Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1928-10-21
Playhouses. in
Underworld Retirement.
BY PHILANDER JOHNSON.

A highly considerate theater re-
trains from interfering to any
great extent with the popular in
tereSt that now asserts itself with
irresistible momentum in the tide
Of public affairs The statesmen
remorselesSly take the center of
the stage and leave the players
cropping in futile bewilderment.
Even the topical clowning, uSu-
ally deemed permissible in con-
nection with public affairs, misses
its usual encouragement and is
confined largely to private life.
In currents and cross currents
of public interest now presenting
themselves, it would not be rea-
Sonable to expect a play like the
Crooks Convention" to create
any conspicuous ripple of indie
pendent interest. Even without
the oratorical splendorS, sunny
days of autumna1 glory, new
moon in the evening sky and
huge silver dirigible sailing
through low-cloud pictures would
quite apart from sports and fiscal
debates be sufficient to divert pop
ular interest from the realm CT
submerged moralities.
* X X
The underworld has been so
thoroughly explored that it has
ceased to be capable of yielding
anything remarkable in either
character type or situation. It is
the study in social Stagnation
which at first acquaintance brings
a surprise and shock similar to
that experienced when drop of
water is transferred from
neglected puddle to the slide of
microscope. The various wrig-
glers, whether of deadly purpose
or only reveling in quaint pic
turesQueness, soon become easily
recognizable and invite only the
indifference that familiarity pro-
verbally promotes.
It Is a very elaborate mechanism
that Arthur Roche has set up in
order to create this satire on
crime. Crime having ceased to
be funny no longer lends itself
congenially either to humorous
phrase or reformatory invective.
The rhymes of gentle Alice Brown
and her atrocities have had their
golden Gilbertian days along with
the enterpriSing burglar and the
sentimental cut-throat occupied
In crime. For the various
dramatizations which continue to
defy cold, scientific interest in
morbid types of humanity and
seek to clothe with misfit romantic
interest a section of life which
after all is important only for its
pernicious possibilities, can merely
reproduce portraits from the same
old rogue'S gallery and offer an
other page from the well thumbed
"blotter" in the police station.
The Convention" is interesting
only insofar as it is typical of the
efforts which have passed in re-
view like a noisy parade of small
boys marching vociferouSly, but
headed for nowhere in particular.
This present specimen aims to
be almost phantaSy remotely re-
lated to some of the Barry pro-
auctions in which dreams come
true with such confident felicity
that the bare facts of existence
seem Of no Importance whatever.
X X X
The work needs an interpreted
ton OF the utmost delicacy to
establish it as a whimsical conceit
of mastery artistry. The only
player in a very large cast, who
gives full support to the authors
attention is Joseph Kilgour, who
as an editor attacks the organized
crooks and is shot down too early
in the action to lend the influence
of his convincing compoSure. The
idea of a minister coming into
a convention whose members
stand with smoking guns and,
after a fervent eXhortation, brief
and not particularly we'll worded,
bringing them to their knees as
sobbing penitentS in instantane-
Gus conversion would require a
great deal more literary power, as
well as more actorial personality,
than is rendered available in this
production. It would correspond
to a test Of persuasive eloquence
worthy to the rank as transfer
fof the oratorical flnesse of Mark
I.Antony to the domain OF the
faeketee;