PASSING OF A STAGE JESTER

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 220, 11 June 1919, Page 7

PASSING OF A STAGE JESTER

THE LATE R..G.KNOWLES. Mr. R._ G.' Knowles, who died' recently In America,'made his name and kept it as the breathless comedian. In a tall wTvito liat, a Gladstonian collar, frockcoat, and white trousers, ha .would strut up and down the stago liktj aelockwork' man, pouring out with jerky continuity a cascade of stories, and he would skin breathlessly into the middle of another story before you had tjme to -laugh over the point of the last. -He would cast a rapid, pained-glance, at anyone'- who laughed. He was a great star at the old London Tivoli in' the Strand. He left the variety stage at one time and went lecturing,round the world, but ho came strutting' back. He had that distinction ia technique without which no comedian can go very far, and, like all the big comedians, having once elaborated it, ho had to evick to it all his life. His set. mannerism on ,-the.6tage gave.no idea of tho v,vncity and'variety of the real man. He was excellent company and a man of considerable public. spirit. He was always doing what ho could to promoto AngloAmerican friendliness. He was last sijen , in London eft a charity matinee, when he made ail appeal and was unrecognisable to'his'admirers as a handsome benevolent person in.evening dress. He thought out a device for use against the submarines, which it is believed was taken up by the authorities, and he was interested, too, in a scheme for salving Sunken' ships. He was full of ideas of all kinds, and altogether a live man; He was' one of the first ; .to popularise baseball in- England*