Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1911-03-28
COMES
INTO HIS OWN VIA
COUNTRY BOY"
Play at the Newark POrtrays
One of the Seasons Most
Interesting Characters.
POWERFUL PLAYLETS
FILL PROCTOR PROGRAM
Pretty Girls. Frolic and Fun Are
Features in Every Play
house.
The Country Boy.
By Edgar Selwyn.


Hiram Belknap, a leading citizen.
G. C. Stacy
Hezekiah jerks, his secretary......
George H. Wender
Sarah. a servant. -. Geraldine O'Brien
Jahe Belknap. Edith Lyle
Forrest Winant
Fred Merlzle, a newspaper man..
Robert McWade, jr.
Lucy, a colored waitress.
Geraldine O'Brien
Miss Dunstan. an embryo prima
donna ...:.......... Carolyn Elberts
Mr.. Phelps, a travelling salesman.
Walter Allen
Mrs. Phelps, his wife. Kate Donnelly
Mrs. Bannan, a landlady............
Mrs. Stuart Robson
Herman Leitz, a star boarder....
Jack j. Horwitz
Joe Weinstein, a theatre ticket
Spectator .............Arthur Shaw
Amy Leroy, a how-girl.............
Willette Kershaw
Jimmy Michaelson, a man-about
town Stanley Wood
The newspaper man, plodding along
the uneven tenor of his way, a power
full but more or less unknown factor
in molding public opinion, kinder to the
public than it realizes or appreciates,
promises to come into his own via the
stage entrance.
Some Of him, many of him, truly
have become worldwide figures, and
great; but he, as a reporter, a copy
reader or a city editor. has remained
in the middle background except to
those with whom he comes directly in
contact, a speculative figure. But
thanks to the fact that many of our
playwrights of today are newspaper
men of yesterday. his real Importance
the power he holds in his pencil, his
kindness, humor, keen sense OF right
and generosity-is emerging from
under the bushel.
Last season gave us a fine produc-
ton of 1.-THE Fourth Estate" and, while
in 1.-The Country Boy" now playing at
the Newark Theatre, II is the fate Of
the boy around whom the, interest
centres; it is the kindly, q%uick-of-
understanding, though grouchy, news
paper man who sees beneath the sur
face and really settles the boys fate.
sCoiors laid ON Thick :.
The picture is strong, with good
drawing, but the coiors are crude and
laid on thickly. Comedy falls into bur-
lesque, replaced in turn with a bit of
real drama, but the ending is as all
comedies should be.
The play is logically developed, con
vincing and teaches its lesson without
becoming pedantic and with a widely
humorous vein. The story is of a u
try boy with a mother and a sweet
heart, impulsive, thoughtless, careless,
and all the -"lesses" of which an only
son, country or otherwise, can be ca
pable, with an overload widowed
mother to foster them.
Seeming lack of opportunity in the
little town, ambition to arm money
in order to marry, and the girl, per-
suade. him to go to the city, there to
do something big" OF course he is
DONE" and big, too, by his own RASH
ness and ignorance, aided and abetted
by a sweetly vicious Totty Footlights.
He loses his job, is spurned by the
girl he really loves, and is requested t,
vacate by the landlady, whose gas and
butcher bills are something awful.
Thus reduced, he discovers the true
character of Totty, in whom he be-
lieved, and whom he had hotly de-
Tended, and prepares to take the gas
route"
This is prevented by the newspaper
man, who proceeds to unfold a few
wholesome truths as to what failure
and success really are, and they go
back together to the country, the one
to start a newspaper and the other to
look his supposed failure squarely in the