The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-10-15
NOTHING BUT LOVE-
HAS OTHER CHARMS
Really Good Musical Play,
Despite Title, Appears
at Lyric. q.
WELL KNIT PLOT AMUSES
Show Is Funny From Start to
Finish without Touch
of Naughtiness.
Nothing but Lovo"--At the Lyric

Beneath the more than usually inane
title Nothing But Love" really good
musical play blossomed at the Lyric
Theatre last night. Whoever selected
the name ought to be treated to some
of the medicine which made DR.. Tibbets
sQuirm and run away when 1t, his own
concoction, was spooned between his
lips in the course of the goings on on
the stage. However, prospective audi
ences may be assured that while the
display of affection is adequate, 1t by no
means monopolizes the talent of an ex-
ceptionally talented group OF actors.
One finds the obligation of attesting
the merits of this comedy all the easier
because it represents the effort of new
firm of producers. Maddox & Hart. and
because most of the other names on the
programme are unfamiliar to many
patrons of the theatre. Frank SIAM
mers, who wrote the book and lyrics,
comes from. a vaudeville apprenticeship,
as does the composer, Harold Orlob. An
drew Tombes, the chief comedian. is also
a recruit from vaudeville. 1t might be
expected that such a connection would
be merely series Of unrelated ,skits
parading through a formless evening
But instead, as musical comedies go, this
one has a well knit and coherent as well
as amusing plot into which all the
spri ghtly singing and dancing and divert
ing conversation fit as IL they belonged.
And right here it must be said that
Mr.. Stammers has succeeded in proving
that musical comedy need not infringe
upon the copyright of Signor Boccaccio
in order to be entertaining or even to
appeal to the sophisticated. A first
night audience heard not line or wit
messed movement suspicionable OF
1Aaa faxtr do
three illusions to the passing lof Scotch
be so classified. Yet merrirhent con-
tinued throughout the evening.
Allyn Hicks (Andrew Tombes) Is an
automobile racer, but gentleman for
all that, sir, who, at Miami, despite the
fact that he cannot swim, rescues the
drowning beauty June Mdrbury (Ruby
Norton) from the cruel surf hard by
the palms. He and she are carried to
the home of June. the heiress. Curly
cupid-the little gentleman is there in
the flesh, dimply flesh. with his bow and
arrow-shoots both of them full of holes
during the process of resuscitation and
afterward.
They try to make a hero out of the
non-swimmable Hicks, which is enough
to say about the plot except that, strange
to say, it ends happily, like all Florida
romances.
Who is it Tombes reminds us Of
Booth Harrington? Anyway, the young
man is an accomplished comedian He
knows exactly when to be comic and
when to be lugubrious and when TO mix
his curves. He dances, sings, plays leap
frog. drinks Scotch from a flask f&ed
up to look like prayerbook ESQ the
play is shocking after alD-does every
thing with the facility to be expected OF
an enforced Carnegie hero. Moreover.
he is obviously an intelligent person
lind his performance is delicately
shaded. He is well supported
IT IS a cast in which none of the prin-
cipals need apologize for singing. The
Blonde Ruby Norton, Marion Sunshine
winsome and rollicking, and Florence
Enright, who is scream as an amorcus
maid with yearning to initiate Nazi-
nova, all found favor, and so did all
the men. Easton Yonge, Andrew
Tombes, Donald Meek. Robert Woolsey
Clarence Nordstrom and Stanley H.
F'orde find 1t necessary at one stage OF
the proceedings to burlesuue a vaude-
vile acrobatic troupe. which they dc
cleverly The chorus damsels were
comedy and scrumptiously gowned.
So much has been said about lyrics
lately that it ought to be added that Mr.
Stammers's songs are unusually good
nonsense and that the enunciatlon Of the
| singers In uncommonly precise. Moth
ing But Love" is nothing t good fun.