Evening star., 1937-03-31


enough to project upon the national
scene a woman whose accomplish
ment rates as the greatest of her sex.
The dirge singers probably are not
correct.
The award comes to Miss Cornell
when she is playing role that is not
her best. Nor is it the best play of
Maxwell Anderson, who wrote The
Wingless Victory" Both of them
have had better material, but as super
lative artists they have lifted some
thing ordinary to their own eXtraor-
dinary levels.
When one looks over the local
drama season, there is but one best"
for all the fact that it has been a
year of better than average theater
here That was Miss Cornell as
Oparre, the Eastern princess whose
magnificent assault upon race preju-
dice achieved such tragic failure in
the Anderson play. Whatever the
part may have lacked of freshness
and completion in the writing, it took
on both in the interpretation To it
Miss Cornell brought wisdom as near
infinite as the perceptive artist
achieves, and an articulateness that
sent it singing into the darkest cor
ner of the dullest mind.
There were moments when it was
difficult to believe finer performance
ever had been given in the theater,
moments when art, with capital
"a" kept capacity audiences COM
pletely enthralled.
The play, when it has Katharine
Cornell, is not necessarily 1.-The thing"
One realized that standing in the back
of theater where thousands sat like
so many statues, so still that life itself
seemed to have ceased save as she
gave it voice and movement on the
stage.
The Chi Omega judges who honored
her with their national achievement
award will have no explaining to do
to those familiar with Miss Cornell's
right to pre-eminence in her field.
X
A S THE dullest -Witted person who
follows the screen knew it would,
"Maytime" will remain for a second
week at the Palace 1t may even stay
longer There is every reason why
1t should, the two best ones being that
1t is perhaps the best of movie musi-
calls and that it is playing to packed
houses. Or maybe that is Just one
reason, this departments mathematics
being so weak it would not know.
r
THEY have some funny tales to
tell, these people who come to
Washington with shows that have been
playing the road" 1t has been a
long time since the road was thickly
congested with living actors and
actresses as it is today. In the lean
years a great many of those who dwell
along it have forgotten, or never
knew, the method and the etiquette
Of the living theater.
Performers will tell you, for in
stance, that they have encountered
audiences which do not understand
even the idea of reserved seats. In
motion picture houses they are ac-
customed-as we are-to take any
seat that is unoccupied. In the
darkness, sometimes. they even ignore
the fact of occupancy.
So, when a legitimate attraction
has come to town, the audience just
wanders in and attempts to sit
wherever there happens to be seat.
1t has been no end confusing to
audiences and educational to per-
formers. The latter had forgotten,
playing only the larger towns, Just
how far the theater had grown away
from the public, and vice versa.
X X X
Seventh Heaven" the idyllic ro-
nance which dragged its characters
MT ~ the sewers and cutters of