Evening star., 1940-01-07

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Enthusiastically as serious docu-
ment, are lax in their duties. But,
the mission Of a critic is to remain
a reporter, just as Igo is, and your
average theater audience doesn't
want that-they want entertain
ment and illusion.
This battle between critics and
those in the theater has long ex-
listed. Alexander Woollcott, when .
critic. once sued the Shuberts be-
cause they banned him and the Su-
preme Court ruled that, as real
estate owners, they could keep any
one they wanted out Of their
theaters.
Too, they banned Walter Winchell
after he headed a review of one Of
their musicals starring Edna Leedom
with 'Leedom and Weep" but
Wlnchell got into one of their subse-
quent shows starring the four Marx
Brothers by making up as a fifth
Marx brother.
But. Winchell is a critic who is
able to and has Gn his frequent
movie appearances) proved he is also
a good actor because he was an
adept vaudeville performer before
he bounded into journalism.
Woollcott, once the most feared of
critics as far as producers and play
wrlghts were concerned, today is an
established actor. The comedy hit,
The Man Who Came to Dinner" :"
was written about him, and he will
play himself in that mirth-provok-
ing farce on the Pacific Coast.
Woollcott, in his reviews as critic
for the New York World, made many
remarks that annoyed folk along
Broadway.
He was practically challenged to
a duel when the erudite and late
Lowell Sherman opened in a Broad
way play. Woollcott wrote: LAS Cas-
anova, Mr.. Sherman was, frankly,
pretty bad - incorrigibly actory
throughout and so alien to the
brocades and periwigs of the 18th
century that he seemed always to be
looking for telephone"
Woollcott got into similar trouble
with a fellow critic when he wrote:
The remote Louis Sherwin (before
he shut his eyes, held his nose and
jumped into the movies) was 50
abjectly devoted to the word 'jejune'
that he would lick 1t and paste it
on every new play whether it was
the last jejune or not"
He also was condemned when the
Theater Guild produced "the Fail
ures" in 1923, a pretentious play for
the intelligentsia. Woollcott said, as
a conclusion for his review which
really didn't say whether the play
was bad or good, that "a 4-year -old
girl who was taken to The Failures
by mistake bit her grandmother be-
tween the acts"
The late Percy Hammond, critic
in Chicago and New York, frequently
found that his satirical comments
irked producers who sometimes
barred him from their theaters.
Growing weary of musical shows
which offered little except chorus
girls in undress, he wrote: II wish
producers would realize that girls
knee is human joint and not a
form of entertainment"
He was once banned from some
theaters because he ended a review
with i've found I've knocked every
thing in this show except the chorus
girls knees, and there nature has
anticipated me-"
The late Haywood Broun, when he
quit sports writing to be dramatic
critic, was sued because he called
certain actor "the worst actor on
the stage" Broun won the case
and when that actor appeared in
another play Broun commented Ellis
performance last night was not up
to his usual standard"
James Whitaker, once the critic
of the New York Daily News and
then the husband of Ina Claire, re-
viewed a play in which she starred.
"A year ago when I married Miss
Claire" he wrote, "she told me she
was an actress. There was nothing
in her performance last night to
bear out her words"
What Miss Claire told husband
Whitaker later never has been
recorded, but he was barred by the
irrepressible Shuberts shortly after
because he called one of their thea
ters "a mauseoleum."
Then, few nights ago, a group