she finds her prayers useless she disappears. In the next act Jim Carston’s ranch is besieged by a band of Indians from whom he rescues the Countess of Karhill, who has come to persuade him to return to England. The besieged are at their last gasp when help comes summoned by Jim’s wife. She in despair at losing her child shoots herself, and as the play finishes it is evident that the boy will not be long without a mother or Jim a wife of his own kind. With the Sonoma nearly a week late in arriving at Sydney, the work of putting the finishing touches upon “The Squaw Man” became a day and night job, and in order that his new company should have every facility for rehearsing, and Mr. Waldron and Miss Humphries to get into touch with their Australian associates, Mr. J, C. Williamson closed the Collier season at Her Majesty’s Theetre on Wednesday. The brilliant young comedian opens at Her Majesty’s Thea-

tre. Sydney, to-night,, in “On the Quiet,” the delightful farce comedy in which he was even more appreciated than in “The Dictator.” •* X* -X- * A renewal (for a number of years) has just been effected betwen Mr. J. C Williamson and Mr. George Edwardes, whereby the former has the first option on the all the plays produced by the latter. Friday night (July 6) saw the Royal Comic Opera Company bidding farewell to Sydney playgoers, who have had the pleasure of their company for the past six months, and a week’s holiday now awaits them. Next Saturday they begin a four weeks visit to Adelaide with a repertoire of five plays: “The Little Michus,” “The Shop Girl,” “The Girl From Kays,” “The Country Girl,” and “Paul Jones.” The first-named will be their opening piece in Melbourne when they begin their season on August 11. -x y * In order that Sydney theatregoers may have an early opportunity of seeing Miss Tittell Brune in her latest success, “Dorothy Vernon, of Haddon Hall,” Mr. J. C. Williamson has arranged for a special season of four weeks for that play there, commen cing on August 4 (writes Mr. George Tallis). The decision will necessitate an alteration in the New Zealand tour of the company, who will commence at Wellington on September 5, instead of at Dunedin on August 7, as originally intended. A further advantage gained by the readjustment will be a season at Christchurch during the Exhibition, to which apparently all New Zealand is going. * * * * Mr. J. C. Williamson has already plotted out the first three months’

arrangements for his new dramatic company, headed by Mr. Waldron and Miss Ola Jane Humphries. Five weeks will be devoted to Melbourne, and then a provincial tour of Victoria will follow, the company journeying by easy stages across to Adelaide in time to open there on September 1, returning to Sydney afterwards. In all probability a New Zealand tour in December will be the next move of the company. In London at the end of May last C. N. S. McLellan’s powerful drama of modern life was the subject of a libel action, its author suing Mr. Charles G. D. Hannan for publishing a statement that it was a plagiarism on the latter’s comedy (unacted) en titled “The Coachman with the Yellow Lace.” The court was naturally crowded during the course of the trial, which resulted in a verdict for Mr. McLellan. Not the least interesting piece of evidence was Mr. McLellan’s own story of the birth of the play. He and his wife happened to be in Paris a few years ago, and they were both attracted by a young girl, pretty, refined and engaging, but nevertheless acting in a way that discounted these attributes. They were at a loss for an explanation until one day they saw her in violent altercation with an elderly man, having scoundrel written all over him. They came to the conclusion that she was being coerced by him, and when a few days later Mrs. McLellan announced that she had dreamt that their room had been entered by a woman burglar, her husband immediately co-ordinated the two facts, and “Leah Kleschna” was begun. « « * * On the last night of the BroughFlemming Company’s season at the Princess’ Theatre (says the “Austra-

lasian”), Mr. Flemming, in the course of a speech before the footlights, said:—“ln thanking you I am necessarily painfully reminded of the incalculable loss I have sustained in the death of my late partner, Robert Brough. Dear as he was to you, he was doubly—trebly— dear to us, this side of the curtain. You knew him as the actor —some of you have had the privilege of calling him friend, but we knew him as the man, the great man whose work will always remain as a monument in the theatrical history of Australia; the man whose untiring patience, whose broadmindedness, whose tender affection, rendered him dear to all with whom he came in contact. Ay—and we know that of which you know nothing, and of which the world will never know—his many acts of charity, of secret, boundless charity. And now, ladies and gentlemen, I have much pleasure in informing you (and I hope the pleasure will be equally yours) that I have decided to carry on the Brough-Flemming Company under the same title, just as long as you and the public of the other States support me. And with greater pleasure I have to tell you that your old favourite—she who is enshrined in the hearts of all here present—-Mrs. Brough—will continue to be associated with me; and ,further, to tell you that I have completed arrangements to reopen in this theatre next No vember during the gala time, when I shall have the pleasure of presenting to you Miss Beatrice Day in two of the latest London comedy successes..