The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1904-04-24

n Camille in America within the
half century. All possibility of
variation in that miserable sinner.
from the crude force of Matilda Heron
10 the subtle fineness of Eleonora
Duse, would seem to have been ex-
hausted long ago. Yet here stimuli
Laneously come Virginia Harmed and
margaret Anglin with newly devised
novelty. Neither of them gives a new
view of the character or presents an
Old one with distinction. and both.
therefore, are disappointing. for we
We're expectant. But they do ingen-
lously strange things in the scene of
Candles death.
The farewell words Of Miss Harned's
Camille have been spoken, she has
thrown Nichette's bridal veil over her
face in mute longing for what might
have been and has sunk limp into Ar
nand arms, when suddenly she takes
fresh and very picturesque grip on
ne. The cynic may say and with some
justice, considering how Miss Harmed
has already protracted the dying scene,
That she can't bring herself to stop
acting. But the impartial account
must tell that the odd innovation is
theatrically impressive. Armand holds
her on his breast. Her voice is almost
gone and feeDly she whispers a desire
and there she kneels. her head buried
low I'm her arms before a tall cross.
From church across the way comes
the solemn chanting of a New Years
hymn. Armand stands near her with
his head sinking humbly in the plea to
heaven. Thus they remain silent for
minute that seems five in its intensity
of silence. Then he touches her arm.
ever so gently, yet with a living hand
that sends the lifeless body backward
To the floor. With a cry he bends over
her and kisses the sOulless lips of the
first Camille 1 have ever seen die on
her knees.
Margaret Anglin's Camille dies i'm
bed The apartment is not so poor as
the formerly prosperous cOurtesan is
usually brought down to in her last
extremity. The bedstead, which stands
with il foot toward the audience. has
canopy of silk and pillows of lace. The
light is dim at first and we barely dis
Germ the woman lying fiat on her back.
She turns uneasily. means piteously
and aWakenS in pain. The watching
Castor gives medicine to her. tells her
that morning has come and opens a
window TO the daylight. Thereafter her
face, white as her nightrObe and the
bed clothes, is brightly illumined. That
Is a new. strange and awful moving
picture. And it is hardly more than 4
pantOmime with signs, gasps and feeble
outcrieS, but scarcely any articulate
speech. This Camille has no cough.
nor has Miss Harned's. No symptoms
of pulmonary consumption are apparent
In either case. The disease might be
any other OF a wasting nature. That
il the single departure from precedent
that both actresses agree in. Miss
Harueds debilitatiOn is palpably as
Sumed, for you can see the full blOoded
health that il thinly Overlays with a
pretense of illness. and she lets out her
voice in a way that bellies her asser-
ton Of weakness. That is preferable,
however, 10 one phase of the enerva-
ton which Miss Anglin's more delicate
physique enables her TO simulate. Even
before the death scene Miss Anglin has
kept her voice so low and faint that We
have had to call on our memories to
tell US what she was saying. Now she
alters the wording to make il fit her
changes in the action. besides weaken
ing her tones still more 10 indicate
deadly feebleness and she might just
as well be speechless.
Miss AngHn's Camille doesn't die
hard, but she is reluctant and very
very slow. She hugs Armand all over
the bed till the cOverlid and the pill
lows are fumbled. her hair and night
dress are rUmpled and there is a sug-
gestiOn of a wrestling match protract-
ed by the inability of either contestant
to force the others shoulders and hips
10 the ground all at once and thus get
the referees decision under the rule.
Still, / am bound 10 say that there is
nothing to ridicule. II is true. also.
that neither Of the new Candles causes
much shedding of tears. In the one
case her sorrows are too Electrically
expressed and in the other not theat-
ricaUy enough One is over demon
strative and the other is wearisomely
monOtonOus. We could forete1 Miss
Harned's vim. but the Intellectual
quietude OF Miss Anglin was a sur
prise. I believe she would have got
through triumphantly. however. if she
had placed herself under the control of
some wise director. Nevertheless,
when the end comes, which is about
midnight, she expires quite az original
y as her rival does a quarter Of an
hour earlier at another theatre. Her
body relaXes in Armand's embrace, her
arms drop limp. her head says forward
on his shoulder and we know that her
broken heart is at rest.
Henry Miller is the Armand 10 the
Camille of Miss Anglin. He, too, strikes
out for unconventionality. William
tourtenay serves Miss Harmed in that
singularly intense in a manly avoid
ance OF the customary mawkishness.
makes no far departures from the
standard. Mr.. Miller's position as a
Joint star enables him TO indulge him
self in oddities. He eliminates Dumas
text at various points. The most re-
markable of these is the omission Of
Armand's denunciaJiOn Of Camille at
the ball. He doesn't dash TO the door
way and cry, Enter ALL" nor ask the
assembled guests if they see this wO-
man and If they know what she has
done. That passage has been mall
treated so much in burlesques that Mr..
Miller may think its serious potency is
gone. But il is Armand's one electrical
speech and the audience misses it.
This is Mr.. AHlier's original substi-
tuition of a climax TO the act. After
Camille has maddened him by her low
ing lie that she prefers the Count de
Narville. in order to keep him from
fighting n duel. and he has misunder-
stood her with unconscious Creulty, he
quits the room in a frenzy. We hear
2 tumuit OF excited voices and he re-
turns in the midst of "a dozen men, who
restrain him while frightened women
follow in. he struggles like a maniac
in the friendly hands. breaks away
from them and then, without a word
Of the familiar language, throws the
handfuls of money at the fainting Ca
miles feet.
Horace b. Fry is a solid man among
fnanciers in Wall street and poll
ticians in the Union League club: and