The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1907-12-22

the terrifying music OF nSht opera
seriousness to ragtime. In this latest
version. produced nearly "a year ago
in Chicago, and still doing so well there
that a second company had to be or
ganized for New York-the robbers are
! so tanned and rag-tuned that one can
not be sure they are outlaws at all.
And the plot is wholly omitted. Moth
ing is left of it to interfere with rapid
succession of songs
Many of the songs are not new; none
of the most applauded is; yet these
same ditties failed to find favor for
Mile. Sallie.' The secret lies in the
changed way of singing them. One is
called Life Is a Seesaw." 1t was
obvious a year ago that the words
were no more fatuous, but the tune a
/ deal more engaging than the average
of this modern type of sentimental bal
! lad. which is not so doleful about love
! as old songs were apt to be, but takes
/ it cheerfully with a swinging rhythm.
| But it was sung by an awkward young
man and a foreign donna, who gave all
/ her attention to correct voice produce
ton. The young man is the same now,
but the girl is bright and smiling, and
she sings without worrying her face
into grimace. That song has been
moved along from an inconsequential
place in the course of the first act
to the last before the finale; and it has
the advantage of coming after one Of
the funniest. scenes of May Vokes and
John Slavin, who deliver the humor of
the entertainment. II is returned to in
the finale after a brief scene, in which
little Slavin comes TO elope with Miss
VOkes. He puts a ladder against the
house and climbs it, gently tapping onto
his lady-lOve's window. But an irate
old night-cdpped woman puts her head
out instead. Very civilly the young
man apologies and moves the ladder
along to the next window. After this
the song is repeated, with more than
the former number of strOlling couples.
Six sprightly girls dance to it, and
there is a f1ower-decked and electric
lighted seesaw, and after the cur
tain has fallen girls holding dark Ian
terms open to their faces pass in front
of ii with an oddly pretty effect.
= = x
Another song is similarly rescued
from its disregard of a year ago, when
an inconspicuous comedian sang it in
an inconspicUous place. Now Slavin
has it, with the whole chorus and six
good dancers to aid him, and it is
placed close to the climax of the play.
1t is in bantering praise of Wagner,
Verdi and Mozart, introducing at the
end of each verse a few well-sung bars
of the, Lucia" sextette, or the pill
grims chorus from ''Tannhauser," but
concluding with a lively, tunefui re-
frain, admonishing makers of musical
farces to provide a closing air that
the people will whistle as they go OUT"
and the air is so catchy that they do,
thinking that they want to return the
next night to hear it again. All this
proves that these hodge-podge shows
must not be thrown together so care
lessly as they look to be.
x X X
Intellectual drama is on the upward
incline with various kinds of New York
ers. 1t must be so. A play each by
Henrik Ibsen, George Bernard Shaw
and Hermann Sudermann is put on our
stage this week as money-making ven
lures. Ten years ago, even five, none
of those authors was thought of as a
reasonable business risk, and all were
introduced here at hOpelessly expert
mental matinees. Now we have "A
Dolls House." Candida" and Honor
in the evenings, and 1 guess that al
are sOrdidIy profitable. And their sue
ceSsful appeals are made to sections
Of the populace ranging, so far as dol
lars are concerned, from two down to
a half. ALA NazimOva, the Russian
actress who speaks English so we'll
that you can almost understand it, is
a fad of fashionable women, and Just
why I can't tell you, as her person.
atty and her art seem to be above the
appreciation of frivolous minds, yet
yesterday I saw women-nOt men, mind
you, but very smart women-buying
seats from sidewalk hawkers to see her
in "A DolPs House" Why, even Mans
field lost courage with that example
of Ibsenian realism, and relegated it |
TO matinees, with his wife in it and
himself out of it; and such brave ven |
turers as Mrs. Fiske and Miss Shaw |
used it with much risk and no profit. |
while now it stays a month in a Broad |
way theatre.
Admitting that Nazinfova, depicting a |
silly doll of a wife IN an Ibsen play.
with altogether unlovely characters |
around her, is merely fad of the fash |
ionable groundlings, what shall we saw
of a Shaw piece of satirical whimsical |
ity, that was first performed here on 1
an off afternoon for foolery, but now
given quite in the way of theatrical /
business? Did any echoes of the Ar
mold DAILY ado reach you? DAILY is an
clever young actor, who
aspires to be famous; and he under
took to duplicate Mansfeld's idiosyn-
cracies before he had earned Mansfeld's
degree of authority. Daily obtained suf-
fcient backing to lease a tiny theatre
around corner from Fifth avenue.
close to Delmonico's and Sherry's, with
the homes of seven multi-millionaires
only a few hundred feet further off.
and his scheme was to establish in New
York a counterpart of the Paris Theatre
giving short odd plays, and
beginning at 8 o'clock, so that people
who dine late might devote the last
half of an evening to his shows. He
figured il out beforehand as money
making enterprise in high-browed
dramatic art. The rental of the pocket
IF a theatre was only $500 a week He
tut off S175 in expenses by following
David Belasco's example of doing with
Jut an orchestra. BelascO has abolished
music at both his theatres. When the
curtain is ready TO be lifted deep
-Oned bell strikes once in the lobby;
IND then q chime underneath the bands
Usual place. now covered with flowers
md illumined. is rung long enough to
permit the Ioungers to get back into
heir chairs.
DAILY tried a still more curious ex-
leriment He did no advertising in the
newspapers. but depended on circulars
nailed to people whose names are I'm
he socially who's directories. His