The Salt Lake herald-Republican. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1909-1918, 1909-12-19
Nes0 Nes0 York Plays
BY FRANKLIN FYLES.

cuss phase Of life the nicer Of US had
heretofore ignored.
Must Laugh This Season.
But this season we must laugh. If we
must we may as well laugh at THE
Lottery Man" as anything else. 1t is
by Rida Johnson Young, who gagged
popular taste pretty accurately with
Brown of Harvard" Like that. Mrs
YOung's new play is the triumph of
memory over invention. If it fails of
success The reason viii be simply that
other people remember the same things
that Mrs Young does. The idea of an
! impecunious young man putting him.
self up as a prize in a lottery is a good
one But it was as good ten years ago
when Paul Bilhand and Michel Care
used it as the theme of a farce called
THE Surprises of LOve'-and they
/ handled il far more cleverly. Mrs.
Young makes her man a journalist. She
pauses for none of the incidental
| touches that would make such an idea
/ really funny. She wouldn't have time
without sacrificing some irrelevant joke
When she recalls ''wheeze" she drops
| it in. The young man in Brown Of
/ Harvard" called out: What do you
put on your face after shaving?" To
| which, need 1 add, the witty hero re-
piled: Court plaster"
Don't ask me for some of the merry
/ jests that interrupt what might be &C
/ ton in 1.-The Lottery Man" The SOU
venirs of ones remote childhood are
/ sacred. Suffice it that in place of the
witty development Mrs. Young remem-
I bers so many jests that she has time to
/ involve her lottery man only in be-
/ tTOthal to a comic supplement spinster
and then eXtricate him without eXplana-
ton, but in time for an early curtain. "
/ OF the spinster-need l note? Ssomeone
I says. IF you marry her. you can't
take her out-peOple will think you're
paying an election bet"
After watching THE Lottery Man"
and Penelope" and comparing the
New York with the London company,
1 give a decision to the foreigners on
points. Each cast is assigned to char
/ actcrs belonging to its own country, and
/ can discern no contrast of merit in
that respect. Our comedians are as
clever as theirs in putting cOngenial hu-
NOR over the fOOtlights. In general eff
fects and results, hOwever-in play by
what, if they were football tens, would
be termed team work-we are deficient
With our actors the motto seems to be,
Each role for itself, and the devil take
the play" This is an old complaint to
make of American productions. We
have skilled stage directors, but only
those who have the authority to hire
and discharge are able TO enforce Obedi-
ence.
Nothing is said in our important &C
tors contracts. as a rule, about submis-
sion to discipline 1 have known OF
those who rehearsed in compliance with
the ideas of author, manager and dlree-
tor; but with no intention of acting thai
way; and in the first public representa-
ton they unbalanced whole scenes, pos
sibly frustrated the plays purport, by
wrenching their own roles out of pro-
portion with the others. Many English
and some French companies have sci
a right example here; so have the lOca
German stock organizations: and now
at the New Theatre lessons in pOise anC
balance, in a first regard for the play
as an entirety, are being given. Bee
pardon. I am lapsing from description
into pTeachment
The theatrical fad of the mode has
become a variant of an old Christmas
tide custom. For ever so many years
and nobody knows why, voealists, mu-
sicians, elocUtionists and other mono
loguers have come out Of obscurltS
The difference this year is that drsmat-
: ic pantomimists. whose antics have
caught our fashionable wOmen's fitting
fancy have added themselves to thS
turkey hunters. That phrase means, il
stage diction. actors who 60 barnstOrm-
, ing to get chances at holiday good
/ cheer.
Dumb Art stuntsrs.
The new dumb art stunters range
from Loie Fuller, Isidora Duncan and
Ruth ST. Denis, whose daring nudity il
classical dances I have described as
] drawing crowds to the biggest theatres
down to painter who uses a girl mode
in his studio lectures on painting; to g
/ college professor who utilizes his daugh-
. ter's fine figure to illustrate his lessons
in anatomy: and to a dime museum
! which beats in novelty all other sights
{ in barefoot dancing with a fOur-legge6
woman This quadrupedal ballet ar
lists extra pair Of limbs grow small