A WORK OF—SOME IMPORTANCE.
"Let who will give me a plot, I will write their dialogue." (Extract from Uncommon-place Book of Mr. O. Wilde.) Now when the author of A Woman of No Importance and of Lady Windermere's Fan has to find his own materials for a plot ("'Play-wrights' materials for plots made up.' Idea for Literary and Dramatic Advertisement" Note-book, O. W.)—well, he does find them, and makes them his own. ("Adoption not adaptation. A clear distinction.—N.B. I confer the 'distinction'" O. W.) Certainly "Our Oscar" possesses the happy knack of turning out some well-polished epigrams up to Drawing-room date. And so it happens that, during the first two Acts, when Mr. Wilde's dramatis personæ are all gathered together, with nothing to do and plenty to say, their conversation is light and airy, with an occasional sparkler coming out ("A summer night, with, at intervals, a brilliant meteor flashing through the sky." Uncom. P. B., O. W.), that crackles, goes pop like the weasel of the old song, and "then is heard no more," as was the case with Macbeth's poor player, and, as he was a poor player, his fate was not undeserved.—(Mem. "A Lady Nickleby or Duchesse de Malapropos, to misquote.—For example, she might say, as quoting Shakspeare, 'Life's but a walking candle.'" O. W.)
We all remember how poor Mr. Dick couldn't keep King Charles's Head out of his manuscript. The Author of No Importance is similarly affected. Left to himself for a plot, he cannot keep melodrama out of his play, and what ought to have been a comedy pure and simple (or the reverse) drops suddenly into old-fashioned theatrical melodrama. During the first two Acts Lady Hunstanton, Lady Caroline Pontefract, Mrs. Allonby, Lord Illingworth, The Venerable James Daubeny, D.D., talk on pleasantly enough until interrupted by the sudden apparition of the aforesaid King Charles the First's Head, represented by the wearisome tirades, tawdry, cheap, and conventional, belonging to the Lytton-Bulwerian-Money period of the Drama, of which a considerable proportion falls to the share of the blameless Miss Julia Neilson, who, as la belle Américaine, Hester Worsley, in her attitude towards her audience, resembles the blessed Glendoveer, inasmuch as it is "hers to talk, and ours to hear." Deeply, too, does everyone sympathise with lively Mrs. Bernard Beere, who, as Mrs. Arbuthnot, a sort of up-to-date Mrs. Haller, is condemned to do penance in a kind of magpie costume of black velvet, relieved by a dash of white, rather calling to mind the lady whom Charles Dickens described as "Hamlet's Aunt," her funereal attire being relieved by a whitened face with tear-reddened eyes. It is these two characters, with Gerald Arbuthnot, Mr. Fred Terry, who, like the three gruesome personages in Don Giovanni, will intrude themselves into what might have been a pleasant, interesting comedy of modern manners, if only it had had a good comedy plot.
Taken as a whole, the acting is admirable. Mr. Tree, as the titled cad, Lord Illingworth, is perfect in make-up and manner. Certainly one of the many best things he has done. It is a companion portrait to the other wicked nobleman in The Dancing Girl. ("There is another and a worse wicked nobleman" N. B., O. W.) But this is no fault, and, indeed, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to find fault with Mr. Tree's Lord Illingworth. Mrs. Tree as Mrs. Allonby, is a very charming battledore in the game of repartee-shuttlecock, who with eight other principal characters in the piece, has nothing whatever to do with the plot. To the character of Lady Hunstanton, as written in the Mrs. Nickleby vein, and as played by Miss Rose Leclercq, the success is mainly due; and "for this relief much thanks." It is here and in the comedy characters of the Archdeacon (Mr. Kemble excellent in this) and of Lady Caroline Pontefract (who couldn't have a better representation than Miss Le Thière) that Mr. O. Wilde shows what he can do as a writer of comedy, both in the quality of the material and its introduction at the right moment. ("The right speech at the wrong moment, or the wrong speech at the right moment, both are fatal. Thus is it that comedies become tragedies, and tragedies comedies." U.P.N.B., O. W.) At the Haymarket the "play's" not "the thing," it is the playing. ("Likewise the writing," O. W.)
However, it is not for the plot, or for the Bulwery-Lyttony orations, or for the familiar melodramatic situations that audiences will seek the Haymarket. No, it will be to hear the Christy-Minstrel epigrammatic dialogue in the first two Acts, to laugh heartily at Miss Leclercq as Lady Nickleby Hunstanton, to smile on the Archdeacon and Lady Caroline, and to enjoy the first-rate acting all round.
MEMS, FROM THE O. W. UNCOMMONPLACE BOOK.
"Essentials for success of modern play are 'Latitude and Platitude.' First being risky is saved by second."
Receipt for Play-making.—First catch your epigrams: preserve them for use: serve with sauce piquante un pen risquée distributed impartially among a variety of non-essential dramatis personæ, invented for the purpose. Provide fine old crusted copybook moral sentiments, to suit bourgeois palate: throw in the safe situation of some one concealed, behind door or window, listening to private conversation. Add one well-tried effective dramatic situation to bring down curtain on penultimate Act, and there's a stage-dish to set before the appreciative B. P., if only it can be presented to them effectively garnished by a clever and popular Manager at a first-class theatre.
FLOWERS OF FASHION.
The Botanical Afternoon Fête of last Wednesday was a brilliant gathering in brilliant weather. Privileged is "the Inner Circle" to have in its midst these lovely gardens. "The Flowers that bloom in the Spring, tra la!" were all out uncommonly early—long before the earliest worm, which hasn't a chance against these very early risers. "All a-growing!" on the part of the flowers, and "all a-blowing" on the part of the Band of the Second Life Guards. Among the distinguished company present we noticed the Crimson Queen, looking immensely well, the blushing Duchess of Albany, the Duchesse de Vallombrosa, Admiral Courbet, in a striking costume of "deep yellow splashed with red" (where had he been?), the Ladies Daphne Pink and Callas White, and Maréchal Niel. For "Uriah Heep," who "loves to be 'umble," a Silver Medal was awarded to Mr. Pike. "The prize, that's my point," observed the sharp Pike. Funny Fish Pike.
A Penny Wise.—The new import of the latest Budget may be aptly called "A Penny for your Thoughts," as no one pays a tax upon his income as it really exists, but as (for Income-tax assessment purposes) he believes it to be.