Judge — September 27, 1919 — page 24: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Drawn by Hew HE small boy who picked up a copy of the New York Times and looked and looked in vain for the page of comic strips with car- toon cantos of Mutt and Jeff and the Bringing Up Father epic and the romaunt of Silk Hat Harry; the hardware drummer who asked at a Boston newsstand for Snappy Stories and was told, “No, we haven't that, but we have the Atlantic Monthly”: their tribulations were as naught compared with the plight of the roving amusement seeker who stood:at the corner of Broadway and Forty-second Street, a few.weeks ago, desiring to “take in a show.” He was a man eminently fitted for a seat at the Winter Garden. His whole mental and moral training from childhood, his present trend of un- thought, made that his logical goal. But the Winter Garden wasn't in bloom. Neither were the “Gaieties,” nor the “Follies” nor the “Scan- > dals.” All stricken. What in the whirl was open? Well, up in Forty-cighth Street, Manager Brady was presenting and butlering in a murder mys- tery. The Rover hadn't contem- plated going in for crime that evening. He was more interested in classy comeliness. The only other show was “John Ferguson.” Name didn’t mean much, but what's the dif- ference?—many a time you've been stung for picking a show because it had a pepful name. Besides, the “ John Ferguson” theater was nearer by two blocks than the “At 9:45" Playhouse. So (as likely as not), the Rover took a chance on “John Fergu- son Gosh! Nothing like the Win- ter Garden. No music, no comic stuff. Instead of a nifty chorus coming down the runway in tights, an old guy with a beard sitting down at the kitchen table reading the Bible; and his wife By Photo by Cavrnnu Froxe Revattes, Snared on the Gay White Way Lawton Mackact or “Moxte Cristo, J Ainptawe Wixcs or Materia Assisra: Keerixc Her Freer Orr tur Ground cy telling him that the house was going to be sold over his head. Some people have a queer idea of entertain- The actors did it well, though. But they missed a lot of opportunities. The scene was supposed to be somewhere in Ireland, and they could easily have worked in some comic stuff and something about St. Patrick and Robert Emmet and the Irish Republic. Look what Belasco did with * Dark Rosaleen!” Why, in this show there wasn’t even a song about a shamrock. Just straight, serious highbrow stuff, Gradually the power of the play began to “get” him. To be interesting to watch, a thing does not have to be diverting. Seeing your house burn down, for example, is said to be quite absorbing. We knew a lady who, seeing hers burn, was so absorbed that all she had presence of mind to bring out be- fore the roof fell in, was a box of matches. Well, the Rover was absorbed in watching the flock of disasters that hit John Ferguson’s holy home. He saw the son arrested for murder. He saw—I mean, he heard about—the daughter’s mis- fortune. He saw at the end the old man’s spiritual triumph, the faith that would not crack under catastrophe. And somehow he too, the Rover, came through without cracking. It was an awful v tion of Providence upon a Winter Gardener, a tragic ordeal involv- ing thought undiluted and clap- trapless emotion. But he emerged intact. And next day he remarked to the boys at the office: “Saw : . .. fine drama.” And _ his tone was unmistak- ably lofty. Fixps cE IN