The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1895-02-02
News OF The Green
Room and Foyer
Some Of the More Important Doings
of These, Our Actors.
SIGNS OF A HEALTHY REACTION
Belief Expressed That the Problem Play
and Tepid Farce Comedy Have Each
Reached the End OF Their
Ropes - Dramatic Notes.

If we are to believe the scholarly
critic of the Chicago Herald-to whose
opinion in this instance at least we
are fully prepared to shout "bravo!'-
there will soon be.a healthy reaction in
the tastes of the theater-goers of this
nation. The Herald opines that this
recoil from the nausea or the inanlty
of the problem-play or the tepid farce
comedy will take the form of a strong
counter current in favor of the melo-
drama. That. thinks our western
friend, sin lbs best estate Is the eX-
ponent of distinct human interest.
Even when degraded to the uses of SEN
sational realism 1t preserves recog-
nized dramatic form and invariably
teaches the important lesson that vir-
tue yields better dividends In the long
run than vice. 1t Is not the function Of
the stage to teach this or any other
lesson. but If 1t Is to be taught incl
dentally 1t Is much better that this
should be accomplished through a me-
dium exciting honest, sympathetic in
terest, than by means of those cavil-
ing epigrams and risque situations
which the followers of 1bsen and
Houptmann have found necessary to
their peculiar mental disturbances.
The lbsen cult. which has been en-
braced with such suspicious fervor by
not only Houptmann but also by
Sudermann, Pinero, Wilde and\Henry
Arthur Jones, not to mention Others
of inferior consequence, has driven
| from the theaters large contingent of
honest, right-thinking. and pure-mind-
ed people, who formerly attended in
search of refined diversion. Those who
| love to consider themselves advanced
thinkers, and are inclined to assume airs
| of superiority for the Indifferent reason
| that they can sit through relation OF
demi-mondaine infelicity without a
, blush, are insufficient in number to
make amends for the disgusted patrons
who have been lost to the theater. But
| If these worshipers at the shrine OF
Ibsen and his official following are
not conspicuously numerous, they are
sufficiently enamored Of their own con-
sequence and inspired BY belief in
their personal amplitude of superiority
| to noisily proclaim their new faith. not
forgetting to belabor those who do not
| agree with them. The drama, they as
sert. was not intended for babes and
sucklings or for the feeble and colorless
intellects that are so shallow as to de-
sire propriety and decency in their en-
tertainments, but for strong men and
women who can see soiled linen laun-
dered without an appeal to smelling
salts or disinfectants. 1t matters not
that the problems" they propose to
solve by means of stage puppets and
a strained sequence of dramatic events
are no problems at all, but self-evident
propositions known and read of all
men. They tickle themselves with the
fancy that they are calculating psyche
! logic truth, when, In point of fact, they
are simply feeding upon prurient
| fancy.
Mrs. Kendall is one of the most con-
spicuous among those who imagine
that the unhappy results of marrying
courtesan will not be definitely under