The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-10-25

rice has prepared disastrous slump In copper. He invites Jerome to a midday luncheon. Jefome Is drowsy and distraught after a night of dissi- patton with Matrices wife. Maurice Is alert and eager for an astounding vengeance. He fools with Jerome like a cat with a mouse. ever purring. nev. CT scratching, until newsboys are heard crying extras about a panic in the stock market. The scene. as written by Henri Bernstein. the newest Of French authors to get theatrical dis- tfnction, Is an achievement in stage craft. Maurice's spell of emotional suppression and forced pleasantly ia followed by his outbreaking denunci- ation Of his ,wife's parAmour. and the wreaking of vengeancei through the depreciation of copper stoch. What matters 1t that King Copper goes down. too7 He IS savageiy gleeful over the ruination of his hated rival In hts wife's love. Only the two men. per- sonated by Gillette and Arthur Byron. are in this peculiarly rousing episode. which makes Samson" the season's best isgitimately dramatic succesa thus far in Broadway.
 Like previous dramas with plebtan husbands and patriciari wives at va- riance, but In which affinity must be reached at the climax. logically or otherwise. samson" has a fourth act weak by comparison with its Strong third The way to happy denoae-. mens is cleared by convincing the nifty bride that, after all. she has q donii- . nant spouse. and his belief that shes though going to & brothei with her pronigate lover. is not an aduitereas- Gillette has taken on. in this strange iy venEeful husband--a Samson who pulls down a stock market to destroy hia swifa's libertine, lover, even though he is himself crushed In the ruAn---a far bigger job in acting than he has ever before dared to undertake AS written, the man Is so brutaliy pas sionate in his love Tor ms oeiicAte wife that she Is in physical as well as mental dread of him. and will not sub init herself to him conjugally. I sup- nose that tile author meant the char acter to he wrose harsh ard brutal : Now. Gillette is essentially mental in his acting, and for him to express the ferocity of the man-as he does vivs idly--is out of his line ana q good achieyement--that of an aesthetic. col- legion portraying q roustaDout. Fred eric De Belleviiie. assigned to the role of humorous father, and doing well with t. would make nkelier samson. So you can estimate Gfllettes SKILL In making brain serve for brawn. The cast is noteworthy with Marie wan
 
 mother from conventiona1fty. Con- stance Collier. brought from London for the wife, Is a handsome Jewess with the emotional knaeks ? George Probert is glib as an almost slangiiy American young Parisfans ana Pauline Frederick ia admirable as 2 deini-mon" daine. Usually I don't list the per- formers of a play so much as that and I do 1t now to show the help siVs en by Frohman to Gillette to make sure hurrah for Samson.
 Nou, as to Louis Mann's attempt Tn .erha Man Who Stood stilf to, pull himself up to David WarAeld's level in ",rhe Music Master. as e German widower in New York sorrowed by a daughter. At the outset tho door or. a small jeweffy store in the Bowery is banged open. and 8 stormy girl whirlwinds in. She is -twelve-year- old in size, but double that age in vim. In a>frock short of skirts and sleeves. her bare legs and arms look like juvenile slim limbs; but she swears with full-grown oaths while. in a rough-and tumble bout. she and a tramp claw and clutch, fall down and get up, roll over and over. and so out as they came in. with the beginning and conclusion of the scrap invisible