THE “CALLED BACK” DRAMATIC COMPANY.

Kumara Times, Issue 2924, 13 March 1886, Page 2

THE “CALLED BACK” DRAMATIC COMPANY.

An excellent house greeted (he management and members of the “Called Back '* Dramatic and. Comedy Company at the Theatre Royal last night excellent, we should say, as compared with the reception which has for some months, or even years, been given to piofessional actors in this town. This was no doubt due to the fivst-class reputation the company had obtained, and which, we are pleased to find has not in the least degree been overrated. The general verdict is that the company is, all round, the best that has ever been on the Coast. The piece produced consisted of a dramatisation of the late Hugh Conway’s weird anti sensational romance “Called Back,” in a prologue, three acts, and denouement. The hero of the piece, or blind witness, Gilbert Vaugh an, was personated by Mr C. H. Taylor, who acted the part admirably; his impersonation of the character was perfect, representing an English gentleman of rank to the life, while he ponrtrayed human suffering under peculiar circumstances with marked acuteness. Pauline, the heroine (whose memory of the past was obscured by the shades of the present) was enacted by Miss Eloise Juno, and wonderfully successful the lady was in (his character; the distressing scene in which her long-disturbed reason was struggling to reassert itself was depicted with painful reality, far beyond the ordinary reading of the story could ever conceive, and met with well-merited applause. The other principal characters—Macari, Dr. (Jeneri, Bryan, and and Albert Kenyon—were ably represented, particularly the two former. Mr J. H. Nun n, as the crafty, plotting, vindictive villain Macari, was immense, and it is seldom, as a contemporary remarked, that such a finished piece of character acting is seen, even to the minutest details of foreign pronunciation; he, too, was loudly applauded. Mr Wilson Forbes, who represented Dr. Oereni (Pauline’s Guardian), thrilled his hearers with the confession made by him in the wilds of Siberia, where as a political prisoner, condemned to twenty

yeais’ hard labour in the mines, he was followed up and discovered by Vaughan, to whom the secret confined in the Doctor’s breast was of the utmost importance to discover \ and altogether his impersonation of life in London as contrasted with undergoing a slow and painful death in the dungeons of Siberia drew loud applause. Mr J. J. Kennedy doubled the parts of Bryan (the Night Watchman) in the first act, and thereafter as Arthur Kenyon, and in both parts won the approbation of the audience. Theresa (Pauline’s Italian attendant) and Priscilla (Gilbert Vaughan’s nurse) were both well represented by Miss Carrington and Miss Lily Hill respectively. Mr L. Dunbar played Anthony March (Pauline’s Brother) in a gentlemanly and becoming manner. The minor characters were also ably filled. The tableau showing a vision of the murder was especially effective.

The after-piece, “ Barney’s Luck,” was exceedingly amusing, being brimful of jokes and funny sayings and doings, interspersed with songs, which sent the audience away well pleased. Such a successful performance has never to our knowledge been witnessed on a Kumara stage before. There are many who would gladly see it reenacted again to-night. But out of such a variety of pieces which the company are able to produce with equal satisfaction, the majority will, of course, prefer the announced pieces which are for this evening, the great Irish drama “ Arrah na Pogue,” and The Bonnie Fishwife,” and it may be expected that there will be a still larger attendance to hear this best of Coast visiting companies.