The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1906-02-04

cana were advertised for in the news
papers, and the specification was that
they must be superlatively beautiful.
AS the call was placed under "Amuse
ments," not Help Wanted" nor even
Personal" it was construed to be
meant to bring gOOd-lOokers into the
auditorium rather than what ShOWmen
call gOod-lOokers on the stage. The
special reason for playing that trick
was that ''Mexicana" would have to
get along without blondes, all its girls
being Mexican SenOritas or squaWS.
Faces that are olive or reddish, and
Overhung with black hair, must be pos
itively beautiful if they are to seem
more than merely pretty on the stage.
Did you ever see a chorus Of toddling
japanese maidens in 1.-The MikadO''
that was seductive? l don't believe
that any applicant was accepted for
''Mexicana" at the $50 per week Of
fered, instead of the customary SIS, for
the accepted dozen are not more beau
tiful than the rest of the fifty at any
thing like a ratio of fifty to fifteen.
However, they are fine examples of
fulvOus-hued beauty and a welcome
change from the light pink, white and
yellow bleaching and painting that we
are accustomed to.
Maybe the reader wants to ask if
there isn't in all the Broadway thea
tres, this week, a salient subject Of
more dramatic import than the beauty
Of some show girls. Further along 1
will tell about four noteworthy short
plays at the Actors Fund matinee, but
the only fulI-length one is this comic
opera, Clara Driscoll who wrote 1t, is
a Texan who spends portions of her
winters in New York. She had seen
the picturesqueness of Mexican life;
also, the sore need of novelty in musical
plays; so she undertook to put into
Q - h1I
characterized her novelties. She shows
to us at the beginning a market place
in q Mexican village all alive with
vendors and buyers of flowers and pot
tery. uulCue and tobacco, all sorts of
country produce, The villagers are in
g9y Spanish apparel, the Indians in
Their native attire ali indOlent with
the Mexican lazy spirit of manana.
Thus the action is started with show
. mess that means some hing in particu-
lar ana Il IS ended quite as admirably
with the songs and dances of a fiesta
in garden Of tropical plants.
The understanding is that Miss Dris-
coll capitalized her play, and at a
heavy outlay for no stage mounting
this season has been more carefully
correct regardless of cost. Yet 'MeXi-
cana" with all its originality of scheme,
has been COnventiOnaliZed very dam
agingly. Robert B. Smith, one of those
Smiths who grind out eXtravaganZas
by turning the crank of a machine, has
written into Miss DriSCOlPS librettO
Wall street speCulatOr, who goes to
Mexico to look after a mining project,
loses his last dollar in it, is forced to
impersOnate a bandit leader of an in
SurrectiOn. and has the same kinds Of
! in-luck that have befallen American
/ comedians in foreign countries ever
since Francis Wilson, James 7. Powers,
Frank Daniels and Jefferson De An
geleS began to make audiences laugh.
In this case, Thomas Q. SeabrOOke is
/ the misadventurer, the only character
in the play not native Mexican, and all
( the more homogeneous because he jokes
about New York affairs in the broad
/ brOgue of an 1riShman wearing Done
/ gal WhiSkeTs. Raymond Hubbell has
made the music with a very slight re-
gard for the Mexican nature of the
subject, and most of the tunes, like the
verses. "are native here lin the Ten
derlOin) and to the manner-bOrn. /
/ am not saying that the work of Smith
and HubbeIl is of itself bad, or that
/ 'Mexicana" could live without it; yet
/ it does seem pity that Miss Driscoll' 5
artistic intentions have been disregard
/ ed for the sake of popularity.
/ Why wasn't Ruth Denis of Jersey
/ City-stage name Rahjaka, and right
/ from Hindustan-hiTed for "MeXlcana
/ to vfvify the lethaTgy of the MeXicans,
/ instead of that Familiarity cake-waIk
/ little imp, Blanche DeyO? 1 think of
Ruth because last Sunday nlght
/ q thousand persons went to see
/ her dance and didn't sec
/ her. because it was feared that the
police might be melted by her pOr-
/ fCrmance to enforce the Sabbatarian
! law. But she had danced at private
! entertainment given by Mrs Hamil-
! ton Fish, and subsequently i had seen
/ her exploit in Rowland HintOn's stu
/ do. Ruth dresses for a Buddhist wor-
/ shipper; that Is, she wears nothing
! else in sight than a sCant and sleeve
| less Jacket that reaches but a little be-
! low her anIxIes-when she isn't whfrl-
! ing it after the fashion Of the dervish
| dancers, whom you may have seen
/ with oriental athletes in the Barnum
! shows The section of Ruth's body
! constituting her waist is bare-not
! falsely with pink webbing, but really
with skin-tinted tawny. So are her
! feet and ankles also, as revealed when
! she whirls her skirt out high and wide,
/ her legs are nude to somewhere above
| the knees. Now, If Ruth had been IN
! covered in ''Mexicana' like that, but
in the gufse Of some Aztec princess in
! a rite Of sun worship, Miss Driscoll
! couldn't have complained or her-at
/ least, not for destroying the atmos-
! phere of the play; and I guess the
! audiences wouldn't denOunce the
/ nudity of art in way to depreciate
! the box office receipts. AS it is, Ruth
has probably gone to waste for stage
! purposes.
Once a year and for one afternoon,
/ Daniel Frohman, president of the
| Actors Fund, brings the warning the
| atrical managers together for charity s
| sake. This seasons matinee was re-
/ markabIe not only for the celebrity of
! the performers, but also for the new
matter which some of them intro
/ duced. And a tricky connection was
/ made between two short plays which
! Margaret Ellington and Blanche Bates
used The woman whom Miss Hing
/ tor personated in "a Maker of Men, y
/ written by Alfred Sutro was a young
wife and so was the woman whom
! Miss Bates persOnated in My Aunts
! Advice" rewritten by David BelascO
] Miss Ellington has more of fresh,
wholesome, vital beauty, I think
| oil,