Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-03-06
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES Z. TRACEWELL.

same place. He is glad of it. He needs
company.
| The newborn theatergoer stops in
the lobby, not because he Is waiting for
any one, or because he wants to, but
because he realizes it is the thing to do.
| There Is the old group of ladies in
| opera cloaks. He wonders If they have
been standing there all these years,
| waiting for him to return. He Is sure
he recognizes the girl the young lady
with the dark hair and eyes.
And the elderly woman with the
| lorgnettel She was standing right there
by the door that last night, waiting for
the same immaculate gentleman in
| tuxedo-and here he comes now!
The juSt-born theatergoer would not
| be surprised to see Rip Van Wrinkle
come in at any minute. Anything may
happen in lobby
With what assumed nonchalance one
hands his tickets to the tl1ick-set ticket
| taker! There is a technique here.
Never yet have we seen a person with
tickets look the man in the eye. The
man does not expect to be looked in
the eye. He does not want to be looked
| in the eye. He would drop the tickets
in amazement if any one should say to
him pleasantly, Good evening, sir; how
are you?"
Once through the little entrance
one may go into an Ark two by two, but
into a theater only one by one-the
| interesting passage is made from the
door to the back Of the auditorium.
The orchestra is tuning up. The
chairs are mostly filled. One stands
as ..onchalantly as possible until girl
in an absurd costume appears. This,
one knows, is the usher. Yet the cos
tune is a shame. A girl ought to be
able to be an usher without looking so.
| We give her our stubs and are shown
| to our seas. Now we are in at last.
| Carefully Ne arrange our coat, our hat,
! pull up uur trousers so they will not
wrinkle too much, and prepare to en-
Joy the play.
But the play is terrible.
It is so dull that it buckles in the
middle act, and never comes to itself
again Until curtain goes down for good.
What do we care?
The theater is the show for us. The
audience is the show. The fat lady in
the box is the show. The lights are the
show. The little concertmeister is the
show. He plays well.
| One tries to read the program at
| last, there being nothing else much to
do except look at the tiresome play and
listen to the exceedingly dull lines.
The program tells about the play Of
next week. and one wonders anxiously
| If 1t Is going to be as bad as this.
| One casts surreptitious glances up and
down the aisle. Maybe there is a pretty
girl to look at. When one used to 60
to the theater usually there was at
least one pretty girl to look at.
| Yes, there is.
She is across the aisle, sitting with
her husband, who pays no particular
attention to her. One resents the hus-
bands attitude. The sap, why does he
not whisper sweet nothings into her
pretty ear?
she looks up. Maybe she is bored,
too. Her eyes are blue-cornhower
blue. One pretends to become terribly
interested in the program, but when one
looks UP again the blue eyes are gone.
They never come back again. one
knew that they would not. They were
not that sort of eyes. All, welll The
i people, and the lights, and the curtain,
and the program, and the fat lady in
the box. the fat lady with the meaty
shoulders-and the cornflower blue eyes.
And suddenly one remen1hers-those
! eyes we're there 10 years ago.