“IS ZAT SO?”

Wairarapa Age, 9 February 1927, Page 5

“IS ZAT SO?”

A SUCCESSFUL PRESENTATION. Actors and management had every reason to be pleased with the reception given at the Opera House last ’evening to the new American comedy “Is Zat So?” The house was comfortably filled, the piece went with a happy swing, and first and last it was received with enthusiastic approval. Like other American comedies, “Is Zat So?” embodies some elements of good oldfashioned melodrama, but it has its best title to consideration <dn its quality of making those who look at it laugh. By this standard it was last evening, as it has been on other occasions, a most pronounced success. Besides being funny, this new American comedy is the medium, of a rich and rounded education in American slang. Any of us who read popular magazines know something about American slang, but even to those who have matriculated in the magazines, such a dialect as garnishes “Is Zat So?” will bring enlightenment and a perception of their poor and limited grasp of the language that is spoken, by some people on the Western side of the Atlantic. The story of the comedy does not matter greatly, but in the extent to which it matters it is one of love and prize-fighting and good comradeship, superimposed on a lowor-det?k melodrama in which a villain, until the hour of retribution strikes, is engaged in swindling and deceiving his wife after having brought shame and dishonour on the name of his dead brother-in-law. Much of the action of the play is in the hands of Messrs Hale Norcross and Richard Taber, who play respectively the parts of a trainer and manager, and that of a prize-fighter. Much pleasant fooling follows upon the transformation of the trainer and manager into a butler, while the “pug” is pressed into service as a footman. These two kept the house in a roar, and they were ably supported. The comedy is crowded with incident, including a 'realistic boxing bout, and a final episode in which the villain is resoundingly thumped and battered, off stage, as all villains should be. Besides the actors named, the part of a foppish but good-hearted major 's effectively interpreted by Douglas Vigors. Excellent renderings were given in their several parts by Mr. Barrie Livesey, Misses Daphne Bairn, Alary ll 7pb Hanley (whose scenes with “Chick Cowan,” the “pug,” were in every way delightful), Maude Carroll and others. Mr Sammy Green did fail jus: ice to the part of the truculent chaffeur, who tries conclusions with “Chick Cowan,” and Mr. Arthur Cornell was responsible for some good comedy. A word of praise is due also to Master Bruce Walker, a very likeable small boy. Mr. Claude Saunders made the most of the ungrateful part of a thoroughly despicable villain.