The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-02-21
nY LANES y CANNON.

Al which is now on at Ne New Play
wrights' Theatre, has to 40 with a
community Of Negroes in HalNom who
have a social background of southern
cotton fields and one-man truck
patches. The varying changes
wrought in them by rs years of pro
gressive development of civilization
along the lines of machinery and jazz
provide the theme.
Sam Pickens has the languor of
southern fields in his blood and can
not adjust himself to the pace Of the
machines and factories. He gets 1.-The
working blues" Loafing, dreaming,
banjo-playing, drinking beer in the
cool Harlem saloons-and looking
for a job" These pleasant occupa-
tons fill his lazy days, clouded over
only by the ever-harsher demands of
his wife (who washes "white-folks' -
laundry for living) that he gets a
job and keep it or else "leave home
and rustic his own pork chops" His
friend, Chill McGregor, the horse-car
driver, rationalizes Sans ways of
life for him and Celebrates, with
many-syllabled words of his own coin
age, an easy-going and indulgent
"Horse-Car Philosophy" that fits
smoothly and lightly on the souls of
Sam and his beer-drinking work
lodging cronies. Around these two
central figures the play and all its
characters revolve.
Humor and Burlesque.
The play opens on a scene in Har-
lem in 1903-the time of horse-cars,
rag-time, beer-saloons and the fearful
ballad about the dead wife in the bag
gage car ahead The high point of
the first act is the revival meeting.
Here Sans wife, Sally, brings him by
threats and main force to be preach
ed at and prayed at" until he gets the
love of Jesus and work in his heart.
In the midst of riot of religious ex-
citement, between the preachers
threats of hell-fire, the Testimony"
of an undertaken slyly advertising his
business, and heavily-built woman
penitent, endeavoring to leap up to
Jesus" Sam cuts and runs, badly
scared, but with his soul and sins in
tact.
The lush humor and rollicking bur
lesque of this revival meeting scene
invest the whole act. Special refer
ence belongs to the renditions of q
ragtime song of the 1908 period and
e - .o,+;,,, o,+oi bo1Io Il 1,rL ;ob IL, +hOCa
days was sure fire tear puller. Lis
tening to the take-off last night, we
wondered il an Interpretation of oul
own jazz-shouters and nanny
singers will sound less grotesque q
years hence.
Chill McGregor, out of his owl
| Imagination, evolved utopian lane
called Nohoken, just across the river
where Sam was to get a job in th'
! circus. According to Chills account
everything was free in this great anC
wonderful land of Hoboken, very little
work to do end lots Of food and beel
and fun ard play--the prospect ap
pealed 20 Sam immensely. But whel
he arrived at the real Hoboken-Ho
boken, N. J.--he couldn't find the cir
Gus and while ne was looking arounC
the cops encountered him. Being
black, broke and a stranger, ht
aroused the suspicious and hostilit!
Of the coppers.
They slugged the "Nigger bastard
with clubs and blackjacks, on genera
principles; and in the hospital, in de
lirium, Sam finds the lost Hoboken'
and the circus, too. Abe Lincoln, whC
founded the town." is there, and San
is elected president just like Chill nae
said. In fact, the place is Heaver
and like the Heavens of all men, San
fashions it out of his own hearts de
sire. This is scene Of such whim
steal humor and poignant beauty a.
to lift "Hoboken Blues" far above tht
common run.
The Machine Age.
! The moving picture Of Sans hap
piness as president has an undertont
Of sadness from the start. It is 81
obvious that it cannot endure, that
it is not founded on any realities 0.
| life in the machine age. Even at the
height of Sans power and happiness.
as president Of Hoboken" one feel
the impending establishment ant
tragic end. In the third act the adj
venture in Utopia winds up in the
gutter of money-craze and jazz. TIT
phantasy fades, the humor withers
the laughter dies--and the machin,
grinds on.
think the play has too much "pro
paganda" of the obvious kind. In
ference, hint and suggestion could b,
substituted with better effect il