New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1888-12-18
THE DRAMA.
STANDARD THEATRE-MIss EsMERALDA.

STANDARD THEATRE-MISS ESMERALDA'
A long. dreary, dismal repulsive performance was
given last night at the Standard Theatre In the course
OF which Victor Hugo's great tragic story of the
Hunchback OF Notre Dame, butchered and bedaubed
beyond recognition, was clumsily exploited In
nondcscript fabric OF screechy music and halt ana
silly called buresquc. This implication mas
been perpetrated by Mcssrs. a. c. TORI and Horace
Mills authors heard Of here for the first time, and
II IS heartily hoped for the last. Miss Nelly Farrcn
and her Gaety company acted the piece, and probably
made the most that could be made OF It, but the
innate stupidty Of the composition, It's poverty OF
invention It's fatal lack Of comic incident and Dus-
ness, its execrable straIning after puns' ana inc
mouldy and grown condition OF It's JOKES mako
fits redemption hopeless. Nothing was said or dono
In IT, aside from the expert and nmble dancing OF "s
of the incidental women aud perhaps travosty of
the old time sword combat that rose above the level
of those tavern entertainments once popular when
Plancus was Consult, under the of the Free and
Easy In the acting Of Miss Farren. who Is still
a very neat executant, the observer sees traces OF
true buriesque stye-the faculty, that Is, OF
doing comic deeds and saying. wildly extravsgant
,rords In n perfectIy serious manner. SINH
lar indications occasionally visible
though probably they were not Intended
in the performance OF Quasimodo, by Mr.. Fred
Storey Miss Farren has been trained In good
school, and, although her voice is worn and rough
and her demeauor hard and unlovey, sho Is good
actress Tho rest were nowhere. Tho omedians
made UP In a manner so disgusting that merely to
look at them was to experience feeling Of nausea
Since when was needful become hideOus In order
to DO funnyi Carcatue is not buresque, and carl
caturc when It transcends even 10 grotesQue be-
comes loathsome. In this piece one man walks on
the stage as handorgan- grinder and another a.
monkey, and tho grinder clutches the tail OF tho
monkey, affects to consider II telephone tube, and
blows down into 1t to hail his companion. Out OF
what London slum cellar that idea extracted as
an idea OF humorl From this single specimen may
DO inferred tho quality Of the whole structure of
baldcrdash and vulganty. There was time when
burlesque was associated with the idea of pleasure,
whom II involved an artistic treatment, and the
persons employed In It seemed happy In their art
These people difused an air OF wretched effort,
boisterous and feversh stranng after the clumsest
and coarsest effects fret, Jam, worry, and perspra
tion No good to themselves of such
laborous, insipd, depressing and clownsh folly,
and surely no benefit accrues to spectator 1t
must be said however, that each and every idotic
proceeding Of the night called repetition with
applause indicative Of public rapture, and players
are not perhaps, SO much to blame who mako them
selves asinne spectacles when they find fools to
laugh at them. The antics Of drunken man, imi-
tated at ntolerable length by Mr.. Charles Dandy,
with all the grOssness OF inebriety and little OF INC
comical inconsequence Of 1t, gave wonderful salts
faction. Miss farren played captain Phoepusi Mr.
Frollo and Miss Marion Hood pierced tho welkin
with her thin, acidulous vocalsm as Esmerada
There were some pretty dresses vIsinie' ana me
not however, art In burlesque and the mischief
IL Is that It minis tiers TO taste for Vulagrty al
mos. pernicous In It's tendency to degrade and dis
grace the tone of civilization In this country.