OCR Text |
Show NEW YORK THEATRICALS By FRANKLIN FYLES. New York, March 24 Who says the theatre is thoughtless? It is serious this week with - four new dramas of religion. American writings, ' too, of good literary quality, and well performed. "Thais" takes up the theme of many olden romances, a monk's forbidden passion for a woman. wo-man. Anatole France in his famous hook made the man an anchorite in the Saharan desert, and the woman a courtesan in Alexandria. The story embodied in an opera, has lately had Mary Garden Gar-den for a soprano Thais. Now we have it in drama by Paul Wilstach, straight and strong, with Constance Collier, of London renown, for the Thais, and Tyrone Power of the Forrestian voice, as Brother Damiel. The play begins in the pious purity of a Christian brotherhood, liv-$ liv-$ ing comfortlessly apart from the cheer of other men sworn against the charm of women, and depending de-pending for solace on the eteinal reward of paradise. para-dise. But the lusty Damie'. has visions other I than those of ecstacies. The play shows one in which he sees the Alexandrian harlot in a beauty quite unlike the pictures of feminine saints. Thereupon, There-upon, he feels an irresistible call to go to the city, and save the soul of that woman. This is staged reverently, mind you, without a trace of cynicism, yet suggesting that the monk's spirituality spirit-uality is tinted with carnality unsuspected by him. The next view is a change from the miserable miser-able desert monastery to the courtesan's house of pleasure in Alexandria. The setting is a reminder re-minder of those ornate palaces in which Wilson Barrett used to install himself as some princely profligate who persecuted early Christians until converted to their faith; and the prodigal gaie ties look like those that Barrett was wont to set forth; but Thais has no desire to pain anyone; any-one; and with a company of girls she entertains such guests as pay the price especially her own patrician sensualist, acted by that survivor4 of Boothian tragedy and Marc Antony specialist, Arthur Forest. The hilarity is sightly, although wicked, and is under reckless headway when Damiel Da-miel gets into the garden of what might be named Ardor. Thais gazes in disdain at the unkempt monk, won't listen to him, and he is driven away. However, he is a zealous missionary, and his view of the woman doesn't shake his determination determi-nation to save her soul. He won't let her alone until she repents her evil ways, becomes his proselyte, and loves him as he does her that is, without knowing it. They ascribe their mutual affection to sympathetic piety, until it develops into undeniable passion. A husky pair are Tyrone Power and Constance Collier. The actress is tall, solid, shapely, and is accounted a beauty. In sleeveless drapery, hung from one shoulder by bepds (that should be strung on tough wire for safety) and falling across hei bifcast vbelow the opposite armpit, she Is an image of voluptuousness. And she is a fine figure still when garbed in the coarse white cloth of a nun for she decides to depart from sin, with no recourse to the monk's love, and to save both their souls by celibacy in a convent, con-vent, while he goes back an anchorite to his monastery. We witness their last meeting and parting in the courtyard of the charnel house where women dead to the world are buried alive. It is "a walled enclosure. A nun says Damiel is prowling outside like a lover. The mother superior su-perior knows the piety of Thais Is sure, and believes be-lieves an interview with him will be beneficial. So the man is at the woman's feet in his cowl and robe, a. monk declaring his love to a nun, and imploring her to go away with him. But she is spiritually stronger than he, although more pitifully miserable. As he saved her from infamy, M she now rescues him from a sin unpardonable. Rising unsteadily to his feet, he staggers out H through the gateway on his way to the monas- H tery, while she goes more calmly and resolute- M ly into the convent's portals. M H "Lola" is a whim in pcychology, to be sure; almost a joke in metaphysics; and its cry of soul- H and-body separation and reunion may be regarded M as a travesty in pathology; yet It is a drama so H dreadfully engrossing that many nightmares may H come of it. An old physician gives himself to oc- H cult science and neglects his medical practice. He jH is a widower with a daughter who does not com- H plain of their needlessly small income, but de- H votes herself to him filially. Lola is sweet-tern- H pered, gentle-mannered and altogether lovely. H The doctor believes he has perfected an electric H machine that will, in cases of sudden heart fail- H ure, bring a dead person back to life. He has H tested it on dumb animals, but it chances that hl3 H daughter is the first human being to be treated H with it. She is hit by an automobile, and not H seriously wounded, but the shock kills .her. She H is brought home dead absolutely lifeless. The H apparatus is used. It sends a sputtering, spark- H ling stream of electricity through the girl's body. H Then the curtain goes down, leaving the audience H alert to the oddity of the scene, although in little H doubt that she will be brought back to life. H Yes, Lola is alive in the next act, and in per- H feet health physica'ly. In her impalpable being, H however, she is terribly ill. Life has been re- H stored to her body, as it was before, but as to H soul she has ffered a horrible change. She was H pure as an angel in Heaven. Now she is foul as H a devil in hell. Yesterday she discarded an agree- H able young millionaire wooer because she learned M of his moderate immorality, and betrothed her- H self to a circumspect but poor bank clerk. Today H H she is quarrelsome with her fond fiance, and goes H motoring secretly with the other fellow. She is H impudent and neglectful to her father, and un- H kind to the faithful servant of the household. To H charity patients formerly objects of her charity B she is abusive. Upon the slightest reproof she B '' becomes a virago. She shows unmaidenly de- H sires, steals her father's savings to spend on H dress, goes spreeing with the millionaire, and H I runs away with him when caught in her wicked- H ness. The dreadful truth is that her soul left her H body at the instant of death, and cither was not H reincarnated when physical life was resumed, or H else it returned to her in a degenerate condition, H thus changing her to a Jezebel. H The author of this singular play is Owen H Davis, and the actress of the unfortunate crea- H ture who dies, and comes back to life with her H nature demonized, is Laurette Taylor. This H young woman is equal to the versatility needed H for the contrasting depictions. As the normal H daughter she is winsome. As the soul-discarded B sinner she is repulsive. In the third act, after H ' months of misbehavior in several cities, and fig- H uring in published scandals of the - f ind, she H returns to her broken-hearted fath Not in B ragged penitence, though, but in l..u .ened ef- B fiontery. The parent asks if she is sorry? No, H Ashamed? No. She is an awful example of a H girl g ad ?1ip is bad. Why, then, dops she show herself in the home she has agonized? Because her heart threatens to fail under the stress of excitements, and she wishes to be where the apparatus ap-paratus that raised her from the dead may do it again. There is imminent need of it, too, for she at once has an alarming attack of irregular heartbeat. heart-beat. Will the doctor save his daughter a second time? No. Ho cannot think it wise to prolong such a vicious existence. She falls dead while beseeching him to make use of the machine. Instead, In-stead, he smashes it, when he might revive her, and lets her stay dead. And down goes the curtain. cur-tain. But there is a fourth act. It begins where the first left off. The intervening two have been the doctor's dream, as he drops asleep over his untested invention. Now his daughter awakes him. She is the same lovely girl as ever. "The Confession" is not the first drama, and perhaps not even the hundredth, to take for a subject the sacred secrecy of the Roman Catholic confessional. Every priest of that church is vowed to never divulge what a penitent tells him, and the civil laws of most countries exempt him from giving evidence in court, even though he might condemn a criminal or exculpate a guiltless prisoner. pris-oner. In this play a Canadian half-breed is an unsuspected murderer; and In his low cunning he calculates that, as communications in the con- fessional are Inviolable secrets, he will save him self from punishment by God if he secures absolution, abso-lution, and yet incur no danger of being hanged. The priest's own guiltless brother is convicted of the crime on the testimony of the real murderer, and sentenced to be hanged. But the half-breed, when sure to die of hasty consumption and being be-ing still a, keen pietist seeks to clear his way to tffc. Paradise by avowing himself the murderer. Meanwhile, all the trusty theatric tricks of agony that an old melodramatist like Hal Reld can think of befall the brothers and their family. The Innocent convict's mother and young wife beseech the governor in vain to commute the sentence. sen-tence. Their farewells to him are plteously prolonged. pro-longed. The sufferings of the priest become acute when he has to give religious consolation to his brother, yet must withhold exculpation. The priest is acted by Orrin Johnson, who doesn't make him ascetic, as that might blunt the appeal for sympathy, but is humanly emotional In the fight of brotherly love versus religious duty. He decides to keep his oath to the church, but having hav-ing come to that resolution, he drops on the floor and wildly prays God to prevent the sacrifice. Theodore Roberts conceals himself in the character char-acter of the half-breed and makes It wonderfully Impressive. His furtive watching of the priest at the trial, in dread that, after all, he may break his holy vow and become a saving witness for his B This photograph recently taken in Big Cotto. "vt , near th reservoir Is 01 of the finest views ever secured In this famous canyon. It Is one of the several pictures taken m by the Jack Gflraer party during a tour In a " 'a -d ''SO' . From left o r jht those In the picture are H. Vance Lane, Ja:k Gilmer, James Jennings, and Mrs. Jack Gilmer. ! I brother his fright when he goes on the stand I himself, lest the lawyer for the defense trick the truth out of him his cringing insolence when ne dares the priest to betray him all manifestations of the fellow's nature are vividly underdone with strong effect. This is Hal Reid's first plunge into Broadway, t M and will he sink or swim? He takes the risk of ' being drowned by a flood of pious resentment at I his use of what Catholics regard as the holiest of j their rites in theatrical make believe. At the open-I open-I ing performance a dozen to a score of displeased pietists quit their seats during the- confessional scene and didn't come back for the death procession. proces-sion. Yet who knows? The play may find its public. pub-lic. The audience sees and hears a priest receive a confession of a sin and grant absolu ion. Subsequently, Subse-quently, he acts as the spiritual adviser of a man condemned to death, and recites the service for the dying on the way from cell to gallows. No $ words or emblems are omitted from these ministrations. |