The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1891-02-07
TIE DIVINE SARAH
She Changes her Hotel, Dislikina
the Hall Boys Complexion.
HER PRESENTATION OF LATosC.
Criticised by Nym Crinkle-"A Strength Of
DelineatiOn Which Gives it the Charm +
OF an Entirely New Creation.o ~

| lSpecialto THE HERALD-Examiuer Disns+.h
NEW YORK, Feb. 6.-The divine Sarah
moves herself and thirty -four trunks from
Ine Glsey to the Hoffman house to-day.
ana ner managers are indulging in the hope
mat tney have permanently settled her at
last- When she arrived Messrs. Abbey and
Gfau informed her they had made arrange
ments for her at the Albemarle. She rs-
FUSED to go there. A suit of parlors wa,
nufrieuly secured at the Gilsey, and Mime.
bernhardt was installed there with dus
state and ceremony. Within two hours
she developed violent dislike towards the
pattern OF the carpet, informed the propri.
etor she didn't like the designs on his din
ner service, and encountered half DOZEN
illore Things which gave offense to her
supef-artlstlc soul. She objected to eyerv-
tnlng from the hall boys Complexion To the
pattern of the wall paper, and kent mn an
eternal flow of petty complaints Gallon
lated TO sour the milk of human kindness in
the BOSOM OF any hotel proprietor. She Was
nuhored, however, 10 the top of her bent.
| ana the proprietor did all in his power to-
sFatily her wh1ms. Two days ago the Hmit
vi l!s endurance was reached and Bern
nerdt announced she would leave the
shelter OF his roof at once To-day she will
occupy tne same suite at the Hoffman house
"hicn sue mad during her last visit to this
city. 1t Will cost 500 a day without meals
raul always has the same rooms.
Nyn Crlnkle thus describes Bernhardt
al the Garden theatre last night in La
Iosca" The story of La Tosca' is well
known in this city from the representation
o. o. Ghe play given by Fanny Davenport.
Inc performance given Of it to night at the
Garden theatre was superb. From the
moment the curtain rose, disclosing the
chapel OF st. Andrea, till it descended upon
the suicide of La Tosca as she Ieaped into
Cne 1lDer to escape her pursuers.
tuere was delicacy of touch. a
strength OF delineation which gives IL
Inc charm OF an entirely new creation
Mime. Bernhardt pOrtrays fear, disgust
horror, hatred and yin6ictive resentment
compressed into few seconds, by a clearly
marked whirl of excitement There can
De little doubt Nine. Bernhardt. if Judged
by this play, sustains the tension of inter
eSts wholly Oy her own nervous tension.
she certainly has little occasion in sucn q
work 10 go any deeper. Anything like the
equanlm1ty OF great purpose is absent in
the portraiture of La Tosca' The deadly
calm OF fate gives way to alterations OF
impulse. she will protest DENY. betray
decelve, love, hate and kill as the mood
SEXES her. Then she will Weep repent and
do penance az pietorielly as possible. She
is feline, vuIpine, yiperish. One can almost
near her teeth snap as she strikes Scarpia-
and her uphfted arm has the celerity and
deadly siuuous movement Of the cobra
The rapidity of the action does not give
time TO think
Whenever slow reflection comes it Will
De with the conclusion that all this is an
acute supert1ciality; that the audience has
been fascinated by the commissions of an art.
not Dy Its convictions. No criticism that
is just can take the full measure of Bern
hardt in La Tosca.' Such piece of cold
blooded romanticism keeps her talents ON
the bass keys of her wonderful gamuJ.
The vagaries of the Roman girl, whose
blood is italian and whose brain is Gallo
are at the best visual rhapsody of vice
She must not be measured by these notes
but by the full diapason.
mot the least effective of her many tours
de force was Nine. Bernhardt's scene al
the corpse of her lover. There were some
indications of physical WEAKNESS in her
voice and action, for the nervous strain
had been prodigous, but she carried out
the Greek idea OF pathos, and an irremedi
able and pltlless fatality ensWarthad the
whole of the concluding incident. The play
may be dismissed as unworthy of the hour
and to the discordant ear of lat
ter-day art, but the impression
that this singularly uncanny per-
sonailty makes upon Us cannot be erased.
At the close Of the fourth act, her audience
showed symptoms of having been stunned
Those who left the theatre after that act.
carried away with them the dull, confused
sense one retains after looking at a pro-
diglous monstroSity, and cot that restful
satisfaction that attends the contemplation
OF what IS normal and intrinsically beauti.
fuI