The Washington herald., 1919-06-10
OF ns.ey.-
~ EARLE DORSEY.

For the first four scenes OF Q
five-scene play at the National last
night, George C. Tyler showed
Washington q new peace by Rich
ard washburn Child and Porter
Emerson Brown that bore all the
familiar ear-marks of a hit, and at
the beginning of that fifth and final
scene. an elaborately-erected. swift
ly-motivated., brilliantly dialogued
comedy leisurely ran out into a col
loquial sand-drift and laid down to
rest.
The piece Is Made Of Money" and
in its initial and secondary stages,
it breathed that essence of dramat-
ic swiftness. suspense and motiva-
ton which found such brilliant ex-
position in "A Tailor-Made Man"
In fact. at several times. 1t looked
like all Made Of Money needed
was n final bit OF polish to estab-
Iish 1t as a budding hit of next sea-
son..
But when Miss Lynn Fontanne. of
the piercing. magnetic gaze. began at
the start of the nth scene to moralize.
to philosophize. to fall into epigram
and enigma In speeches that hardly
any actress, no matter how great,
could possibly hope to vitalize. one
sighed for the playwrights who must
set themselves to a laborious task OF
rewriting In far more effective fashion
a last scene which dragged into the
mira 0f int nfhaF
which had promised So much.
Made of Money" opens in a rural
blacksmith shop. A motor bus en-
route from a fashionable sanitarium to
a railroad station breaks down. Some
prominent passengers while away the
enforced wait by arguing the ability
Of money to make anyone successful.
There is one, Daniel Hardy, a finan-
cial giant, who enters into the whim
and bets 100000 against a similar
amount by his friends that he can
make sensational success OF anyone
In three months time.
The first one who enters the
blacksmith shop will be the subject
of the experiment. whereupon In
strolls Miss Lynn Fontanne, in the
role OF village nobody's girl and
the play Is on.
For two more acts. which include
three scenes. the experiment pro-
crosses with dazzling swiftness and
interest. She is gowned in fashions
latest, she is subtly press-agented as
a royal princess. an international
spy. For her. an entire floor of q
hotel is rented. society fawns at her
feet. publishers and picture mag
mates flood her with fabulous offers
and to the eye, she is a success. Miss
Fontanne, however, let's us see that
Mary Blake has a mind of her own.
that she too, is determined to play
a role in the making Of her own
success and the curtain comes down
on next to the last scene with Hardy,
the fnancier, confused by his own
experiment. propoundjng a question
not unlike Pilates immortal one:
what is successT
Now, it must not be supposed that
Messrs. Brown and Child have ut
terly failed to answer their own
question. They answer 1t in way
which, IL not sound drama, is at least
fair-to-middling philosophy and when
the question of the bet-the question
of whether Mary Blake as a princess
royal is a succesS-is propounded to
Mary Blake herself. there ensues a
scene which, we're II not for its en-
barrassment OF coIloduy, It's too great
length and the fact that an audience
has already been wearied by more
than one hour of unnecessary wait
ing between acts. one might say that
the authors told their story with
fair success.
But there is too much said. Too
olr.
Mary Blake show Hardy. the finan-
cier. that the success he had made
of her was only a sham, that 1t was
based on nothing more lasting than
sensation. that It included no exercise
Of those virtues which alone can make
a success actually permanent.
And there is a weak spot in the
actual thesis. Mary Blake sets her
self to the task of forcing Hardy. the
man of iron. to act from disinter-
ested motive. She forces him, 1t Is
true, to say that a certain act Of his
is dictated by regard for her wishes,
but after all, one cannot get away
from the patent fact that he's In love
with Mary and what could be more
selfish than a mans regard for the
woman he loves?
Made Of Money is notable for its
almost complete elimination of the
love interest. Here 1t Is purely sug-
gestional; IL is never a foreground
subject. The cast, with one or two
exceptions, is exceptional Alfred
Lunt never lapses from his character
ization OF Hardy. the financier. the
iron god" of Wall Street, to whom
power is the breath of life. 1t is not
a brutal characterization. It Is brutal
as the rapier might be brutal. but
it is not a belaying-pain brutality.
Lynn Fontanne, as Mary Blake, is an
actress of indescribable charm. Her
characterizations are SO poignant, so
subtle, so personal. that one is left
wondering where personality leaves
of and artistry begins. Her PERFORM
ance last night was almost peerless.
Sidney Toler, a character perform
er of unusual excellence. again achiev-
ed a personal success. George How
ell was even better than in "On the
Hiring Line" He brought an in
genioRs hilarity to his role which
was kept within discreet bounds. Al
bert Tavenier did not look or act
like a Senator. William Norton look
ed more like a blacksmith on bis day
off than a business man. Susanne
Westford, as a boss modiste, looked
too much at the audience. Otherwise,
it's fortunate that time and space
permit the mention of no more.
Miss Alice Everhart staged a scene
in a rnodiste's establishment with un-
usual technical skill, and the gown
display therein was one Of the few
gown displays we've seen that wasn't