Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1935-01-06

Some of the more constructive re-
viewers have limited that Mr.. Behrman
in Rain From Heaven" makes too
pretty a picture of the Jewish hero
In a crisis Of oppression. shall give
you briefly vague idea Of his situa-
ton and leave it to you to decide.
Hugo Willens (John Halliday Is a
German music critic, expelled from
Munich on the grounds that he is
ne-eighth q Jew. He accepts that
bad break with becoming tranquility
and finds a haven in the country
house, near London, of Lady Violet
Wyngate. Played by Miss Jane CoWl,
Lady Wyngate is, Of course, gracious,
sympathetic and personable. A little
confused by the current chaos In ro-
nance and economics, she has with
her also in week end party certain
rich man from the U. S. A. (Thurston
HalD and his younger brother ben
Smith, a polar explorer, whose prin-
cipal passions are Lady Wyngate and
the undiscovered fields of snow.
The Americans resent the European
intruder's presence because they think
he is interfering in his seductive
Continental way with the Yankee ice
mans hot pursuit Of Lady Wyngate.
One day, at or nearaboutS the tea
hour, they forget their good American
manners and insult the unoffending
emigre They denounce him and ap-
ply epithets to him, although he is
much finer a gentleman than either
of them. Accepting their blows with
a sweet and understanding smile, he
clicks his heels together and exits
politely. 1t is the opinion. as have
intimated, of a number Of construc-
tive critics that the play and its lesson
would have more Of wallop were Mr.
Halliday to say to his adversaries,
What do you mean by that?" And,
receiving an unsatisfactory answer,
would punch them both upon the jaw
in a scene that might endear Rain
From Heaven" to Hollywood. That,
however. is the blunt, Rice way, not
the subtler Behrman method. The
latter is the more effective.
WHAT, one wonders, has become Of
Elmer Rice? Having been easily
enriched by the Times Square show
business, Mr. Rice conScientiously
started out this season to rediStribute
his il-gotten gains by revolutionizing
the theater and Transforming it from
an art gallery into a soapbox. He
bought the most famous of the New
York play houses, the BelaSco he
@y,,1
titles forget, and he was all ALT with
desire to awaken Broadway to the
values Of the commercial stage.
/ His published contempt for other
playwrights from Sidney Howard to
Philip Barry was enormous, and he
dismissed their works as cheap toys
in the dramas kindergarten. He
| pooh-poohed them. His remarks on
behalf of theater uninf1uenced by
the box office-a theater that, written
and backed by him, would give the
public what it needs, were stimulating,
and it seemed to many of us that he
was about to ope the gates of Beulat
land to pilgrims having no other place
to go. However, the minute that Mr.
Rice's sermons began to make inroads
| on his pocketbook he closed them up
No cold commercial employer could
have put his employees out of business
more quickly than the great-hearted
Mr.. Rice did. Now that he has
vanished I wish that I could bring
him back and show him in Rain
From Heaven" how much more effec.
tive it is to whisper than to bray.
X
THE stages distaff side is, as usual
predominant in the Broadway
dramas. Turning your telescope upor
Broadway's heavens you will discern
only two men stars, Walter Hampder
in Shakespeare and Walter Huston
in "Dodsworth," both of them of the
first magnitude in their different