Auberon. A reading, as they say, either commends itself to one’s sense of truth or it doesn’t. In the one case—
Dorriforth. In the one case I recognize—even—or especially—when the presumption may have been against the particular attempt, a consummate illustration of what art can do. In the other I moralize indulgently upon human rashness.
Florentia. You have an assurance à taute épreuve; but you are deplorably superficial. There is a whole group of plays and a whole category of acting to which your generalizations quite fail to apply. Help me, Auberon.
Auberon. You’re easily exhausted. I suppose she means that it’s far from true everywhere that the scenery is everything. It may be true—I don’t say it is!—of two or three good-natured playhouses in London. It isn’t true—how can it be?—of the provincial theatres or of the others in the capital. Put it even that they would be all scenery if they could; they can’t, poor things—so they have to provide acting.
Dorriforth. They have to, fortunately; but what do we hear of it?
Florentia. How do you mean, what do we hear of it?
Dorriforth. In what trumpet of fame does it reach us? They do what they can, the performers Auberon alludes to, and they are brave souls. But I am speaking of the conspicuous cases, of the exhibitions that draw.
Florentia. There is good acting that draws; one could give you names and places.
Dorriforth. I have already guessed those you mean. But when it isn’t too much a matter of the paraphernalia it is too little a matter of the play. A play nowadays is a rare bird. I should like to see ¦ one. Florentia. There are lots of them, all the while—the newspapers talk about them. People talk about them at dinners.
Dorriforth. What do they say about them?