New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1870-11-04
ACADEMY OF Music.
Mr.. McWade,

Mr.. McWade.
"Rip Van Winkler' He who is not ac
auainted with Washington Irving's capt.
rating legend should be banished, not to
Sunny Side, but to the shady side of Amer
lean literature.
rip Van Winkle." Who that has passed
ahe kaatskill mountains fails to associate
chat Amsterdamish name with the brown
sides of the rocky declivities which sink
their mouths into the waters that all along
their course 10 the Narrows murmur the
tnelodious ALTERATION of Hendrick Hudson
The genius of Irving has peopled the
irilds of the kaatskills with palpitatins
humanity and phantom shapes which make
us realize at once the real and the ideal.
One day-we remember il well-these
mountains We're enveloped in thick, brown
mist. The sun arose, and the drapery was
lifted as by mag gical hand. slowly. silently.
solemniy. from the base to the summit. As
the weirdlikc curtain disclosed scene
sitter scene of beauty and of grandeur. our
mind reverted to Rip Van Winkle the phan-
tbm spirit, of the mountains, and the sleep
OF twenty years, during which the farmer
like face of George Ill had given way to the
martial one Of George. of Mount Vernon.
Rip Van Winklc went to sleep only to
wfakcn as changed and surprised as We all
shall be when we bid good might to the
world, and bid good-mornins 20 the res,lrrec-
tibn'
ti..- - J, h
iIncied one nights sleep is typical of the
I'd >urrection? That while inebrietv and
the worthles,ness it supcr.nduces are
wildly portrayed by the actor. the author
tJpitied the beyond. and the stage gives its
emphatic Endorsement of the grand idea of
living
Has it ever, too, occurred 70 anv one that
whatever genius, with its God-given capa
city of hammering out immortal sparks
frpm the anvil OF thought, places its hand
on locality, and these sparks take the
tocm OF .entient beings. thenceforth and
forever that locality is inlperishable in the
II emory of man, We need Lot ask the
question OF q thinker. And if the stage,
which is one of the great translnissory vehi-
clks of genius. costumes each sparkling
III ought and gives it the vitality of men
aifd women i'll .robu,tuous life, the world
is all the better for the costuming and
yitaiization
Rip Van Wrinkle. Let us get back to the
co lntry of old Peter >tuyvesant and his
jolly Knickerbockers
some one said the other day that SIr.
Joseph Jefferson had a pre-emption claim
10 this character. Well, let us see about
thht.
Charles Burke wrote two-act drama
Ca led Rip Van Wrinkle. Jefferson, in
STRESS Of weather, at Melbourne, Australia
played at IA venture Burke's dramatization
of Irving's famous Rip, and happily it was
a success. Turning many profitable pen
ny Jefferson engaged Boucicault, the great
DIR l'natic adaptator and upholstcrer, to i'm
prbve on Burke, and give him q fuller
drama. based oD the immortal legend. 1t
wa done; it made Jefferson rich; it trans
tol ned silver placer into pactolus of
gold.
Now, Why should Burke. or his assigns, not
ha Fe a perpetual pre-emption right to Kip
Van Winke. and why should Boucicault
dare infringe upon Burke's presumption
Arid by the way, how dared Burke infringe
upPn the domain Of Irving himself!
When Edmund kean, after circlns
around London like an eagle, as he was.
pohnced down one snowy winter night on
the boards of Drury Lane, and laid Mack
lin 's Shyiock IN the shade, or, was regarded
By the metropolitan critics as the very nu-
letsonation of
The crook back on his charger"
in tne haze OF Barnet fight did the critics.
or Lord Essex or the rest, regard Macklin
as having pre-emptlon title to Shylock or
Elfiston to King Richard! And Kean.
when he defeated Booth. the elder. in
Othello-the first as the Moor the second
as tsgo-dd he think he had Il pre-emption
rght to Othelo or Richard, when in Boston
and New York he found his rival a success
fuI representative Of the heroes of Shake
spearss
E're.emp. ion, If this new Jsffersoniap
TO- trine should prevail, Manager BdweI |
and al other managers, would be compelled
to close their theatres, and both star and |
stock air their wardrobe and sell, out at
auNti0n.
No one will dispute Jefferson's fine per
sOn3tion of Rip Pa7l Wiasklc or the interest |
yeining Boucicaults stage version of the !
legend. Both, however, can not only be |
made the subject of emulation, but of de- |
cided improvement.
When. at the Varieties, NJ. jefferson |
played his celebrated character part, we |
we re told that his pathos was indescribable. |
One journalist almost made us believe that |
if we sat in the dress circle, it were best to |
provide ourselves with an umbrella to keen |
lrA-, fer the tears from above would fal! |
ike rain. !
We went; carried no umbrella; and came |
AWAY dry Even the ladies around us,
strangely enough, refused to weep. There |
-1%hir, of