The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-04-22
|s REAL ISM NEED' OF PRODUCTIONS.
 IN THEATRE WORLD.
New York Public Surprised By Much Suggestive"
 Scenery

NEW YORK, April 2f-In one of the scenes of Polly Preferred" at the little theatre there is a practical reproduction of sn automat restaur- ant wherein the actors, so faithful are they to the varities of New York life, use actual, five-cent nickels in the slot machines. In further fidel- ity to what's truly what on broad way as New York knows it. they eat actual automat pie. So literally do the property people and actors in- terpret the mechanics and manners of the automat that nobody in a Polly Preerred" audience will ever sit back and muse sAh. dear old Delmonico's, to the life
 This lteralness will feed and strengthen the plaNgoer's imagina : tion which was starving on the spare diet of several of the most arty and ambitious shows produced in New York during the now waning season. Many of them gave only the most economical eye-f -fulls.
 O O O
 Ask Too Much.
 One production In which the art of merely suggesting a scene asked much too much of the imagination was Nazmova's play "Dagmar."
 In "Dagmar." the designer under took to save comp-board and paint by Suggesting" a scene on the beach at Deauville, an off-stage yacht and boudoir He asked you to conjure one of those swan.i,1e craft. lying close inshore on pretty blue bay without showing you so much as a glimpse of single spar, or even a ripple of the bay. All you got was a man in flannels and yachting cap who put his and to his eyes in the manner of an Indian scout and said. "Ah. how pretty she is. with her 3,000 horsepower, twin-screw engines, l2-foot draft 30-foot beam and 120- foot length over all How pretty"
 For the beach you had settle, striped awning and brief stretch ol ducl1-boards suggesting a board- walk.
 In Jane Cowl's Romeo and Juliet" a ballroom is "suggested' by a plum colored curtain that cost much less than ballroom set and which is supposed to signify that the ballroom lies just behind it's folks. In the theatre Guilds production of Peer Gynt' horsesome proposition the interior of tent is Suggested" by a corner of tent -colored sky cloth dangling from the ceiling of the stage.
 Want Real Doors
 Some producers claim this is art and others who still incline to prac- teal doors that give good solid slam claim it's memerly an unworthy economy. Those who go to the theatre don't really resent art if it is led up and introduced in a plea : sant way but this art of Suggest ing" scenes has made itself bore in the New York theatres this year. The draper with his bolts of cloth contrives a certain far-fetchcsl re- semblance to mountains and ca k trees by delft arrangement of the folds. But when thirty yards of muslin dangles itself from the fly loft and says, Took at me, I'm the dark, stone wall of a castle dungeon" people are inclined to walk out with the retort sgo on; you're nothing but30 yards of muslin.a
 There were two openings in New York this week, How Come" another colored musical show at the times square and within Four Walls" at the Selwyn theatre. both produced by Selwyn who had the week to him. self.
 How Come" is full of the same negro music which professors have been writing about since 1916 and literally seasoned with the same comedy that made "Shuffge Along and Liza" such great successes.