Judge — February 14, 1920 — page 30: what you’re looking at

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

Drawn by Haman Parwen HOULD a melo- drama’s manners be stealthy or swash- buckling? That de- pends on whether your hero is a foxy news- aper reporter or a fascinat- ing French Royalist. In “The Acquittal” we see the sleuthsome but matter-of-fact scribe scotching out the murderer after the glass arm of the law has let him slip. In “The Purple Mask” we see the debonair Mr. Di- trichstein, as the Vicomte de Somethingorother, put a crimp in Consul Bonaparte’s secret police force. Each is worth watching. “The Acquittal” is of the “Three Faces East” or speakeasy school, where every head shake, every glance means something momentous. It is related that when George M. Cohan was smoothing “Three Faces’?into shape, he twanged his twang thus: “Keep it down, people! Keep it down! -If they ever get on to you, they'll laugh you out of the theatre.” Accordingly the performers did keep it down, and every time Emmet Corrigan, as the super-spy, took a step or put his finger to his lips, the whole audience felt creepy. The mantle of mystery that envelops “Three Phizzes” has fallen upon its successor “The Acquittal,” which is staged by the same Sam Forrest who helped George M. hold down the earlier piece; and the little touches of Forrestry are skil- fully laid on. Spies being out of date, the villain is a husband —guilty of murder and a blond stenographer, both in the worst degree. Lacking the evidence to convict, however, the prose- cution has been unable to pin his punishment on him, and he is set free to regain’ home and wifey. But not wifey. Wifey braves him in her boudoir, con- fronting him with the fatal let- ters which he wrote to blond [ The Etiquette of Excitement By Lawton Macxati Bibecde Photo © by Alfred Cheney Johnston Dororuy Dicxson Sees SANcTuARY IN A Frienpty Moon stenog when blond stenog was murdered - benefactor’s secretary. Wifey was the mysterious veiled lady who visited benefactor just previ- ous to poisoning. Horrible husband grabs tied-up epis- ues and brutally sneers at her ultimatum that he be- gone from the premises forever. The letters are her only evidence. He has them. Sheis in his power. Now for the nasty brutality. But hist! a knock at the door. The intrepid reporter, concealed in the inner chamber, has overheard all. Enters. Schrecklich spouse applies pistol. In vain. Reporter has stalled and forestalled everything, is supreme master of the situation. Under- neath his unassuming exterior he is a Sherlock Holmes, a General Foch and a (slenderer) Irvin Cobb rolled into one. The play ends gently but firmly. Such doings are not for the distingué Mr. Ditrich- stein. For him there must be something with swish and sweep and swoop. As a reckless royalist mantled in a cloak of mystery and weaving a mask of regal purple, he waylays unwary minions of Napoleon—Citizen This and Prefect That—and extracts from them large moneys as the price of their release, which sums he tosses lightly into the coffer of the Cause. + The Republican administra- tion, apprised that ‘he. has planned to kidnap an official at midnight in a little town, sends crafty Citizen Brisquet of .the secret police to impersonate the old official and nab the masquerader. Brisquet — posts guards galore, but the Purple Mask makes off with him as per schedule. And that is but the beginning of the story. ee others treat melodrama with matter-of-factness; Leo (Roman slang for “lion”) re- mains ever the guy with the grand manner. comichooks.cemm