THE AMAZING BERNHARDT

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 37, 7 November 1917, Page 2

THE AMAZING BERNHARDT

Mme. Bornhardt has returned to the stage to all appearances not only restored but positivoly rejuvenated by her recent sojourn in the hospital, says the "San Francisco Chronicle." In both parts of tho new programme sho. played a mid Sling youngish character, and rather amazingly created the illusion. In voico aii'd in tho vigour of her performance also slio revealed more of the Sarah of old than wo havo known in recent years. Tha brave motto on her curtain is Quand Memo; but what might have been a rather melancholy occasion turned out to bo wholly delightful. On her first appearance the audienco 6too'd up and cheered her to the echo. That was to be expected. But at the end it went wild with onthusiasm, cheering for what seemed at least ten minutes.

Tho present engagement at the Knickerbocker is for two weeks only, after which Mme. Bernhardt will make a tour of our leading cities, and then, it is said, go to Cuba, Porto Rica, and South America.

The first part of her double bill was a one-act French play of tho war, by MIL Henri Cain and L. Guerinon, "L Etoile dans la Nuit." Tho "star" is Mme. Bernhardt, and the "night" is the blindness which has come upon a young French lieutenant as tho result of a wound at the front. A poet, and sensitively proud, he becomes obsessed with the idea that hist face is horribly disfigured; and, convinced that no woman could love him, ho obstinately persists in breaking off his engagement. His finncoo comes to live in his mother's household, and all join in tKo fiction that she is an ancient aunt of the cure's, who has volunteered to be lITs secretary and correct the proofs of a volume, of poems. Tho scene is very poignant and dramatic. ... Mme. art was never more striking than in the passage in which, by degrees, she leads the lieutenant back to his belief in her. No'small part of the success of the littlo play wa6 duo to. a vigorous and very human bit of character acting by M. Garvais, who played the poilu. Mme. second appearance was as Portia in the trial scene of "The Merchant of Venice." Shakespeare does not easily lend himself to translation into French, especially in the moro sonorous and dramatic passages. But Mme. Bernhardt read tho lines with a fine sense of their values, and at the climax of tho scene, as already recorded, she roused the audience to a high pitch of enthusiasm. Again elie was ably seconded by M. Gcrvais, whose Shylock was as remarkable for its discretion as for its vigorous grasp upon tho character.