New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1914-04-01
A Striking Drama of Negro
Life by a Young Amer
lean Poet.
"A WOMAN KILLED
WITH KINDNESS
Thomas HeyWood's Ancient Do
mestic Tragedy Proves Sur
prisingly Modern.
Nv tRIHuR RjHI.


II Is TO he hoDed that Mr.. Ridgeley Tor
rence's one-act negro play. Granny Nau
nee" may ind its way TO n larger az
dionce than was able TO see !; IL the tWp
performances given by the Stace Society.
Both the play and the acting deserve q
wider hearing
The scere Of this unusual piece is a
negro hut in our own South-possibly in
that Southern Ohio borderland from
which the author came. The characters
are three negro womeE-Granny MaLmee,
an old slave nesress. and her two daugh-
ters, Pearl and Sapphie. Sapphie has
been living in a rearby city and as the
play opens she u.s. just about to return
home with her baty.
To the old black mother. a stern. al
most Biblical figure. with her pride in her
black blood and i'm the fact that the
women OF her line have kept that black
blood pure. the arrival o. this, the only
nan-child she can claim. is at once a
triumph and a sort OF high revenge.
Her only son. Sammy, had been burned
at the stake by white men for a murder
white man committed, and the mother.
rushing in TO try 10 save him. had had her
sight burned out by the fire. The hatred
end resolve nourshed all these blind
years-she has even kept some Of the
charred sticks from the fire-mount and
flow out TO Sapphies son The one bed
is made ready for him. with the best
white sheets Sapphies husband may
sleep i'm the wooGhouse. the women will
shift for themselyes-none but the black
man-chid-"pure brack-royal brack!'-
shall sleep there.
As . matter Of fact. the child's father is
Wflte--a son Of the man who set the fire
around Granny Maumees Sammy. In the
suspense which accompanies the gradual
revelation Of this truth. as in his imagi-
native insight and economy OF words. Mr..
Terrence shows himself the dramatist no
less than poet The whole story of Sap
rhle's fall is compressed IN her childlike
monotone, repeated from time TO time
HE jos would have his way
\ similar dramatic. force and poetic eX-
preston is shown i'm the curious and bar
barrie incarnation scene that follows, dur
ing which the old woman's sight returns,
although there were moments in this scene
which did not seem as clear as might
be. With old age and 'broodinG the old
woman has turned more and more 10 AZ
rican superstition. and in the stress OF
her revulsion at finding her grandchlld
partly white she reverts completely.
Kindling a fire she makes an image out
of candle grease and the money the white
man gave Sapphie and holds the image in
the flame. She intends to "conjure' the
white man who is at the threshold, and
while he is I'm that condition chain him 10
a stake and burn him as his father burned
her son.
As she looks into the fame, however,
the image of Sammy returns and seems
to tell her to remember her Christian
teaching and 10 forgive the man who has
wronged them. No doubt this is perfectly
plausible. but as played the old woman's
sudden cry suggested 10 one slow thlnkliE
spectator at least that she had maze
some mistake In her "conjuring and was
burning the Image Of the wrong person.
The unfamlliarity of the stage business
makes such errors likely. and the proven
ton of any such haziness is doubtless a
mere matter Of stage management In
me end. at any rate. Granny Maumee let's
the white man 20 his way, brings her
daughters out of the spell into which he
has thrown them and then falls dead at
their feet
Miss Dorothy Donnelly's playing OF
the part was really extraordinary in
its Hfelikoness. in its creepy. savage
nobility. Miss June Mathis, as the stay
at-home daughter. and Miss Lola Clifton
as Sapphie ably assisted. How true Mr..
Torrences play may be TO negro psychol-
oev may scarcely be gone into here. OF
its artistic plausbility as well as its stage
effectiveness there is no doubt. II is dra-
matte pioneering which deserves the
heartiest announcement.