The San Francisco call., 1908-10-05
"TfXAS' IS ENJOYED
AT THE AMERICAN
Many Strong Scenes Are Pre-
sented in the Clever
Melodranla
"The Devil" Now Makes It's
Appearance at the
Orpheum
By Walter Anthony

The American theater has S1.o0 worth
of vaudeville for 81 this week II s
another bargain day in Market street,
and the piece, if yesterdays audience
knew what it wanted, Will get Dig
play. The matinee crowd followed every
line of the story of the little Texas
girl and her cowboy lover; the in
triguing Englishman bent on robbing
the girls father of his ranch, and the
haifbeed Pasquale, whose mission In
life seemed to be to kill the hero.
While there are no stars in the COM
pany, the performance is uniformly
good, and the wild life of Texas, though
somewhat broadly, is interestingly de-
plcted The comedy situations are nu-
merous and well received, and there are
several climaxes which thrilled the
matinee audience and got the reward of
cheers from the gallery.
Miss Nora Shelby played the role OF
the Texas girl with breezy effect, and
was best in the lighter sections of the
book. Tank an "ld timer, WIS the
best of the party of players, though for
honors he was closely pressed by Ted
E. Griffin as Pasquale, albeit the latter
had to stand for the Kisses his villiany
earned.
There is not much else to tell. The
plot is not altogether new; it is some-
thing like Arizona" and The Virgin
ian and other western plays. but its
locale is new and its lines are original
and in many spots excellent.
For those who like melodrama in its
better aspects Texas was written, and
by them 1t Will be enjoyed.
Even the Orpheum. staid conserver
of vaudeville traditions, has fallen to
The Devil craze. / had hoped to be
spared another infiction, but it was
not so ordered, and last night had to
listen to the great trio from the last
act of Faust" sung by Marguerite.
Faust and two devils.
In spite of the violence to nomen-
clature involved in q trio which is a
quartet, the singing was quite good.
The Cadets de Gascogne are the vocal
lists. They give no other names, so
cadets they shall be. There are three
high soprano, worn at the base by
much flirting with high notes, but un-
impaired as yet in the upper tones. A
barytone with the quartet is good
vocalist and the bass makes a firm IL
not altogether artistic foundation.
did not hear the tenor. They sang
Strauss Blue Danube waltz with ex-
cellent ensemble effect, and were
hugely appreciated by the audience.
Although dressed in a sort of Spanish
costume, they did not sing the Torea-
dor song; and the trio from Faust"
as before said, was a big hit in spite
of the fact that they overplayed the
devil, Mephisto's role being sung by
bass and barytone.
The Saytons in a contortion act be-
gin novelty and end a sensation, if
not shudder. The spectacle of man
splitting himself in halves, walking
both ways at once, tangled about the
anatomy of another man equally dis
persed and scattered, Is wonderful, but
disconcerting. Some folk would not
care to see the vision on Sunday
night Their turn is very remarkable,
however. and cries for a technical ana
tomical discussion, not dramatic.
General Edward lie Vine is a Jug
gler. He carries a scene laid in fort
and arrives as an awful soldier. His
makeup was conceived in the dark and
put on wrong. Never did you see such
clothes. or such couRtenance. All
of which is delightfully."- at variance
with the deftness and cleanliness of
his act His Juggling with a cigarette
paper, cannon ball and a sledge
hammer-all reals remarkable. and
his stunts with a silk hat, a cigar-un-
attached-and his head and foot-at-
tached-are the best of their kind 1
have seen.
Closing the bill are Miss Belle Hath
away and her monkeys and balloons
in an act that was more of a success
last night than the trainer intended 1t
to be. Her "simian pets" cut up scan
dalously; ran off the stage and did
many other ludicrous things not down
on the program. The act, while good,
offers nothing in animal turns not seen
at the Orpheum before.
The 'Phantastic Phantoms," Miss
Vinie DAILY, Jane Coutnope and COM
pany and the Swor brothers are re-
tanned from last week