Los Angeles herald., 1909-09-14
THE CAST

1.-THE General" little brother Of Tom anu
Adele. e................... Donald Galiaaer @
Group. .................... ~. ~ N0"9tNA
Adele Randall. ll.................M May Buckiey
Madame Davezac. ........... Maud HOsioru u
Anne Pleyden. :.......'...' Nora sheipS ''il
Crosse Pouette, IA slave. .,..... Ruth Lloya
NANNY Lima Jane hendflck
a Plantation negress. ...... Gladys <nlLhihub
Louisiana in 1882. The action is from sun
rise to sunrise.
BY w. HERBERT BLAKE
Two picturesque and fascinating
gamblers made their dramatic bow 10
Los Angeles last night. At the Audi
torium appeared Jack Brookheld; at
the Mason Cameo Kirby. The hrst Was
the modern type of gamester, as "Ihe
Witching Hour" is the modern type OF
comedy swift, hypnotic, marVelously
enchanting in its realism and It's ro-
nance Cameo Kirby as he tells u.s.
is of the old school. the school OF the
thirties, and so is his play. a comedy
of manners: a hero after the pattern
Of Don QuiXote and the elder roman
ticists. Seniority has its claims. Let
us meet the elder first.
Cameo Kirby CANDLES by the code
and his code is relentlessness. lie sees
q half intoxiated Louisiana gentleman
in the clutches of q less scrupulous
gamester, and to prevent outrage ne
takes hand in the game, winning the
of returning it to him when sobered.
Before this can be done the other has
committed suicide, and the baffled
trickster has shot Kirby in the back
and fled. All this precedes the acton
of the play, which shows Kirby re-
turning to the estate which now be-
longs to him, but which the son of the
suicide is prepared to fight for rather
than relinquish. The mind of this son
has been poisoned by Moreau, the dis
honorable gambler, and on the return
az Kirby Moreau meets him in duel,
only to be slain. The son, burning with
desire to meet Kirby himself, fingers
near the scene OF the duel ana taxes
the pistol from the dead man, expos
ing Kirby to the charge of numbering
q defenseless enemy.
Unsuspecting, Kirby fees from
crowd bent on aVenglng Moreau
death, and enters the mansion or the
children of Randall, for whose suicide
he is blamed-his own house by law
They do not know him. nor he them
He tells the daughter of Randall of his
peril in general terms. and to save him
she introduces him as Moreau. A rel
ative of the family suspects sham,
and little by little the truth comes out,
being revealed at length by the tale
bearing of Jealous creole servant.
In the meantime Kirby has fallen IN
love with Adele, the daughter of the
dead Randall. Again and again his
partner and Sancho Panza, Larlzin
Bunce, begs him to flee the house be-
fore the inevitable revelation OF the
truth, but each time love is too strong,
and he stays. At length the truth
comes out, and a tragedy seems una
voidable Tom Randall, son of the
suicide, demands a duel. but the gam
bier, with a stately and pardonlng
courtesy, produces the proof of his In
tention to make restitution in the deed
of transfer of the property, tells the
true story Of the game which ended in
Randalrs self-destruction and pre-
pares to depart but the love of the
young girl has been touched into In
sistence by his chivalry, and the last
curtain falls with the certainty that
they will marry and that Cameo Kirby,
like Jack Brookfield will reform, will
become the 'good prince" of the ro-
nance which his youthful admirer In
the Randall household holds so dear.
But this is only the plot of Cameo
Kirby It's real charm lies in the
spacious days of the older south, which
1t illumines by light at once realistic
and romantic. To the incest detail the
production is In the spirit of the
Louisiana which bred courtly danes
and gallant sons. But "Cameo Kirby
is not merely sectional, nor even
American. He is of the breed Of
DArtagnan and the Knight of the
Windmills-the soul of romance, so
true to the pure ideal of his boy
worshiper that when he comes in
through the open window with his enc
mics on his heels that youngster rec
ognizes him at once as the hero of his
story book come to life and seeking
his aid and protection. 1t is one of the
most veracious and appealing bits in
the entire play. and one of the most
dramatic.
The character drawing of the collab-
Grating authors is precise and accu-
rate, as Is all their best work in novel
covers or between stage drops. Most
of the roles were real and Vlrile last
night. Mr.. Farnum's elegance and
f1uency of method and manner graced
the part of the chiValrouS gambler,
making credible a somewhat fantastic
character, yet one which might find it's
once-living parallel in Mississippi river
annals of eighty years ago. Mckee
Rankin as Kirby's partner-bluff, prac-
tical and unromantic, a Sancho Panza
to the life-was superb-the best piece
of character acting I have seen in
many years. He fairly shared honors
with Mr.. Farnum.
Miss Buckley imbued her heroine
with radiant impulsiveness, balanced
by a dainty reserve-true paradox Of
the southern gentlewoman. Her ac-
the sweet old language of Dixie, as did
the brave trustfulness of the charac-
ter in the climaxes of the play. Miss
Hosford gave a well rounded persona
tion of the dame of bygone day Ruth
Lloyd was pleasing as a slave. but G.
r. Webster less so in balancing role,
failing in verify by overplaying the
rheumatics and general stodginess of
the part The negro supernumeraries
didn't act. They were merely natural,
which sufficed.
There was one serious flaw in last
nights presentation, and it threatened
shipwreck for time in the third act
the acting of Gordon Johnstone as Tom
Randall, the impetuous and irrational
son of the suicide. Mr.. Randall ap-
palently has no sense of minor values,
Hs cannot temper even his anger and
his ardor by a slight degree Of re-
straint. In his fury he ranted and the
result was lncoherence. In his peni-
tence he sniveled, and the effect was
repellent. In the effort to achieve tho
southern drawl he was very frequently
indistinct in his utterance. In tho