Variety (September 1908)

14 VARIETY WATSON'S BURLESQUERS. "Make them laugh/' is the slogan of Billy Watson. It doesn't matter how, do it. • In carrying out the idea Billy is more than successful. The laughs follow each other through three acts with untiring regularity. At times the dialogue at- tains a purple hue, but the stuff goes double, letting the talker out It is seldom offensive. The show in the main is the same as last season. "Krousmeyer's Alley" is given in three acts. The first and second are separated by what the program pleases to call an "olio." It consists of two singing acts in one. Between the second and third acts the time is used up by Billy Watson and Billy 6pencer in a conversational arrangement. It may do to say right here it is doubtful if anything funnier than this talk will be heard in burlesque this season. Some of It would never do at a benefit of the Mothers' Club, but it is so funny and well handled that it can be overlooked. Let's get to the big part of the show. The chorus is just indescribable. There sure twenty. You dont need to count, they look like a thousand from the front. If there were one more on the stage it would be breaking the fire regulations. Annie Bernstein is the soubrette. It is a question whether Annie was picked be- cause of the chorus or the chorus because of Annie. Anyway Annie looks almost petite with that massive background. Four of the largest "girls" are put in front to lead one of the numbers. It's the weightiest quartet above ground. Nine hundred pounds would be a light guess. The numbers as a whole don't amount to much, although there are one or two well worth while. A mixed sextet for the finale of the second act was easily the best and made a corking fast finish. The girls are all called upon to do a little something or other alone at some time during the show. The opening of the second scene takes on the aspect of a chorus girls' contest. A couple of Watson's did very well, Harriet Bailey carrying off the honors with a nicely turned bit of "coon" shouting. In the matter of costumes the show is rather below par. There are few changes and these, with possibly one exception, have hardly even the appearance of new- ness to recommend them. Billy Spencer follows the hot pace set by Watson without getting lost in the comedy race. The two are on the stage almost continuously, not even leaving it during the numbers in which they do not participate. They are never tiresome. They work up the feud between the "Dutchman" and the "Irishman" so skill- fully that every time they come together it seems funnier. Harry Gardner is the only other man involved to any extent. He does well as a "Dutch Cop." Miss Bernstein is the lone woman prin- cipal. At least she is the only one who never gets into the chorus. Annie's cal- liope voice is heard to advantage in the pieces, and also in the alleged olio. A very awagger brown dress was about the only wardrobe Annie displayed. Her part doesn't really require any more, but at least another "kid" dress might be worn for the closing. The Bijou Comedy Trio are the rest of the olio. They make a good singing trio of the usual type. The singing went very well. Doth. RICE & BARTON'S BIO GAIETY. Charles Barton has applied the polite farce idea with a nearer approach to suc- cess this season than for a good many years. Barton has been addicted to this form of burlesque offering for a long time. It has serious drawbacks, chief among which is the restriction it imposes upon the operation of the chorus. Even in this year's opening piece, the best Barton has had for a long time, the choristers re- main in inaction for twenty minutes or so despite the neat arrangement which brings them on the stage at the opening and finale. Barton is in his old-time role of the sporty husband and makes it genuinely funny through a series of farcical compli- cations. The principal comedian is admirably supported by an uncommonly imposing array of funmakers, prominent among whom are Jack Magee (Murphy and Magee), Fred Eckhoff (Eckhoff and Gor- don) and Jeff Healy (Jeff and La vera Healy). Frank Pierce (Pierce and Maizee) is saddled with an impossible role in the first part, but shows up to better ad- vantage in the burlesque, where also Healy and Eckhoff have some capital comedy. The show starts off with several first rate numbers, then lapses into polite farce for twenty minutes or so until the chorus is again introduced as part of a vaude- ville entertainment at the home of "Brown" (Barton) which is worked up for a musical finale. This detail is well enough handled, but the costuming of the choristers is all cheap flash. The opening of the burlesque gave the audience its first glimpse of tights, in the glittering display being Alice Maizee, in quite the nattiest "principal boy" cos- tume that has been seen this season. Miss Maizee is perfectly proportioned for ap- parel of this sort and the audience voiced its approval of her with enthusiasm and frankness. Murphy and Eckhoff here have the grotesque roles of two tramps masquerading as noblemen, but their com- edy was a good deal newer and fresher than that familiar idea, while Barton chiefly rested after his strenuous labors in the first part. The burlesque with its well laid out numbers and pretty dressing ran its length very satisfactorily. Camille Farlardaux opened with her singing specialty, a bright and sprightly number, although Miss Farlardaux for- gets at times that she is billed as a "French chanteuse." Murphy and Magee do their novel conversation called "The Floorwalker and the Customer," an un- commonly clever arrangement of talk. Kelly and Bartlett have an entertaining knockabout act with a quantity of new styles in comedy falls, while Pierce and Maizee offer a partly new routine of songs, finishing with an effective con- versational song which works itself up to a laughable climax in a quarrel. Also Miss Maizee sings a song anent the "sheath" gown girl with a bit of in- cidental patter and wears a startling sample of that mode. Eckhoff and Gordon have a well han- dled comedy musical turn, in which the man does all the work, and The Healys closed with their singing and piano play- ing. Twenty girls, all in the "broiler" class make up the chorus, a good looking and well-drilled organization. Ruth. HARRY BRYANT'S EXTRAVAGANZA. It will have to be said sometime, and just aa well now as any. The selection of female principals for burlesque has ruined many a good show in the past, is doing that now, and will in the future, if probably the worst fault of a bur- lesque organization isn't corrected. This goes for the Harry Bryant show especially. Mr. Bryant has a good piece in "Gee Whiz, or the Mayor of Tank Town" writ- ten by Fred Wyckoff, and he has six wo- men principals, Edith Bryant, Elizabeth Mayne, Martha Hableman, Clara Berg, Florence Hughes and Lillian Sieger. Of the half-dozen there is but one help- ing Mr. Bryant's show. That is Eliza- beth Mayne, the soubrette. Miss Mayne can not dance, neither has she a good sing- ing voice, but the girl looks well, dresses nicely and has plenty of ginger, so much so she should be on the stage much more. Clara Berg had the most to do among the women, mixing up in nearly every- thing, wearing tights, singing, etc., finally' putting a period to her wild stage riot of action by a "Salome" (New Acts). Since Miss Sieger can play the cornet sufficiently well to win applause in the olio from an untutored audience, why should she sing at all? Among the men are The Clipper Trio, who sing well in the pieces holding up the vocal end, and in a light-constructed act in the olio. Harry Bryant, Fred Wyckoff, Mr. Parent, Billy Cook and Geo. Johnson are the comedians, Messrs. Bryant and Wyckoff handling the larger part of the comedy, Bryant rather subdued in compar- ison to former days, and Wyckoff as a capital "rube," his regular stage character. Cook is a German, who ofttimes wavers over into a Hebrew dialect. Parent makes a fair "kid," poorly made up, and Johnson is a constable, not at all bad. There are eighteen girls in the chorus. Their work shows a lack of discipline, the dancing and alignment being very irregu- lar. One tall good-looking blonde in the second row near the right end (from or- chestra) might fall asleep standing up any moment from her bearing. Two brun- ettes in the front line on the other side are good little workers, and make the chorus seem lively. Some of the girls are fairly good-lookers, good enough to be made principals under the circumstances. Five or six changes are made in the first act, and two or three in the second. The dressing is satisfactory at all times, but the numbers could be stage-managed to much better advantage. "A Tangled Tale of a Theatrical Troupe's Troubles in a Temperance Town," the program description of the piece, is a good account of the plot. Some "imagin- ary" stuff, the "trained flea," two-count- 'em-two travesties are introduced, and Wyckoff inflicts what is almost a mono- logue during the action, but the dialogue and story are well written. Were the comedy drawn together it would help. Darmody, the club juggler, opens the olio, which besides the two previous acts mentioned, has The Goyt Trio, a man and two dogs, giving a rather interesting hand- end head-balancing exhibition, the dogs playing no small part. Mr. Bryant has assuredly striven to present a show which would rank with the best. He did everything to help that along excepting for the mistake—a fatal one in this instance as well as in others. Bitne. GAY MASQUERADERS. To call the Bob Manchester show "a riot of color" would be totally inadequate. It is rather a carnival of disorderly con- duct in its color schemes. The women principals are the worst offenders. They all go the limit of color combinations, but perhaps the creation which Susie Fisher wore in the second act led the others a little. The chorus also has some weird dress combinations. One was an opera cloak of blue and yellow that fairly shrieked. It's all very well to make burlesque cos- tumes bright and cheerful, but Manches- ter let his costumer do neck falls and somersaults. In other respects the two-act piece, "A Night on Broadway," gives promise of working out into a capital burlesque show. The second act can stand as it is, but the first needs strengthening in the comedy. It is the book at fault rather than the principal comedian, Harry A. Emerson. Emereoli struggles- TirjtiJoll/ through the straight dialogue in the first part, and then as a last resort descended to wild clowning in his desperate effort to gain laughs. He doesn't have to do this, for in the second act, where the book gives him half an opportunity, he is genuinely funny along legitimate lines. Miss Fisher is at her best when sing- ing. She haa a splendid contralto voice, and it waa the subject of wonder that she was not given more to do. Her only real opportunity came in the olio when she sang "You've Got to Sing an Irish Song," and here she scored the musical hit of the show. For the rest she deliv- ered "straight" speeches couched in such polite language the audience couldn't understand them half the time. They saddled the same sort of dialogue on Eva Bryan. Eva couldn't sing, and she didn't dance. Her contribution to the gaiety of the performance was rather less than nothing. Flo Zeller had the burden of the singing. Here is an extremely sweet, although light, soprano voice, of rather unusual excellence for burlesque, and the numbers in which she was principal were altogether enjoyable. Not the least im- portant of the singers was a chorister on the right of the front line. She has a powerful baritone that gives the ensemble numbers a good deal of effect. Besides which service she is one of the best work- ers in the ranks. Corinne De Forrest has one lone song in the second act where she first appears, doing very well for the short time she is on the stage. Ned Norton seems to be new to bur- lesque. He handles a straight part like the ingenue of a Broadway musical com- edy. He's a particularly nice looking youngster, has an agreeable voice and dresses as well as one of George Cohan's chorus men, which is saying a good deal for burlesque. One doesn't realize how much a good "straight" man can do for a burlesque organization until a really good one comes along. Thomas Potter Dunn offered a rather mixed turn in the olio, following an Ital- ian number in costume, with that "Rosie" recitation used by Ben Welch until that comedian saw the nonsence of trying to drown a good comedy act in fruitless tears. Other olio acts are the Four Jug- gling Johnsons and the Eugene Trio, acro- batic (the latter under New Acts). Ruth.