Screenland (Oct 1923-Mar 1924)

SCMEENLANB true in the instance of Martin-Harvey, the Englishman. The latter is an intelligent manager, a manager of taste and of enterprise, but as an actor he is distinctly second-rate. Martin-Harvey's conception of acting is of an art resident almost entirely in the tonsils and biceps He interprets a role less as an actor might be expected to interpret it than as it would be interpreted by an elocutionist doing Walter Camp's daily dozen. He reads a funeral sermon over the role to the accompaniment of various Lionel Strongfort and Earl Liederman exercises. But his selection of drama is usually as valid as his productions of the dramas themselves. His Oedipus, due to the efforts of Reinhaidt who made the production for him, is the best presentation of the Greek tragedy that the theatre has witnessed in our time. And his production of Via Cruris is similarly impressive. But he leaves much to be desired as an actor. All Dialogue and No Plot IPrederic Lonsdale writes very much better dialogue than he wTrites plays. The dialogue in much of his latest comedy, Spring Cleaning, is as witty and sparkling as anything that has come this way this or last season. When the plot of the play doesn't get in its way, the dialogue is completely diverting. Indeed, so diverting that it deceives one into believing that the play is much better than it is. Mr. Lonsdale's plots would seem to be culled in essence from the remote past of Henry Arthur Jones (as in his Aren't We All?) and from the somewhat less remote past of Haddon Chambers (as in the instance of Spring Cleaning.) Mr. Lonsdale's technic, forsooth, would seem to be to take an old plot and then, by the exercise of amiable and humorous dialogue, make his audience forget it. Which, incidentally, is not such a bad technic after all. Speaking for myself — which is sublimely idiotic talk, as for whom else should or can I speak? — I may say that I enjoyed this Spring Cleaning a great deal. It would be very easy for me to turn professor and learnedly tell you of all its defects — they are as obvious as Cyrano's nose or Charlie Chaplin's feet — but the fact is that one does not particularly notice them while one is sitting in an orchestra chair and laughing at Lonsdale's delightful embroidery of humor. A. E. Matthews is extremely amusing in the role of a philandering bachelor, and Arthur Byron skilful, as always, in the opposite role of the husband whose fair squaw the bachelor has clapped an evil eye upon. Estelle Winwood is effective in the actor-proof role of the prostitute whom the husband brings in off the streets to teach his wife's degenerate friends a lesson, and Violet Heming, commonplace in the earlier stages of the evening, manages her scenes of indignation later on with considerable dexterity. Edgar Selwyn has staged the manuscript very well indeed. "Stepping Stones" Entertaining It is the fashion of a certain school of criticism to attend an excellent music show, have an excellent good time at it, and then write a piece deploring the inconsequence of such entertainments. It is a process of ratiocination that, try as I may, I find myself unable to plumb. The critic who cannot enjoy Hamlet one night and the Follies the next seems to me to have something constitutionally wrong with him. The critic whose pleasure lies in a single form of theatrical exhibition is one who may be listened to wTith interest and with profit once in a while, but surely not regularly. The Mikado is a work of art no less than Romeo and Juliet. Shuffle Along has its place in the theatre, and in criticism perhaps no less, equally with The Swan. Stepping Stones, the latest Dillingham show starring Fred Stone and featuring his little daughter, Dorothy, is a good show, good entertainment of the appropriately fight order, and deserving of just as favorable criticism in its way as The Swan is in its. The dancing is as good as Lonsdale's dialogue; the melodies are frequently as good as Martin-Harvey's production of Oedipus; the costumes are as beautiful as the acting of Eva Le Gallienne. The libretto, by Ann Caldwell, however, may politely be left to a grim silence. The hoofing of the little Stone girl is of a remarkable versatility: she can do with her feet everything that her father can. Two Witty Bubbles 2^oe Akin's A Royal Fandago and Somerset Maugham's The Camel Back are witty bubbles that are not entirely successful in enduring the harsh pinpricks of the theatre. Each of them blows up dramatically before half its course is run upon the stage. Both have excellent first acts; both have much charm; both have a liberal sprinkling of amiable humor in their second and third acts; both run very thin as the evening wears on. This is even truer of Miss Akin's opus than it is of Maugham's though the producing treatment of the former may be in part responsible for the tepid effect in the later part of the evening. Ethel Barrymore, as the princess who claps a naughty eye on the young matador in the Akins play, is, as ever, an attractive figure, and the newcomer, Jose Alessandro, is a talented and engaging leading man. The rest of the company that Hopkins has assembled is pretty sour. The Maugham piece has fared much better in this respect. The cast, headed by Charles Cherry, Violet Kemble Cooper and Louise Closser Hale, is exceptionally good. No Deposit oS any kind Read this — the fairest diamond offer ever made! We will send you either of these genuine diamond, 14K. solid gold rings without a deposit of any kind. Send no money. 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