Evening star., 1914-04-14
New National.

.Tante" comedy in four acts,
founded on the novel of the same name
~ Anne Douglas Sedgwick and pre-
sented at the New National Theat.l
last evening by Ethel Barrymore, with
he assistance of company of the
highest merit, is Il brilliant study of
human nature. The play reflects hu
manitys strength and its weakness,
it's hypocrisy and its sincerity, from
the heights of the temperamental
genius to the homely station of the
companion" who. knowing and under
standing it all, can nevertheless love
and seek to comfort it when it strands
upon the rocks of its own inevitabl
fate.
The dramatization by c. Haddon
Chambers is study that blends the
observation and descriptive skill of
the thinking novelist and the highest
dramatic art of the playwright. Its
charm is not in its plot of story or
the thrill or surprise of the ordinary
drama, but in the unfolding of the
elements of selected chara cterS in
their finest details and in their
relation with type the existence of
which may well be ina gined. but with
which an acquaintance is denied save
perhaps to the few. There is never a
forced effort to Tighten situation or
to coax laughter save as they come in
natural sequence in the presentat ton
of the story of level-headed English
loves him and who is the adoring and
deceived foster child of a self-centered
genius. supremely egotistical and self
lsh' Whimsical in the qualification of
her Tdnlty, unSDarlnS in her efforts to
attain given result and yet withal
close observer and student of her own
methods in making puppets of the hu
rnanity that surrounds her.
The spot center of this remarkab BILE
story and one that shines in its brilliancy
like the star royal of a specially con-
structed Ornament is Nine. Mercedes
Okraska, whom Karen Woodruff, her
calls ''Tante." The battle royal of the
story begins when Gregory Jardine, an
English lawyer, who has won the heart
of this child. makes it clear to Nine
Okraska their intention to marry. The
contest RACES until the willy artist-the
greatest pianist of her day-has won the
girl back to herself by skillfully de-
signed campaign which forces the hus-
band to denounce her for introducing into
his home an actress of question: BILE re-
pute, thus enabling her to enact a rnelo-
dramatic scene that influences Karen to
desert her husband that she may go to
comfort the grieved heart of her beloved
benefactress, her .'Tante'' Here another
trend is given the play by the develop
ment of an attachment, real, Or not, it
does not matter. on the part of Tante
for Claude Drew, a poetic humming BIRD
in the garden of femininity; her dis
covery of Drew in the act of kissing
Karen, much against her will, but
quite in keeping with his char
acter; Tante's vulgar outburst of
jealous rage and her denunciation of
Karen as an migrate. which dsillusions
the young ward and wife and for the
first time leaves her free to go back un-
trammeled to her husband, who has come
for her.
After another scene. cleverly planned
for its effect upon the young wife, in
which Tante vainly humbies herself on
her knees to the girl in seemingly
heartbreaking plea for forgiveness and
the return of her love and finds in defeat
her own human heart shorn of it's hypoc-
risy. Tante casts herself back on her art
10 die game" and finds solace in meio-
dramatically playing Chopin's funeral
march. while her dsllusioned ward and
creature of her whims with her husband
sits -everently by in sad but silent adj
miration of iEe artist.
Miss Barrymore presents a wonderful
characterization of Tante. Every phase
of this ever varying character of temper
amental genius and human hypocrisy is
reflected with consummate skill and nat
uralness. II is the ilnpersonation Of
woman that the mind condemns and the
heart pities. brilliant luminary OF
human conception that in its fall reveals
but the burned-olIt, blackened mass of
the fallen meteor.
Eileen Van Biene gives a beautifully
natural and charming irnpersonatio OF
Karen, and Charles Cherry q strong
manly and always discreet characte. q =
ton of the young husband. AS satellites
of the brilliant Tante the one as the
sycophantic. MISUNDERSTANDING hypocrite
and admirer of the great artist. the
other as her plain, matter-of-fact com
panion who knows her at her true worth
and yet loves her. Haidee Wright ard
Mrs. Thomas WhifeH are excellent r
henry Edwards meets all expectations
as Drew, the poet lover. and William
Ingersoll makes an ideal Franz Lipp-
81,
hearted admirer of Karen and one of
the tools Of the inexhaustibIe Taute
These characters each stand out prorni-
lently in :.le play because Of the detail
OF novelist and dramatist in their treat
ment-simply other types of human ma
ture; composite, perhaps, yet quite
familiar.
AS in cast. in its setting Charles
| F'rohman has given 'Tante' "A uo,,nf
| ing in keeping with the public's estimate
| of his ability.