Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1914-03-17
ION THE LEVEL" WINS
ORPHEUM APPLAUSE

her happiness While she is there her
husband enters. A tensely dramatic
scene, in which he accuses his wife
of infidelity follows. Ned protests
his love for Mrs. Claxton, crying out
his hatred of his wife, and when
Mrs. Claxton tells him with deliberate
scorn that 1t was his money she
loved, not him, he turns in despera-
ton and fires at Gerard. The shot
goes wild, but Nell faints and falls.
and her husband, thinking he has
killed her, rushes out into the night.
There Is not tagging moment in
all this splendid third act. Mabel
Brownell gives all of her keen UNI
Outstanding to the roll of Nell, whose
sorrowful desperation contrasts so
wildly with her blitheness In the
early scenes. In vulgar parlance Miss
Brownell has the punch" Her voice
alone can express the whole gamut
of emotions
The last act finds us home again. in
the Varney apartment. Tom, inc
faithful one, has watched until the
arrival of the Bangses. Nell Is in an
other room, sleeping. Her physician
has given her an opiate. Tom tells
the Bangses OF the whole affair, add
ing, in an awed voice, that, just as
Varney fired the shot, all of the
lights in the room went out. 1t was
a miracle! Business of hushed
voices. Everybody ION the stage) ex-
periences a feeling of ore" as they
pronounce it in New York. Tom also
expresses his conviction that Varney
must hear his wife's delirious cries
and will come home. Which he does
with commendable promptness.
IL
loans him the money to make good
his thefts, promises to help him in
every way, and then, patient resig-
nation athwart his brow, departs
upstage for an ocean voyage with
my sweetheart, my-mother!"
There followed the exquisite pic
ture of which l have spoken. And
when the managerial. shears have
done their work; when the first act
has been made more compact, and
the last one more plausible, we'll
have a play that might equal the
record of paid in Full"
Clifford Stork looked very hand
some and was altogether likable as
Tom Gerard. Tom is a fellow with
an appeal Mr.. Storl1 conveyed his
love for Nell with admirable delft
ness. He could edit a volume or two
on how not to exaggerate. An actor
of less ability would have sighed u
sigh or two, and cast languishing
glances at milady's medulla oblon-
gaia. Not Mr.. Storl1 however He
just let us know about it, took us
into his confidence, as 1t were.
Miss Belle Daube, who was brought
from New York to play Mrs. Claxton,
erstwhile known as Beauty" por-
trayed a woman hardened by expert
ence, who has come to value people
only for what they. can give her:
whose time, as she herself declares,
is money, and men must pay. Mrs
Claxton smokes and ostentatiously
asks for absinthe, which makes us
want to smile; absinthe is so typi-
cally villainous. Why doesn't a wom-
an of her type ring occasionally for
we'll, most anything else? Miss
Daube was most convincing, never
theless.
Carl Eckstrom, as Robert Bangs,
and Helen Holmes, as his wife, were
effective as the happily married
couple who insisted upon launching
everybody within reach upon the
matrimonial sea. Edward Van Sloan.
who was cast as the bank clerk, was
not in his usual form, betraying a
noticeable nervousness in the first
and second acts. His work In the
trying third act was up to stand
ard, however. Mr.. Van Sloan's face
Is too full of character for him to
successfully portray moral weak
ling. His watchers cannot get away
from the feeling that he Is pretend
ing.