The Minneapolis journal., 1906-11-18

thru speaking tube in an apartment
house, but, after all, is it not I, nearer
argument aesna than 0 Blank NJ Verse verse 1 Isl na"
character study. She is not the time
honored ingenue of comedy, who says
silly things to make people laugh. Miss
Elliott gives her the light comedy
touch, but she also shows her the little
vixen ready, at word, to be trans
formed into q woman Of passion. In
deed, Miss Elliott's Cleopatra and Mr..
Robertson's Cesar are new portraits
matter Of fact, it would be carping
critic who could find any flaw in the
entire production, as to acting, cos
tuning, setting, business" or what
not. The mechanism is so perfect that
1t is inconspicuous, and the. audience
finds itself applauding the dialog rather
than the actor. Mr.. Robertson made
"a graceful Acknowledgements of this
fact in his curtain speech on the open
Mr. Shaw Of his (Mr. Shaw 's) triumph.
Now, since the play is the thing,
what is the plays Is it high COM
edy, tragedy Of blood, melodrama, or
extravaganza It contains elements Of
all these. The program styles it " his
tory and it certainly follows the old
chronicle history plays, 80 far as loose
ness Of structure goes; Indeed, the
act is omitted and no one misses it.
Almost any act could be omitted with
equal propriety, and yet each is capital
Of itself. The lack Of structural unity
was felt by one member of the audience
who remarked to his companion as he
was leaving the theater, "If the play
had been about Antony and Cleopatra,
there would have been something do
ing" There is no love theme, nor any
incidents and brilliant badinage into
an artistic whole. If the whole thing
is a joke--and there is always that
lurking suspicion when one is attempt
ing to analyze Shaw concoction-the
final touch Is given by a note appended
to the program which respectfully rec
,ommends to the critics a long list Of
authorities from Heroditus to Muir
rays Handbook Of Egypt
It is a rather curious fact that
Bhakspere g "Cymbeline and Shaw g
stCesar and Cleopatra are both sup
posed to occur in the first century, B.
g., but there the similarity ends. shaks-
accuracy. Shaw does. "Cymbeline -
Iis romance; "Cesar and Cleopatra"
q "history,'' if you please. The
Shaksperean drama Is a world master
piece, glowing, alilt, impinging on the
Imagination Of the superman; the Shaw
= Shaw, with this piece as basis-for
It is the only one in which he has had
the temerity to enter the Shaksperean
field--asserted that he could write bet
ter plays than Shakspere. In the deluge
of anathema which followed, Shaw ex-
planned himself in print and speech
until the controversy became so ludi-
'crously notorious that young play
wright, j. B. Pagan, wrote burlesque
about it which was given last year in
hondon at the Haymarket theater under
the title "Shakspere vs.. Shaw.'
Of course all Of this helps to adver-
Else G.. Bernard Shaw. Even as old
rare Ben Jonson was Enthusiastically fond
of talking about himself, so today Mr..
Shaw has the same habit. Another
trait which he has in common with
- the immortal Ben is his delight in
hoodwinking his audience, in slapping
the audience in the face, as it were. In
consequence, a Shaw audience is an
laughing all OF the time, but only oc-
casionally is there simultaneous rip
pie. NEVERTHELESS, his originality and
daring hold everyone. I had an illus
tration of this fact on election night
- when T saw Arnold DAILY in Shaw g
ssomedietta, 1'Hew He Lied to Her
HUSBAND at Keith s Fifth Avenue
vaudeville house. The audience was
tumultously excited over the election
it was not out for Intellectual amuse.
ment land yet, such was the candid
suavity Of Mr.. Daly's impersonation
and the :audacious brilliance Of Mr..
Shaw's piece, the audience was held
as in a wise. Probably half Of them
did not realize that this was a satire
on the authors fairly serious work,
Candida ''-and incidentally satire
on the New Yorker. The audience
laughed uproariously.
But, 'f better than Shakspere9'' Mr.
Shaw puts the question himself in his
introduction to "Cesar and Cleopatra, -
and, to be sure, he implies an affirma-
tive answer. Granting, for the sake of
argument, that his Cesar Is more vital
than Shakspere nevertheless the
mere juxtaposition Of these two plays
which we have been hastily reviewing
shows that there is really no compari-
son. Shakspere is to Shaw az Hyperion
to satyr.
Nevertheless, in this introduction to
HCesar and Cleopatra and in the
play itself, Shaw focuses our atten-
zion On glaring convention of the
shaksperean drama, namely, it's disre-
gard of external reality. The setting
Of HCymbeline' is the land Of make.
believe; the people Of "Cymbeline'
never could or would do the things
they are supposed to do. Mr.. Shaw 3
Cleopatra and his Cesar are as real
as Mr.. Shaw himself. To become un-
duly conscious Of convention in art
is to lop it off. The Shaksperean for
mula, therefore, no longer fits our
present civilization and literature.
Realism will be the keynote Of the new
historical drama. "The whirligig of
time will soon bring my audiences to
my own point Of view,"' says Mr..
Shaw, and think he speaks with the
voice Of prophecy; "and then the next
Shaksper6 that comes along will turn
these petty tentatives Of mine into
masterpieces final for their epoch"
PRESS AGENT YARNS