The New York herald., 1922-03-10
HAIRY APE, NEW O'NEILL PLAY,
AN IMPRESSIVE STUDY OF LIFE
Is Similar to Emperor Jones'
and Fine Specimen of
Authors Work.
BY LAWRENCE REAMER.


The Provincetown Players added an
other drama by Eugene O'Neill to the
list which they have already introduced
to the public at their converted theater
In Macdougal street. This is 'The
Hairy Ape" which was seen last night.
1t proved profoundly impressive study
Of question which occupied Mr..
O'Neill in Beyond the Horizon" that
is, the tragedy of the round peg In tho
square hole. The dramatist has i'm
parted a new picturesqueness to the
topic. however. in selecting man who
is unlike his fellow creatures in more
than mind and character. He Is a
gigantic stoker on an ocean liner, 1ok-
ing, growing, tyrranizing over his
mates and sweating in the fireman's
forecastle. He is a part OF steel since
steel Is the bones and muscle OF the
great boat and he is the power. with his
stolxing the fuel, of the great boat that
travels across the ocean.
So he laughs at the Irishman who
rhapsodizes about the days when the
ship was one thing and the man an
other and the ocean seemed to weld
them into one. Those were the times OF
u
the steamer and gloried In it. One day
there came into the engineers room the
sociological daughter of the great king
of finance, who owned all the steel in
the world. He glanced UP at the young
girl in her dainty draperies. With q
look of horror at the hairy ape she
dashed from the room.
His Day of Pride Ends.
His day of pride in his work had
ended! He had learned what the world
outside his domain thought of him. The
ridicule of his companions made him
still more determined to revenge himself
on her and the rest of her kind that
can SO lightly call a man a hairy ape
and rush from the sight of him. He
leaves the ship with a companion. Then
he leaves behind him the only spot that
ever gave him happiness, the only place
he in reality belonged"
When he gazes into q shop window on
the Fifth avenue to which his companion
has led him that he may see the rest OF
the world. the sight of the men and
women of fashion so angers him that the
next scene shows him prisoner In one
of a long series of pens rry graphically
pictured on the little stage. Here as the
prisoners wrangle and laugh from their
different cages the voice of one Is heard
reading series Of charges against the
I. w. w. He learns that 1t intends to
destroy the world and the end of his
term finds him awaiting membership in
its fold. He wants to blow up all the
steel plants. Mistaken for a spy. he Is
seized by the members and thrown into
the street. Where then, does he belong?
All the world has rejected him
Here intrudes one of the weaknesses
of motivation that sometimes show
themselves in the O'Neill plays and usu-
ally just in the climax Of the drama.
The hairy human ape wanders to the
zoo to see the greatest ape there. He
will talk to the other one like him, the
biggest and the strongest in the cages.
II is In this episode that plausibility for
the first time altogether fails. What
would have led even such a man to such
a visit? 1t seems that only the play
wright's recognition of the immediate
necessity to bring about his tragic cli-
max is responsible for 1t. The end is
undoniably effective. He talks with the
monster behind the bars. He opens his
cage that they may be together. In the
darkness the towering bulk OF hair
and muscle seizes and chokes to death
his human visitor. With his last breath
he calls out to question the world as to
where he belongs.
Profoundly Impressive Scene.