San Francisco dramatic review (1899)

8 THE SAN FRANCISCO DRAMATIC REVIEW September 30th. 1899 Correspondence and Comments NOTES FROM NEW YORK Special Correspondence. Notwithstanding the rush of new plays into Gotham this season they have not quite overwhelmed the older ones. This week's round of pleasure contains Mrs. Carter in "Zaza" at the Garrick. and Mr. Sothern and Miss Harned in "The King's Musketeer" at Daly's, and they are competing stoutly with such recent productions as "The Only Way" with Mr. Miller at the Herald Square; "The Tyranny of Tears." with Mr. Drew at the Empire: "Becky Sharp" with Mrs. Fiske at the Fifth Avenue; "The Gadfly" with Mr. Robson at Wallacks; "Cyrano de Bergerac" with Francis Wilson at the Knickerbocker; ' The Ghetto" at the Broadway; and "The Last of the Rohans" with Andrew Mack at the Academy of Music. There are many more importaut productions to come in the near future, but the season may now be said to be fairly well under way. Four continuous shows are in full blast, and that recalls the comment made by some of the Eastern managers upon the opinion expressed in the first issue of the Dramatic Review that there would be a fortune in it for the person who would establish a continuous show in San Francisco. Eastern managers figure that if New York with its population of 4,ojo,ooo can support only four continuous shows, San Francisco with less than half a million cannot support one continuous show. But then it must be remembered that several years ago it was regarded as risky to start the first continuous show in this city, then the center of a population of more than 3.000.000. * * Willie Collier, after a month at the Manhattan in "Mr. Smooth" (which was all the time he could get in the preliminary season) left this week to go on the road. He was the first comedian to leave town. He expects to reach San Francisco the last week in March, and if he keeps all the members of 1 he original cast, he will give satisfaction to his old admirers on the Pacific Coast. He has no pretty women with him this season, but he has several very clever comedians. * * * Mme. Marcella Sembrich is the first of the Metropolitan Grand Opera singers to arrive from Europe this season. She came ahead of the other members ol the company to take part in the Worcester and Maine musi. cal festivals. She is without doubt the most artistic woman singer in the world to-day, and her success ought to be encouraging to women who do not begin their vocal education until late in life, and Mme. Sembrich, although a successful violinist before, did not begin to study singing seriously until she was thirty-five years old. Throughout the summer Franz Kalten born, under the able management of his talented wife, has conducted orchestral concerts every evening in St. Nicholas Garden which in the winter time is used for a real ice skating rink. The success of the enterprise has been so pronounced that Kaltenborn's Orchestra will hereafter be one of the features of the summer season here. Mr. Kaltenborn, besides having been a protege of the late Anton Seidl, is a violin virtuoso of marked ability. He bought and now uses the violin on which Edward Remenyi was playing when he died suddenly on the stage in San Francisco. Among the vocalists who have appeared with him this season was Miss Adrienue Remenyi, daughter of the dead violinist. The most pronounced success made by any singer with the Kaltenborn Orchestra this season was that achieved by Miss Alta Yolo, a California girl, with a rich voice and charming personality, studying for opera here under the direction of Tom Karl, the famous tenor, now master of singing in the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. # # Emil Paur, who has been abroad listening to the festival performances at Bayreuth, will direct all of the Wagner performances at the Metropolitan Opera House this season. He will conduct one concert of the Philharmonic Orchestra before joining the opera company at the opening of the company in Chicago. * * "The Ghetto" by Herman Hyerman, Jr. a Dutch author, now being played at the Broadway is already being confounded with "The Children of the Ghetto" by Zangwill, the novelist, which is to be produced a little later at the Herald Square with Blanche Bates, the California actress, as the leading lady. Many persons went to see "The Ghetto" thinking they were going to see "The Children of the Ghetto." That shows that Jacob Litt, the new manager of the Broadway is adept in the art of getting there first. But George T. Tyler, manager for the forthcoming production of "The Children of the Ghetto," promises to eclipse the success of the play of similar name, although that play ran 300 nights in Amsterdam. According to the accounts which come from Washington where Israel Zaugwill's plav opened last week.it will be a success after that skillful stage manager James A. Heme cuts out much of the novelist's superfluous material. Owing to the money which has been made out of the dramatized novels like "Trilby," "The Prisoner of Zenda," "Under the Red Robe," and " The Little Minister," authors are beginning to write novels in the hope that there will be a demand for a play of the same name and story. But when such a novelist get a chance, unless he is already a playwright, he had better hire some able stage hack to make the dramatization for him. The hack may spoil the novel — he generally does — but he is far more apt to make a hit with a play than the brilliant novelist who is uuused to the work of building plays. De Mille, the minister, would neTer have succeeded with "The Charity Ball" and other money-makers if he had not let an experienced stage carpenter like David Belasco put his plays together. So also much of the success of "The Children of the Ghetto" will be due to the clever work of Heme, the actor, manager, author and ardent supporter of those broad principles of human affection laid down by the late Henry George — that one man has as much right to life, liberty and property as any other, and no more. By the way, Heme and George spent much of their early life in San Francisco, and Belasco is still remembered by graduates of Oakland public schools as one of those irrepressible reciters on Friday afternoons. Belasco was learning his profession as a stage manager while spouting in the grammar schools of Oakland. * Critics here are unanimous in declaring that both Stuart Robson in "The Gadfly" and Francis Wilson in the musical version of "Cyrano de Bergerac" have made a mistake in trying to be too serious. When the public learns to appreciate an actor as a clown, it is generally disappointed when he attempts anything else. But sometimes the clowns get too ambitious, and not uutil impelled to by diminishing returns from the box office do they resolve to be foolish again. De Wolfe Hopper had to return to buffoonery in "The Charlatan" after the first week, and Messrs. Robson and Wilson will probably have to stop being so serious. * # "A Stranger in a Strange Land" at the Manhattan Theater this week contains Jane Corcoran, recently graduated from a NewJersey convent, but a San Francisco girl by birth. She is a daughter of Estha Williams, the actress, who is the wife of Arthur C. Aiston, one of William A. Brady's partners. # Otis Harlan, so long identified with Hoyt's farce-comedies, will be seen next week at the Garrick in "My Innocent." He tried it on the dog in Poughkeepsie, and reports say that it was greatly appreciated, but by whom doth not appear. As the story deals with the "innocent boy" of old Commodore Smith, it was no doubt edifying to the Yassar girls. * * The Rogers Brothers seem to be making as great a hit in "In Wall Street" as they did last season in "A Reign of Error." As one of the German comedians is examining the ticker, he exclaims, "It is very dull today." "Why ?" asks his brother. "Because Richard Croker has been accused of nothing new." The Tammany boss who sat in a box at the Yictoria on the opening night was greatly pleased at this jibe because he had just gotten off from the spit at the Mazet Committee which had been roasting him a beautiful brown. A San Franciscan. GRAND OPERA BEGINS Special Correspondence. New York, Sept. 29. — Maurice Grau and the principal members of the Maurice Grau Opera Company arrived to-day from Havre on the French liner LaNormandie. With Mr. Grau are Mme. Calve, who returns to America after an absence of three years; Susanne Adams and Rose Olitzka, Mile. Bauermeister, Mme. Salignac, De Vries, Pini-Corsi and the members of the chorus and ballet. Luigi Mancinelli, the musical director, arrived to-day on the Campania; Andreas Dippel, the German tenor, left Bremen Sept. 27 on the Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse. Edward de Reszke sails to-morrow on the St. Paul. Zelie de Lussan sails the same day on the Umbria, and Claude Bonnard sails on La Champagne, which leaves Havre to-morrow. Pol Plancon sails from Cherbourg Oct. 6, on the Fuerst Bismarck. The season of the Maurice Grau Opera Company begins Oct. 10 at New Haven, Conn. DETROIT Special Correspondence Detroit, Sept. 25.— The opening of the season of 1S99-1900 at the Detroit Opera House occurred last Monday evening, when Chauucey Olcott made his first appearance here as Dick Ronyane in "A Romance of Athlone." It is a genuine Irish comedydrama — a pretty conceit, treated with intimate knowledge of the possibilities, limitations and tricks of the stage, set with fine taste and cleverly "atmosphered." Mr. Olcott and his company give a highlvpleasing performance, and they were received with enthusiastic favor by an audience that was noticeably representative. Conspicuous in the support are the Sir Philip of Daniel Gilfether, the Lady Ronyane of Etta Baker Martiu, the Francis Ronyane of Dustin Farnuin, an actor of exceptional equipment for heavies; the Bessie of little Tottie Carr, whose precocity is modest and otherwise without offense, and who doesn't give one an uncomfortable hint of chronic catarrh; the Dick O'Brien of Luke Martin, a mellow and reposeful actor; the Major Manning of Paul Everton, the Rose Manning of Olive White, the Eleanor McBride of Mabel Wright, the Standish Fitz>immons of Richard Malchien, the O'Grady of George Brennan, the Ann Shea of Mrs. Lizzie Washburne, the Robin McMahou of Charles R. Gilbert, and the Mary of Marguerite Diamond. * * Otis Skinner and a good company opened to-night at the Detroit Opera House in "The Liars, " which is new here. The piece will run a week. C. S. T. 57". LOUIS Special Correspondence. Sr.Loi'lS.Sept. 18 — The curtains have been run down on all the summer theaters and the last one of the theaters, the Century ushered in the season last night with "Hotel Topsv Turvv," which is like a farce and yet it is unlike it, and it is like a comic opera and yet it is entirely different and it is like a vaudeville show at your Orpheum and yet the people are really too clever to be vaudevillians. "Hotel Topsy Turvy" is clever. Eddie Foy who has walked the cocktail route on Market street many times when he was withDave Henderson iu"Sinbad," "Crystal Slipper" and other extravaganzas, is the comedian. He still has that same catfish mouth expression and he is as funny as ever. In the same company is Amelie Glover who was better known as the Little Fawn when she was with Russell's Comedians. She is the same little winsome woman, though her absence of four years from the stage has caused her to be almost forgotten. Well, it is the old adage, "Out of sight, out of mind." Gus Thomas' play "Arizona" is with us