The times., 1899-04-04
NationuI-"Nathan Hale"

Some day in the near future great play
will be written by Clyde Fitch. From the
almost hysleric enthusiasm OF an audience
which fitted the auditorium Of the National
Theater last night as an grange fits its
peeling the impartial observer would have
made the mistake of judging that the fu-
ture became a very contemporary present
with the Nat c. Goodwin production OF
Nathan Hale but to the watcher who
was impassionate as well as impartial the
wrongfuness of this verdict would have
been palpabie. Nathan Hale comes as
close to being a great play as The Moth
and the Flame" did to being a good one
and neither quite touched the mark. The
drama under consideration is merely such
an approach 10 that standard that through
the opera glass of enthusiasm it seems
within reaching distance.
The first element of superiority in Mr..
Fitchs offerings is their bold departure
frcm conventionaiity. With The Moth
and the Flame" the author challenged crit
icism by mixing his comedy and pathos
In the first act with startling disregard of
the dividing line between the two qualities
as well as by placing the action OF his
strongest scene in church. Although
in the presentation OF yester-evening the
heroine is permitted to have prophetic
dreams and fainting fits and the hero to in
iulge in toasts and reScuins women, Mr..
| Fitch now displays a great deal of this
same bravery by a somewhat unique
method of construction. by the novelty of
setting bis primary act in a schoolroom.
| by lack CT lines in the last, and even by
| taking for his principal character his
| toric parsonage around whom cling so
many poetic romanticisms as have been
manufactured for or by the Revolutionary
patriot. That several episodes in the
piece episodes ranging in Importance
| from n laughable lovers quarrel removed
/ from The Ensign" to a forced identifi-
| cation that has been used in Secret Ser
vice" and other such works-haye been
| quietly confiscated by Mr. Fitch is a fact
! that ceases to be deserving of mention
| when one has noted the marvellous manner
| in which they are handled.
The dramatist has supple" Nathan Hale
| with love story in telling the tale OF
that soldiers life-a proceeding for which
| the real martyr might or might not have
! been thankful according to his ideas of
I the other sex. At all events, Mr.. Fitch 5
action in making the subject Il pupil of the
| patriot schoolmasteT affords some of the
brightest and most wholesome comedy I'M
aginable at the beginning of the effort.
| After that first scene Nathan Hale" is
| like the close of day. 1t grows more and
more somber until history obliges the au-
| thor TO kill his hero in one of the most i'm
! pressive and stirring acts ever staged in
| Washington, made all the more effective
| by the lightness of the preceding incl
| dents-by the stirring situation following
| Hales volunteering to undertake the duty
| of IA spy: by the sustained interest that
; comes after his recognition by the man his
| sweetheart has discarded for him; by the
| yiriIity and power of his attampted eS-
cape, contrasted with the humor of the
first half OF the play even as chalk mari
| contrasts with the black of the board OF
which it is drawn. this parting and the eX-
ecution that the audience is led 10 suppos,
succeeds it come nearer to greatness thar
does anything else in the piece. After tn,
final curtain had been rung down OF
Nathan Hale" the audience was TOO mucl
moved to applaud.
Mr. Goodwin's work in the title role O
this wonderful offering is just what il
usually is-forceful and intelligent anC
conscientious. Although il is impossible
for the star to give 10 Hale the boyishnes:
in keeping with the part he does show be
coming energy and temperamentalness IL
his mpersonation. Infinite in its detai
and suggestion. his portrayal is sort o
combination of all his earlier works, an'
| vet perhaps better than any of them-mor'
amusing than that in Turned Up" NOR
ambitious than that of In Mizzoura.
tenderer than his "A Gilded Fool. NOR
stirring than his creation in Ambition,
and more versatile than his An American
Citizen Mr.. Goodwin approaches great
ness even as his vehicle does.
[ The supporting cast is notably good
Maxine Elliott, a wonderful woman, who's