Young Actor’s Amazing Success

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 358, 19 May 1928, Page 22

Young Actor’s Amazing Success

Frank Lawton, Aged2o, the Falk of London BIG PART IN “YOUNG WOODLEY” All London is talking of the success of a young actor, Frank Lawton, the 20-year-old star of “Young Woodley.” this play was refused by the censor for some years, but at long last has been produced in London, and has met with instantaneous success. Lawton plays the part of a Cambridge undergraduate who falls in love with his tutors wife. How would a boy of 20 cope with such a burst of good fortune? writes a London critic who went to interview him. His name was emblazoned all over the entrance to the Savoy Theatre. His photograph peered gravely from a score of frames. Then he told me his story simply, quietly, and sensibly. He had played tiny parts in Sir Gerald du Maurier’s two recent successes. His father had died ten years ago, and ever since Mrs. Oscar Lewisohn (Edna May, “The Belle of New York”), had been like a fairy godmother to the young actor. All these distinguished friends had helped to bring him up and mould his character. And then he heat'd about “Young Woodley.” He wrote to Basil Dean and proposed himself for {he part. Mr. Dean replied that he had never seen Lawton act, so Lawton found a part to play at a Sundav night performance of “Sadie Dupont.” He entreated Mr. Dean to spare the time and look at his work. Dean gave him the part of Woodley. After that, Dame Fortune was prodigal of her smiles. The Lord Chamberlain witnessed the first performance of Young Woodley, then under his ban. Press and public enthusiastic. The ban lifted. A long run assured. Visits of Lawton in the part he has made his own to the great British cities being arranged. What a sequence of high achievement! But I was most touched by a letter sent to Lawton by Mrs. Lewisohn from Cap Ferrat. I am honoured to quite a telling passage from this charming woman's message: “Great people, dear Frank, never : lose their heads with success, because they are great people. It’s only those who, perhaps, make good once in their lives who go potty and never do anything afterwards.'!

George Grossmith, here with “Captain Applejohn’s Adventure,” tells the following story about a theatre charwoman. One day while he was rehearsing she came up to him on the stage and said, “I’ve got a son who ought to be on the boards, sir. I wonder if you could advise me what to do about him?” “What can he do?” asked George. “Oh,” said the char, “he’s so funny he'd make you die of laughing. You see, he has fits.”

Who killed Montgomery Stockbridge? Sydney is sure to be intrigued with “Whispering Wires,” a new murder mystery drama produced recently at the Palace Theatre. Stoclv bridge, a New York millionaire, is threatened over the ’ohone that be will be a dead man within two hours. Private detectives arc called in and ! are placed at every entrance to the | house. Stockbridge then settles down to read in his library, a man I being stationed outside the door. The phone rings and Stockbridge answers ! it. Simultaneously a shot rings out and he falls back dead. The detectives rush in, but find no trace of any ; intruder. Suspicion is cast upon the ! millionaire’s butler, his daughters fiancee, an escaped convict, and others, but the denouement is surprising. The principal characters, Muriel Starr and Mayne Lynton, were excellent. Others who took prominent parts were Mary Macrae and Bertha Ballenger, and Fred Coape, Charles Lawrence, Ellis Irving, Harvey Adams, Robert Ginns, Fred Francis and Rutland Beckett. * * * Exception has been taken by the Chinese Minister in London, Dr. Vi eiCheng Chen, to certain passages in “Hit the Deck” at the London H PP°' drome. As a result Jack Waller, of Messrs. Clayton and Waller, the I ,r ‘ > ducers, has written to the Minister offering to withdraw any parts to which exception might be taken by China. The subject was first raised in the House of Commons by Mr. John Eiuckworth, the Liberal member f° r Blackburn. In reply to a question, * - i G. Locker-Lampson, the Under-Secrtr tary for Foreign Affairs, stated t within the last four years protests n been received from the Chinese Ls tion against certain plays in Don among them being “Hit the Deck. The latest acquisition to the ranV i of broadcast playwrights is Mr. ard Shaw, whose play. "The Man of Destiny,” was given recently C Ol fi )W London studio of the 8.8. C. * 1 that G.B.S. has given permission , one of his plays to be heard by less the thief authors who remain side the range of the microphone Mr. Rudvard Kipling, Sir James Id, 1 and Mr. A. E. Housman. No “ composer of note refuses permi-' for his work to be broadcast.* where prohibition exists it is I cul . allv on account of copyright d ju-