Variety (December 1907)

VARIETY Hkiety A Variety Paper for Variety People. Published erery Saturday fey TKS VARIETY PUBLISHING CO. Knickerbocker Theatre Building, 1402 Broadway, New York City. ./♦^j-ttthSt. Adams and Drew have dissolved part- nership. ■ Adams and Kirk have joined Alf G. Herrington's "Lady Birds." Telephone 4023 SIME 7. , Editor and Proprietor. Entered aa aecond-cloaa matter December 22, 1005, at the Poet Office at New York, N. Y., under the act of Oongreee of March 3, 1870. CHICAGO OFFICE, Chloafo Opera Hoaee Block (Phone, Mala 4980). FRANK WIE8BERG-, EoproieatatlTo. BAN FRANCISCO OFFICE, 1116 Yaa Neat At*. (Room lit). W. ALFRED WILSON, RepreaenUtlTO. LONDON REPRESENTATIVE, O. 0. BARTRAM, 49 Rupert St., W. PARIS REPRESENTATIVE, 0. M. 8EIBT. IB cents an agate line, $2.10 an Inch. One page, $100; one-half page, $50; one-quarter page, $25. Charges for portraits furnished on application. Special rate by the month for professional card under heading "RepresentatlTe Artiste." Advertising copy should be received by Thura- day at noon to lnsnro publication In current Issue. •^B»DESra»pOUNCI >89 SUBSCRIPTION RATES. Annual $4 Foreign 6 81x and three months In proportion. Single copies ten cents. VARIETY will be mailed to a permanent ad- dreaa or as per route as desired. VARIETY may be had abroad at INTERNATIONAL NEWS CO/S OFFICES Breams Building. Chancery Lane, LONDON, E. C. ENGLAND. Advertisements forwarded by mail must be ac- companied by remittance, made payable to Variety Publishing Co. • Copyright, 1007. by Variety Publishing Co. Vol. IX. DECEMBER 21. No. 2. A Merrv Christina/*. We offer our thanks and sincere ap- preciation to the many senders of tele- grams, cables and letters congratulating VARIETY upon its Anniversary Number, and extending their good wishes for the future. The favor met with by the issue was far beyond either our hopes or anticipation. Each year of the two we have been for- tunate to celebrate by a special Anni- versary' Number. VARIETY has tried to avoid the beaten path/r of all big issues, and accepted the occasion as opportune for especially invited contributors to voice their own views in their own language. Our readers have the writings of our stafF before them fifty-two times each vear. Tf it does not become tiresome we are surprised and the compositions of others, not professional writers, should come as a distinct relief it does to us. l*'or the success of the Second Anni- versary Number, we freely and gladly credit the contributors to it. Each and every one. Every special article was read- able, and w;is read, and our very best thanks are here expressed. Poll's, Scranton, donated its evening re- ceipts last Monday to a local charity. Whit Cunliffe and Lily Flexmore arrive next week. Both open at the New York Dec. 30. Fred Niblo and Josephine Cohan and Company remain at the New York for the second week commencing Monday. Jos. Bernstein and "Kid" Griffo will join "The Toreadors" next week at To- ronto. Lew Rose is their manager. Anna and Effie Conley are at the 58th Street house this week in place of Netta Vesta, who wus taken ill early in the week. Truly Shattuck's engagement for the Wintergarten, Berlin, as reported last week, was arranged through Marinelli's New York office. Trixie Friganza and Radie Furman were taken ill during the week at the Grand Opera House, Brooklyn, having to retire from the bill. Louis Mann will play at the Colonial week of December 30, remaining oil the United time for the balance of his Klaw & Erlanger contract. W. E. Ritchie, of the Ritchie Duo, the " 'cycle act/' has recovered the use of his right arm. and the act will appear at Keeney's next week. The Piottis, character songs, have been booked for forty weeks over the Sullivan* Considine Circuit, opening at Duluth Monday, December 23. Elizabeth M. Murray, Toby Claude and Schrode and Mulvey are awaiting con- tracts for foreign time, secured for them through Jenie Jacobs. Julian Rose will commence a "jump" to- day from the Tremont, Boston, to the Garrick, St. Louis, where he will open to- morrow (Sunday) night. EckhofT and Gordon declined to open the performance at Fifty-eighth Street this week, leaving the bill before the first show. The Aerial Shaws replaced them. The Cora Youngblood Corson Sextet plays its first Eastern date at W. L. Dockstader*i Garrick, Wilmington, week Jan. fi. Alf. T. Wilton is booking the act. Vesta Victoria opens at the New York for a return engagement on Dec. 30. Miss Victoria may remain two or three weeks. She will probably thereafter be routed by the United Offices. Albert Loyal and his dog "Togue."' the t;iIk at present of the other side, was of- fered to the Hippodrome management, but declined. The dog is said to be the most remarkably trained canine ever exhibited abroad. The Montrose Troupe, a foreign act and an Orpheum Circuit booking, opens Mon- day, Dec. 23, at the Majestic, Chicago, for their American showing. Mr. and Mrs. Max Hoffman (Gertrude Hoffman) sail this week for London per steamship "Oceanic," to be gone five weeks on a pleasure trip. They wil visit Lon- don, Paris and Berlin. Matt Woodward has been commissioned to write a first part and burlesque for Abe Leavitt's "Rentz Santley" Company (Eastern Burlesque Wheel) for next sea- son. He will also stage the pieces. The Jackson Family of bicyclists have been booked far enough ahead on the other side to keep the act busy for an- other year. They open next season with a two months' engagement at the Circus Bosch, Berlin. Minnie Du Pree, of Eckel and Du Pree, will have a unique Christmas gift. While the pair were playing Mahanoy City, Pa., recently Joe Eckel thinks he discovered a pearl in aa oyster served to him in a local restaurant. Jos. Weber, manager of Weber & Rush's vaudeville house in Binghamton, Schenec- tady, N. Y., and Atlanta, Ga., says he is playing more costly and high class shows at the three houses just now than ever seen in them before. Fred Zobedie, the acrobat, opened on the Klaw & Erlanger circuit last week, under his 25 weeks' contract. This week Mr. Zobedie is at the Grand Opera House, Brooklyn, playing Hathaway's, Lowell, commencing Monday. Maude Caswell and Arnold have decided to remain abroad yet awhile, having re- ceived considerable time over there. They are at the Apollo, Dusseldorf (Germany), until December 15. The month of Janu- ary the act plays in Berlin. Lucy Weston, the English songstress, will open at the New York Jan. fi. Miss Weston is bringing over two songs she expects will become popular. One is named "The Curate and the Maid;" the other "Keep Your Feet Together." There is a possibility that Mi.ss Weston will not come over here to play the time. Grand Lodge President Green, T. M. A., will preside at the installation of the newly elected officers of New York Lodge, No. 1. at the I.ongacre Athletic Club Jan. .">. .lames 11. Curtin, of the London The- atre, is the newly elected president. Florence Gale and Company were booked for three weeks of United time this week by M. S. Bentham. Miss Gale onlv latelv • • • played her new sketch in vaudeville. The present bookings are preliminary to an engagement for the remainder of the sea son. Eltinge missed two shows at Shea's, Buffalo, this week, caused through an operation for an abscess Mr. Eltinge was obliged to undergo. Dr. T. Wright, who performed it, operated on Eltinge for the same thing a year ago in Vienna, while both were visiting there. Mrs. Heras, of the Heras Family of acrobats ("K. & E. act"), fractured a rib on Tuesday while at the Union Square, but attempted to play the week out. The engagement for Ottawa next week will be canceled to allow the heavy under- stander of the act a chance to recover. Gus Elen has had only nice things to say of America and Americans since his re- turn to London. An artist there comment- ing on it in a letter lately received says it is so very different from a few years back when foreign acts "hammered" the United States before they even sailed for home. P. Alonzo, the Poli Circuit general rep- resentative, inadvertently disclosed the other day that he is not a frequent church- goer. While discussing the Supreme Court decision rendered affecting Sunday performances, Mr. Alonzo said, "Well, the churches will have to close now, too." Asked why, he replied, "They charge ad- mission. n "Doc" Campbell, formerly of Campbell and Johnson, has entered into a team witii Barber, late of the Barber-Ritchie Trio. The new act played out the Campbell and Johnson engagement at the London Hippodrome, closing there Dec. 8. John- son was taken suddenly ill some weeks ago, returning to New York. He will rest for a few months before returning to the stage. Maidie Scott, the Irish comedienne, is due to arrive in New York to-day, and will open at the Tremont, Boston, on Mon- day. Miss Scott is a typical Irish girl in looks, with black hair, blue eyes and the roguishncss of expression which goes with the rest. She has played "principal boy" parts in many of London's pantomimes, and was the "Aladdin" in the spectacle of that name. Billy Noble, the "Dixie Boy," principal comedian with "Twentieth Century Maids," and his wife, Jeanne Brooks, principal woman with Weber & Rush's "Parisian Widows,'' will work as a team next season. Both have been successful in their chosen fields, and have been plan- ning a big act which it is expected will prove a feature. Just when they will place it has not been stated. Probably the record for rapid fire song writ inn was effected last week when Jack Nor worth called up his collaborator, Al. Von Til/er, in New York on the long distance phone from Boston and told him he needed a new song at once. Mr. Von Til/er immediately hummed over a new tune while Norworth made a mental memorandum of the metre. Five minutes later Norworth had a lyric written, again called tip his composer and s:in« over his verses. That night the sons was put on with complete orchestrations and is now a part of the mouologist's act.