Show RISTORI The Great Actress and Her Performance Per-formance Last Nifflit Ristori once the great Ristoriplayed Queen Elizabeth last eveniug to avery a-very small house The slim attendance attend-ance was partly owing to the double admission ad-mission fee partly to injudicious advertising adver-tising and partly to the knowJedge that the Ristori of today is not the Ristori of I a quarter of a century ago It is impossible impos-sible for her ever to appear young again even when aided by all the arts and devices de-vices known to the profession but the I I flame of her genius has not been extinguished ex-tinguished and in spite of her nearly three score and ten years some of her conceptions and passages in Queen Elizabeth are marvelously powerful and grand But still one having seen Ris tori in the zenith of her glory cannot but regret that she was not content to rest when she reached the summit of fame With the exception of Edmund Tearle the support is mediocre Tearle is a prince among actors and his genius entitles enti-tles him to a higher rank than leading support to a superannuated actress Noth ingrcould be grander than his defiance to Queen Elizabeth when he snaps in twain his sword and scornfully casts the fragments frag-ments at her feet The stage accessories were very meagre and the settings bore signs of having been thrown together in great haste Considerable indignation was created by the tedious wait at the beginning of the performance The curtain was advertised ad-vertised to raise at 815 when the management man-agement must have known it would be impossible to commence at that time as I the train was not due until nearly 8 The train was a few minutes late last evening and the performance did not commence until 9 oclock Mary Stuart was played this afternoon after-noon to empty chairs the attendance not being half that of last evening Altogether Alto-gether the Ristori engagement in this city was a most dismal failure financially The agent of the company was strongly advised by the Theatre management man-agement to fix the admission price at a reasonable figure but he was too supremely conceited to listen to any advice ad-vice He was foolish enough to think the mere mention of Ristoris name would set the town wild When the receipts were counted in the box office last night and it was found there was only 500 in the house the matinee price was dropped to 1 and a mere handfull of spectators witnessed wit-nessed the performance this afternoon Had the admission been placed at 1 for each performance the company would have taken in at least 1500 instead of 700 |