The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-02-27
MIR. WOODRUFF LIKES US
AND LWHAVEN LIKES "BROWN
 OF HARVARD

to to Governor WoodrufT-Inside
 History of His PIay-A MoneymaI1er
 From the Start-First Anniversary
 Celebrated Monday Night-Opening
 Weeks stand at the Hyperion.
 MT. Woodruff waved a powder puff you do? You'd better not shake hands I'm all over grease paint. Merry work, this makeup business.
 Now, do you know, I'm mighty glad to see you? I'm glad to see any New HaVener; take it all in all there isn't any city that seems more like home to me. All my folks are Connecticut peo- pie, you know, l was born up in Hartford, and my family is Connecticut Yankee to the backbone, even if did go to college in Massachusetts"
 Are you any relation to Governor Woodruff" was asked
 Second cousin-about as near, you might say. as Tom Brown of Harvard is to his English cousin that went to IluSD DXs l HIS IS NTONGIlOI WOOQI All home town, isn't it? I thought so. Per- haps that's the reason have so many family friends here. This noon I was taking luncheon at the home of one of your Yale professors, and how do you suppose the hostess received me? Why, she gave me her hand and said How do You do, Harry?' I must have looked rather surprised, for she smiled and said, No wonder you don't recog- nize me. The last time I saw you you were four years oldn I found that one of her uncles, or somebody had been my fathers dearest friend, and they had in their possession the dads di- ploma. He was a Brown man, class of 5S and a lot of
 Somebody outside gave the door a couple of whacks and remarked Waugh -ka-baugh' in a desultory sort of way MT. Woodruff smiled re- signedly. :
 That's the muezin-can to mape-up. Don't let it bother you, Those fellows are always obsessed with the fear an actor may be too late-though I never was yet.
 Well, I suppose you want to know a little something about the play. Now, don't think I wish to disparage. Miss 1 Young, she's a tremendously clever girl and has written some ripping good plays since Glorious Betsy that Miss Mannering is following us to the Hy- Derion with. Is her workout at the time she wrote Brown of Harvard she didn't know a little bit about play writing. You ought to have seen that : first draught. MT. Miller looked it over and didn't see any hope for getting it into shape as play, but thought we might make an entertainment of it. There wasn't even that in it for me. read 1t over and groaned in spirit. Lord, lord,, thought has 1t come to this, that I've got to stand up on my hind legs before a pay audience and sport such piffle as thls?' Well, that 1 just shows what prophecy in the show l business is worth. MT Miller took the play back to the girl and told her what I he wanted. I contributed from my re- membranes of undergraduate days at Harvard, and between the three of us we turned out one of the brightest, best acting little college comedies that you can ever hope to see. So that was the l genesis of Brown of Harvard We opened with it at the Princess theater in New York and played it there for 300 nights straight, then carried it to Chicago, where we did a phenomenal summers business; carried it back east and repeated our premier success. Fin ally we fetch up at the Hyperion for a week stand, and if we don't establish 8 record in this town there'll be no vir- tue in history.
 Monday night was the first anni- versary of the play. In that time it has made over $44O0O clear, and the end is not yet Miss Young gets per cent. of the gross receipts, which is one of the reasons her friends see her behind a chauffeur in her own automobile.
 ''yos. on the whole Brown of liar ward has distinctly taken on with the public, There's something infinitely at- tractive about the little comedy that seems to make everybody love it. Some people when they've once seen the thing. can't get away from it at all I know one man that's been to Brown of Harvard fifty-eight times, and an other enthusiast writes me that she's lforming a matinee party to come up tc the Saturday performances from New York. Comparison are odorous,' as Mrs. Malaprop used to say, but ii Brown of Harvard continues at the same rate as it has begun, we'll have every other college play that was ever written backed off into the unknown region of the vastly beyond
 "The deuce! There goes the prompt CTS bell. Let me meet you over at the New Haven house sometime, old man; we'll baptize acquaintanceships.