Dramatic and Musical

Free Lance, Volume IV, Issue 184, 9 January 1904, Page 11

Dramatic and Musical

By Footlight.

THE Favourite," placed by the Anderson Company, at the Opera House, is the sort of melodrama the public of Wellington revels in. ' There is a horse race in it for one thing, and the horses are Avellgroomed, upstanding animals, ridden by people who haven't the least fear of falling off. It has a real racecourse crowd. Hoarse ' bookies" laying the odds, large solemn policemen, and veiling crowds. Also, the horses can be seen in the distance, "cutting out the time" in excellent form. Then, there is a lady getting drowned in a tank, a coster's "beano" in full swing, a "scrapping" match between two "lydies, and a really excellent plot running through the piece. One doesn't quite gather what the medical villaiii is such a wretch for. but he certainly is an excellent scoundrel ; as a poisoner burglar, and general "bad egg," he can not easily be eclipsed. As a. horse-doper he. isn't much class, for he easily mistakes a cotton bajida.ee over the white "stocking" of the favourite for real hair, and a painted white foot on another chestnut for the real stocking. However, the thing is smartly done and m the sight of the audience, who all appreciate the stage horsemanship and love the hero and his lady love that is his employer and a sti qight-going "sport" and racehorse owner. * •+ ■+ The villain of the piece has his hand against everybody, of course, and is successful in getting many hisses out of the audience, a rare tribute to his powers. Throughout the thrilling story a waif child pla-s a prominent part. The sporting lady takes pity on him. and makes a stable-boy of him. The lady is a widow, and has lost her own child. It is unnecessary for me to say that the rraif child eventually loses his Cockney accent, and is proved to be the real child of the lady. The villain doctor poisons the child with aconite sweets, puts the heroine in a tank on the top of a house, and has a rare time. The waif child generally saves everybody from getting poisoned, and leads a stupid police force to its quarry. * *■ * As the lady "sport" who loves her trainer, Miss Eugenie Duggan plays a very exacting part with power and charm. Her exclamation about giving the public "a run for their money" was vociferously received. At the head of a particularly restive horse, which was really excited, Miss Duggan showed coolness and nerve. Miss Pattie Hughes, as the waif child played with much cleverness. Her precocity was not overdone and her acting particularly in the scene in which she finds she is the son of the lady "sport," is very fine. * * * The hero's part was in the capable hands of stalwart George Cross, who, as a horseman, a lover, or an enemy of infamy filled the bill with great satisfaction to the audience. The villainous doctor, as pourtrayed by Mr. Dalgleish, was a fine study , indeed, the finest one Mr. Dalgleish, who has been with us many times, has yet done in Wellington. Mr. G. P. Carey, as the German valet, Ludwig Strauss, had much of the humour of the piece m his hands. His material is not strictly "comic relief" , it is genuine humour, and he made the most of it. * * *■ The servant girL of Miss Hilda Fraser was bright, and the minor parts, although not calling for special work, were in the hands of people who have frequently better material. The names of Miss Nellie Ogden and Miss Clara Stephenson, Messrs. Charles Stanford, Horace Denton, and Frank Reis are all well known. The Onera House is nightly very crowded, and the crowds pay a tribute to the excellence of the acting and the remarkable faithfulness of the stage pictures. Bland Holt in his palmiest days never put on a more complete melodrama than "The Favourite." * * * "Robinson Crusoe" is still presiding over his anything-but-uninhabited island at His Majesty's Theatre. The sonsy wearer of the greeni bifurcations and the lovely cloak (Miss Tilhe Dunbar) is generously distributing song gems and the irrepressible Denis Carney, as Mrs. Mother Crusoe, tickles the audience into paroxysms of ecstatic merriment by his weird beauty and -wondrous wit. The "giddy goat," the

Dnscoll droJhties, and the Pirate King ot Joe Cowan all receive their full share of the approval of the large audiences, and from night to night new olitical allusions and quaint localisms that hit the audience in the old spot are freely fired from the Fuller fun - maxim. The panto, is well dressed, and is now in excellent working order, the whole show going w :th a breez-' briskness that makes it unnecessary to ask what will the haivest be. "The House that Jack Built" does its duty nobly every night in filling the house that Percy runs and hundreds of hapoy Welhngtomans for three solid hours are carried back, to the joys of their youth, and forget grown-up cares. Many of the little shortcomings inseparable from a first night are now cured, and the piece runs like clockwork, breasting the tape every time not later than 10.30, which is a decent respectable hour for family men to take the homeward path. The "pubs" are closed at that time, and there is no large inducement therefore to have "just another" to pet rid of your emotion. There are plenty of good points to set the audience laughing, or to engage their attention. Tommy Taylor, M.H.R., would be edified to hear that one of the Ogre's cruellest tortures is to condemn his enemies to drink the liquors prescribed by T. T. Then, three of the ultra-comic characters have a trio to themselves in which they manage to play off a _ string of local allusions such as "Didn't you bungle the Kent Terrace Dnin 9 " Mother Hubbard in the person of Tod Callaway, "takes off" a feminine fashion by wearing at the end of a long chain a heart as big as a spade. * * * All sorts of odd characters caper through the piece • Gnomes with enormous heads witches in their cave, fairies in their glade, and goblin gymnasts. Miss Agnes Bahilly executes a very nimble pas seul, pirouetting on her toes very prettily, and the skirt dance by half-a-dozen nynmhs in gauzy draperies is sweet enough for anything. Carleton and Sutton, in their exhibition of animated statuary, are highly effective, and Miss Emm c Fmith and Miss Yohe fire many a youthful manly breast as with languishing glances they warble "1 ye Got My Eyes on You." Of course, every Johnny there imagines he is the only pebble on the beach. The patriotic duet of the Ogre's paqces about "The Watchdogs of the Sea" a' so hits the public taste fairly between the eyes. * * * Then, "The House that Dick Built," with its nonsense verses and its picture bannerets about j.»,ichard John, Sir Joseph, Wilford, Skerrett, Isitt Atkinson, and Twomey, scores heavily every time. And the PTsod old harlequinade, with clown and pantaloon, briskly performing the old-time business and reeling off gags and wheezes new and old in the old-fashioned style, rounds off a very complete and satisfying holiday performance. Music and dancing, dazzling costumes, picturesque scenery, live business, ludicrous and lovely characters, and no end of broad fun and infectious humour, make up an entertainment that shrivels up the blues like the breath of a sirocco. It took three months to work up this pantomime. After it had run two nights, somebody asked the manager what his new programme on Saturday would be. Percy merely wiped away a tear. His heart was too full for utterance. ■*■ -t * J. C. Williamsons Dramatic Company, with Harold Ashton as agent, and Cuyler Hastings and May Chevalier as leading people, has carried Dunedin by storm, with J. M. Barries play, "The Admirable Crichton." It has been produced there for the first time in the colonies, and is said to be a great hit. The story is an amusing one about a wonderful butler who assumes the leadership of a wrecked party of aristocrats whilst on an island, and then, upon returning, slides back to his old station. But, on the island it

is a case of topsy-turvydom. The butler, as the handiest man, is spoken of as "The Grov.," and the tattered aristocrats pay him the utmost deference. The Wellington season opens on February 4th, and during its currency anr other attraction will be presented in George Fleming's dramatisation of Kipbng'% v\ ell-known story "The Light that Failed."