As Michael Trent, Mr. George Alexander played excellently, and I have nothing to say against either the quality or the quantity of his work, except that in the First Act the tale of his experience in the Beresu forest, which began with a very natural air, developed into something like a recitation. He might almost have been Mr. Roosevelt, in a mood of exaltation, describing his river to the Geographical Society. That clever actress, Miss Henrietta Watson, had to play a difficult part as Trent's lover, in a vein that, I think, is new to her. She did it well, though she seemed to start on a note of intensity which left her too little margin for the time when she really needed it; her appeal, too, was rather to our intelligence than our hearts. Mr. Nigel Playfair, waiving his gift of deliberate humour, showed himself a master of the petty meannesses of a certain phase of suburban banality. Mr. Volpé presided, with the right rotundity of a rubber company's chairman, over a very spirited meeting of indignant share-holders. And, finally, nothing became Mr. Reginald Owen so well as the manner of his dying.
O. S.
"Young Wisdom."
Victoria was very young and very, very wise. She knew all about the slavery of the marriage-tie, the liberty of the female subject, and high-sounding things of that sort, and kept books of advanced thinking secretly under her mattress—where her little brother found them and thought them dull, and her mother found them and thought them rather funny. Victoria's theory was that all marriages ought to be preceded by a trial trip, but it was her sister Gail who had the pluck to put this theory into practice. She insisted on her young man, Peter, eloping with her on the night before their wedding. Peter, a simple gentleman with a mouth permanently open, was reluctantly persuaded. Whereupon Christopher, the best man, engaged to Victoria, insisted upon Victoria also living up to her theory and eloping without clerical assistance—which she did almost as unwillingly as Peter. The two couples meet at midnight in an old moorland cottage rented by an artist called Max (no, not the one you think), whereupon two important things happen:—
(1) Gail decides in about twenty minutes that she loves Max, not Peter. (2) Victoria decides that she hates trial trips. So they all five go back together, and, after a lot of "Tut-tut-what-the-blank-upon-my-souls" from the military stage-father, they sort themselves out again and get married properly—Peter being left over with a cold in the head.
The author, Miss Rachel Crothers, has not strained herself severely in writing Young Wisdom, and the result is a pleasantly innocent little play, which, thanks to the Misses Margery Maude and Madge Titheradge as the two sisters, and Mr. John Deverell as Peter, gave us all a good deal of pleasure. Miss Maude had a part with a little comedy in it for once, and she played it delightfully.
M.