The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1908-09-13
BY FRANKLIN FYLES.

New York. Sept. LILLIAN Russell
and Margaret Ellington. beauties blonde
and brunette; Hattie Williams and
Gertie Millar, American and English
singing and dancing jolliers; Mary
Mannering. sweetly suave. and Carlot-
Ia Nillson. wilfully eccentric-those six
actresses burgeon forth this week in
Broadway without one mans name
printed in the bills as big as theirs.
Truly. women have all their rights on
the stage. and perhaps little bit more.
And the actress in the half dozen least
deserving to have all the eyes in a the
atre fixed on her at the outset of new
play got that distinction by going to
bed. What actor on earth could hold
rapt attention while he shucked his
clothes and shucked himself away to
sleep?
X * X
So give precedence to Carlotta Mil
son in Diana of Dobson's." The first
sight in this play is five beds arrow in
a room nearly bare of other furniture;
yet 1t isn't a ward in a hospital. nor
a dormitory in a reform school. but a
sleeping chamber for saiesSirls in a
London department store, where the
treatment of employees is much harsher
than, in American retail marts. The
time is nearly H. at the stroke OF which
l.
the five girls hurry in to save them
. selves from tardy fines. The first is
beyond girlhood. and ripples of laugh
ter accompany her taking off of gown,
shoes, hat and half of her hair. The
second is no younger. but jollier. and
increased meriment follows her more
blithesome tossing off of the same
things. A third intensifies the engross-
ment by shedding her petticoats, also,
as she sits on the edge of her bed, like
the others. and chatters with them. A
fourth bushes the faintest hum of COM
ment, and focuses all glasses; for she is
young, she is pretty and she takes off
every scrap of day clothes, puts on her
nightie, and gets under the coverlet.
She does ii, though. without denuding
aught save her arms and feet. vouch
for the curious fact. too. women were
more openly keen than men TO watch
the deft process. Why?
Notwithstanding its starting and
startling scene OF girls undressing
ical purpose by Cicely Hamilton. an
English woman of advanced ideas
Z Moreover, its chief actress. Carlotta
Nillson, seems to have taken that art
idealist Mrs. Fiske. for a model OF
dramstic endeavor. Carlotta is the
fifth salesgirl to turn in for the night
She is grouchy. The bondage of serv-
ice in the Dobson store has made hel
rebellious. AS to her disrobing, IL takes
off no more than the waist of her frock;
for something happens that keeps the
girls from saying their p-ayers-if in
deed they have the praying habit-and
tucking themselves away TO sleep. Di-
ana gets a letter saying she has in
herited an English sum equal TO $1,000
and she declares that she will be a lux
urious lady as long as her legacy lasts
A boss woman comes in to order the
lights out at IL. as the rule is at Dob
sons. Diana cries. Damn Dobson.
and the curtain shuts in the salesgiris
ere more than one of them has her pet
ticoats off.
The remainder of the play shows how
Diana spends the $500 in the guise OF
a wealthy widow at an Alpine resort
where she has the time of her life; and
when her money is gone, her return tc
London, where she sinks through ill
ness to the depths of poverty. Mean
while, toppy young idler has become
her beloved lover. The finish is on
London bridge in a night three months
later with the former idler lodging like
a tramp on a bench, because the girls
taunt-that ne couldn't earn a living
has melted him 10 test the question in
vain: and she looping on the same
hard boards. too. hungry and forlorn
from lack of work. They compare
notes of misery. agree to join their mis-
fortunes In possibly alleviating we'd
lock, and the curtain falls finally on
their breakfast OF coffee and, cakes
bought with a shilling borrowed from a
kindly policeman. Diana of Dob
sons" has been recommended highly to
London by the authoritative Lena Ash
well, but here Carlotta Nilsson doesn't
carry the play along.
A. X
The opening disclosure in Fluffy