GOODWIN'S WEEKLY. 11 H
1 H
Be With The First Mighters BS ", " I
"UNDER COVER"
Surrounded by withered, retouched scenery of
the iSelwyn stamp, that excellent octor H. B.
Warner and his company are doing their best to
make something of "Under Cover," a four-act
(melodrama of upper tendom by Roi Cooper Ma
grue. The author, who we believe is compara
tively new in the business, has wasted no end of
clever lines on a vehicle tho construction of
which has little to commend it, as it falls far
short of most of tho crook plays high and low that
have been presented. The chase for tho necklace
S' is very tmuch on the order of "give me them pa
pers" of other years, and even in the most dra
matic situations in the play there isn't anything
to thrill, or hold the interest at an intensity. The
denouement is cleverly arranged, but it takes a
long time to get to it, and it is really too bad that
an author with the ability to (make his lines spar
kle as does Magrue should have put them "Under
Cover." That's a rotten pun.
Mr. Warner, fine actor and worthy son of his
father, has a personal charm which combined
with his natural ability always makes his per
formance a treat, but in "Under Cover" he de
scended, and he probably knows it. But then one
cannot And a real play every season, those things
being almost as scarce as real actors.
Isabel Irving, who may always be depended
upon, possessing fine poise and the art of an older
school blended with grace, charm, exceptional in
telligence and a complete understanding together
with lilstrionic ability that has always been splen
did, gives a perfect performance. Another act
ress (visible, unfortunately, only in the first act)
whose work created a nice impression, is Prances
Stamford.
Rita Stanwood in the lead as Ethel Cartwright,
tho girl coerced by the secret service agent and
in love with Steven Denby played by Mr. Warner,
is apparently not so much at home in plays of
this character as she was in "Excuse Me," and
"My Best Girl," though in the scene in Denby's
room, she rose to the occasion splendidly in her
erotic ferocity. Her entire performance was
very good.
Except for a certain insusiance, there was
nothing to commend the work of Ruth Donnelly
1 as Nora Rutledge. She hardly has a line in the
play that isn't full of fat, but she slurs and slights
her reading and loses most of the effect. We
fear It will take much tutoring to make an actress
of Miss Donnelly,
jty Of the men T. J. McGrane as the deputy sur
veyor of customs did fairly well, though he could
not get away from the tendency to' overdo, which
seemingly overtakes most actors who essay the
roles of third degree coppers. The Monty Vaughn
of William Courtleigh, Jr., was played to a nicety
and he brought out everything that was in the
part. Old friend Frank Kingdon with his usual
polish in a part eminently suited to him was all
anyone could be and the inspectors played by E.
M. Dresser and J. Wilson didn't do anything to
mar the performance.
But "Under Cover" is not an "Alias Jimmy
Valentine," "Deep Purple," "Within the Law," or
,k any crook play of quality that has lasted over a
season.
PANTAGES
There is a girl over at Pantages this week with
a lilt in her throat that is winning every audi
ence. She Is Agnes Von Bracht, a Dane, possess
ing a wonderfully sweet voice with which she
Bings in English and in her native tongue. Her
work is especially appealing after listening to the
usual blat of near operatic soloists. There are
some other good acts on the bill, notably the Tal
Plen troupe of Chinese wonder workers, jugglers
and contortionists. The greatest novelty of their
performance te the feat performed by two of them
in which swinging from the,lr queues in midair,
they enjoy a little libation seated at a table sup
ported by them.
Charles King, Virginia ,Thotnton and Erman
Searey are presenting "The Stranger" during tho
second week of their engagement at Pantages,
and aside from having been seen here before, it
falls far short of their playlet last week, "The
Village Priest." The character work of Searey
is the one noticeable thing in the sketch. Fred
Duprez has a monologue and an after act contain
ing considerable humor, though he gets his audi
ence in the beginning with smut stuff and they ap
parently like it. Another act is that of Izetta who
plays an accordeon fairly well, isn't much of a
singer and wears a costume that is a scream. It
isn't meant to be funny but the expanse of pink
Incasing Izetta's nether extremities makes it so..
A good picture and some good music round out
the bill.
ORPHEUM
There is a lot that is good in the bill seen
at the Orpheum this week, but many of the acts
are so long drawn out that they detract from the
impression they create at first and become tire
some. However there are enough novelties and
clever performers in the offering to make it en
joyable most of the time, though the precedent
of the week before set a pace that was hard to
follow.
Following the pictures, showing scenes in
Sumatra and the Valley of Waitaki in New Zea
land, pictures by the way that add to the interest
ing and educational scenes with which the Or
pheum people have scored during the season,
Eadio and Ramsden open the show in something
called "Charle's Visit," which is an excuse for
the songs of one and the clever contortions and
eccentricities of the other.
Then Brent Hayes takes a long time to show
what he can do with the a banjo. True enough
he is master of it, but the banjo act in vaudeville
is somewhat passe. Tom Brown, Louis Fletcher
and Tom Driscoll have a peculiar act called
"Christmas Eve," giving them various opportuni
ties to prove that their voices are good. Inter
spersed with the music is a llttel story containing
humor and sob stuff.
Mme. Jeanne Jomelli, formerly of the Metro
politan, has created considerable interest In mu
sical circles, though as was to have been expect
ed, the selections from her grand opera reper
toire did not meet with the lesponse from the
masses that her singing of "Home Sweet Home,"
brought forth. She is a gifted and finished art
ist of pleasing personality, and big enough to go
to work.
Victor Moore, Emma Littlefield and company
in "Change Your Act or Back to the Woods, get
a lot of laughs out of their burlesque with the
assistance of some stage hand slapstick work.
They could impiove V ir act immensely however,
by a little careful wc ig during the spring time
so that the novelty of it would not wear off owing M
to its length. M
Anna Chandler with some new ideas regard- M
ing the way songs should be sung and some chat- M
ter, humorous If not uplifting, scored a big hit. M
She is one of those don't care ragtime artistes M
who always seem to ingratiate themselves im- M
mediately with vaudeville audiences. The "Dance M
of the Temptress," as produced by Alice Eis and H
Bert French, is a weirdly beautiful performance H
in which the stage effects play an important M
part, with great billows of Bparkllng foam in the H
background which move and whelm everything M
within reach much as the surf and settling spind- H
rift in the wake of a liner at sea. The dance is H
original and somewhat exciting finishing with H
the immersion of tho whole damn family in the M
suds. H
M
WHAT'S THIS? PEG O'NEILL AND I
TIM FRAWLEY. M
Peggy O'Neill, the star of Peg O My Heart, H
who made Laurette Taylor (Mrs. Hartley Man- H
ners) so jealous profe tonally a year ago is now H
Mrs. Timothy David Frawley, that inveterate H
bachelor of the stage and the fascinating Peg hav- H
ing been married secretly in San Francisco a 'H
few days ago by a Catholic priest. It is said that H
the devotion of iFrawloy to Miss O'Neill has been H
noticeable for many months. It certainly was H
here during the recent engagement of the little H
actress at the Salt Lake theatre, but no one who H
knew Frawley thought that he was starting In a H
romance. H
In the old days of the Frawley stock company H
at the Grand theatre here when such stars in the H
embryo as Blanche Bates, Madge CanCooke, Julia H
Dean and others were playing, Frawley was per- H
sonally well liked and quite a popular stage hero. H
Since those days he has been seen here once or H
twice and has been about the country with vary- H
ing degrees of success making his headquarters H
in the east most of the time.
"POTASH AND PERLMUTTER"
Most of the big popular successes on the
American stage came unexpectedly. Some of
them have gone begging for managerial recogni
tion, while others were thought of so poorly In
advance, that it was hard to find who wrote
them. Among the latter is "Potash and Perl
mutter," the comedy founded on the "Montague
Glass" stories in the Saturday Evening Post,
which A. H. Woods will present at the Salt Lake
theatre for five nights and Wednesday and Sat
urday matinees beginning Tuesday, March lGth,
with the same identical cast that played at the
George M. Cohan theatre, New York, for fifty
six weeks.
The company includes Alexander Carr and
Barney Bernard who created the famous parts
of "Abe" and "Mawruss." Charles Klein, the
well known author, was invited to make the dram
atization of "Potash and Perlmutter." He drew
the ground plan, so to speak, and then begged to
be excused. He said that tho material of the
"Glass" storfao was to disjointed that it did not
promise well for the stage. Other hints were to
the effect that he had been requested by prom
inent New York Hebrews not to lend himself to
the caricature of their race. Jules Eckert Good
man and a number of others were asked to take
up the work, but for some reason or other, de- 3