The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-09-27
THEA TRICAL LETTER
 OF FRANKLIN FILES

naughty words" That is right. !. says teacher. but I must know what it was so as to punish Johnny" "well,' the youngster finally demurs. s.I can not speak 1t, but you name off all the naughty words you know, and I'll tell you when you say the right one.
 one Gus Edwards Che may and may not pc Augustus) has a music publish Ing establishment in New York, and one Ned Wayburn (who may and may not De Edward) has a school for stage dancing. Working together-why not The answer Is that School Days" aiter slow start. becomes a lively Ittle entertainment. Edwards is clever with tuneful songs of the sort called catchy" and here we ret a lot of them mixed up with Aaron Honman's fiimsy but bright and fun ny hbretto. If Edwards the composer runs out of tunes he simply can fall oack on Edwards the publisher for music. Probably he did not in this instance; but it really doesn't matter where the songs come from, as long as they are as good as the one about "the calender of love-" through which the pupils stroll vocaily; as another about "Sunbonnet Sue" in which the poys Kiss the girls beneath their pro- tectins sunbonnets; and as a third in Wnicn the. very pretty teacher sings
 Maybe 1t is a bear" to three bully little boys and two charming little girls. all dressed in their nighties.
 Wayburn's stage school devotes It. seii principally Ito children, and in
 schooi Days we see results of his laoors. Although most of the prin- cipals are small-size adults, the chorus ranges from tots of six to a majority Of nOXE and orfrIa al nE~
 my! the amount of vim they do put into their work, Wayburn has the knack of getting spirit and "team work" into their dancing. Stiu. and Tor the same reason, I heard q bored old theatrical cynic say: "I wish to goodness that teacher would dismiss her school and send those blamed children home." And a pious old Iady was shocked dreadfully when a boy. being asked if he didn't want to go to heaven, replied positively: with the aead ones! Nav" All the same. I think that "school Days" would make Methuseulah, Doctor Osler or any of those chaps feel young.
 Probably the four couples of negro boys and girls who sing and dance in "A Girls Best Friend" have been cas- fer to train than the ballet-chorus in school Days" for black and-tan skins cover more of born mimicry than pink and-w white; and I was curious to watch the first experiment, so far as know, in playing blacks behind whites on the stage. The authoress and star actress of "A Girls Best Friend" Lot tie Mortimer. however. holds herself aloof from the dark-hued portion of her company. and assigns their leader ship to a powdered pretty soubrette and burnt-corked comedian. Other peculiarities lead me to write about this new play more readably, trust than importantly.
 How about Lottie Mortimer. She said to herself, as I make a guess at it, that being a cut-rate star actress whose vogue was with the populace. she was up against problem hard to solve for the season of 190s-9. I take up her case to illustrate the difficulty encountered by those who, hitherto, have entertained people with more dimes to spend than dollars. A slump came to the gun and knife drama last season. The galleries joined with the parquets in taking gory melodramas as joke. For awhile audiences get their moneys worth of fun by treating he- rotcs as burlesque; but that form of diversion lost its attractiveness and the multitude went like sheep over a wall to vaudeville. female minstrelsy. moving pictures. anything else than the ''melodrama" that for years their coins had prospered. What was to be done? Four theatres in New York that were devoted last season to the Bowerys brand of drama are turned over this season to vaudeville, two are lifted to a good grade of touring plays, three are occupied by stock companies, and tenth, after a dis endeavor to resume with the rejected sort of meIodrama. will drop back to moving pictures. It was at this tenth tn eatre that Lottie Morti-