ASIDES.

Maoriland Worker, Volume 3, Issue 87, 15 November 1912, Page 6

ASIDES.

The Bert Bailey Dramatic Company commence a tour of New Zealand at Auckland on November 18. Bert is no relation to Bill Bailey whom the coon singer implores to come home, but ho is some class as a comedian, and New Zealand ought to welcome him as a long-lost brother or something to that effect. The company's piece de resistance is I "On Our Selection," which has proved | a money-spinning dramatisation of I Steele Rudd's popular Australian book lof the same name. | All the North Island "smalls" are to ibe visited, and "Dad" will descend on I Wellington on December 14 for a brief season, after which the South Island [will be toured. * j * The following dates for the Now Zealand concert tour of Madame Kirkby Lunn, heralded as the finest contralto vocalist of the day, have been so far definitely arranged : —Auckland, November 25, 27, and 30; Wellington, December 3, 5, and 7; Christchurch, December 14, 16, and 18. Mr. Frank Tait was expected in Auckland last Monday to fix up details of the tour, which should bo a vocal and : financial triumph. I Say, you must hear Madame Lunn. I " * | A song iv the heart is worth two at j the concert. * * » j The Fuller-Brennan management is j keeping pace with the times. j At the Wellington Theatre Royal on j Monday week last the old-time first ipart was replaced by a refreshing musical and humorous entertainment contri- , buted by Bletsoe's Crimson Ramblers ;— a costume comedy company on the I lines of the Dandies and Scarlet Troubadours. The innovation was a welcome one — "a hit, a palpable hit" —and was vastly appreciated by Royal patrons, being voted "just tho thing the doctor ori dercd" to raise the vaudeville show to [its rightful place in the esteem of [ theatre-goers. ' All the other artists "took well, and ;gave pleasure to all," and the whole j entertainment was one of the best we have sampled. j # * * Andrew McCunn, musical "producer" ifor J. C. Williamson, Ltd., has returnled from a six months' tour abroad. [ "Wherever I went," ho remarked in the course of conversation with a Sydney "Sun" representative, "I heard ragtime. In Paris it was all ragtime, and the same in London, but I never knew what this musical form was until I went to New York. There you get the most quaint effects. They have got the restlessness and tunefulness of ragtime down to a fine art. "A number of the best melodies I have brought back. We will do them in 'Puss in Boots,' this year's pantomime. In the way of numbers, 'Puss in Boots' will bo the most catchy production of the pantomime s-eries. "American choruses ?. They aro a lit-j

tie bit too strenuous. They are never still. You have no idea until you have seen them how they work. The best description of them that has come under my notice was in 'The Green Book.' "A writer in that magazine says, 'If an artist in musical comedy comes out and sings about a railway engine, the chorus immediately begins laying the track for a railroad.' That little exaggeration is curiously true." » - » Lily Brayton confided to a Christchurch interviewer that Katherine in "Tho Taming of the Shrew" was her favorite part. "I do love getting in a temper," she said with a charming laufh that made it hard to believe that she could ever get into a temper. "I love tearing round and having something to butt up against."