The Press.
London, England, 1853-06-18 00:00:00

Tip puma.

lIAYMARKET THEATRE.
WE must confess we were most thoroughly dis•
appointed with The Cruel Kindness, written by Mrs.
Crowe, the authoress of " Susan Hopley" and the
" Nightside of Nature." Mrs. Crowe's prose works
display so much imagination that we looked with
confidence for a more successful result. We have
already expressed our opinion that English dra.•
matic authors might well take a lesson from their
French brethren relative to the construction of their
plays ; and tothis piece of advice (which was never
more needed by any one than Mrs. Crowe) we would
add a friendly suggestion, that the writers for the
stage shoud content themselves with proper and legiti.
mate success, and not allow their ambition to attempt
a class of composition which none but the greatest
dramatists, and they, too, in rare instances, have ever
rendered popular. A play in five acts, and in blank verse,
requires an amount of poetic genius, descriptive
power, and novelty of construction, which is rarely to
be found combined in any one individual. Mrs.
Crowe's play lacks all these qualities, and is more
than usually deficient in force and gravity of ex•
pression, the plot, too, is hacknied, and there
is no interest to relieve the mawkish sen-
timentality which pervades the whole work.
Of the acting we have but little to say that is favour-
able. Mr. Barry Sullivan is a very moderate per-
former, and Miss Reynolds has not sufficient power
for .he part of the heroine. Mr. Howe, atlhough
he is not as successful in depicting the anguish of
disappointed rage. as in the violence with which he
reproves his sons for their disobedience to his com
mends, was respectable as the Duke or Urbino.

165

We would suggest that some aet of Parliament
should be passed for the relief of innoeent
and unolibniling foreign names which are now
universally massacred in every theatre in London.
After what Italy suffers at the hands of the ladies
and gentlemen engaged in the representation of
Marco Spada at the Princess's, we think that some
reparation was due to her in the present instance.
Mr. Rogers, who plays Lores:o Marvas of Pesaro,
might with advantage be reminded that, when he rro
nounees the name of his unhappy marquisate as if it
werespelt" Pizarro," he shows his ignorance of metre
as well as of geography.
The play is put upon the stage with great ear.',
hut the anaehronisms in the scenery show great want
of judgment. The Castle and Town of l'rbitoi wont,'
surely aff..ird sufficient scope for tho talent of a scenic
artist without reclining to a style whieb never even pre-
vailed until more than a century later than the period
in which the action of the play is laid. The most
elaborate scene is a moonlight forest glade,
Sir. which, as it is totally opposite
to anything in nature, we presume to hate been
painted according to the prineiples (if any such there
be) of the pre-Raphaelite school nor is it the land
clime alone that is wanting in effect of reality, for
we may travel man; miles before we walk in any wit;
like the doll which was seen to move haekwards and
forwards in the distance, and then suddenly to emerge
from a bush iu the person of the lust lady and her
infant child.