"CHANTECLER."

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 775, 26 March 1910, Page 6

"CHANTECLER."

• -4 _ ROSTAND'S EXTRAORDINARY PLAY. TEE EXCITEMENT IN PARIS. The floods which occurred when tho Seine overflowed its banks were quite diminished hi importance for the citizens of Paris by comparison with "Chantecler/ For seven.years Frenchmen had waited patiently for Rostand's great play, and when at last the production having, been definitely announced, a series of postponements followed, their nerves gave way. In fact, Paris was threatened with an "Affaire Chantecler.'" 'M. Rostand's bird had been going to crow : for so long that.the city began to wonder whether ho ever would; One. theatrical paper had the following comment:—"lf this sort of thing goes on, not a soul will believe it when the first performance of "Chantecler" really does take place. .-. .Parisians will bear a great deal, but there is a limit." Another

thus voioed the,irritation of playgoers: "We.can live,no longer in this state of mind. Let the first nights of 'Chantccler' be fixed for April 1, and let us have done with it." . SEATS AT HUGE PRICES. Spectators bidden to the dress rehearsal had had their tickets by them for ten days or more, while Rostand was revising his play finally,, and, it is said, cutting out tho'Rat's part, in compliance with a suggestion from none other than M. Clemenoeau, himself a dramatist, over and above tho part he has played on the world's, stage. The house had been booked for the "A" and - "B"-. first nights for huge prices for at least four weeks, and thousands of seats already paid for up to, the eighteenth performance. ' None of the holders of, those seats knew where they were while the uncertainty lasted. None could accept engagements for anything, for whether it was the repetition general or the seventeenth performance; any date was uncertain. Thus, if tho seating capacity of the Porte Saint Martin Theatre were put. at 1700, this meant that about 28,000 or 29,000 Parisians had been paralysed in their plans for about three weeks. No wonder the volatile Frenchmen became excited. One angry man wrote to the papers:— "Sir, —For tho last fortnight successive postponements of 'Chantecler' have disorganised- nj^jristenoet.

I can no longer accept or send invitations without the proviso, 'Unless "Chanticler" . . .' I can now bear it no longer. Kindly announce, therefore, that I offer for sale two stalls, Nos. 208 and 210, which I bought for the first night of 'Chantecler.'—Leon Burette, Rue de Moscou." However, the historic night came in the first week in February. In- the Porte Saint Martin Theatre were Ministers who had been able to give no appointments. for weeks, business men who had done no business, dinersout who had not been able to dine out, and patients who should have undergone operations a month ago, and would now, at last, oonsent to undergo them (a doctor whom the Paris correspondent of the London, "Daily Telegraph" could name vouched that this was the case for at least two patients that he knew). For the time being the box office was in a state of siege, and there, were people who wero asked £9 a stall by the marchands de billets. THE VERDICT OF THE CRITICS. Almost all the Parisian criticisms were favourable, but few place "Chantecler" on the same level as "Cyrano " The London "Daily Telegraph" correspondent thought the most remarkable thing about the verdict of the French critics was that, to the Anglo-Saxon

mind, they missed the point of the play.. Many vaunted its symbolism, as many praised its lyric poetry, but very few noted that its brilliant technique I was the quality overshadowing all others. According to the ."Standard's" correspondent, one's opinion fluctuated enormously as the play proceeded. At the end of the first act one was full of, enthusiasm; one was lost in admiration at the extraordinary cleverness with which an entirely novel scene was presented, and at the consummate art. displayed by author and actors in dancing, as it were, on the razor-edge that divides the fantastic from the grotesque; one was charmed by the elegance of M. Bostand*s verse, Dy the brilliance of his wit, the quaintness of. his conceits, and the resonance of his heroics. But he adds that later on en- , thusjasm began to cool; one became first disappointed, and. then bored. The mischief, he thinks, is dono in the third act, in which Mme. la Pintade (the guinea-fowl) holds her reception. It is mere pantomime, a scene such as Mr. Arthur Collins might put on at Drury Lane, but which in Mb hands would be infinitely more effective. The "Daily Chronicle" correspondent finds *he play "exquisite," with its "refined, delicate satire and repartee, and its merciless flaying of the kindred sins of vanity, humbug, shams, and arrogance." "The poet that gave us 'Cyrano do Bergorac' and 'L'Aiglou,' " the writer adds, "has now given us a work equally great. It's fault as a

bafoi© the average public is that only the intellectually great can really appreciate it." A FARMYARD IDYL The story of the play is already well known. Chantecler is a mere provincial cock, lording it in an obscure farmyard, and distinguished for his admirable conceit of himself: One day as he stalks about his narrow domain a shot is heard, and a beautiful hen pheasant, frightened but not wounded, drops from the clouds into the midst of the dowdy hens. Chantecler, struck by the beauty of the newcomer, and anxious to make an impression, takes the pheasant out to hear him command the sun to rise in the heavens. She is impressed, and in the nest act, after Chantecler has survived a duel with a fighting cock, cunningly arranged by his enemies the owls, she confesses her love, and takes him away into her home-in the forest. There it is discovered by accident one day that the sun arises in all its glory without his summons. Poor Chantecler, his pride broken, goes back to the farmyard, and the hen pheasant, caught in a snare, goes to display her beauty behind the bars of a cage. The chief honours in the acting went to M. Gtritry in the title role and Mme. Simono as the hen pheasant. When the curtain rose, Router's correspondent states, ai most realistic scene was

presented. In the background were a huge cart, a hayrick, and a ladder, and to the left a cage containing a blackbird. To the right was a gigantic kennel, which was still untenanted.' On the wall was stretched a great black cat, lazy and somnolent. Cocks; hens, and fluffy chickens pecked and scratched and chattered, the Dlackbird interpolating caustio' witticisms. All the principals had their faces bare, and could thus give free play to expression. The blackbird tripped and ran about the stage in exqisito mimicry of the real songster's manner. The dog had wonderful philosophical homilies to propound, to which tho blackbird had an over-ready commentary of sarcastic and flippant rejoinders and asides. The peacock was a resplendent creation, with a tail which spread out in the centre of the stage, its diameter being between 15ft. and 18ft. The farmyard, in short, was a little kosmos seen through powerful magnifying glasses. The curtain fell on tho first act. amid prolonged thunders of applause. ■ The scenery of th 6 second act is particularly beautiful. It opens at night, and one sees tho branches of a great chostnut-treo silhouetted against a starlit sky, and tho vague outlines of a far-stretching landscape: As the sun mounts upwards at Chantecler's call, the stars pale and die, the colours of earth and sky change and change until the rosy light of a summer's morn glows on hill and valley, on a winding river, un deop-bosomed woods, fields^ii:-

corn, and the joyous song of the birds welcomes the day. For the third act the scene is a vegetable garden, admirably painted; and the last scene is in the forest. In the view of the London "Daily Telegraph" correspondent, "the topmost heights of pleasure were reached in the second act, when M. Guitry declaimed, with admirable force and perfect diction, that magnificent invocation to the sun, which will be given a place of honour m the pages of the French classics, and when, as if in response to Chantecler's call, the sun rose and revealed the splendours of th/i scene." WILL THE PIECE RUN? Will "Chantecler" run more than a hundred days, and will it ever 'be ' revived? These are questions that the cognoscenti were asking themselves in Paris'. The "Daily Telegraph'-' thinks the play is untranslatable, at'all events into' the English language; it could not even be adapted, to form 'anything better than a pantomime bock, even if there are actors upon the English stage capable of rendering a serious version. Whether this be the case or not, Mr. Charles Frohman promptly acquired it for America. In Paris when the last mail leftit was the rage. A statistician calculates that the management will have taken something like £64,000 in

a three months' time in that city alone, d while three different |touring companies, .. with exact replicas of the costumes and . scenery, were to start for different u places in-a few days after the first t uight.' i, Since the dress rehearsal, M. SosJ tand has heroically cut away large slices i- of his most cherished quips and cranks, - chiefly out of the third act. 11 The "Figaro"' gives some interesting 0 particulars as to costumes. These = number 150, including 48 different breeds of cocks, hens, a hen-pheasant, ■ a peacock,. and others. The dramatis • personae are copied strictly after life. 1 An enormous quantity of feathers has ° been employed in fabricating the costumes, nearly £2000 worth having been > used up in the process. The wearing of these borrowed plumes appears to involve serious, discomfort, their weight ' varying from 111b. to 13Tb. Tho dog's kennel_ is nearly 10ft. high, and / the j blackbird's cage is- big enough for, a man to hop about in at ease. There are 21 owls, some 60 oocks, hens, pigeons, geese, and swans, two dogs, ! frogs, rabbit, and a mole.