Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-05-13
Walter Prichard Eaton Sums
Up the Broadway Season
A Year Of Prosperity and Success-And Also
of Good Plays and Good
Acting
By WALTER PR1cHARD EATON


play and make It seem something higher
than farce Mr.. williams was also re-
sponsible for bringing her back, as he
was for Justice"
OF our more serious dramatists with
established names, only Eugene Walter
and Gus Thomas gave us plays this win
ter. Walters play Just n Woman" was
not up to his standard. The first act
showing humble worker in the Pitts
burgh steel mills and his wife, was ex-
cellent, but thereafter, when his man grew
prosperous and abandoned the wife Ga
true and vital teme, as the newspapers
have proved to us), the dramatist could
not quite keep from the taint or artificial
domestic melodrama Mr.. Thomas has
just contributed play called Rio
Grande," a tale of life in an army post
on the Mexican border. This play is "a
curious mixture. The story of it is violent
and sordid and theatrical The style in
which the story Is told is almost beyond
reproach as an example of fluid, natural
technique, lifelike dialogue, quiet, un-
strained progression, atmospheric sugges-
ton. Unfortunately, the more you ad-
mire the technique the more you regret
the unlmportance of the story. And those
who go looking for nelodrama with the
theatrical excitement of ARIZONA" are
likely to be baked of their pleasure by the
very repression and naturalism OF the
style. Mr.. Thomas seems to have fallen
between two stools The play, however,
is acted with unusual skill, especially by
Richard Bennett, as a grizzled old army
colonel. And the first act which creates
with marvellous skill the atmosphere or
q Texas army post on a hot August day.
the dust, the heat, the boredom, the nerves
taut with the strain of prolonged humid
ity and torrid weather, Is a supreme eX-
ample of technical dexterity in the writ
hS acting
and staging.
To balance the stark realism OF
"Justice," we have the sugar-coated ro-
nance of ",rhe Cinderella Man" (by the
Philadelphian, Edwin Chllds Carpenter),
well acted, especially by Shelley HUI IN
the title part and very popular. we had
this winter a fine production of THE
Weavers," Hauptmanns great naturalistic
masterpiece and to balance that, we had
Hackett's production of ''The Merry Wives
of Windsor" with Tom Wise as Falstar,
staged in the new manner, and still selling
out when, unfortunately, Mr. Wise had
To go to another play and nobody could
be found capable of taking his place, Men
ton of four such plays in paragraph
all of them popular, should certainly show
that we have not suffered for want OF
variety nor failed in catholic apprecia-
tion.
As IL only natural, considering the state
OF Europe. there have been few importa-
tions this season. The best, excepting the
Shaw plays revived by Miss George, was
"Hobson's Choice" that merry folk
comedy of Lancashire life brought from
Miss Hornimann's Manchester Theatre.
on the whole, however, we have been
thrown back very largely on our native
resources for our dramatic fare, and 1t
is highly significant that we have made
out so well. We haven't produced
Justice" of our own. Neither have we
produced Major Barbara" of our own.
But "The Great Lover" "rhe Unchastened
Woman" "The Boomerang" "The Gin
derella Man." the Washington Square
plays, together with the witty and anus
ing burlesque of the Cohan review and the
splendid, vivid acting of Mrs. FislSe, the
Shakespearian productions by Tree and
Hackett, and similar products OF our
native stage, have given us a season that
we need not be greatly ashamed of; at
any rate, one that proves our stage is
full of life. and moving on all the while