Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1886-02-26
SALTINI'S GLADIATOR.
synopsis of the Argument of the
sg Play In Which the Great Actor
------- appears Tonight. ! "a

Salvini's version of "The Gladiator
is widely different from that OF the late
McCullough's, and in several importan
respects would scarcely be recognized as
the same play. To appreciate the per-
formance thoroughly, under the circum.
stances ..of Salvini speaking his entire
lines in Italian, one should be familiar
with the plot, or else much that is of es-
sential interest is lost, Notwithstanding
that the great actor succeeds as perfectly
as it is possible in portraying every
feature and fact in his magnificent acting.
Some fifteen years prior to the scene
upon which the curtain rises in the first
act, the Empress Faustina, the wife of
the Roman Emperor. finding herself
I-childless. and desiring to become a
mother, applies to the Oracle for advice.
She is told that her only hope is to OBJ
! tain one by the Cesarian method. With
this in view she selects the wife of Nero.
the Gladiator, who is about to give birth
to a child, and herself performs the oper-
alton, in doing which she inflicts acct
dentally wound on the infants shoulder.
The Gladiator, who had intruded on the
scene, had been chained to pillar, and
was thereby made to witness the oper-
alton which he was helpless to oppose.
lie afterwards sets fire to the royal palace
and escapes with his infant to Egypt,
Where again the child becomes separated
from her father and remains lost to him
Tor long years afterwards. St if IL
The play opens where the child, now a
young lady, is brought back to Rome and
sold into slavery, at the beginning of the
Christian era. She is purchased bv
Flavian, young Roman nobleman, who
subsequently, becomes so enamored of
her that he gives her her liberty, with
the purpose of wedding her. Faustina.
who has@since become a widow.
is desperately infatuated with Flavina.
and importunes him for marriage. Seeing
that Flavna is more interested i'm Neo.
damia, the Gladiator's daughter, than in
herself, she watches for an opportunity to
meet the girl in the garden, when she
urges her to leave Rome and shows her a
former love letter from Flavina, which.
although written long before, is made to
appear as having been just written. Neo-
damla, although fired with jealousy, re-
fuses to leave, and Nero who was
silent witness to the garden
scene is appointed by the Empress to
Kill the girl, instead Of doing which, i'm
pressed by the maiden's beauty and her
helplessness, he assists her to escape. |
She afterwards becomes Il Christian and /
Is condemned to death, and Nero is again
appointed her executioner. When he /
discovers that it is Naodamia,
ne endeayors to persuade her
to renount:e her religion, which she re-
fuses to do. He then appeals to the
spectators, who give him the choice of
killing her or throwing her to the
lions. He decides to kill her. and
when in the act of uncovering
her neck discovers the mark
which he had seen Faustina make on
5he infant and he realizes it is his own
enid. lie again appeals for her life to 4
De spared, and offers himself instead. +
When he finds no hopes, he defies
he crowd to take her, but Immediately
utter hits upon the idea of the girl-life
,eing linked with that OF the Empress'
:hild by decree OF the Oracle.
md makes known the fact.
The Empress, stunned by the
intelligence, consents to spare her one
more day, and she is taken to her cell. In l.
he night the Gladiator, who was aware of I
'austina's treacherous effort to have
Ieodanna murdered that night, breaks
Trough the walls and enters Just as the | I
irl is being killed. At the same moment ]
hat Neodamia falls the Empress son !
keeping with the Oracle's decree, per-
she's at the gates OF the temple bv the t
word of FlaVian. ~ liSlE -0li Ni