The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram., 1911-11-12
BY ESTHER GRIFFIN WHITE.

"Ugliness is out skin-deep The
business of art is to reveal the beauty
underlying all things
So said Mr.. Johnstone Forbes Rob-
ertson in his role of The Stranger" in
The Passing of the Third Floor Back"
which is repeating, in its second sea-
son, the success of the first.
Strange are the anachronisms OF
the theatric art when symbolic play
written. by the bye, by one Of the
best known contemporaneous English
humorists-which has a more distinct
moral than the majority of all the SER
mons ever hammered out from the pull
pit, is one of the most brilliant sue
cesses from the box-office standpoint,
of several years past
This, too. in the face of the state
ment, seen oftener than not, that the
taste of the public runs TO lightweight
"attractions, to unspeakable vacui
ties. to messes of banality and moth
ingness, to trivialities. to suggestive
ness, and to artistic anarchy
1t may be. indeed, that it is Mr.
Forbes-RObertsOns superlative art
that takes" the moralizing in The
Passing of the Third Floor Back" over
the footlights, and then it may be that
easily swayed by an appeal to its
higher nature made in the guise of a
story, but whatever the reason for
the hold that this play has upon the
affections of theater-goers, the fact
remains that it has had a distinct and
peculiar impress and has again illus
trated the theory that in pointing a
moral there is no other medium COM
parable to the theater
And this is possibly because the
latter does not make direct assault
as does the pulpit upon the individual
conscience, but through symbols and
figures, woven into the fabric of fancy,
persuades through the Imagination
rather than insists by an appeal to the
reason.
To emphasize this and yet preserve
the illusion of the supposed raison d.
etre of the theatric art, namely, to
tion in linguistic capsules, if the pur-
pose of the play be didactic, takes
much adroitness, both on the part of
the playwright and the actor.
No one likes being preached at
Nothing is so distasteful to the in
dividual either personally or in the
mass as to find out that it has been
the victim of the moralist who has
been trying to teach a lesson under
the pretense of an assumption of in
terest which the former finds to have
been only temporary.
No man is ever so won.
The regeneration of society will be
accomplished through the seeming con-
tradiction of ingenius comparisons
rather than through bald and direct
statement.
successful with the latter method
The stage might be with the former
So far as Mr.. Forbes-Robertson is
concerned, he is, to take advantage of
some of the expressions in his play,
more the artist than the phila nthrop-
ist 1t is not to be supposed that he
took on this drama because it was his
desire, other than indirectly, to ''ele-
vate the stage" or that he would have
continued with it had it not been a
box-offic success, but the fact that
the material consideration was so
fortunate as to enable the actor to ex
plot the spiritual aspect of the drama,
is consummation as gratifying as it is
devoutly to be desired should uni
versally obtain.
"The Passing of the Third Floor
Back" is familiar to many theater-go-
ers in this city who have witnessed
its presentation otherwhere, but for
those who have not, it might be brief
ly summarized as the spiritual regen-
Grafton of household In an unfash-
ionable quarter of London made up of
dodgers, the landlady and her servant,
and that this is accomplished through