STAGELAND

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 980, 24 May 1930, Page 24

STAGELAND

Leo Carilio, who played “Lombardi Ltd.” in Auckland, passed through Wellington this week on his way back to the United States. * * * Vera Pearce, the Australian actress, who has enjoyed a most successful career in London, has gone to New York to play in “So This is Love.” The noted Savoyard, Henry A. Lytton, recently celebrated his 5000th performance in “The Mikado,” and at tlie Savoy Theatre where he first appeared in it 45 years ago. When the opera was first staged he was in the chorus, and also understudying the late Genee Grossmith as Ko-Ko. After "The Maid of the Mountains” and “The Merry Widow” have finished their allotted runs in Australia, J. C. Williamson will present Gladys Moncrieff in “Katinka,” the title role of which is one of her chief successes. The cast will also include Gus Bluett, Arthur Stigant, Herbert Browne, John Ralston, John Forde, Emmeline Orford, Romola Hansen and others. The play will be produced by George A. Highland. “Katinka” proved most popular when it was presented by the firm in New Zealand. >s * m One of the best productions of "Hamlet” ever staged was given two special matinee performances at the London Haymarket Theatre recently. The performances were in aid of theatrical charities, and under the patronage of the King and Queen. Henry Ainley played Hamlet, and Fay Compton, whose performance in John Barrymore’s “Hamlet” a few years ago was one of the most brilliant of her career, Ophelia. Other leading parts were taken as follow: The King, Godfrey Tearle; the Queen, Irene Vanbrugh; Horatio, Owen Nares; first gravedigger, Cedric Hardwick; Osric, Ernest Thesiger; Polonias, Herbert Waring; Laertes, Frank Vosper.

By COTHOKKUS. Keith Wilbur, through New Zealand some years ago on the Fuller circuit, is doing very well in New York, where he is touring the vaudeville circuits. • * * Lucy Ellen Frith, formerly Greenhill, actress, was granted an order bv Mr. Justice Stephen in the Divorce Court at Sydney, directing Alfred Seth Frith, the well-known comedian, to return to her. Petitioner told the court that she was married to the respondent in September, 1913, at Calcutta. Her husband was born in Derbyshire, England, and he came to Australia just after the marriage. Last October he told her he was going to Wollongong. She asked him not to go. In a conversation afterwards she told him she intended to go wherever he went. He said he did not want to live with, her and subsequently she went to live with her sister. A remarkable drama of a young-ac-tress’s pluck is going on behind the scenes at the London Pavilion. Ada May, the vivacious American artist who has scored a great personal success in "Cochran’s 1930 Revue,” has been playing since the opening performance in great pain and against the advice of her doctor. Miss May hurt herself badly by bumping her back and affecting the sciatic nerve at the dress rehearsal, and, unknown to the audience, went through the first performance with great difficulty. Ever since she has been daily more and more indisposed. She refuses to consider giving in, however, and goes to the theatre each evening straight from bed, where she has to stay all day.

Reg. Tapley, son of Mr. H. L. Tapley, of Dunedin, has secured a part in “The Three Musketeers,” the new musical version of Dumas’s famous novel, which is being played at the Drury Lane Theatre. Mr. Tapley toured in J. C. Williamson’s Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera company in Australia and New Zealand. Last year he left for England in order to continue his stage career and has since been studying singing under Mr. Maurice D’Oisly and Miss Rosina Buckman.

Pauline Frederick, here in "Spring Cleaning,” has married Paul Goudron,

“PLAYS WE WANT” Novelties Introduced into London Theatres FREE PROGRAMMES Free programmes and free cloakrooms have been introduced at the Globe Theatre, London, as part of the new regime inaugurated there by Maurice Browne. It is the custom to make no charge for programmes at first-nights, but it is a novelty for this to be extended to ordinary performances. Free cloakrooms will be particularly popular with regular theatre-goers, for these charges can mount up to quite a substantial figure in the course of a year. One man I know who visits the theatre on an average five times a week proudly boasts that his silk hat, purchased five years ago and now rather battered, has cost him to date £65 in “parking” fees, says a London writer. A number of novelties are also to be introduced in the new theatre which is being built in Seven Dials. The seats are being specially designed for comfort, and on the back of each stall is a hidden electric light. “PLAYS WE WANT” When those sitting behind wish to look at their programmes they have only to press the button in front of them. The programme given to the audience at the Globe was of the magazine type, much of it devoted to the aims and objects of the Maurice Browne organisation. Under the heading, “The Plays We Want,” audiences are informed that Mr. Browne’s firm -wants “plays dealing with the hearts of men and women rather than their heads, with a clash of wills rather than a clash of words, with problems of the day rather than passions of the night. “We want plays written by those expert in. or at least profoundly stirred by, their subjects; plays about their professions by a burglar and a bishop, or a play by a High Court judge on "he relation of ethics to law; we even ’rant a play by a Prime Minister on party funds . .

Fred. Lonsdale Off to Hollywood “SPRING CLEANING” AS A FILM POVERTY TO RICHES After years of angling, ■with all sorts of tempting offers as bait. Hollywood lias at last induced Frederick Lonsdale to go there and supervise the filming of one of his brilliant comedies. Mr. Lonsdale’s contract provides that he shall remain in Hollywood at least three weeks. He will co-operate in making the film version of “Spring Cleaning.” As a safeguard against any distortion of his story or dialogue it is provided that he has the. right to veto anything he dislikes; and he will himself be responsible for any ohanges or new dialogue that it may be necessary to introduce. “Spring Cleaning,” which was produced at the St. Martin’s Theatre, London, in 1925, and ran 262 nights, is the third play of Mr. Lonsdale’s to be filmed in Hollywood during the last few months. “The Last of Mrs. Cheyney” has been a huge box-office success everywhere. “The High Road,” with Ruth Chatterton in the leading part and Fred Kerr in the part he created so brilliantly in London, looks like being a greater triumph still. It is no wonder, therefore, that Jesse Lasky is regarded as having scored a great coup, especially as “Spring Cleaning” is only one of three plays that Mr. Lonsdale has agreed to do. With the technical knowledge acquired in the making of this film, he is to go back to Hollywood in October, supervise the screen version of “Aren't We All?” and write a new story for the screen.

Just how much Mr. Lonsdale is being paid for his three weeks I am not at liberty to disclose, writes a London correspondent. But he may forgive me for revealing that it was In Jersey, where ho ran around as a little ragged boy, that he received the cabled offer of more money in three weeks than he had expected as a child to make in the whole of his life. If I could reveal the actual amount this would be a better story. But the film men will find that one of the many original things about this man of 49 with the smooth face, direct eye. and deep voice is his resolute refusal to talk about money. In Hollywood the subject is now topical. “Spring Cleaning” was played in Auckland by Pauline Frederick, “The Last of Mrs. Cheynev” by Renee Kelly, and “The High Road” by Irene v anbrugh.

“STRONG MEAT” Frank Harvey’s Play has Successful Opening SET IN NEW ZEALAND Lighthouses have always attracted yliters of strong drama. I remember in Paris a cheery little Grand Guigno! , air a)nl ; 1 a, lighthouse-keeper with hydrophobia, and only the other day had a lighthouse melodrama iJevil In Bronze,” writes Alan Pardons m “The Daily Mail.” Frank Harvey’s “Cape Forlorn ” produced at the Fortune Theatre, has t? 1 ' scene a lonely lighthouse off the New Zealand coast. Here dwell Kell the keeper (Mr.

Harvey), his wife, Eileen (Marda Vanne), and his mate, Cass (Edmund Willard), a 300 per cent, heman. Into the midst of this little company there arrives a man calling himself Kingsley—wrecked in a motor-boat on the rocks (Louis Bradfield).

l Eileen is a proper little minx; she has been carrying on with Cass, and now she is prepared to throw him over for Kingsley, who turns out to be a fugitive from justice, having run away with the funds of the building society which has all the skipper's savings. Gass discovers his secret, and gets killed by Eileen for his pains. But in this way the full truth comes to the skipper; Kingsley, throws liimself into the sea, and Eileen, having collared the stolen money, freshens herself up for whatever new man may come along. The acting is first-rate, especially in the case of Miss Vanne, who portrays the innate cheapness and commonness of the woman with real insight, yet makes one feel the ennui which weighs so heavily on her. Mr. Harvey is excellent as the skipper, and Mr. Willard plays those strong men parts with a brutality that is really convincing. Production excellent, with admirable sea (and even seagull) effects. Good, strong meat which should now bring fortune to the theatre, which has not always acted up to its name.

Diana Wilson, here with Lawrence Grossmith, is playing in “Debonair,” a dramatisation of G. B. Stern’s novel of that name. Jean Barlin, a Swedish dancer now in Paris, is claiming heavy damages against a dramatic critic who wrote of him: “Barlin is not only growing very fat, but he almost bursts his tights." Barlin says a male dancer has to be slim and active, and he has not grown any fatter during the last year. The episode reminds one of an unfortunate member of Pavlova’s ballet, who stayed behind and secured an engagement with Nina Devitt at the Sydney Tivoli. At the first matinee his tights split from thigh to knee. His engagement ended at the end of the week. Then he took to driving a taxi to get his fare back to Europe.

ACTORS COMBINE Stage Stars in London Form Players’ Guild POOLING THE RISKS An attempt to restore the spacious days of the London stage by what amounts to a return to the actormanager system, has just been launched. It is in the hands of the Famous Players’ Guild, a new combine which has been formed with headquarters at the Duke of York’s Theatre. Its policy, combined with the protessional standing of the stage stars concerned, makes it one of the most interesting and important ventures of the kind launched in the English theatre for many years.

Among the artists forming the group are Henry Ainley, Cedric Hardwicke, Owen Nares and Marion Lome. With Miss Lome is associated her

husband, Walter Hackett, the dra matist, who is the author, among other plays, of “Ambrose Applejohn’s A d v e n tures,” “Other Men’s Wives,” and “77, Park Lane.” He will write most of the series of plays in which Miss Lome is to

appear. OTHERS TO FOLLOW Several other well-known artists are joining the group. It is proposed to place each of the artists in a separate theatre where he or she will appear in a series of plays. Active operations are to begin when Nares and Miss Lome will each be presented in the first of thenseries. Mr. Hardwicke will appear under the guild as soon as his present arrangements with Sir Barry Jackson allow, and Mr. Ainley when he has finished his engagement at the Haymarket. Behind the scheme is a business organisation which has devised what, for a theatrical undertaking, is a newkind of financial arrangement. Roughly, it will pool its risks over the whole enterprise, and so reduce the usual gamble of theatrical production. GOOD OLD DAYS The joint managing directors of the guild, which w-ill have its headquarters at the Duke of York’s Theatre, are R. Low-ris Pearson and W. Macqueen Pope. “The object of the guild,” Mr. Pope said, “is to try to stabilise the theatre, so far as legitimate plays are concerned. “The guild regards the days of the actor-manager, when each star appeared always at a certain theatre, and no other, as one of the finest periods of the English stage. “Tree, Alexander, Hare, Cyril Maude and the rest were fixed planets round w-hich the theatre-going public revolved. “Under the policy of the guild the public will always know w-here their favourite star can be found, and the type of play being presented in the particular the atre.”

‘HANS ROTHSCHILD’ Rise of Famous Family Told in Stage Play ROYALTY AND MONEY “Hans Rothschild,” an historic play concerning: the famous Rothschild family, has been written by an Austrian playwright and produced in Vienna. In five acts and ten scenes the author aims at showing and contrasting the rise of finance and the decline ot dynastic power, the development of economics against absolutism, and the growing dependence of Imperial power on money. The play opens thre days before the outbreak of the July Revolution in 1830. At their Frankfort home the five brothers of the rising dynasty of the Rothschilds, Amschel Meier, Solomon Meier, Nathaniel, James, and Karl, and their aged mother, Gudulla, hold a family coun cil. For a number of years the Rothschilds had Lad the power, through money, to dictate peace or war. They now decide to assist Monarchism against the Revolution, since it will turn out to their advantage. No country on the Continent can put up an army without their money. A STRANGE INTERVIEW The Vienna Government at this time has no financial resources. This is the moment for the Rothschilds to step in. In Austria,, however, the Jews were still without rights. They were not allowed to stay in Vienna for more than three days, and they could not acquire property. Strange to say. no fewer than 15,000 Jews lived in Vienna in those days. • A strange comic element is introduced to the play at this point. Amschel Meier Rothschild, the outcast Jew, who has no legal rights, is received by the highly Catholic old Kmperor Franz, in an audience arranged by Metternich. In patriotic, glowing words, Amschel Meier describes to the Emperor what he is going to do for Austria, and proud old Franz realises for the first time that finance has him in the hollow of its hand, and that he must give in. SUCCESS From that moment his health begins to fail, and a serious illness ends in death. The Rothschilds, however, are triumphant, having saved Austria and the Continent from the Revolution. Their power rises to unexpected heights. At Amschel Meier's "at home,” nearly the whole anti-Jewish Austrian aristocracy visits the Jewish financier, and his success is definitely crowned by the appearance of Metternich at a Jew’s house. An extraordinary law is made in favour of Amschel Meier and his family, permit, mg them to live in Vienna. Apart from the Continental personalities the Emperor Franz Metternich. and Tallevran—Lord Palmerston has a political role in the play, the action of which occurs in London. Frankfort, Vienna, and other places. Hanns Sassman. the author, is “a self-made man.” He tried many things before taking to the theatre. Of his many former experiments, the production of peasant plays in an open-air theatre, situated on the top of the Baerenkogel. near Murzzuschlag. in Stvria. at a height of 4.000 feet above sea level, deserves special mention This was the highest stage in Europe