Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1909-06-01

PORTRAITS
boldly thus to indite that claim. I'm
like Lady Frederick, she need never
fear to reveal to her admirers the rouge
and powder of her dramatic technique
It is doubtful if she would know where
| to look for it. If an interviewer Should
require the search. The manner has
been blended with the temperament
and the resultant is the artist whose
excellence is so careless as to risk even
a lack of clarity in utterance, assured
that her auditors can read her meaning
by the context of expression and dainty
by-play. 1t is a wonderful thing-this
liberty which Miss Barrymore takes
with her audiences. Yet, who pro-
tests 1t?
OF the supporting company some
good can be said. Bruce McRae was
! mildly cynical and convincing as the
elderly lover. Jessie Milwards opu-
! lent charms adorned the part OF the
youthful admirers elder sister, Ar
| thur Elliot, as the bluff old admiral
suggested almost equally King Edward
| VII and King Henry VIII, which is
! fair admixture of the finely blended
| Briton. OF some of the costumes toll
Grated in the supporting company we
cannot trust ourselves to speak. With
out grudging Miss Barrymore the mag
| nificent creations over which the or
| chestra circle sighed as one woman,
| one cannot but wish that the entire
cast could have been at least attrac-
lively dressed. Perhaps the deficiency
| is one Of the blessings of the star sys-
! TENN deep, deep disguise.
! Some of the lines in Mr. Maugham's
! scintillating book exact quotation.
when a mans in love-" remarks one
of the bright women in that Monte
Carlo hotel "he makes a pedestal of the
ten commandments and stands on top
with his arms akimbo." And little
later we rub our ears at hearing that
CLOTHES hang really well only on a
woman who has lost every shred of
reputation" This stings, but does not
rankle "Only an uncommonly good
woman can be content to use the
| crookedest means to gain her ends,
says Paradine. and we understand why
Lady Frederick tells him he has the
soul of a Jesuit under the dress of a
Yorkshire squire.
you're growing sentimental. It's
the punishment the gods intlict on a
cynic when he grows old" says milady.
and we begin to understand the depth
and perspicacity of the Vaughan
philosophy.
Miss Barrymore adorns Lady Fred
erick." She dallies with it in elegant
nonchalance, and we are all at her
feet, faulty enunciation and encroach-
ing mannerisms notwithstanding. Will
her managers heed the warnings of
some of their best wishers and give
her a vehicle in which all that robust
and tantalizing talent can find its ap-
propriate medium?
The glory that abides in the humble
and common things of life illumines
Merely Mary Ann" as Zangwill wrote
it, and so limpidly did Miss Florence
Reed reflect the radiant soul of the
little London slavey that not one of
us but regretted the necessity of that
last act and the brief metamorphosis
into the "lady" OF the great world of
the bored It was at the Belasco yes
terday afternoon. but it was so vivid
that one forgets the playhouse in re-
calling the play. Our bodies sat stol-
idly in certain comfortable seats, /
suppose Our souls were wandering
about London haunts of impoverished
genius and sunny common sense.
To humanize an artist to educate a
/ genius: that was the whimsical task
which wise old Mother Nature set
Mary Ann, who BACKED his boots and
bore his i'll humors and taught him to
make his peace with life. And in this
charming character, whose very sim
plicity conquered the baser nature of
! her muslcian-hero, merely by not be-
! l16VlnR IN II. MISS lNGEu gives US llcI
| first "heart" role, as the good old trite
phrase goes. AS she slowly spoke her
opening lines in the first act we saw
! that she had mastered the part, we
! forgot the actress we all understood
that quaint English country dialect
we had met Mary Ann, and she was
more bewitching than all the demure
| ladies of parlor and salon whom Miss
Reed is wont to impersonate.
/ cha 1711Y11blU aopaptg the TranOa-
ferrous corrections in speech rendered
by that capital cocknev matron (Miss
Ida Lewis). as she holds those inimit-
able conversations with the canary, as
! she pauses a moment beneath her
| candle light on the attic staircase, on
up to the climax of the third act, Miss
Reed holds us in the leash of her art.
And very quietly we learn, as did
the caddish young composer, that the
soft, fragile things of life are really
| the strong things, and that best of all
are the cows and pigs and bluebells and
| country fields which tumble quite he'll
ter-skelter into Mary AIMS vision
whenever she hears her musician-lodg-
er play.
Even in her altered character of the
| last act one felt the same plaintiVe
note in Miss Reeds portrayal. It is
the true test of her delicate artistry
! that only when she was moving wear
| lily in the society to which her legacy
had introduced her, did Miss Reed seem
to be, as indeed Mary Ann was, acting.
And it was a return to reality refresh
ing as a gust of salt spray. when she
came back at the very end, Marion
no longer. but Merely Mary Ann" for
ever
Mr.. Stone gave a very finished pic
ture of the young composer who strug-
giles to keep his wings unclipped. One
is both glad and sorry when he fails
one cannot be Indifferent Indeed, you
are deeply irate at him, in your heart.
from first to last, for his blind and
fatuous egoism, true as it is to the
ideals of the artist. Mr.. Stone has
come into his own in this exacting role.
! Peter, who markets tea by day and