The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-09-13
ADJUSTMENTS.


 Fanny Rice in "At the French Ball."
 play that has been classed as a gen. uine metropolitan success wherever it has been presented this season is At the French Ball" which will be the at traction at the Jefferson theatre tomor- | row matinee and night. What lends in terest to this engagement is the fact l that the well known and perennially l popular comedienne, Miss Fanny Rice. 1 is the star of the production and will l positively appear at each performance in 1 the character of Nancy, the wife of Shoe l maker Patch, a part that was written l especially for her and which fits her like 1 a glove.
 Miss Rice, in addition to being cast 1 in a most congenal role, Is surrounded | by a notable cast, numbering people who 1 are well and favorably known for their metropolitan successes. The production l and costumes are all new, each having been made especially for this production at the best known studios and by the most prominet artists in New York city. At the French Ball' is styled as a comedy with music, but it is also a play that is rich in heart interest, teens with l sparkling lines and bright comedy situa- tions and above all, it is a clean, whole some play that Is close to nature in it's
  ence every minute the curtain is up.
 Nancy. the wife of the humble shoe maker tires of. her lowly lot and wants to see the world. She has heard many stories of it's wonders and beauties and leases her husband to be allowed to go on a trip to see them. Finally he yields to her persuasion; he gives her three pairs of shoes he has made, one for a i great singer, one for the wife of a rich cfn hTDl ur,l faffffa donna of the Manhattan Opera company, telling her to collect the money for them, see the world and come home again. Nancy goes first to the singer and rec l ogni2es in her Dolly Green who has been l telling her all the beautiful stories of the i big world. Dolly promises to show Nancy the sights, including the French ball. ] Then Nancy goes to the stock broker s l wife, and finds in her a girl with whom 1 she once worked. The young wife is in ! trouble, for she has written certain com promising letters to a foreign rascal and 1 he now demands a large sum of money under threat of exposing her to her hus- band. Nancy steps into the breach and l claims that she wrote the letters, thus saving her girlhood friend. But Nancy's , husband Patch has followed her and ! hears his wife confess her faithlessness. i He is about to denounce her when Nancy
 
 1 you fool. Don't you know I can't write"
 Then Nancy goes to the prima donna s, and so pleased is the latter with her that she dresses Nancy up in some of her fine clothes. One of the richest comedy scenes of the play is introduced here when Nancy impersonates the prima donna with a bogus duke and with the aid of a lot of friends in coarse garb, thwarts the duke in his plan to coerce the int J,Fy, sum of money. Lastly Nancy is seen at the French ball, and this once famous affair in New York Is depicted in a beau- tiful and graphic way. Several Broad way specialties are introduced here. in- cluding Miss Rices famous vaudeville act that created a sensation on two con- tinents. Finally Nancy is heart sick of 1t all and yearns for the simple little home. Patch shows up and she cries out to him in sheer joy and off home he takes her, there to live happily ever after.