The Washington herald., 1918-03-15

DptClhl OITtsADuutuL VI lne washington
New York, March IA peroxide
blonde with the movements of a wild
gazelle and all the innate modesty OF
fried shrimp or a kippered herring
gave blase New York a wild jolt this
week with a series Of dances at the
artistic Metropolitan. In an hour s
time she proved that Of the many
barefoot. bareback and barefaced
dancers that have been seen there she
was qualified 10 rank as the most
notable.
The dancer had a troupe of anaernic
looking girls with soulful eyes to help
her to make nature surpass art IN
new ideal Greek dances. 1t was an
nounced that the star of the aggre-
cation came from the trackless
West" The dances were more de-
voted to nature than to art.
What there was of the costumes
might have been Greek, although there
was difficulty in classifying the few
yards of tulle and gauze. The light
often shot through their diaphanous
draperies and even blase New Workers
gasped
1t was in the last dance that the
dancer showed just how far she was
willing to go in her efforts to stimu-
late the Greek idea in dancing. BY this
time but a minimum of gauze hamp-
cred the dancer. The spotlight at
tackled her with relentless frequency.
Either she grew sad under the in
fiuence of the waltz or the draperies
realized what a small part they had
really come to play in the performance.
Or it may have been that they had by
that time grown too scant to with
stand the efforts Of an orchestra OF
100 musicians
At all events the bit of gauze which
had made the last stand for the con-
ventions fioated into the air and then
down to the stage. The dancer smil-
ingly disappeared and the audience
gasped again.
1t is such performances that dis
courages the true devotees OF Terpsi-
chore who are trying TO uplift dane
ing and express its real grace. Such
dances are no more like the grace OF
the real Greek and interpretative
dances than the honky-tonkers of the
Barbary Coast express the grace of
Mordkin, Chalif, Pavlowa or Duncan.
hldhdSCI VI Oil opera IOuSS
the Bronx was arrested recently on a
technical charge in connection with
the Sunday closing. More as a joke
the arresting officer placed him in a
cell for twenty minutes. A few days
later a woman stepped up to the box
office of the theater.
She bought two seats and then lin
gered. Say" she finally said TO the
manager II know you"
Where did we meet?' he asked.
we were cell neighbors over in
jail. Pulled on anything good lately -
Spring is here. It's coming is re-
fiected in the New York newspapers.
The seed poets are at it again and
the wife's chirp for the new hat is
heard. Claudius Clam has passed up
SIS week job as a fish salesman to
devote his life to writing touching
lines for suffering humanity. When
near-spring gets men to write poetry
for seed catalogues winters back is
surely broken More than twenty
five poems entitled Spring have al
ready appeared in newspapers and
, more are coming. Down in the high
skyscrapers the clerks are getting a
touch of the yawning fever and gaze
llstlessly out over the Hudson .oward
the approaching green of New Jersey.
Garden tools are being put on sale in
the department stores and automo-
biles are being lacked up for the
spring "once over" Yea, bo, spring
hath cometh!
Rube Goldberg. the cartoonist. has
written a minstrel show for the So
ciety OF Illustrators. 1t is to be
known as the Bolsheviki minstrels
and the performers will appear in
long boards resembling the patriarchs
OF the East Side. 1t is said to be the
funniest thing of the year.