IN PERSONAL TOUCH.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1427, 30 August 1917, Page 30

IN PERSONAL TOUCH.

Mr. E. J. Mack, the noted American comedian, has arrived in Sydney under engagement to H. D. Mclntosh.

Mr. W. Liddle, who has been pleasing audiences on the Fuller circuit with his baritone voice, has joined the Dandies.

Miss Gertie Cremer, the clever young daughter of Mr. A. BrandonCremer, has had to undergo a critical operation and is at present in Huia Hospital, where she is making satisfactory progress.

Mr. Cyril Maude, in his farewell speech in Melbourne on the last night of “Grumpy,” paid a graceful compliment to Miss Kathlene MacDonell, for whom he foretold a wonderful success and popularity. Miss MacDonell occupied a box, and Mr. Maude’s reference to the young Canadian star evoked loud applause.

Mr. C. Martinengo, formerly business manager at King’s Theatre, Newton, is ahead of “The Birth of a Nation,” at present showing in Dunedin

In J. and N. Tait’s next attraction for New Zealand, “Turn to the Right,” young Joe Blascom, returning home after “doing a stretch,” finds his dear old mother about to be turned out of her home because she is backward with her rent. Gilly, Joe’s confederate in crime before they all turned good, moves heaven and earth to get the money, but finds the town so stoney that he raises a shriek of laughter when he says: “Has anyone in this town got 25 dollars?” There is one man who has loads of dollars, and he is the one to whom Mrs. Blascom is indebted, so Gilly and Co. get busy on Mr. Ownall and deplete his safe to the extent of what Mrs. Blascom owes him, and rush round with the greenbacks just in time to give him his own back in the form of the overdue rent. How these bright boys are guided right by the unerring hand of dear old Mrs. Blascom is one of the best sermons ever preached, and yet it is not a sermon because laughter shimmers through the tears the whole of the evening through.

“You don’t seem enthusiastic about elevating the stage.” “No,” said the theatrical manager. “The more you try to elevate the stage, the more depressed the box-office seems to become.”

The most, perplexed and perturbed man in Sydney the other day was “Jimmy” Turner, of the J. C. Williamson mechanical staff. A telegram was the cause of his anxious expression. It read: “Turner, J. C. Williamson, Ltd., Sydney.—What am I to do in this dilemma —Maude.” “Gorlumme,” said Jimmy Turner, “I don’t know any Maude.” He made this statement to Mr. Westmacott, to whom he brought the telegram, together with his worried look. Mr. Westmacott read the message and exploded with laughter. He saw in a moment that the telegram was for Mr. Turner, manager for Cyril Maude. The famous actor was wiring to know what was going to be done about the strike. —Sydney “Sun.”

Miss Ada Reeve will be accompanied to New Zealand by a full vaudeville and comedy company which will include Louis Nikola, the English magician; Mr. Harry Jacobs, the singing conductor; Lucie Linda, the brilliant dancer; Kennedy Allen, the hoopologist; Raymond Wilbert; Hector Napier, Frank Markley, and the English Comedy Company.

Said Miss Kathlene MacDonell, who is starring in “Daddy Long Legs” at the Theatre Royal, Melbourne: “There is a cynical actor in New York who attends every first night he can. He says he hates plays, but likes to see the artists suffer. I know what that

suffering is,” added Miss MacDonell. “Vividly do I remember my first big chance in that same city. I was so nervous I was as one in a trance. And all the time I was fighting to win recognition. Suddenly a face I knew caught my eyes. It was this actor, sitting in the front row. I remember it flashing into my mind, ‘he’s come to see me suffer.’ It was a stimulant to me. I don’t think anything else could have ‘bucked me up’ like the determination his presence gave me to make good.”

A good word for the “movies” was put in by Mr. C. H. Poole in the House the other evening. While hoping that the amusements tax would not hit tile shows too severely, he believed that with strict censorship pictures would be a valuable asset to the community. Hon. Mr. Russell: “The trouble is that the picture people say that if you raise the pictures above suspicion they will not draw the people to see them.” Mr. Payne: “Nothing of the sort.” A member: “ ‘lntolerance’ was no good because it was not spicy enough.” “Intolerance is never any good,” rejoined Mr. Wilford.

Madame Sarah Bernhardt once said: “There should be in all the states in the world, in all the towns of those states, and in all the quarters of the town, organised orchestras playing all day, sad airs and gay airs, attractive and charming. The busy crowd as it passes might thus catch a breath of poetry or of gaiety, a second of calm to soothe perhaps some pain, a minute of forgetfulness of some disappointment. The roadmenders would more speedily mend the broken roads. The townsfolk would feel the influence of the caressing wave of sound. There would be fewer assassins, fewer robbers, fewer bad people altogether. The poor would eat their frugal meal with greater pleasure.”

D. W. Griffith to an interviewer during his recent visit to England: “Yes; I certainly intend to take pictures here when things settle down. I have already realised that one may get backgrounds here as nowhere else. I have a great ambition to do a film based upon the legend of the Knights of the Round Table, and to use for it the wonderful castles of Wales, the meres, and the mountains. Photography may be so improved before long that we shall be virtually independent of climatic conditions. In “Intolerance,” by the way, we succeeded for the first time in taking pictures of moving clouds.”

Miss Ada Reeve’s Sydney season terminated on August 4 after a sensationally successful six weeks’ run. Probably no other artist in vaudeville has achieved the success and popularity that Miss Reeve won in that time. After a brief season in Brisbane she is to visit New Zealand, for the first time. .