The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-12-03
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"The Virginian.o

"Ihe NIf8huhuus
 The last act of 'The Virginian" an- swered the question that was forming in the mind of the audience at the Mont gomery Theatre last night. What did you see in this play to go wild over?
 The question Is never to be asked. The last act answered 1t with fullness and with satisfaction. New York Is very often wrong, especially where musical comedies are concerned. but New York was right in the case of '"The Virginian."
 C. course Montgomery expected a vlrile, natural portrayal of The Vir- ginian' by Dustin Farnum. Montgom- cry people knew that MT. Farnum would stir their emotion and their ad- miration, as the son of the prairies, the loyal, strong cowboy of the free West
 Mir. Farnum could have done all this, as he did and his play would still lack the merit that should lift 1t to the worthiness of the praise that has been bestowed upon 1t. We feared this very thing until the last act. We feared that Mir. Farnum was going to do a striking and artistic piece of character acting with some intelligent assistants making an agreeable back ground and holding, as 1t were. the spot lights on him in the critical per- iods. The last act was stored and charged with human emotion and dra- matic interest.
 Being a book play defects were ex- pected in "The Virginian." Expecta- tions were realized. The audience went to the theatre last night eager to breathe the exhilarating atmos- phere of the breezy West. The West Is just now the literary fashion. Pres IL fo Oh ion. It Is an old fashioned magazine a too conservative magazine, that doesn't print ranch and mining camp stories A book with cowboys, miners and ranches is sure of a respectful bearing. The ranch. however, has the call on the mining camp. ..
 The President. in his younger days, discovered this well spring of literary interest, but since he found 1t the ground about 1t has been sadly tramp led by those who followed.
 Not that any reflection is intended upon the literary workmanship of owen Wister as clean an artist as ever grew rich from royalties on one of the hest selling books of the year. Mir. wister's experience has been too va ried. his perception too keen, and his literary touch too sure and delft to per init the thought that his best known work is tame and mediocre.
 Rut A book Is a book and a play Is c different thing. The charm and inter- est of d book Is in the series of inci- dents that make the story and illus trate the characters of those who live in It's pages. play Is a succession of climaxes, few in number, but each with its own particular strength. An incident is not climax, nor Is cli- max. an incident.
 And so the audience which went to revel in the freedom and breeziness of the Western atmosphere was disap- nointed. It was not there to revel in, except in that last act, although the audience. now and then, had a fieeting sensation that the real thing was crop ping out.
 An! but the last act was intoxicat- ing. There was humor. pathos, emo- tion and tragedy, dished up in a very cornucopia of dramatic riches. The audience laughed when the-cowboy or- ator presented the wedding present. If watched with eager interest the rounds of Trampas and his gang, paint inp the town of Medicine Bow red and hunting for trouble.
 The street fight between Trampas and The Virginian was an artistic tri- umph. It was the real, vital thing. There was the embarrassed meeting between two enemies, the hot words. the sudden flash of anger. the blow and the clinch of enraged men. There was nothing insipid or time-worn about this stage fight. The hearts of men and women leaped into their throats when the two men fiercely rushed into a clinch.
 Tears were in the eyes of the emo- tional during that strong dramatic scene where Miss Wood, the Vermont school teacher. throws to the winds the conventional possession of her Puritan training and pleads with her lover to leave and avoid the duel with Trampas, and tears were in their eyes when The Virginian turns aside his bride of the morrow, not that he loved her less, but he loved honor more. This