New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1912-11-20
Edward SheIdon's "The High
Road at the Hudson Theatre
Mrs. FiSke Strong.

Mrs. FlSke Strong.
THE High Road" is not vehicle for
Mrs Fiske, but Mrs. Flske IS vehicle
for THE High Road" And in the inten-
ton Of the reviewer a better compliment
could not be paid either to author or
actress The play is worth playing, and
Mrs. Fiske interprets it with fine power.
That the chief figure in The High
Road'yis a woman and that the chief
plea IS made for woman do not mean
that this is a brief for womans rights
or that the men in the play figure only
as foils. There is an all around sympa-
thy and humanity IN the writing which
takes It deeper than the play which pre-
sents a theory
During the 1--we acts each Of which rep
resents a period of development, a char
acter is built up. In the first act when
to be the kind of character that is going
to grow. She IS not going to grow until
she is twenty-five, and then crystalline
remaining for the rest Of her life mat
ure child. That is the usual She is the
unusual.
when Alan Wilson. a young connois-
seur Of art and Of life, comes to board
az the poor. hemmed-in Catslill farm
where Mary Page and her father live he
sees in the child something that Is good
enough even for his exquisite tastes-too
good. in fact, to leave to the washtub and
the kitchen She is full Of rumors not
only OF ambition, but Of poetry and i'm
aglnation, all still vague, like a mirage.
over across the valley, on the side of the
first mountain that shuts off the world
from her, there is a pile OF stones. At
sunset they catch the last light. For a
long time she has watched them at that
hour, watched them turn into a palace
with glowing windows, from which strains
Of unearthiy music drift. IL is the house
OF ultimate desire-quite vague. She tells
this fancy to Alan Wilson. He has trav-
eled about ia the big world" and Will
understand. He understands very well,
well enough to tell her that when she
has climbed the mountain across the
valley to reach the lighted palace she'll
not find It there, but will see IL on the
next mountain beyond. The disappoint-
ment will not be great, however, because
she will be able TO see It more plainly
and hear its music more distinctly. And
each time she climbs the next mountain
she will always see the palace beyond,
but always nearer.
Then the young philosopher and lover
takes her away with him TO start the
first climb. And so she begins her life.
Each following act opens after skip
ping intervening years. The acts, in
fact, show results, and for this reason
are keenly anticipated. The second act
discovers Mary Page three years later
housed In a palace OF raTities in Sew
York. Wilson, the collector, has gath
cred choice things from over all the
world TO set about her. In fact, they
both have gathered them. They have
travelled everywhere together. The end
of the wonderful life has come for Mary
Page She has come 10 a quite eXtraOr-
binary decision. She is going to leave
Alan and 10 TO work. The rawlings Of
the man who has grown 10 love her and
now wants to marry her amount 10
nothing. She realizes that big life can
be lived in the world and that she has
not been living IT, There has been a
growing desire 10 get out into 1t since
the day her carriage was stopped in the
street by the parade of the laundry
strikers She had stood up and peered
over the heads of the crowd and seen
that the strikers were all young girls.
They were pale and poor, but very brave
That was what had touched her-their
bravery.
She left Wilson and went 20 take
place in the terrible army OF workers
The story follows the rise of Mary Page
through her career Of leader for the cause
OF woman's work, her triumph at the
CAPITOL when her bill for the eight-hour
day is passed. her marriage TO the Gov
ernor. whom She had known in her home
village twenty-one years before, and her
fight with the man who tries 10 keep her
husband from the White House by raking
up the story of her three years with Alan
Wilson just on the eve OF election.
In the story there is a background of
politics and OF causes" but these inter-
ests do not stand to the front in the
play. The growing and changing OF char
acter as one scene follows another is
what comes 70 the centre OF the stage.
What had those first three years of
travel and unpermitted experience done
for her? They had evidently pushed her
roots down into the ground They were
mistake. she said. but without taking
that wrong step she would never have
taken the step beyond So II was impos-
sible TO regret.
When the curtain went up on the third
scene and discovered her a woman who
had fought through the ranks Of labor
ers. and become a leader of a country
wide movement, the sense that she had
found herself was apparent at once.
She was no longer the vague little girl,
nor any longer the restless woman who
was following the wrong road But
she was still the sensitive dreamer