Evening star., 1935-04-05

London, in fact, gave 1t a cold
shoulder 1t is doubtful if Broadway
will do the same. While its theme is
not new or startling. while its drama
Is slightly too disjointed to make it
anything like the perfect play, it is
the kind of entertainment that you
have come to expect from Miss Cor
nell-serious, poetic and spoken so
that its smallest comma becomes in
teresting.
Mr.. Van Druten rested his case last
night on the words. "The glory is in
the living" These Miss Cornell spoke
just before the curtain descended, after
three acts of reminiscing on the pros
and cons of war and on love affair
that she grew to understand in its en-
tirety only as she reached this simple
philosophy.
In the meantime, she had tried to
forget a soldier lover by living what
she called second best with home
spun sort of husband (Moffat john
ston), who asked no questions and
told her no lies. And in that living
she had acquired what she thought
was an also second best state-the be-
lief of willful forgetting, the certainty
that the past belongs to the past and
the present very much to the present.
The past, however. came back at
her when not only suit case full OF
letters was revealed, but when neu-
rotic young man. touched with genius
and frenzied with the joy of living to
the hilt his obviously brief tubercular
career, spoke those same kind OF
poetic dreams that her soldier lover
had spoken before the war had turned
his verse to hate.
X X X
THIS frenzied, neurotic young man
last night reached heights that al
most took the thunder out of Miss Cor
nell's final scene. A young actor by
the name of Burgess Meredith, he
played the role of Leonard Dobie with
such skill that after his longer scenes
he received an ovation comparable
only to the stars. And Miss Cornell,
sensing his excellence, as also Aurlol
Lee, who staged the play with ex-
treme senSitiveness, saw to it that ne
got his lions share, letting the rest
of the cast play second fiddle while
he was at work and allowing him the
final curtain call-which is rarely
the privilege of a young player IN
company with the countrys best.
Mr.. Burgess was not, however, the
only victor. Miss Cornell's moments
of torture, victory and despair were
played with that Cornell genius tc
which her rapt admirers have be-
come accustomed. Even when she
was merely draping herself gracefully
over the sofa in "Barrets of VIM
pole Street" style, whole rows OF ave-
struck mortals sat there transflxed
with admiration. And as the Cornell
voice sang out loud and clear and
full of the sort of vibration which
has made that voice almost immortal
men and women (mostly women)
wrung their hands and fought hel
battles with her and emerged from
the fray teary-eyed, exalted and glad
for such an emotional encounter.
MISS CORNELL'S quiet magic was
~ not, however, uninterrupted
Margalo Gilmore, thankfully removed
from her Valley Forge" peruke,
played Sister Mercia with force that
she has not displayed since-well.
perhaps since ever. A keenly drawn
character, she revealed clearly to her
sister what stern patriotism can be
during a war, and sent away her
f1ance when he indicated that while
he could fight the Germans he
couldn't hate them.
Every scene Miss Gilmore played
was excellent, except one-and that
may have been the fault Of the au-
thor's British conservatism. Some