New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-08-10

The philosophy of "The Very Idea"
is unsound, but the fun is unremitting.
The laughter which greeted this new
piece at the Astor last night was so
obviously genuine that one could
hardly believe it came from first-night-
ers. "The Very Idea" is much the
same sort of farce as Baby Nine"
but il is funnier. Memories Of the
weeks other offerings may have made
il seem funnier than it really was, but
even a liberal discount permits Of but
one conclusion. There is no doubt at
all about 1.-THE Very Idea" is hit.
The author of the new piece is Will
lam lie Baron, who first burst upon
the horizon ten years ago as the
librettist of "The Echo" first written
as college show, and then made over
into a regular production. Since that
time lie Baron has dashed off odd
parts of lbrettos now and then, and
they have been uniformly good. THE
Very Idea" is his first farce, and In
the main it is an adroit piece of work.
II gets under way rather cumbersome
ly, and there are evidences Of padding
in the second act, but it is continu-
ously laugh provoking, and its minor
flaws are accordingly unimportant.
As in "Baby Nine" the basis of "The
Very Idea' Is a childless couple. A
brother whose hobby is eugenics I'M
dertakes to supply the couple with an
acceptable and trustworthy infant by
the simple expedient Of selecting suit
able parents and then persuading them
to have a child. His choice falls upon
his own chauffeur and the young
couples maid, who, for the sake of
convention which not even a eugenic
farce can completely ignore, happen
to be about to be wed. The pride of
the vicarious father and the various
| little receptions which the young cou-
pie are compelled to practise furnish
a majority of the fun, and there is a
not unexpected denouement when the
mother refuses to surrender her in
fant-not even for the promised
$4,000. Nor is the news which the
young wife tells her husband as the
, curtain falls entirely q surprise to the
audience.
Upon this theme and with the in
valuable assistance of a splendid cast,
Mr.. lie Baron has built an uproarious
farce. To examine into its plausibility
is to cause the entire structure to col
ldpSey Will NC HO CA
animation into its FEASIBILITY. 1t
may or may not be true that physi-
cally powerful couple are capable OF
producing a higher grade of progeny
than a couple of slight build, but the
fact that such a tenet permitted the
casting of Ernest Truck in the role
Of the childless father makes it read
lily acceptable. Mr.. Truck was never
so funny as he was last night. Time
and again he drew laugh upon laugh
from lines that never contained them
when they were written, and only the
general high grade of the performance
kept him from running off with the
entertainment.
Richard Bennett, one Of the few ac-
tors who are equally at home in both
drama and farce, had no difficulty in
handling the role of the eugenics-loving
brother, and capital performance was
given by Florence Oakley as the maid
who becomes a mother. William P.
Carleton, Dorothy Mackaye, Purnell
Pratt and Josephine Drake were the
others in a good cast,
"The Very Idea" will get q laugh
out Of any one, and a couple of hun
! bred out of almost any one else