Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-08-23
We Have Saved the Stage
And Recaptured the Road
Say S. O.S. Press Agents
Folks May Be Still Willing to Pay for Good Plays
but Where Are They ?-Somethins Needed
Besides IS O. S." Buttons.
By w. H. Landvoist.

crowning need of the theater to-
day. It may be possible to stir
the old institution into new life
and save our stage" at the same
time. The idea may lead to the
formation Of fine stock companies,
at least in the larger cities, and
let them do the play pruning and
producing, leaving the great New
York moguls to the lesSened duty
of handling the visiting stars for
the highest theatric illumination
of whatever may be produced in
this way. This method, at least,
overcomes excessive transports ton
costs, and it promises much in
the way of economy in play han
ding on the stage itself. There
are many yet alive who will re-
call the great stock companies OF
other days. Today, more than
ever, they are needed as schools
for those players who before many
moons will need to be replaced
with something just as good" It
was the old stock company that
made the great actor in bygone
days. And what man has done
man can do again, maybe.
II COOKING over the fence Of the
enemy, right here in Washing
ton, Manager Harry Crull of the
Fox Theater, is quietly doing this
very thing for vaudeville, which
the movie unceremoniously wiped
on the earth and then, repentant,
went back and restored as q
valuable asset and financial sup
port to the wayering talking pic
ture. The motion picture industry
has accomplished great and very
fine work in its own peculiar
sphere, but it has long been a
question If it has always acted
wisely with the other branches OF
theatrical entertainment. "All the
worlds a stage and all the men
and women merely players. They
have their exits and their en-
frances, and one man in his time
PLAYS many parts, his acts being
seFen ages" This was never more
true In Shakespeare,S day than
now. And this irrefutable fact is
why the movie can neither de-
stroy nor replace the legitimate
theater. Pictures are pretty things,
sometimes interesting things, but
they are always counterpartS OF
something greater. Even though
you make them talk. they can
never be human, and humanity
demands creatures Of flesh and
blood, not their photographs TO
depict itself. Even talking
xsgrso f&1a aaY Yanvnx. III IL
TN all the publicity that has been
spread broadcast throughout
the land by the enterpriSing pub
licity man one thing was omitted.
It is the invaluable worth Of legiti-
mate drama, be it comedy or
tragedy. The ancientS who con-
ceived the theater struggled
thoughtfully in the days of Sages
and philosophers to make IT. what
it should be. And sageS and phi
loSophers in these troublous times
may better the work of their
wonderful predecessors. The difi1-
Guilty has come to them because
they took their gaze from the
wonderful creation of the Greeks
and Romans, the French, the
German and the English, almost
ignoring the Spanish and the Ital-
ian, while paying but passing heed
to the SWede and the Dane. The
theater has been constructed upon
centuries of thought by all ma
tionalitieS because 1t is the stage
OF human life and its problems.
You can't wipe it out with talking
pictures. And yet how many
countless thousands of our young
folks of today know anything of
1t, except a feeble imitation BY a
noisy counterfeit that, even in the
stage Of absolute perfection, can
never replace 1t. What has been
done by the enterprising press
agent TO supply, even in part, this
invaluable education? And what
do the producing managers who
have made theirs care about it
! anyway?