New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1922-09-03
Mines Plays
By Louis kantor

By Louis kantor
| THREE PLAYS. BY A. A. Milne q p.
T MR.. MI NE believed in fairiea
| N But he doesn't. And his
| "A readers aren't asked to- Yet if he
| did the fairies would be more
whimsical" and less .entangling than
the incredible machinerya kind Of
omniscient detective service which he
has assembled to explode the trivial
notion in "The Dover Road" that an
| unshaven Don-of the British mud
| dled-class-Juan with an inf1amed nose
| precipitated by draught from a.
window will, the cold nose, that is,
flush the bud of romance.
| MI. Mines Illuminating thought is
that . clipping couples were given a
week of the mean" of domestic life
| ing its customary "bend" they most
probably would depart immaculate of
conception. How to prove this ex-
| traordinarily novel thesis is Mr..
| Mines sproblem."
Nov, how" Mr.. Milne--I shall as
sumo for purposes of simple exposition
asked himself, Fam l going to ar
range to have an clipping pair, believ-
| ing themselves, for the purposes of
my argument, in love, one of them
enough to desert his wife, spend u
/ week together en- famille, yet not 'seri-
ously' en- famille? Well, l shall have
Mr.. Latimer, somewhat touched by
my wand of whimsicality, with lots of
! front of which the motor carrying this
couple will break down. Once inside,
there will be no other immediate
means of shelter, the couple will be
forced by Mr.. Latimer's footmen to
stay for a bit.
'Of course, Mr.. Latimer will be ami
.nase& by my idea about clipping. But
| how will he know that this or that
couple is about to elope? And why
should MIR. Latimer's chauffeur always
drive the motor. | fancy it will be
necessary to smooth over these ques-
tions and chance having the dramatic
| critics call this omniscience whimsical
| Anyway, the motor can be hired one.
| Mr.. Latimer needs simply to have his
motor on the spot.
"But now that l have Lord Leonard
and his lady, Anne, in Mr.. Latimer's
| house, how am going to destroy their,
| for the purposes of my argument,
romance. HIM! HIM! I'll have Lord
Leonard put in draughty room and in
| the morning he will awake with a
catarrh. Mr.. Latimer will arrange to
| have Lord Leonard's clothes carefully
| dropped in a tub of hospitable water
and to have his shaving tools mis-
placed. My lord, he will look seedy
and unshaven! A bristle day, you
| know, keeps love away!
Moreover, Leonard will like kidneys
| III, of ,,,,l1 IL
| test them. 1t will not be the first time
kidney has failed to irrigate a
romance. And then, for variety, I'll
have another pair just finishing a
week. One of this pair will be Eus-
tasia, already wife to Lord Leonard.
| Mich olas, her young man, will decide,
after this strenuous test week, that
Eustasia isn't for him, because she is
too kind and makes him to say No,
thank you'll ninety-six times during
the day. And so on"
NOV this routine, for every couple
~ is subjected to the same ritual, is
amusing, but isn't light enough to be
fantasy" nor is it natural comedy.
Fantasy and Mr.. Mines clanking ma
chinery are incongruous. The fun and
the idea are thin, a quality shared by
all of Mr.. Mines plays in the present
volume, and the people who exploit
both are determinedly dull. How can
one regard seriously, as naturally
comic, the amours of folk whose affec-
tions will not withstand the scratch of
/ an unshaven chin. What would happen
to Mr.. Mines notion if an eloper had
a beard and was immune to speedy
colds. And why isn't Mr.. Latimer's
| test applicable to clippers who never
have been naturally married?
| The comedy of "The Great Broxopp"
is simpler, keener. The caricature of
Broxopp is slyly suggested from the
moment he hits on that miraculously
stupid phrase "Broxopp's Beans for
1 Babies "-which literally puts him in
! the mouths of all Britain's babies. 1t
| is revealing satire not only on the
Broxopp type of human being but even
more SO on the communities which fat
! ten his kinds paunches and pockets
and eat their food from billboards. Mr..
Milne shows how an appallingly mean
ingless phrase will eventually enchant
people into absolute slavery. Then,
Broxopp is "seen." He is a character
and his caricature "holds" throughout
even though it is almost drowned in
the last act by Mr.. Mines everpresent
rush of ssentimentality, Nevertheless,
| prefer this play to "The Dover Road. u
4
About Blayds" best of the lot, but. SO
help me, save for it's technically able
first act, ! found it "most trivial"
Briefly, Blayds, the great Victorian
poetic survival, is revealed after his
death to have been fraud, to have
| achieved his reputation as great poet
/ by publishing as his own the poems
| bequeathed to him by a comrade who
died in his twenties. The play really
is over with the curtain to the first
act The last two acts are devoted to
an exceedingly tiresome discussion.
aged romance, as to whether the fact
that Blayds was an imposter should be
made known; in short. whether he shall
be given honorary membership in Brit
aims squirearchy.
For on the whole Mr.. Mines nlays
| are quite good, but do not believe
they are reading" 80 much as thew
are acting" plays. They need the fat
tening OF stage presentation. The
people. the British upper class. thew
casually-Mr. Milne, like his own aMr.
plm, is a passer- by-mirror-are an un.
important lot. One wonders whv M
Milne waists his West End technique on