The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-12-23
THE "GREAT DIVIDE" MYSTERY
HOW IP SHOCKS AND DISAP-
POINTS, AND WHY.
Naked Truth and the Intellectual HinterIaDd
How New Themes Are Received by
the Old Public Bro Wnins and Mr.
Moody on sin-The Pointing or Morals.


the Old Public-Br Wnins and Mr.
Moody on sin-The Pointing Of. Morals.
Il is only In q reconcile sense that The
Great Divide can 10 called a mystery play,
but there Is no escape from the mystery
that hangs about its audiences. After 9
lukewarrn reception on the occasion OF its
first production in Chicago ii was damned
on the road as dull and rawly obscene from
Dan to Beersbeba, including Pittsburg,
Washington and way stations. IL lie said that
Mr.. Miller and Miss Anglin were thinking
hard OF its successor when they opened
in their little playhouse on Broadway.
But the theatrical scribes of this philistine
metropolis, who, when occasion prompts,
are tot homires. pronounced 1t In one voice
the rsrest Of all works Of art, a really great
drama. In its own case the great divide is
apparently the North River.
But there is a no less marked divide
within this great divide. According to the
verdicts Of its audiences 10 il the most
praiseworthy play Of the seasop, and also
the most to be condemned. OF every FIVE
who see it, at a rough estimate, two share
the opinion Of Pittsburg. And the carpers
here and on the oad are by no means oil
from the intellectual hinterland. My own
experience Is that a full half OF them are
people OF the very highest intelligence.
Meantime the Princess Theatre is nightly
crowded TO the verge Of the fire laws. On
a raw and rainy Monday night in the week
before Christmas. when theatrical paper
Ia An obsolete security. there was not more
than a single row Of empty seats. OF
applause there was almost none-scaroely
excuse enough for a couple Of PERU nctory
curtains. But while the action was in
progress the audience was tense with an
excitement such as only tho most absorb
Ing drama can produce. Here is a mystery
the heart OF which is worth plucking out.
The voice from the hinterland puts the
easiest riddle. No Sphinx could take out
honest life Insurance whose existence de-
pended on keeping IL a secret that the
high uSfhded American public denies the
existence Of such things as brutal drunken
ness and intended rape on this pinkly proper
earth beneath yon sky Of baby blue. There
should be nothing in a play, according 70
a popular verdict, which a lad oan't take
his sweetheart to see, a man his wife. Note
the fine assumption that all sweethearts
are imbeciles and all wives are prudesl
Against stupidity, as Schiller sang, the gods
themselves contend In vain. A large part
Of the people VIC abominate THE Great
Divide" are those who ave been encour-
aged In the playhouse 20 be imbeciles,
prudes and the natural protectors OF such.
A theatrical reporter was lately asked that
dear familiar question. What Is tho best
play In town." When he answered eccord-
ing TO his conviction, his interlocutor re-
Piled: Il dont like the subject. In such
matters / follow William Winter IL
was useless TO retort that Mr.. Winter him
self has found" the Great Divide Of might.
The one thing the conventional ~playgoer
nay be relied on to resent In the playhouse
is new truth, especially whsni il is-as truth
proverbially should be-naked. A favorite
managerial saying 10 that folks like
those plays most which show them them
selves. But not their true selves. What
they delight In is themselves well dTaped
In beautiful garments and illumined by the
endearing aura OF the limelight. The his
tory OF the stage for twenty-five hundred
years Is replets with examples.
Time was when even "love interest was
taboo. Shocked at the romantic themes Of
Euripides and his depictions of intimate
and imprisoned love, Aristophanes, in his
Frogs no doubt voicing a popular pref
udice, evoked the ghost Of Eschylus from
hades and made it declare:
But no sthencbo,a I've given you. no; no
Ph@dvo. no heroine strumpet;
IL Nv once put a woman in love in one act OF
one play. may my teachings be scoutedi
But. as Prof. Gilbert Murray points out.
ClytDmnestra in the -Agamemnon- is not
only false to her husband but, TO any
subtle reading of the play in love with
Egisthus. She probably differs from the
women OF the earlier poets in Just the
same way as Phedrd differs from her."
In such matters the whirligig Of time
brings about its revenges. The generations
after Artist ophanes idolized Euripides for
precisely the things that shocked the gen.
Grafton which Witnessed his innovations.
Moliere had a similar experience. Mr..
II. C. Chatneld- Taylor's scholarly and
delightful biography, which I have just
been reading, wildly recalls the rage Of
affronted piety which greeted his lashing
OF the false devotee in -Tartune" and kept
it five years of the boards, in spite of the
authors specific, explicit and perfectly
just contention that il was aimed only at
hypocrisy. and thus was of service to all
true religion.
Sometimes the objects Of popular abomi-
1bAOh "iO kiObCoiuVAJ !" TUT dOC-
AIDES, almost centuries, no French Play
wright dared TO put a bed on the ste ga
OF the Theatre Francois. even the most
deoorous and conjugal four poster. when
the innovation was mt de it called forth a
storm OF prudish protest. Less ths n a
decade 9 a similar cutlery was raised here
at Clyde Fitch's realistic bedroom scene
In The Girl and the Jud ge.' To-day the
difficulty is TO keep playerfolk from putting
in beds where they don't belong. When
Mr.. BeAsco does not write a play with a
great scene centring in a mattress il is a
case to be chronicled. Mr.. Sothern and Miss
Marlowe represent the bri.al chamber OF
Romeo INC Juliet in unfinching detail,
thaugh IL Is manifest to any student OF
Elizabethan stage management hat Shakes
peare never contemplated any such dis
i~llusioning actually. And now the bridal
bed OF Romeo and juliet has made its way
into grand opera.
For il there is nothing quite as revolving
to b popular IDEA of seemliness as naked
new truth, there is nothing as dear 10 il