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Show country. He got off all the staple American jokes as original and as happening hap-pening to himself. A young lady of my acquaintance who "knew him very well astonished at hearing him abuse this country so savagely In private, alluded al-luded to the fact that in his lecture he had expressed rather complimentary views than otherwise. "Yh," said the poet with a machiarelian smile, "but lecturing is an art." Cobbling also ap-to ap-to be an art. Have you any idea what it costs to educate the public at the Metropolitan opera house.? The total expense of a season amounts to about $500,000. Of this the boxholders pay over $200,000 and the public about $.'15,000. The artists get $140,000 and the orchestra $50,000 a season. The assessments assess-ments per box have varied in the different seasons from $2500 to $:000. This it a notable showing for our wealthy and philanthropic men. and the effect upon the taste of the public has been remarkable. Who will do as much for the theater and for n larger public and one that sadly needs educating. THEATRICAL TOlTcS. The Latest Outrage in Tragedy Perpetrated Perpetra-ted by Oscar Wilde and Lawrence Barratt- THE MOST OONSPI0UOU8 FAILURE Uat Goodwin's New Play Vulgar, Slangy and Amusing The Latest Farce Comedy and Minor Notes. ' New Yokk, Feb. 7. Special correspondence corre-spondence to Tiik Timks.I Mr. Lawrence Law-rence Barrett's production of "Ganis-lon" "Ganis-lon" was the most conspicuous failure this season. It barely lived two weeks, ane replaced by a revival of "Francesea la Kimini," which, in turn, after ouc week's ruu, made way for a new tragedy trag-edy by some inglorious Milton, who should have remained quiet as well a.i annonymons. "Guido I-'erranti" is the crimp, and Oscar Wilde is now tho acknowledged ac-knowledged criminal. The languor- fooling In accordance with 10th ceu-tury ceu-tury ethics you would think Guido's loving the young wife would lend a kind of air of gayety to predeteimlned murder of the husband, but no; here is where one of the surprises comes in. Love beautifies and ennobles Guido, so I hat he gives up his projector revenge and has come simply to lay his murdered mur-dered father's dagger ami a kindly ex-planitory ex-planitory note on Gesso's chest, just to remind him of his crime and show him what he could have done if he'd only wanted to. Guido should have sent the articles in question by a messenger boy. This would have given the old man plenty of time to die before they reached him. This loafing about bedrooms bed-rooms at night with daggers and loaded notes and sentimental reflections, just to show off, is a dangerous business. It makes the man in black fairly wiggle in disgust, and lie goes off down the side of the house that he may be spared to be disagreeable on some future occasion. oc-casion. As Guido mounts the steps leading to the ducal chamber, the por-tierre por-tierre parts and Mrs. Gesso appears in a rapt expression of one of Macy's most ures, walk, inflections, starts and poses. His efforts to become an acquired taste in New York have cost him a great deal of money, and he has not yet succeeded. suc-ceeded. Miss Gale has the best acting part in "Guido Ferranto." Mr.-Vronn and Mr. Smith were the only people in the cast who distinguished themselves. -- -- -4- Mr. Nat C. Goodwin inaugurated a money-making season this week in "The Nominee" at the Bijou theater. It is a pity Mr. Goodwin does not take a much higher place than he at present occupies on the American stage. He should be the representative American comedian, and he is only a burlegquer. His performance in the wretched little one-act play that precedes "The Nominee" Nomi-nee" shows that he has serious ability of a high order. Why does he not get a good comedy and prove bis ability to do more than to extort shallow laughter. laugh-ter. "The Nominee" is vulgar,' slangy and amusing, and Mr. Goodwin's performance per-formance is vulgar, slangy and amusing. amus-ing. It is painful to the thoughtful observer ob-server because it is so suggestive, of higher and better things left undone. I imagine Mr. Good win has made plenty of money. Let him expend some of it ! experimenting in a higher field the field of comedy and corned v-drama aud a fame worthy the noblest ambition awaits him. Coquelin produced the original of this play here, and Charles Wyndham played here in a capital Knglish version of it. From a box office standpoint the American version is a success. -- -- -- , The only other novelty this week is James T. Powers ex-comedian of the Casino in "A Straight Tip." . The piece is a type of the omnipotent,, omnipotent om-nipotent "farce-comedy," so called. Given an entertainer with a few specialties, speci-alties, some skirt dancers or a ballet, an Irish comedian with red hair and sluggers, some topical songs, a Dutch comedian with a big stomach, one or two tuneful glees, a tramp, a grotesque dancer, venerable jokes, a lot of stolen music mix thoroughly thor-oughly in a plotless mess of horse play and you have the modern farce-comedy. farce-comedy. "A Straight Tip" has packed the Park Vilatie all week. -!- Carl Millocker, the successful composer com-poser of "Poor Jonathan," "Black Hussar," etc., does his work from midnight mid-night to 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning. This probably accounts for that famous astronomical song, 'Tiead the Answer in the Stars." ous poot-icsthotic has done much that was both brilliant and abnormal, (witness (wit-ness "Dorian Grey,") and he wrote "Guido Furranti" in a particularly long-eared mood. 'J hough, for the matter of that, "Guido" is a vastly more interesting play than "Ganelou," and is marked throughout by a certain melo-dramatio clearness. There is no ' ingredient of the hideous old allopathic allopa-thic tragic formula that is left out of this dose. Illicit love, murdered fathers, fath-ers, oaths of vengeance, masks, daggers, dag-gers, dungeons, prisons, assassination, nd headsman all shaken up in a gtrong solution of be-lud! Tho humorous sido of a'liloody story i Before the play begins Guido's father ' has been betrayed aud murdered by Gesso, duke of Padua. I needn't tell you that Guido has entered an oath in the Heavenly Register's office to be avenged. To do so he insinuates himself him-self into the duke's household and be-' be-' comes one of his retainers. . Here be meets his fate in the Duchess Beatrice i an innocent, beautiful young thing just j out of school ami short dresses. Old Gesso is introduced to show just how odious a husband can be when , he tries. He has bad teeth, bad heart. expensive night gowns. After passing the compliments of the evening he explains ex-plains the nature of his errand and she announces the cheering intelligence that Gesso has just kindly died. Guido tries not to look glad and piously raising rais-ing his eyes ejaculates something about vengense being his, etc, "Not at all," chirps she in a sweet girlish way, "I killed him'.'' Guido does a neat back-action back-action stage start, and a trick groan, and you feel that he is surprised, not to say shocked. She gently explains that sho had heard him say there was a barrier bar-rier between them, and she thought it would please him to know that it had been removed; that she did it all for him, for love of him; that she wanted to keep him pure and spotless, so as to have one spotless one in the family; that now they would go away to some lonely island in the sea where there was no extradition treaty and be so happy together, and she winds up by begging for a kiss just one playful kiss!, Guido ii a sot a muffin! He can't enter the spirit of a bit of pleasantry. He meets her gayety with a sea sick expression, and claims that thore is blood on the face of the . I I L 1 . 1 1 ---(--- Mr. John Chanler, if he isn't careful, will have claims to remembrance and distinction other than being the husband hus-band of Amelie Rives and a relative of the Astors. He has just succeeded in raising the money to establish a permanent perma-nent art scholarship, which will furnish fur-nish $1100 a year for five yean to some American student, selected by competitive compe-titive examination, and enable him or her to live abroad and pursue the titudy of art under the ablest masters. This noble charity if probably the result of a knowledge of the struggles of young artists in Paris, gained by Mr. Chanler through his distinguished young wife's experience as an art student. He seems to have broached a similar scheme for the actor I should judge from a letter he received from Mr. Booth and which reads as follows: fol-lows: rKAH Mh. Chani.fr -Your svheme Is an excellent ex-cellent one, ;ind tends toward the education of the actor. With the same end in view Jesuih-Hnhcd Jesuih-Hnhcd Booth's theater with the hope that It would be dim In time a training school for the American act-ir. Tnla fulled though my bust- . ncss experl'ince bemir Ipkh than my prores- -eloiial. One of the advantiKi-s of your plan la . moon; that her hands are sticky, and that a great big abattois stream meanders mean-ders right between them. He refuses point blank to kiss her, and hurts her feeling iu every conceivable way. I think it contemptable of Guido to go hack on the girl who did his dirty work for him just to give him a chance to remain re-main noble and beautiful. However, that is just like a man, and this is one of the troubles of nature in the play. With the fury only known to scorned ladies, she rushes forth, calls up the guards, rouses all the neighbors, rings the police and tire alarms, and coming back with all these people who have been sitting up all night with tlir. clothes on, ready for just such an emergency, em-ergency, she points out Guido as the assassin of her rather late-lamented husliand. Curtain! In the next act the Duchess presides at Guido's trial. Tho man in black pops up again-recognizes again-recognizes the bloody dagger as be, longing to the duchess, or to Guido, and in mediaeral phraseology, is "dead onto" the whole scheme at once. bad manner, bad digestion and bad conscience con-science and is made up in pretty equal 1 parts of vinegar, croton oil and vitriol. ; lie is the most consistent and thorough-, thorough-, ly interesting personage in the play and ' he is dead almost so soon as you know him. Of course so soon as old Gesso's back is turned Guido aud Beatrice move about the staere anil indulge in the mystical mys-tical pre-Kaphaelite maunderings in the subtleties of love, and thoroughly bore the parties of the second part. Mr. Barrett has the unirue distinction of being be-ing without exception the worst lover on the stage. So soon as they get down to business, nnd begin to thoroughly enjoy themselves them-selves and exchange locks of hair and candy mottoes, a man in black, (they always appear in black, theso disagreeable disagree-able people!) with a cloak and a mask ami a general billions aud discouraging expression, (he felt compelled to take down the mask al times to let out an over accumulation of expression!) comes in from behind tho arras, (wonderful thing in plays, this magic anas! You can shake almost anything out of one, from a comely old man to a corpse or a regiment!) and reminds Guido that he is liot at a Sunday school picnie playing Copenhagen, but that he has sworn a big round oath, and advise him to keep it in a break-it-if-you-dave sort of way. A colicy expression Hits across Guido's face, his pectoral muscles quiver, and he acknowledges the corn, as they used to say in the Kith century, tho lady refuses re-fuses to believe that anything cau take precedence of her, as ladies are apt to, but Guido is lirm and says there is a barrier bar-rier between them and that he will never, never see her again: and then goes right on seeing her every few seconds sec-onds thro' the four remaining acts. That quality of resolve never burrows up my soul now. Experience has made me move sanguine. The noxt night Guido climbs into the anti-chamber of the Duke's bed room and stands there by the window in the glorious limelight and the moonlight while be utters several inaudible, sepulchral se-pulchral redactions in his very best voice to goose-flesh mimic. So soon as the moon shows signs of discouragement, discourage-ment, the rellections are turned oft and the omnipresent man in black pops up to ask disagreeable quetions. Is he really goiug to kill Gesso or it he only Guido, being asked if he has anything to say, folds his arms like an early christian martyr and vows he will say nothing, and then he talks on pretty much through all the rest of the act. Beatrice fairly thirsts for her lover's blood. .She don't even wait to give the headsman time to put an extra edge on his axe. She cuts him short off every time he rises to a point of order. The man in black calls Guido's attention to the fact that the husband killed (iuido's father and tho wife would now murder him, and edges him on to disclose her . perfidy, crime. Guide apparently consents and tells tho court his index finger will poiut out the real criminal. This gives the duchess nervous twitching, and there follows an exciting battle between herself and the chief justice, which ends in her defeat and the prisoner is allowed lo speak. Then (iuido spreads himself in probably the best anti-prandial effort of his life." You can see that he has been loaded fhr this extempore effort all along. He winds up in a blae of glory bv accusing himself of the murder, mur-der, "fhis was a bit unnecessary as he already stood condemned before his rhetorical effort, but it' had the effect of working tho duchess up to such a pitch of expectancy and horror that, she swooned at his sacrificial feet. The last act is devoted to dungeon, dagger, poison, the reconciliation of these admirable lovers, and death in each others' arms. Mr. Barrett as Guido was eiactly what he is in every part same gest- I ' 1 ' tr " - tKt Vlf !,-, ,1,-n. )IMb,.l Ik nu I U 1 UT II till UH of business men. ant the aril -.tic In the bunds ot artists. I feel quite Kure that the dirta Ik of your plan c ulrl be arranged an that the novlco i-ould reielve here the requisite tralnlnxtoput him or tier In a requisite position to begin w rk on the stare. Your Biigirwtion 1 a gooa one that tt e noli-e after r elvlng this training train-ing should enenri a year or two alirnad nop-plii2 nop-plii2 long tnoiiuh In the different capital to familiarize himself with the methods of different differ-ent RCh'tols. Wishing your plan success. Very truly. Edwin Booth, -- - " Mr. George Sweet stands sponsor 'or a scheme to give American opera, by American singers and in the American language. Mr. Sweet studied abroad, sang principal roles for seven years in Italy, and then in Berlin. In this country he sang in Italian opera with Mapleson and in the ill-fated American Opera company. Although a grand opera singer, he proposes to furnish onlv litrht opera, and prjmises works by De Koren, George Chadwick and others. There seems to be a growing disposition to give the native bird a chance to scream and wag his tail feathers. -t- -- -- Oscar Wilde cables his thanks to the American public for "its cordial reception recep-tion and generous and spontaneous recognition re-cognition of his play as a work of art." He is pleased with the "success" of the piece. He says: "America has no rival in its imperial hospitality hos-pitality to art and artists." I was present at a lecture defivered by Oscar in Edinburgh on America. It was just after bis return from tbis 'Y i, ' :.'v '. |