"WHAT EVERY WOMAN KNOWS."

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 787, 9 April 1910, Page 12

" WHAT EVERY WOMAN KNOWS."

SIR.. J. M. BARRIE'S LATESTPLAY. Miss Nellie Stewart appears to have made a success in "What Every Woman Knows" (by the author of leter Pan"), produced at the Princess ineatre, Melbourne, on Easter' Satur- »' n i r " e * h° wever ) does not write star plays—his every part is capable of being made a good one, and in this respect "What Every Woman Knows" is not remarkable. There,'is always one man and one woman in a play to provide the central interest, and these are played by Miss Stewart and Mr. Beatty, not, I should say, "happily chosen, for the interpretation of a Barrie play. Beatty is invariably hard and mechanical, and Miss Stewart, since' her operatic days, has succeeded chiefly m roguish comedy and pretty pathos, Neither of which aie needed in the part of Maggie Wylie,, a serious Scotchwoman. The the play is simple and unique. . The Wylie family, sober Scotch, ascertain that a burglar is in the habit, of visiting the house, but' it £ < ?? lj :., for the wading he gets in the Wylie library, which his ambition makes as.precious as gold.' The family meet and consult as what shall'be done with the. man, a young , Scotchman named Shand, and finally decide.that he shall not be. interfered with, but, indeed, shall _be subsidised, if he will marry Maggie at the.end of five years (then 21). Shand promises. His success is unchecked, and six years later he is elected to the House of Commons: There follows a fine' scene, in •which Maggie,, after vainly trying, toiwoo one word. of. -affection from ,:the man who has promised to marry' her, tears up the, "legal document" and flings him back his freedom. .Shand is stung: to ,a refusal of her gift, and, in a speech to his election committee, ho declares his approaching marriage to. Miss Wylie.' The excited electors demand to see the lady; and Maggie, carried shoulder high in-'a chair, wins their hearts with a speech of two words, "My constituents." Shand still continues to succeed, unconsciously aided by clever Maggie. Then.comes a split. Shand becomes enamoured of Lady. Sybil Lazenby,_ a Suffragette, and she, on her part, 'imagines him to be her .twin soul. In, the meantime Maggie has been typing John's speeches, and i,supplementing them 'with, the neat touches of humour which make his reputation. She finds-him making love to Sybil, but, in; fulfilment of a bygone promise to her' husband, proceeds to ("act differently from other wives." She tries to hide the, trouble from 1 her father and brothers,' but Shand, in ' a melodramatic moment, openly declares his passion for Lady Sybil: The Wylies look on amazed at something "too big for. us to understand," but Maggie has '■a ' shrewder '■'appreciation of the grand Sassion. "When will you be going, ohnf" she asks . quietly. "It could not well be until Saturday. That's the day the laundry comes home." She arranges with her friend the Countess de la Briere to invite Shand and Lady Sybil to a Surrey cottage. There Shand finds Sybil's inspiration fails him, and Sybil in turn sees in him a man unspeakably dull. At the end of a fortnight Maggie arrives. She will' not hear of John being from his inspiring lady," and,, when Lady Sybil would draw back, encourages her with an account of how Stand's London house has been prepared for her reception. "I've had the vacuum cleaners in," says Maggie, and the grand passion begins ,to look very small. The final touch is provided by • a speech which. Shand has submitted to Mr. Venables', a Cabinet Minister, and which Venables has declared unsuitable. The Countess, with kindly malice, gives'him a "revised copy," which she has stolen from Maggje's handbag. Venables is delighted,; and rushes to congratulate Shand, who sits in dejected silence as the truth is. forced • upon him. Maggie pleads long before her husband will listen to her, but at last sho succeeds in arousing in him a spark of that humour which is needed to complete the man. ■ "If you would only laugh at me, John," she has said to him a hundred times. John laughs, and the situation is saved.