AMUSEMENTS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 142, 24 September 1910, Page 8

AMUSEMENTS

"THE GIRL FROM RECTORS.", ' I No girl in New Zealand has been so much in the public eye of late as "The Girtl from Rectors," and iast night we saw her in New Plymouth. If "Rec-! tor's" were in New Plymouth, and there were a few "girls" like this, "Rector's''| would, if a boarding-house, never be short of young men boarders anxious to be waited upon and entertained by such »brinvming-over species of the modern fun-loving, careless girl. This "girl" was audacious, and that puts it fairly. She exercised the minds of the playwright's other characters not a little, and as for the audience they <wert kept in a continual state of wonderment as to .what freak of folly she would be up to next. There is 'little cohesion in the story or plot, the whole tiheory of it being mistaken identity. A. plot of J this sort, bright, dialogue, placed in the, hands of a company of clever actors, ii capable of marvellous situations, and Mr. Hugh Ward's company is undoubtedly clever. The one vein of continuity i through the pietfe is "the girl" herself, Loute Soudane, Miss Grace Palotta. She' is the wife of Judge Caperton, but in hisl absence from the country" she is also the| "affinity" of Richard O'Shaugnessy, > a gay young dog (Mr. Aubrey Mallalieu), Her carrying-on in this clandestine, ■fashion with "the dicky bird" is interrupted by Dick's approaching marriage with Miss Marcia Singleton (Miss Ruiby Baxter), whom lie has practically stolen from his cousin, a cold and calculating but boorish professor. Colonel Tandy, 'who has been an. intimate of Richard in his gay times, learning of O'Shaugnessy's change of views with regard to tlie iiistiution of marriage, prophesies a "row" when Loute hears ot it, and the audience see from her introductory rattle, whoop and laughter, that he was not far out. Miss Grace Palotta was Loute Soudane, and she carried the audience with her through a roaiing night of three acts'. The Richard of Mr. Aubrey Mallalieu was a clever piece of work. The professor, a lonely scientist engaged in the search for matrimonial bliss, was prominent in three of four acts, and Mr. Reginald Wykeham, as Colonel Tandy, the veteran about town, ably assisted. The play went with a swing from start to finish, and the large audience laughed boisterously with but brief intermission right through.