Page Six.
THE SALEMITE
Friday, April 29, 1938.
JOHN MASON BROWN
(Continued From Page Four)
deeply, to live more fully, and to
experience true passion and exulta
tion. “It is the record of splendid
sinners, who just redeem themselves
before taking off. ’ ’
“Julius Caesar,” another Shakes
peare play classed as “presentation
al,” called for a few laudatory re
marks about the Mercury Theatre
Group, which Mr. Brown regards as
very important and signifieant. It
is a young band of actors ‘ ‘ polarized
arouiid Orson Welles.” They have
gvien this year, “The Cradle Will
Rock, ’ ’ Dekker’s ‘ ‘ Shoemaker’s
Holiday,” “Julius Caesar,” and
opened Friday night in “Heart
break House.’ ’ In' the modern dress
version of “Julius Caesar,” “for
once, Mr. William Shakespeare man
ages to escape the strait jacket of
tradition. ” “ Mr. Shakespeare, ’ ’ he
went on, ‘ ‘ has been in as much
danger from his admirers as Mr.
George Washington from the D.A.R.”
The Mercury production was some
thing more than a theatrical experi
ment. A political drama of today,
it made fun of the modern dictator,
it satirized fascism. Brutus is the
modern liberal; Caesar scowls like
Mussolini. Played against a back
ground of brick wall and radiators,
the darkness stabbed by spotlights,
the play had remarkable power. A
crowd dressed like striking taxi
drivers, and storm trooper conspira
tors appear in it. All through, there
is the ever-increasing scuffling of the
mob, that unforgettable herd-like
noise of people running.
“ ‘The Shoemaker’s Holiday’ has
what the scholars call ‘healthy an-
imality of spirits’,” remarked Mr.
Brown. “At least, one can certainly
say there are no innuendos. Dekker
said what he meant, unblushingly! ”
The Elizabethan gusty spirit was re
tained in the Mercury production of
this season, thanks largely to Hiram
Sherman, who, Mr. Brown said,
“Gave the best low comedy per
formance I have ever seen,” and
Edith Barrett, who left rather sacch
arine roles to play an Elizabethan
slut.
Mr. Brown gave more credit to
Burgess Meredith than to Maxwell
Anderson for the charm of “The
Star Wagon.” Of it he said, “One
of the most easy to enjoy, almost im
possible to admire.”
Another play dealing with the
problem of time, although here the
author, Mr. J. B. Priestly, looked for
ward instead of backward, was
“Time and the Conways.”
“On Borrowed Time,” the most
difficult play of the season to do
justice to in a synopsis” was also
. “one of the tenderest and most beau
tiful productions of the year,
Master Peter Holden, age 7, Mr.
Brown declared was “the best child
actor I have ever seen in the theatre,
one without any ‘ brattish ’ quali
ties. ” The attractive, oathful, old
man, who chased Death up the apple
tree was Dudley Digges.
“Our Town,” by Thornton Wild
er, like Julius Caesar, was produced
without scenery, but for a different
reason. Here the author strips the
theatre down to essentials, for he is
trying to strip life down to its essen
tials. “He is writing about the
eternal verities,” said Mr. Brown,
“The play is a picture of the horn
ing, the growing up, the courtship,
the marrying and the dying in a New
England town.” “If you follow the
suggestions of the actors, you forget
the lack of scenery.” In sjjeaking
of the much-discussed graveyard
scene in the last act, where the dead
sit on straight- backed chairs, Mr.
Brown said, “Mr. Wilder was faced
with the problem of putting adequate
speech in the mouths of the dead,”
and in consequence this scene does
not quite come up to the first acts.
Frank Craven, “one of our nicest
actors,” appeared in “Our Town.”
“Susan and God,” by Eachel
Crothers, was the story of a silly,
vapid, egotist (Susan) and the Ox
ford! movement. An entertaining
satire, this play probes no great
depths.
Of “Of Mice and Men,” by John
Steinbeck, Mr. Brown said, “In no
contemporary play is the tragedy of
human loneliness more tellingly
shown.” A representational drama,
it has the uncommon power of the
novel, which Steinbeck wrote with
the theatre in mind. “It should not
be compared to ‘Tobacco Road’,”
said Mr. Brown. “Steinbeck wrings
beauty from an appalling crime,”
but “Tobacco Road,” “which has
become an American institution,”
wrings no beauty anywhere.
“Shadow an Substance,” he said,
is ‘ ‘ The best play to come out of
the Irish theatre since Sean
O’Casey’s “The Plough and the
Stars,” and “Juno and the Pay-
coek.” “It shows integrity and a
fine mind, and is as generous as the
Iri^ themselves.”
“Once Is Enough,” with Miss Ina
Claire, “ is in the best white tie tra
dition of British drawing room com
edy. ” It is buUt around a week
end party (all the people are lords
and ladies, of course), and is very
much fun, ‘ ‘ All about whether Her
Grace will be smart enough to keep
His Grace from running away with
another woman and creating a dis
grace! ’ ’
In “The Sea Gull,” by Chakhov,
are Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne.
Their bounding energy, their gusto.
their way of swooping into a play
like a conquered town, are most dan
gerous in Chekhov. The tone of his
plays is fatigue, frustration, passive
ness. Mr. Lunt manages to achieve
this necessary restraint, but Miss
Fontanne appears in “the very red
dest wig I have ever seen on any
stage,” said Mr. Brown, “and re
vealed everything in her first scene,
that Chekhov had wanted to tell in
four acts.”
The musical comedy, “Virginia,”
was described as “the longest dis
tance without any point. ’ ’ He was a
very much kinder, however, to ‘ ‘ Pins
and Needles,” produced by the Inter
national Lady Garment Workers’
Union, and the current “Hooray for
What!” with Ed Wynn.
The first “signifies a new epoch”
as an intelligent musical comedy
dealing with social questions — capi
tal and labor and social security and
such. The latter, a satire on war, is
one of the best of Ed Wyn’s stage
efforts.
George M. Cohan in “I’d Rather
Be Eight,” is “An Aristophanic
Revue. ” ‘ ‘ The most important thing
about it,” remarked Mr. Brown, “is
that it is at all.” In no other coun
try would such irreverent portrayal
of prominent political figures be al
lowed. “Even in England, neither
the public nor the lord chamberlain
would quite understand.”
A Tailing Girl
She took my hand in sheltered nooks.
She took my candy and my books j
She took that lustrous wrap of fur.
She took those gloves I bought for
her;
She took my words of loving care,
She took my flowers rich and rare;
She took my ring with tender smile.
She took my time for quite a while;
She took my kisses, giv’n so shy;
She took, I must confess, my eye;
She took whatever I would buy—
And then, she took another guy!
Hold Everything
The pee-wee auto was speeding
fifty miles an hour. Every seventy
feet, the little trinket would hop
right upon the ari about five feet.
A cop finally brought it to a stop.
“What’s the big idea of that car
jumpin’ that way?” asked the cop.
The driver answered: “There’s
nothing wrong with the car, officer.
But I’ve got the hic-hiccupsi ’ ’
Social Tact . . .
is making your guests feel at home
even though you wish they were.
—DaUy Texan.
Somewhere a Voice Is Calling
The air is tense; numbers are
called; a hush falls upon the crowd.
Women tremble; men swallow hard,
striving desperately to hide their
emotions. More numbers are called.
Here a face grows luminous; there
discouragement is evident. Then
suddenly a demure voice is heard—
“Bingo! ”
—The Pelican.
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