Photograph by the Misses Selby. Author’s Collection.
BELASCO, ABOUT 1911
of voluble vehemence addressed to de Maigny with fine abandon, passionate intensity, and powerful effect.—The cast of “The Lily” is appended:
| Comte de Maigny | Charles Cartwright. | |
| Vicomte Maximilien de Maigny | Alfred Hickman. | |
| Huzar | Bruce McRae. | |
| Georges Arnaud | Wm. J. Kelly. | |
| Bernard | Leo Ditrichstein. | |
| Emile Plock | Dodson Mitchell. | |
| Joseph | Marshall Stuart. | |
| Jean | Douglas Patterson. | |
| Michel | Robert Robson. | |
| Odette | De Maigny’s | Nance O’Neil. |
| Christiane | daughters | Julia Dean. |
| Lucie Plock | Florence Nash. | |
| Suzanne | Ethel Grey Terry. | |
| Alice | Aileen Flaven. |
“Just a Wife” was written by Mr. E. Walter and was first acted at the Colonial Theatre, Cleveland, Ohio, January 17, 1910, and at the Belasco Theatre, New York, on the 31st of that month. As a playwright that writer has exhibited a persistent, morbid preoccupation with the subject of illicit sexual relations which suggests the possible utility of vigorous open-air exercise, the cold sitz-bath and potassium bromide. In this play a libertine named John Emerson, who has consorted with a widow named Lathrop until their relation has become a public scandal, by way of “keeping up appearances” marries an impecunious vestal from South Carolina, named Mary Ashby. As he immediately installs Mrs. Emerson in a luxurious rural habitation somewhere on Long Island and practically deserts her, this expedient would hardly seem to be of much social service. However, after neglecting his wife for about six years, Emerson grows weary of his mistress, quarrels with her and runs away from her to visit his wife. The mistress, much incensed, follows him, and a sort of three-cornered debate,—protracted, sophistical, and indelicate,—on the sexual relation is held at Mrs. Emerson’s country residence, in the course of which that lady manifests a sweet temper and admirable self-control. After it is over, Mrs. Lathrop (to whom it has been intimated that in men the ruling passion is sex impulse and that she is growing somewhat elderly) goes away in a peaceful and much chastened mood. Mrs. Emerson then snubs her neglectful spouse and signifies that he may not hope to possess her as his wife until he has recognized the supremacy of Love, which it is implied he will soon do. It is all very edifying, of course,—especially as the author of it, apparently, knows as much about love, as distinguished from carnal concupiscence, as a tomcat on the tiles does. This was the cast:
| John Emerson | Edmund Breese. |
| Bobby Ashby | Ernest Glendinning. |
| Maxcy Steuer | “Bobby” North. |
| Wellesley | Frederick Burton. |
| Mary Ashby Emerson | Charlotte Walker. |
| Eleanor Lathrop | Amelia Gardner. |
A CHANGE OF NAMES.—THE FARCE OF “THE CONCERT.”
Belasco’s management of the theatre in West Forty-second Street which was the first to bear his name extended over a period of twelve years. In the spring of 1910 he began to feel dubious as to whether he would,—perhaps as to whether he could,—renew his lease at the end of its term, two years later. He therefore determined to restore to that house its former name of the Republic, and thereafter to designate the Stuyvesant as the Belasco Theatre. That change, accordingly, was made, in July, 1910; and on August 22 the Republic Theatre was reopened under that name with a performance of a play made by Mr. Winchell Smith, on the basis of a clever and amusing story by Mr. George Randolph Chester, called “Bobby Burnitt”: that play was produced by Cohan & Harris. On October 10 the second Belasco Theatre was opened with a performance of “The Concert,” adapted by Leo Ditrichstein from a German original by Herman Bahr: it had been acted, for the first time, at the Nixon Theatre, Pittsburgh, September 19.