The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1906-12-16


ern political graft, separate New Yorks
new plays OF this week; yet THE tdght
Eternal and 1.-The Man of the Hour
seem equally potent to interest the
same Broadway kinds Of people. Inc
public's theatrical taste, or liking. does
not run III the rut of one roadway only.
The principal characters In THE
Man of tho Hour" stand for New YORK :
Mayor Mcclellan, Boss Murphy, and
Next-to-Boss Sullivan; and when the
play is over the orchestra sends the
audience out to the tune of ''Tamma-
n.y." yet the author. George II. Broad
hurst, won't quite own up to the fden-
titles. He blandly remarks that they
are the chief magistrate and the po-
liticaI bosses of many an American
city. But Broadhurst is the humorist
who wrote why Smith Left Home
and 1.-THE Wrong Mr.. Wright How
ever 1.-The Man of the Hour" is in ear
nest. even when it is facetious, and Il
demonstrates that we are, at last, Will
ing to LET a dramatist entertain us with
such a problematic subject as political
corruption. But Broadhurst knows the
stage game, stacks his cards before he
deals. and wins by playing them tricki-
ly. His Mayor Mcclellan is young
man of wealth and social position, who
takes a nomination for office because
the girl of his heart taunts him as an
idler, and let's him know that he must
become a man of some account ere she
will marry him. That engrosses the
women ar the outset, and when his
way to fame as an honest mayor
makes him incur the girls disdain rs
seemingly dishonest lover. the women
take him to their sympathetic hearts
and his fortune as a dramatic hero is
assured
Then. too. the two Tammany exam
pies of CRATER are not horrifying exam
pies. They don't know that they are
bad men. They think that they are
practical politicians, even utilitaTian
statesmen; and when the Boss Murphy
declares that graft is universal, from
the clergyman who takes fee to save
your soul to the waiter who takes tip
to serve your dinner. there is a respons-
| i've round OF applause
Il owe a duty to the people" says
Mayor Mcclellan; they made me
mayor"
THE hell they did" the Boss Muir
ply retorts; twas [ made you
mayor"
The parquet laughs, the gallery wells,
| and for a moment IL seems as though
! the whole audience takes the boss view
| of (which is that the mayor ought 70
sign the city railroad franchise. which
will make millions for the boss and q
big Wall streeter, presumably Thomas
| ?. Ryan. But when the Mayor NcClel-
Ian of the play declares that the day NJ
franchise gifts to corporations is done
and that the day of square dealing with
the people has come, there is tremer-
dOuS demonstration Of approval
The Next-to-B Boss Sullivan is papu-
Iarized by Broadhurst. who depicts him
I. l., frN1 he Ef
| play is produced in a theatre owned by
! Sullivan. the delineation, presumably
is agreeable TO the subject of it. He says
that he holds the hearts and stomachs
of his BOwery section constituents be
cause he turkeys them in winter ana
picnics them i'm summer" In this stage
fiction. as in political fact, Sullivan is
| with Mcclellan and against Murphy
not because he is opposed to graft, but
because he doesn't like TO have Muir
ply, his political enemy, get an enrich
ing lot of Il.
But II you set out to duplicate
Broadhursts "The Man"of the Hour
or Klein's THE Lion and the Mouse
don't depend on graft politics, or trus
finance as the sole theme Of your play
! Proadhurst and Klein did not. They
introduced love stories not only, bu
brought them to the front NJ the begin
ming. and kept them there to the end
Rroadhurst ignores the fact that Nc
CIelIan is a husband. and makes him
bachelor with a private sweetheart, a
| we'll as public renOwn, % WIN or los
! through his probity or 'duDlicity in of
flee. And without his mimic affair o
love, his real affair of politics wOuldn'
: render him an engrossing stage hero.
, There is no star player in this drama
tization of Tammany politics. The un
known Frank McVickers gets into goo
view because his personality fits Bos
( Murphy. The well known George Faw
= cett gives amusing manners 20 Next
to-Boss Sullivan. Frederick Perry
an interesting choice for Mayor Nc
CIellan to the mowers Of theatrical AT
= fairs Perry has been for years per
: senator of character old men," fror
1. doddering Baron Chevrials to choleri
Sir Peters, and I don't suppose that on
I of his auditors in a thousand eve
thought of the possibility CT him as
c. good looking youngster. Few even c
theatre freQuenters are aware tina
young actors make the best old mer
g Here Perry steps forth as a ferviC
n handsome lover. 1t is told that q bun
c lesuue actress, being set forth on tn
stage in long skirts instead of her &C
: customed tights, was so ashamed tha
[ she had a conniDtion fit in the wing,
n Perry on the opening night seemed di:
, concerted by the lack of false age, an
=. shy to show his own individuality.
! wasn't till the second performance tina
I he got his balance.
= y X
T The company for the New York pre-
> duction of 1.-The Light Eternal is mad
ND in its principals of lea ding men an
Heading women from stock companie
r of other cities. This religious dram
h was written by Martin V. Merle, STU
!, dent at a Roman Catholic college i
California After being piously pel
$ formed by that scholastic institution
!. was taken up by resident company /
6 San Francisco, and the earthCual
J.. shook it off a stage whre it had stage
nearly three months. JIdythe Char
n man was it's Roman princess, who love
3, a Christian soldier, consigned MIN
r death in the arena when she learne
of his religion, became a convert to
e and strove in vain to save him fro
the death Of a martyr. Miss Chapma
s is a favorite actress along the Pacif
, coast but to 1.-The Light Eternal.
first Atlantic shore audience she was