The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1906-01-28
BY FRANKLIN FYLEs.


away with Dorothy. AS a last resource
she throws his hat into the closet, and'
when he goes in to get 1t, locks the /
door and keeps him q prisoner. Thus
a scene that begins loosely ends WIN
a rousing curtain climax. There us a
later strong episode when, to save MN
(the actor Of him is old John w. Al |
baugh's son and namesake) she meets
the now vengeful Dorothy's exposure
Of his crime by not only declaring her
self the guilty one, but seeming to con-
Wet herself by trrefutable evidence
Mr.. Pollock knows washington by |
experience as a journalist there, and
don't doubt the fidelity Of his studies
of life among department employees
His representations of the ooardlng
house and it's inmates look photograph
ic and sound photographic. anyway,
his rlav is calculated to be both popu-
lar and rneritorious. I have been I'M
Just to give more space to one OF It's
bids for popularity than TO all OF It's
dramatic merits.
Contrary to custom, the maj act OF
"Grierson's Way" is its best II the
preceding three were equaHy ss
and strange, the play would Iast ten
months in use here instead OF only ten
DAYS. The portion fit to live shows one
lover of a girl persuading second
lover to kill himself In order that she
may deliver herself to third lover
IF that strikes you as singular propo-
sition, and you are going to read ABOUT
it, first fix in your mind these pTeilInl-
nary particulars, else you Will not COM
prehend the relations of the men to the
girl. To establish their personalities
with YOU. I will name them after the
actors. Henry Miller and Harry
woodruff, bachelors, and Guy Stand
ing, benedict, love Rebecca warren
with uniform ardori while she concern
trates her love so unwisely on the mar
ried one that she must have nus
hand right off. or her misconduct will
make her an outcast woodruff be-
comes a nonomaniac and talks wildly
of her sin and it's proper punishment.
Miller lapses into monomania, too, but
| its phases are oddly abnegatory. he
! is no more inclined than Woodruff 10
make an altogether wife of Standing
| mistress. but he is willing to be her
make-believe husband in time to pre-
/ tend also, to be the father or her oape.
Is that clear?
Now we come to the climax. Two
years have passed. All concerned are
woe-begone-baby excepted for Re
becca Warren hasn't learned to love
Henry Miller, as she would In con-
ventionaI drama while Miller is miser-
/ able because MS SACRIFICE lAclS t4OI EAO-
duced HAPPINESS for her. Harry wood
ruff has grown malevolent in his mad
ness and Guy Standing has been
/ wretched with an Incompatible wife.
! Suddenly the affair is shaken into
! change of complication by Stand
| ing's return from abroad to announce
! himself widower. At once Rebecca
and Standing are wild with a desire to
mate again, but they can't do it matri-
/ Miller a her initiative
| husband, is an obstacle. What more
can he do for her? "If you live"
Woodruff says to him, "Rebecca will
sin again with Standing and will hate
you; but if you die, she viii marry him
decently and hold you in fond
memory"
! Woodruff is a study in abnormal hui
mainly; manned by the loss of hand
and thereby ruined in his career as a
musician; crazed by that disablement
/ and his unrequited love of a. guilty
/ girl; a crouching, spying, hateful
creature, quite Ibsenishly awry men
tally and physically, clearly written
and wildly acted. He hovers over
the sIumped Miller like a hawk over a
chicken, ready to swoop down and de-
stroy him. AS he does it, when he has
cowed his victim sufficiently with ar
guments that he ought not to live, by
placing a vial of poison in his hand,
thus practically forcing him to suicide
Harry Woodruff had been envied by
many actors for getting the role of the
monomaniac in "Grierson's Way
Ever since Henry Y. Esmonds play
had been performed one afternoon in
London, some years ago, I had heard
il talked that New York managers
were doIts in business as we'll as
chumps in art, else they would fight
each other to get possession Of it. And
when Henry Miller, actor manager
announced it with himself cast for Gri-
erson, he was declared both courage
Gus and shrewdly calculating, for sue
, cess was sure. But he put another
play into rehearsal next day after the
production of the one from which 81
much had been expected by the dra.
matte culturists. It was dull until the
episode I have described, unsympa
: thetio even then and repelIant alto
gether. Esmond has written good
plays, like when We Were Twenty.
One" but he is no Ibsen.
No merriment is meant t.
be caused by ''Grierson's Way
/, and that is so notwithstand
5 ing the baby. which, on the open
. ing night, jollied the grewsomeness
No hint is given of the prenatal influ
ences perhaps the mother was affected
by dread that her child would betra!
its paternity by looking like its papa.
, or perhaps she was scared by a crasl