ALL IN PLAY.
My Dear Mr. Punch,
I have seen The Barrister at the Comedy, and want to see him again, because he is a most amusing gentleman and figures in a case full of good things. There are two authors—as there should be—a Leader and his Junior. Mr. George Manville Fenn (a very excellent novelist) is the "silk," and he has for his junior Mr. Darnley. This latter gentleman be it understood, represents only the best kind of "stuff," for the play is good throughout. It is in three Acts, and there is not a dull moment from commencement to finish. I do not feel equal to describing the plot, which is bustling and clever, nor to jotting down the jests which are funny and novel, nor to criticising the acting, which is all that it should be.
My time was fully employed on the first night, in laughing, an occupation shared by the entire audience. The play was never in danger. There was not a weak spot. No, not even the space covered by Mr. Darnley's moustache. It may be said that an earnest Barrister should be clean shaven, but the remark would only emanate from those who are bachelors. The married advocate has not only to consider his Judge and Jury, but also his wife, and nine times out of ten she combines in her own person the judicial functions with the power of the executive. Where all are good it seems invidious to particularise, but had I to call witnesses for the defence, I think I should choose Miss Susie Vaughan, and Messrs. Mervin, Caffrey and Prince Miller. Another great merit of The Barrister is that he is closely associated with the word "brief." He makes his appearance every evening at nine and has retired for the night before eleven. I fancy, that unlike many other "gentlemen of the long robe," he will have plenty of work to do during the Long Vacation and after.
Mr. Beerbohm Tree, who has become lessee of the Haymarket, has commenced his management by producing a one-act romantic play, called The Ballad Monger, a version (capitally adapted by the two Walters—Pollock and Besant) of M. Theodore de Banville's Gringoire. I remember the same piece was "done into English" some twenty years ago at a Gaiety matinée, when the translator, Mr. Alfred Thompson, appeared himself as the principal character, with the probably unlooked-for result of shelving the drama, so far as London was concerned, from that distant date until last Thursday evening. However, the motif of the play is pretty well known. Gringoire, a revolutionary "Poet of the People," with the connivance of Louis the Eleventh of France, is induced to recite an anti-Royalist song in His Majesty's presence, and is then promised his forfeited life by the same amiable sovereign if he can woo, and win, a maiden who has never set eyes on him before, within a quarter of an hour. In the scene at the Haymarket a table is discovered spread with a meal (I could not quite make out from the text whether it was intended to represent breakfast, dinner, supper, or tea), including some wine, a few grapes, and a freshly-cooked goose redolent of savoury perfumes. Mr. Beerbohm Tree is the poet, and were his method of performance only equal to his power of imagination, he would be very good indeed.
Unhappily his excellent ideas are not carried fully into action, and consequently, after seeing him for forty minutes, or thereabouts, sniffing at a property goose, staggering about the stage with a wine-cup, and declaiming poetry of unequal merit to Miss Marion Terry, one feels that the piece could only have "a happy ending" were Gringoire to be carried away for immediate execution. It is a little unfortunate, too, that the maiden to be wooed and won should be the charming actress I have just mentioned. Miss Marion Terry, in a "piece of absurdity" called Engaged, made a great hit some years ago by appearing as a young lady with a chronic appetite for food, that she was for ever seeking to satisfy. Since then I have always looked upon her as one craving for her meals. Consequently when I found her within easy reach of a goose and in an atmosphere of herbs of a savoury character, it seemed unnatural to me that she should deliberately turn her back upon all these good things to listen to Mr. Tree's poetically (but lengthily) expressed views upon liberty. I could but wonder why her choice had not fallen upon the goose on the table. Mr. Brookfield as Louis the Eleventh, incidentally suggests that that wily monarch was guilty of a crime with which he has not hitherto been credited—a proneness to give imitations of Mr. Irving in the character of Mephistopheles. For the rest, the piece itself is most interesting, is capitally staged, and in the subordinate characters, fairly acted. In the Red Lamp, which followed the Ballad Monger, Mrs. Tree appeared as Princess Claudia, the part originally played, and excellently played, by Lady Monckton. Although probably accustomed to rôles of a lighter kind, she was fairly equal to the occasion. As for her husband, as Demetrius, he was simply admirable and inimitable.
At the Olympic Mr. Willard has made his mark as the Pointsman. Since this clever actor first attracted attention by his wonderfully striking assumption of a "gentleman-burglar," in one of the earlier successes of Mr. Wilson Barrett at the Princess's, he has never had so good a chance of showing what he can do in the polished-scoundrelly line. He is the most accomplished murderer on the modern stage, and really, if one were forced to die a violent death, Mr. Willard seems to be the individual one would naturally select to perform the necessary, but unpleasant, operation. It does not in the least matter to an Olympic audience how he comes to be the proprietor of a low Thames-side tavern when he seems better qualified to lead a cotillon in quite a fashionable West-End Square. All that is required of him by the Pit and Gallery, ay, and the Private Boxes and Stalls—is to do his little assassinations and kindred villanies in an educated and refined manner that can be appreciated by those who have benefited either from the good offices of the School Board or the careful tuition of the leading Universities. Mr. Willard is so good that no one pays particular attention to the efforts to please of his fellow-actors and actresses.
The scenery of the Pointsman is sufficiently ingenious to satisfy the cravings for sensation of a typical British audience. The Railway collision worked as a sort of transformation scene,—the interior of a signal-box changes into the site of a fatal accident—creates much enthusiasm, but the winsome if vindictive Willard still remains the centre of attraction. In the last Act a good deal of gunpowder is burned advantageously to the simplification of the issue. It is scarcely necessary to say that, when the Curtain falls, what remains of Virtue is triumphant, and all that is left of Vice is on the road to justly merited punishment. The Pointsman is likely to remain on the line of the Olympic bills for many a week to come. I should not be surprised to find him still there at Christmas.
Exhausted with the labour of looking in at all the principal London Theatres,
I have the honour to remain, my dear Mr. Punch,
One who has Gone to Pieces.