AMUSEMENTS In an act and frocks that smack of Broadway j just enough to lift the former out of the ordinary and put the latter into the class of the extraordinary, extraordi-nary, Annabelle Whitford offers the brighest bit of vaudeville at the Orpheum this week on a bill averagely good, if lacking a little in novelty. When Martin Beck's agents outlined to Miss Whitford the fame and bank roll that would be her's after a trip into the country of sage brush and hills, they must have stipulated the wearing of the gowns whose wrinkleless charm combine with three very pretty songs, the Man in the af Box and Hans Hanke at the piano to form a clever 1 act, wherein the former star of several of the latest lat-est New York musical shows has mighty little to do but use an excellent voice moderately, a stunning stun-ning figure unreservedly and to unstlntlngly play up all the personality she can muster. With the excellent aid of the gentlemen in the upper box who in plebeian parlance might be termed the "goat," Miss Whitford's first song, "The Flirting Girl" goes nicely. In her second number, '"The Newspaper Girl," wherein she types the Brinkley young lady, she is less successful, possibly because 1 BLANCHE DAYNE Who will be at the Orpheuin next weeK with "Will m Cressy In "A Village Lawyer". M the Brinkley stuff has become very much of a bore k and pretty nearly passe. Between the gliding v' planes of a miniature aeroplane, so mechanically contrived that she is swung out over the first five or six rows of the parquet in the darkened house, Miss Whitford plavs her trump feature and closes the act finely. There is an ultra-smartness in what she does that is thoroughly enjoyable and she easily features the musical end of the bill. The Olympiers in reproductions of statuary, as far as the men of the troupe are concerned, present some exceptionally good things, chiefly "The Race," "The Dying Hero," "The Fighting Brothers" and the finale. A. O. Duncan's ventriloquism ventrilo-quism is far better as it comes from his manikins mani-kins than when he essays the funny end of the stunt himself. That part of his comedy that is new in lines has scored well during the week, however, and he is a strong drawing card on the bill. I It is left to Fi'ank White and Lew Simmons in black face to get out the old stuff and line It i I up for inspection and even at that, it goes under the wire a few lengths ahead of the dusky hued field. Melrose and Kennedy, De Lion and Pope and Uno take care of the heavy end of the bill, the first named finishing with the antiquated table tumbling tumble turn, and De Lion palming his billiard balls deftly and giving the act a new twist or two. The pictures and the orchestra round out a well-balanced bill. As a curtain-raiser for its coming season under un-der the new order of things by which the house will, for the majority of its time, present the lead-W lead-W lng stars and plays under the Shubert control, 5 "The Lottery Man" at the Colonial the first three nights of the week served its purpose admirably. It was scacely representative of the best of the Shubert attractions, even in the comedy category, though as a light farce it is a clever show with many a laugh and a lot of originality in. themie, action and treatment. The show opened its season sea-son here, as well as serving as the initial attraction attrac-tion for the Colonial's winter, and these things considered, it was a remarkably smooth production. produc-tion. Sick of drudging, a young newspaper man prevails pre-vails on a friend who owns a daily paper to allow him to offer himself as the prize in a lottery scheme by which any woman may clip a coupon from the paper, send it in with a dollar bill and secure one chance on the final drawing for the newspaperman as a husband. If he refuses to marry the woman with the lucky number, she gets all the money the scheme has brought in, and if marriage is incompatible to both, they divide di-vide the purse. Of course Jack Wright puts himself him-self up as the lottery prize after he has become convinced there isn't a girl in the world he could love, and before he meets the little lady who upsets those calculations. It is too late to back out, and through three humorous acts Wright sees the lottery to its finish. The novel situations and clever lines that ensue, combined with an exceptionally ex-ceptionally capable presenting company, made ' "The Lottery Man" a hit and thoroughly enjQyable. William Rosell as Wright gave an unusually fine and clean-cut portrayal of an. excellent role, and proved himself every inch a comedian. Mr. Rosell Ro-sell was Sam Barnard's leading man lasT season, and is a thorough artist. Vivia Ogden as Lizzie Roberts, the role Helen Lowell of Miss Hazy fame played in the original production of the show, was a scream, and one wonders how Miss Lowell or anyone else could get more out of the character char-acter sketch than did Miss C;den. She is a very olever woman with a wonderful faculty for making mak-ing up in a way that utterly transforms her. Sadie Sa-die Harris played the girl of the story sweetly and effectively, and Florence Robertson did well fas Mrs. Peyton. Lucia Moore overplayed her Mrs. Wright just enough to make the characterization J a jarring note in an otherwise finished produc tion. At the Shubert the Curtis show for the week has been "The School Girl," an adaptation from several late musical successes and a tuneful, humorous hu-morous catchy little show, well presented. Beginning this afternoon the company offers "The Cowboy Girl," a western drama interspersed inter-spersed with a lot of musical numbers and chorus features. The Orpheum's bill for the coming week looks ' as though it would offer some of the best vaude- I ville of several months. Will M. Cressy has J never, ii our memory is correct, been seen at the local Orpheum, though he has played the circuit these many years. In his one-act plays of New England life this actor-playwright probably has no equal at present. His characters and stories are sd real, the interest in them so ably sustained 1 and his own acting is of such an inimitable sort that he is recognized as the foremost actor and r author in that particular line of work in which iie is now and for several seasons past has been engaged. With him is Blanche Dayne, and they head the bill which opens Sunday afternoon. Their engagement is for two weeks, one of the first holdovers the Orpheum has had in a long time, but a feature easily strong enough for a two weeks' stay. Louie Puller's "Ballet of Light," a scenic dancing number of the usual phantastic order, follows the Cressy sketch, and after the Fuller dances and spectacle, Captain Maximilion Gruber and Miss Adelina's equestrian review will be given. The Van brothers will be seen in a musical act said to offer several novelties and the athletes of the program are the two Dennis. With the motion pictures and the orchestra numbers, they complete the bill. The Colonial's season may really be said to open a week froni Sunday night, when Wilton Lackaye, one of the foremost stars on the present-day present-day stage, will appear there for three nights in his latest success, Cleveland Moffett's play, "The Battle." Many seasons have slipped into the yesterdays since Mr. Lackaye has traveled this far into the west, and his return will undoubtedly be the signal sig-nal for a turn out of the first nighters that will fill the Colonial for the few performances he will give. "The Battle" treats of the socialistic question, and the old story of the never-ending struggle between the classes and the masses is treated from an entirely new angle. Mr. Lackaye appears as a multi-millionaiie who has won his fortune by methods which are frowned upon by those who decry the methods of the great captains cap-tains of industry.