The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1908-11-15

of "Davy Garrick" with the sexes re-
versed.
Discursive? Well, I'll hike back 10
Ethel Barrymore in Va scene of Lady
Frederick" that will be talked about.
The too young sutton is due in the too
old lady's quarters at 10 o'clock a. IN.
The audience sees a room with toilet
table at the center. A French maid
and an English valet are fussing about.
Ethel's voice is heard from an adjoining
bathroom Let in all the light there
is" she says. and the shade of a wide
window is raised. The sritor arrives.
SHOW the gentleman in-tell him l am
in the tub-ask him to please wait for
me-" He comes in and takes a seat.
Good morning, Lord Mereston-I'n be
out in minute" And she is. But not
the decoratedly-gown adornedly-
coiffured, score-and- five years-old beau
ty of the evening before, but two
scored reminder of that lovely creature,
wrapped in a kimono from her bath;
her hair hanging lank, not fiuffed, down
her back And her face, oh, her face!
The youngster gazed amazed. All its
tints were washed away. The pink of
cheeks and jet of eyebrows and lashes
were gone. The bloom of counterfeit
youth was displaced by the dull yellow
of over-maturity. But the audience
could have given that lordling tip.
My Lady Ethel Frederick hadn't de-
ceived him with her semblance of %
years during the previous two acts, but
was deceptive now in her false pretense
of 40 Therein lies the sure popularity
of this comedy here. This is not an old
actress with young makeup taken
off: but a young actress with an old
makeup put on. Rapturous applause
greeted Ethel at this entrance. 1t was
such a good joke, you know. All opera
glasses were clapped to eyes as the
actress seated herself at the toilet table.
The searchlight from a morning win
dow fell on her face. I wondered il she
asked herself: Shall I look like this
fifteen years from now?" Out in the
auditorium no such thought arose. The
absorbing sight was Ethel Barrymore
with her beauty of face effaced. The
suitor's ardOr slumped while she deftly
removes the false lines, tinted her
cheeks and brows, and fastened bunch
of some one else's hair among her own:
and when she said, kiss me, now, for
in a minute it'll be too late he didn't
respond; and she smeared her lips with
red paint.
The upshot in "Lday Frederick. is
heart cooled by English contacts, mar
ries the man who, though a sweetheart
long ago, is her antagonist in a duel
of wits during the action of the play
The most amusing and characteristic
passage, prior to that third act, is when
she. run down by creditors at Monte
Carlo. bets him that a pursuing dress
maker from London. with a bill for
Zoo, will refuse payment. The lady
wins by receiving the parvenu as a So
cial friend, inviting her to supper with
aristocrats given in her honor, and
finally bluffing her TO a refusal of a
proffered check as a personal insult I
wonder how many of the extravagantly
dressed women in the theatre were tax
ing that as an object lesson to be prac-
ticed
Blue Grass was Paul Armstrong;
first play and is, to date, his last Dur
ing evolution from a one-act piece that
was hardly more than a monologue to
full length drama, its author has
won success with two or three Of the
numerous plays he has found time to
write. Six years ago Armstrong was
an obscure journalist. I fancy that
The Blue Grass Handicap" as this
new drama of the week was called
when in its wee infancy, had been
written by him as d magazine story
first Anyway, it went through the
kindergarten of vaudeville before It
| served to introduce a budding drama
fist to New York. Mr.. Armstrong uses
his one-act play as the fourth of the
! five scenes which constitute the three
acts of Blue Grass" 1t seems here