The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1908-09-27
NELODRAMA AND MORALITY
TIE FALSE ETHICS IN 1.-THE
FIGHTING HOPE"

- FIGHTING HOPE"
Why the Clumsy New Play ~ the etuyve'
"'sant Cannot Excite Admiration From
the ThougbtfuI. u Why Miss Bates
Deserves q Part Nearer 10 Reality,
In life thece ere two kinds Of morality
yours and mine. On the stage there
u a third kind. Very seldom at the play
do we have to trouble about the first two,
I In fact. II Ii a distinct advantage to put
them out Of mind. Otherwise the play
endured. Take "The Regeneration" al
Wallack's. for instance. Here. We ara
told, is Q fine moral lesson. As q matter
! o. fact. considered as reality. 'The Re-
generation" is the most immoral play on
Broadway.
A young man is depicted as . thug. q
, villain; but that Is hardly his fault. His
environment was too much for him
he is. however. "on the level with his
/. friends. he lives up to the code Of honor
: among thieves. he is true TO his woman;
he Is. in short. a pretty decent. honest
sort Of thug. But he gets religion. via
~ bbbttCflieut WoIhCI I" BCbttoDabBs ~
Don as he gets religion. as soon. that b,
an he becomes -regenerated.' he shovea
back his woman into the gutter, he ID
false TO his friends, he violates every one
Of the decent. honorable instincts that
hitherto had ma.e him . human being
And that Ia SURPRISED 70 be o fine moral
lessnhi'
At q performance of The Fighting
Hope" the melodrama at the Stuy-
vesant Theatre. 1t lie almost az essential
for enjoyment to forget the ethics OF
!. reality. For here again the play rests
one base at least Of Its structure on the
morality OF the stage. that curious CON
yonton of conduct that has for % long
compelled emotional ACTRESSES to bite
their lips and loosen their collars In on
effort to avoid following II. Poor things,
you weep for them not as stage character
but as artiste. aud when one OF them
chances to be 80 fine an artist a Miss
Blanche BateS you are sure that she loosenl
her collar In her own private capacity
not u Mrs.. Robert Granger.
In this particular instance the morality.
the convention Of conduct. Ia more flag
rantly Of the theatre than usual. Mrs
Granger has a husband. the father Of her
boys'-how the author dinned that phrase
into your ears a. II he thought you were
going to doubt the ladyl-who 10 In prison,
70 she and the excitable newspapers
suppose. for another's mans crime. That
other man Is Burton Temple. president OF
the bank In which her husband was
cashier. (She used to meet him years
before in the Exchange Building. adoring
from a distance. his name unknown; and
INC she looked right into bib eyes in the
~elevator.1 She comes to Temples house,
up the Hudson, conveniently neal Sing
Sing. In the guise Of q stenographer. 10
secure evidence II possible that will free
her husband-and "the father Of her
~boys'-and convict the other man.
Public sentiment works with her. The
case is rak ed up again by q District Attor-
pey bot after rich ~malefaotors.' and
Temple 10 indicted. . He needs proof Of
bis innocence badly. which he finally 30
cures In the shape of a letter written by
Granger that places the guilt without a
shadow Of doubt. (And in expressing
Tenn PIES Joy at this find Charles Richman
showed a horribly rash confidence In the
cohesion Of wood pulp. nearly tearing
the precious letter to bits by his gladstone
c%rumpting Of it, He puts the letter In
his safe. whence Mrs. Granger abstracts
IL and proceeds TO read.
OF course the contents il q knock out
blow Tor her. She realizes that .the
father Of her boys Is q thief, that the
man she would send to Jail In his stead
the man she ono adored in an elevator
u innocent. 1t 10 too much for one mind
TO grasp all at once. The fighting in
sftsct persists. the father Of her boys"
must still be saved. She h~ysteically
insists on that-and burns the letter.
80 far. 90 good But Mrs. Granger was
represented ar a woman OF fine instincts,
good brain and force Of character. That
such q woman should persist in cooler
blood In her false and immoral suppo-
sition that her boys name would be saved
or her boys happiness preserved-to
say nothing Of her own-by the guilt Of
two parents instead Of one IL a trihe
hard TO believe. Yet that Ia exactly what
this play assumes and what you knew It
would assume A babbling old house.
keeper. whose chief uss in the house
teens TO be In helping the plot along by
putting props under the tired long arm
Of coincidence. Greek choruses at this
point. telling Ars. Granger that OF course
she mustn't atone for her act By testa-
tying In court. that Of oourse she must
let an innocent man 60 to Jail TO save
her boys good name.'
It would have been much more sensible
had Mrs.. Granger here struck the immoral
old lady instead Of saving her blows
for'her cur Of q husband. who after all
was 1ths father of the boys But she
didn't. She listened to her. She ap-
peared actually In doubt not only as TO
which course she would pursue but
- to which oourso she ought topursue.
She was supposed by the dramatist to
represent q very pitiable object. because
on the n hand she felt IL right 70 save
an innocent man whom she had begun to
love and who loved her and on the other
she folt 1t her duty to ave her sons
happiness by building their future lives
on q structure Of lies and deceit, by telling
them their guilty father was innocent,
by ~oonoealing from them their mothers
own criminal act. And she reached a
solution not by reasoning the tangle out,
mot by letting in the light, not by any
real thought for her boys and their vel
fare. their genuine moral happiness,
not by any growth Of her own spiritual
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