Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-05-06
STAGE ROMANCES.
Mr.. Barnes Of New York and Little Lord
FaunfIeroy Behind the Feotlights-Tbe


Mr.. Barnes Of New York and Iiitle Lord
FaunfIcroy Behind the Feotlishts-The
shnnty Qnesn-The Two Macs.
If you have read "Mr. Barnes Of New York;
and enjoyed it, you ought to see the play
which Mr.. Gunter has made out Of his popular
novel. 1t is a closer rendering OF the novel
than is usually the case in such adaptations.
The descriptive matter is replaced by scenery.
but the talk and the action of the
story in print may be found very
little cut and condensed in the play. Yet the
purposes of the novel and the play are wide
apart. We credit Mr.. Gunter with desire to
picture actual life in his novel, but surely he
had no such intention when he became play
wright. Anyhow the play is only true to life in
episodes-rare episodes. The greater part of
the play Is travesty; at times sheer farce
comedy. AS dramatic entity it Is not worth
much, but the series of tableaux ap-
peals strongly to the audience by
reason OF the dramatic situations, the
pictorial surroundings, and genuine interest of
the plot The characters stand out more pct
uresquely in the novels pages than behind
the footlights, but the intensity OF such pas
sages as the duelscene and the final catastrophe
In 1hdrfnd's bridal chamber Is enhanced by
scenic and histrIonlc accessories.
Unless one has read the novel the drama can
hardly be intelligible. The fsrcical railroad
ence, but it has no business in the play. the
action of which it delays needlessly. How
MI. Barnes starved Miss Anstruther into his
acquaintance might be shown in fares COM
edy-farces have been built on less substantial
plots-but it is out of place in serious drama,
with its ridiculous railroad guard, comic pas
it pleases the audience does not show that it
has any artistic right to exist.
The play was performed for the first time
here at the Bijou Theater last night.
uit narlr IF
approval and the recalls were numer-
ous. Mr.. Barnes of NelO York could hardly
have been handsomer fellow than Mr.. Robert
H1lliard makes him. The usual exquisite de-
tails of dress in which Mr.. Hilliard excels ap-
pear in Mr.. Barnes. His coats, his hats, his
trousers. to go no further, are above and be-
with deep humility-a cutaway, black morning
coat which Mr.. Barnes wears at Monte Carlo.
The tails of this garment projected from
NJ: Barnes at an unnatural angle,
lent wind, or that at some prior day
Mr.. Barnes had worn a hustle. But this is
merely trife. Mr. Hilliard gives ms breezy,
easy, devil-may-care American: not the best or
the highest type. and not exactly what we con-
ceive Mr.. Gunter's Mr.. Barnes to have been.
He is good fellow. a handsome fellow, and an
American In sympathies so far as they GO.
Naturally the great character of the play Is
Marina the female Fdbaen det Frdnchi, who
reyels in bloodthirsty anticipations of the muir
der with which she means to bring the
a
conclusion. Miss Emily Rigl brings great
power to the portrayal of this character. Her
Marina is very unpleasant person, indeed,
but the actress continues to allow the brighter,
sweeter side of the unhappy woman to emerge
at times, and she makes the character deeply
interesting always. The Enid A1lstruther of
Miss Emma Field is pretty and pleasing girl
Lady Chdrtrfs does not seem TO have been born
in Mayfair. and her daughter Maud must eer-
tainly have been educated in the Bowery. All
the same, as the latter Miss Annie n. Blancke
II. ...nI,1 ~ fah rsrlE
The company as a whole is above the average
for drama of this kind.
Some of the scenery Is very striking an
Italian vista in particular, and the other ad-
iuncts, which include a locomotive of truly
unique pattern, serve their purpose well
enough. Barnes of New York; is an inter-
esting person, no matter how you take him.
Grand Opera House.
Little Lord Fauntleroy" does not seem to
spoil with age. A big house assembled to wit
ness its performance on the Grand stage last
night; sympathetic mothers, being as usual
largely in the ascendant. Perhaps the fact
that a new boy plays the role Of Lord FduatIe-
roy had something to do with the crowd. One
Wallie Eddinger is Tommy Russelrs
successor, and in the opinion of many who
have witnessed the performances of both
children. the new FduntleToy is the cleverer
and the more natural of the two. Eddinger is
q manly llttle Cnap he mas none or that tire
some effeminaey which spoiled Tommy Rus
sells otherwise excellent playing. The little
lord, as Eddinger shows him to us, is not by
any means a show child, but rather an out
spoken, plucky boy; just the identical sort Of
boy that such parentage and such training
would be liFely TO produce.
Frank E. Aiken, as the Earl of Dorincourt
catches the spirit of his part exactly He is
not the priggish snob which is the American
stage type of the English peer;
neither is he the elderly Bayard or
Grandson which does duty for the same
character on the stage of England. He pre-
sents to US an elderly gentleman, who would
be very ordinary save for his good blood ana
habitual power of command. A very grabbed
old gentleman Is Mr.. Atkins Lord Dorincottrt
with all the faults and follies of one whose
life's cup has been sour at the dregs The
family lawyer of M. B. Snyder is conventional
Russell Bassetts Hobbs and G. Henderson's
Dick are well depicted types of everyday
American life. Helene lowell, as MrS
ErTol is ladylike and motherly; while Emily
Lytton plays the loud and confident Mtnnu in
very realistic manner. The play is
not over well mounted, Why for
instance, is the second act said to
take place IN a library, when the room as repre-
sented has not in it a solitary volume? Then.
too tapestry Is not generally sliced up for door
curtains in the English mansions nor are the
portraits of ancestors in latter-day costume
often found woven into said tapestry. But the
most notable blunder was the introduction of
a groom with a mustachel Imagine a mus
tached man-servant attached to an English |
household