The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1905-01-08
LABICHE AND LAUGHING GAS.
ROMANCE or THE ORIGINAL OF
FITCH'S "COL SIN billy"
pespised ny the Public He Conyulsed.
Lahiche was Discovered in His OLD
Age and Elected tn the Academy-JIhe
Present play Ills Masterpiece.

Lahche Was Discovered in His Olu
Age and Elected to the Academy-JIhe
9 Present Play His Masterpiece.
Mr. Clyde Fitch mus, be having grim
little laugh all by himself over the fierce
denunciations which one faction Of his
critics visited upon Cousin Billy IN
his own person he has long been acous-
toned TO being called cheap. inane and
vulgar. but this time the real butt Of scorn
a. playwright who for over quarter
of a century has been accepted by the
foremost critics in all countries as at his
best. master Of the gayer phases OF
comedy; and the play which IL now the
occasion of 80 much wrath has been uni
yersally acclaimed IA ono OF his bare half
dozen masterpieces la 1t possible that
Mr. Fitch has put up a game on US allf
On the programme he said that Cousin
Billy" was adapted with many liberties
from a play by Eugene Labiche Those
who knew lie Voyage de NJ. Perr1chon"
could only take this as an apology for
having tampered at all with masterpiece,
but II sounded very like claim OF ongi-
nality, and the claim was substantiated
by all the superficial aspects Of the piece
as Mr.. Francis Wilson produced lit Was
60 very much Labiche and IL seemed 30
entirely Fitch Now LAbiche wrote In
all over leo plays. nineteen out OF twenty
of which are a negligible quantity. and
could only be made presentable In an
American adaptation by an entire rewrit-
!nn. Was it quite fair 10 set us trap
70 betray our ignorance' II must be
added, however that a working majority
of the first night audience laughed
heartily. and pubGely confessed to hav-
Ing done 50 the next day l. it not indeed,
one Of the qualities OF n comic master
piece 10 he amusing? Cousin Billy
IS already one of the few laughing sue
cesses of the season
One Of the most confusing factors in the
problem was that Fitch and Lahiche
are so very like. In the parodic words
Of j. X. s.:
They so like. 80 very Ike
know not which IL lkcr. he or him.
Az the present stage OF the game, how
over. the palm Of likeness must be awarded
20 the Frenchman Fitch has not yet writ
ten l6O plays and he has not yet been ao-
claimed master At Fitch's age how
ever. Labiche was in much the aame plight
Living in the era that saw the invention
Of annsthetics he was dubbed a manu-
facturer Of laughing gas-and so disposed
of critically. The gay public, little skilled
IN subtle distinctions finds II the most
natural thing in the world 10 laugh at the
man hecause It has laughed at his plays,
And the eolenu academic critics are equally
Y.one 10 acclaim as a masterpiece only
-7hst leads ic borsdorn The common
renss Of botn II ,tions was put 90 sleep
'1y the laughing gas = Labche The
willow G.. sunih-r ia ..ofter after a fa4gty
at Of .nerriment. VINE the fatigue a. turcad
gpprcoie..cr. brilg- the conviction that
bomehow or ether Z must nave been worth
while Ho,r nnhnY classics are Their whose
rf ses on the shelf would be forfeit il any
body ever read tneln SO abiche, the
most rpodest 81 men lived and wrote and
retired 20 his estltes IN the country. esteem-
ing himself only manufacturer Of laugh
ing gas.
In his French Dramatists- Brander
Matthews tells pathetic story OF how this
came about. One time in the height of his
powers. Labiche was in consultation with
Offenbach about the musical setting OF one
of his plays servant brought in a card.
Ofenbach tore it up and said he was not
at home 10 the caller. The visitor was the
aged Scribe who wanted Ofenbach TO put
one Of HE plays to music But | won't
do it the composer added roughly, -Old
Scribe is played out Labehe promised
himself on the spot that he would never
lag superhuous on the stage where once
he had commanded homage. So when the
failures which are the lot Of all rapid and
Secund artists exceeded the successes
he remembered his early promise 10 him
ltelf and kept it.
We might all he still sleeping under the