The Salt Lake herald-Republican. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1909-1918, 1909-08-29
BY FRANKLIN FYLEs.

New York. Aug. 2S.-Get money That
is the moral taught by five of the seven
new plays that start the theatrical sea-
son i'm Broadway. How to get money.
That is the lesson given, one way or an
other, by these examples from sOrdid life
I'm America. The special point of two
dramas curiously alike seems to be: II
Hartman, or Morgan, or Rockefeller, in
vites you 10 a short cruise on his yacht
don't go. The possible consequences are
shown in the third act of The Dollar
Mark and the second act of The Ring
master" George Broadhurst has more
than once got in touch with popular taste
in melOdrama of crafty finance. He has
not convinced me that Hartman, or Nor
gan, or Rockefeller has used his millions
TO revenge the cold hateur of a proud
beauty by juggling a railroad, or giving
the stock market the rdzzle-dazzle, or
putting the lid of monopoly on a tract
of oil wells. But since the people who
most like this type Of play find the
enjoyment enhanced by Identifying char
acters as real men in the public eye,
spoUting the original of BrOadhursts vii
lain Is made easy by being narrowed
down to a few dominant financiers. The
quite angelic hero, possessing a mere
half-dOZen millions, may be almost any
one in this land of wealth. But the vii
lain, figuring his holdings in the hun
dred millions, must be somebody in par
ticular
The fair one spurns Hartman Morgan
Rockefeller villains proposal of marriage
a
Long Island, and accepts the mere half
dOzen-TnilliOns hero. Does II. NJ. r. show
his cards2 No. He asks the weekend
party TO make the trip back to town
on Monday in his yacht Though the
hero fears that the bank of which he is
president may fail and knows he ought
TO take a train, he cannot decline the in
VitatlOn when reminded bV his lady love
that the moonlight on the water will be
very beautiful So in the third act all
are aboard the yacht, while banks tOtter
Wall street is in a panic and the dickens
Is to pay generally BY orders the cap
tain says the machinery has gone wrong
The umpty- milliOn-dOllar villain inter
Tupts all wireless messages that lodge on
the craft. He has the hero in his clutches
But no. By accident, that splendid young
man gets an inkling OF the true state
of affairs. He remembers the financiers
abject fear OF death. Indeed. whenever
that great magnate hears death so much
as mentioned he lnvOluntarily shakes like
e jelly. Covering him with a pistol con-
cealed in a pocket, the hero makes Mr..
H.-M.-R. order the machinery 10 get
busy. A stock company i'm Washington
tested The Son of His Father last
spring. Renamed The RinEmaSter" il
was hurried into New York week be-
fore THE Dollar Mark" Ii was a race
for the Novelty Stakes For a whole act
of -tThs Ringmaster" is aboard q Yacht
where the hero and heroine are guests
of a mult-millionaire, where wireless
messages are delayed. and where finally
a good young fellow Of a few millions dis
Germs the plot OF the bad old fellow of
many millions in time TO reach New York
for fight. Yet I don't believe there IS
any plagiarism. 1t is coincidence only.
A Near Duplicate.
However. THE Ringmaster" is so near
" a duplicate of The Lion and the
Mouse" that Arthur Byron can hardly
keep them separate in his memory A.
thur was for long while the fellow who
braved a Rockefeller Zion" and now he
fights a Rockefeller ''ringmaster' He
was glib enough in his first PRESERVATION
of the newer hero bTt i'm a repetition that
] saw his mind reverted to the more ia
nlIar role, and ne became uncertain what
to say exactly when he faced up against
second embodiment of the money
power. Olive Porter writer Of THE
Ringmaster.' is a secretary to Wall
street operator with tickcrs clicking and
phones ringing in her ears. while she
ShOrI-hands and type-f!ngers her en-
ployer's dictatiOns. So the noisy cOmmo-
ton of money mart. confusing To nov
Ices, are clear to her. Naturally. she To-
Gates the most important portion of her
play III the midst of that sort Of turbu-
fence, with the old 'rIngmasIcr s. Young
antagonist dashing twixt tickers and
phones, dancing jigs of alternating glee
ana wrath, and everything within sight
or SOUND at the utmost stress and strain
OF crisis In cornering of the mar
ket. The actor memory served him <ar-
fectly as 20 all he needed to saw tn and
about his foe daughter-with whom, in
his fight against her dear father was hOr-
rid; but In the long spell of technical
stock talk ne was sometimes at fauIt
So was the audience except the norton
familiar with the processes of sDecula-
ton. OF course, the power Of RockefeIIer
was oVerJhroWn again all the same
The local, trausitOTy playwrights CON
tinue to hold their mirrors up to nature
as they find it degraded in the tenderl0{n
.Ihe only Law is a reiteratiOn of The
Easiest Way" II makes Just the same
sort of exposure Of shOWgirl and DrofIi-
gates in their personal encounters. The
heir TO millions ia this case though is
no degenerate pursuer Of pleasure and
he means no harm to either himself or
the chorus creature who fascinates him
but earnestly desires to marry her ava.
from the vicious life she is leading She
dOtes on a fellow SO low and mean that
he lets her support him from her wages
of both honest work and more renunera-
tive sin. She will be no ones wife bur
his
You chump." ne exclaims. adding
other epithets of contempt and iisdafn3
mot marry him2 Why, grille It WENT
rake no difference to us: Wen be To-
Rether some as now: and think Of the