Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-05-16

Time turned backward ait years last
night. The gay blades of London Towne,
with their ladies faire, strolled Southwark
way and paid their pittance to see and
hear an unknown playwright's effort to
amuse. 1t was nervous night for the
author, none other than our own Will
Shakespeare. The Globe Theatre had risked
his maiden piece Comedy of Errors"
So 1t seemed last night The Phloma-
thean Society had contributed it's bit to the
tercentenary celebration. It had built a
reproduction of the Old Globe Theatre
with It's pit open to the sky; its stage sans
scenic effect And here it presented that
first delicious bit from the pen of the man
who later. with his quill. was to tickle the
world and make 1t laugh; jab It, and make
1t cry.
The place of presentation could not have
been better chosen. The reproduction of
the Globe Theatre had been built in the
Botanical Gardens of the University of
Pennsylvania, and the way there was
through dim-lit lanes overhung with
branches and greenery, such lanes as Lon
don had with its sputtering lanterns when
Shakespeare wrote for all time The audi
ence. in the pit, sat with heads barred to a
blue vaults Of heaven and came away with
better health for the hours spent in the
inclosed open with that skilful Shakespeare
wag.
| Glory be that the humanity of 1899 Is the
| humanity of 1916. Change there be in
rallnent, Dut not IN impulse emotion.
| Old Adam has the selfsame handspring
now as then. VIII Shakespeare might
have scrawed his comedy play yesternight
so well did his quips and jests glovelike
fit his auditors of today.
A merry prologue full of philosophy as
walnut of meat, came pell-mell from the
brain of Prof. Felix u. Schelling, through
the mouth of a most excellent and enter
tanning fool Then the play was on, and
the play was the thing
No scene shifting at the Globe in 1893.
Then, as last night, bustling lad hustled
out, put up placard telling the imagina-
ton of the next scene and act represented
and so swift was the action. so keen the
dialogue, so witty the actor lads and lassies,
that no sense OF loss was experienced.
The excellent cast had been thoroughly
drilled by Percy Winter, and it gave a
presentation that made the heart long for
more of 1t, for a return of the days when
the stage did not bewilder the eye and
stun the senses with riot of color and
noise and movement, but made its sole and
satisfactory appeal to heart and brain.
Between acts. as in ye olde time, there
were gay dances. These dancers had been
drilled by G. Ellwood Carpenter. And there
was strange, stirring barbaric music from
an orchestra conducted by Karl r. Alden.
The performances are continued tonight
and every night this week. with matinees
on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Sat
urday afternoons.
The Philomathean Society is an organza-
ton of Pennsylvania students, and quite
an excellent organization it is. Particu-
larly we'll done were the parts OF the
Dromios interpreted by Park b. Turner and
r. DeWaters Solinus, by Edward Anschutz I;
Aegon. by L. H. Harris, and the Antipholis
of Syracuse, by r. Bevis Lord. The work
of all the women indicated that they cap
tured the spirit of the times they portrayed