Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1878-03-29
A wELL.MASAeED THEATER.
the Prfaco OF HHles's, of London
The Play Of Diplomacy, etc.

A correspondent writing from
London says:
But amid all this theatrical chaos
one Of our theaters-the Prince Of
Wales's-stands out as a sample of
successful management. 1t is con-
Quoted on radically different prin-
ciples. In this house everything,
down to the smallest detail, is at
tended to with intelligence and car
ried out with taste and enterprise.
If anything might be said against
the management, it is that atten-
ton to detail is some times over
done, and little knick- knackeries of
furniture and upholstery are intro
duced in excess into the scenery
and stage decorations. This, how
ever, is q fault on the right side.
This house is owned, l believe, as
well as managed by Mrs. Bancroft,
who, as Miss Marie Wilton has been
long a ~favorite, and deseryedly so,
of the theater-going public. No
one can call Mrs. Bancroft a great
comedian /; but, for an Englishwo-
man of our degenerate-theatrically
degenerate-days, she has talent,
and, if she manages the theater by
her own unaided exertions, she
has high administrative faculties.
For some time this house has
been esteemed the best in Lon
don. 1t earned its reputation
by its successful performances of
modern English comedy as exhib-
tied by the late Mr.. Robertson,
whose plays, Caste, School, Ours
and Play, commonplace though
they are when put alongside of the
higher efforts of the last century,
hold a fair place among the dram
attic results Of late years. The
company of the Prince of Wales
has absorbed whatever talent there
is on the London boards, and the
management has secured what does
not exist in any other house in
Overwhelmingly, that every part,
even the most subordinate, shall be
well rendered. And it is here and
in the careful arrangement and fur
nishing of the stage hat this house
excels. A dialogue between a
housemaid and a boy in buttons is
as well given as an emotional scene
between the hero and heroine, and
the arrangement of the Chippen-
dale chairs and the old china of a
modern English room is as min
utely cared for as the marshaling of
a great tableau at the Grand
Opera in Paris. Mrs. Ban
croft herself not unfrequently
takes the humblest parts, and her
husband, who ranks high among
such comedians as we have, made a
successful hit in a recent play given
in this house by his rendering of
the subordinate character of an
English butler on the continents
a small part for a man of his posi-
ton in the theatrical world, but we'll
worth doing, even as an example of
the way in which the management
is conducted.
Of late years Eneglish adapta-
tons of successful French pieces
have been the staple performances
in this house. The company made
one attempt at the Legitimate
They tried the Merchant
of Venice, but it was a conspicuous
failure. The audiences who delight
in Robertson and in Anglicized
editions of Sardou, are too critical to
appreciate Shakespeare reduced to
the Robertsonian level and looked
at through Robertsonian s~pectacles.
The Merchant of Venice died al
most still-born, and the manage
ment with great good sense appre-
ciated the situation and replaced
the Legitimate drama" by some
thing more congenial to and more
within the compass of the com
pany. At present they are giving
Sardou's Dora in an English dress
and under an English title, Diplo-
macy. 1t has been In preparation
for many months ; it is deliberately
put upon the stage, finished to the
minutest detail, even to the me-
chanical fittings of the French
shutters in the morning-room at
Mont Carlo, and it promises to have
an Unprecedented run. 1t has hit
The prevailing sentiment of the hour
-distrust aud suspicion of Russia
and night after night the most
fashionable people in town 90 to
watch with mtensest interest the
ENHANCEMENT of the English at
tache's wife in the meshes of a web
of political intrigue woven by a
Russian agent in the pay of the
Russian government, and the ex-
travagant denouement of the plot
by means Of a pair Of scented kid
gloves. Stalls and boxes are Ell.
gagged for weeks ahead indeed, now
on the I'd of March, it is almost
impossible to get seats till we'll on
in the spring. The Eastern ques-
ton may be solved and the Russian
troops back at st. Petersburg before
the London public will be tired Of