LYRIC THEATRE.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1442, 13 December 1917, Page 32

LYRIC THEATRE.

“THE BARRIER.’

“The Barrier,” Rex Beach’s famous novel, which has been produced under the author’s supervision for picture purposes, -will be screened under the direction of E. J. Carroll at the Lyric Theatre on Saturday, for a short season. The story tells of the love for Merridy, a pretty young school teacher from Vermont, by two sturdy men, honest John Gaylord and gambler Dan Bennett, afterwards known as Ben Stark. Bennett wins her almost against her will, and Gaylord retires to his mountain. Merridy is murdered by her jealous husband, who accuses Gaylord of the crime, after the latter has fled with Bennett’s little daughter, that she may be saved the evil influences that surround her. The child Necia grows up in the belief that she is Gaylord’s daughter and a half-breed. She meets the handsome young lieutenant, who falls in love with her and whom she worships in return, but the Indian blood that is supposed to run in her veins is “the barrier” between them. Poleon Doret, a big-hearted Frenchman, also loves the girl, and it is through his nobility and self-sacrifice that happiness finally comes to her and her soldier lover. The arrival of Dan Bennett under the name of Stark, his recognit’‘on of his daughter, the renewal of the contest between him and Gaylord, and the participation in the plot of innumerable other characters cause a succession of happenings that produce thrill after thrill. Special music accompanies the presentat’on.