Judge — March 3, 1923 — page 15: what you’re looking at

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

outh 1 by this he- a of real ould made a big mistake in dishing smoking at the Winter Garden. I don’t know how the rest of the public feels about it, but so far as I am con- d the Shuberts should take due and serious notice of what I he- cause I get in for nothing—I don’t like it. Ido not mean to say, of course, that the’ Shuberts ought to sacrifice the taste and comfort of the rest of the public for iy especial benefit, but I throw out a hint. If there is one way that the earn my good will and bring me to let xt performance that Bertha Kalich gives, it is by letting me smoke in the above-mentioned emporium. Whether the former Winter Garden shows were really as good as I used to say they were, I shall never know. There is something about a Flor de Pittsburgh makes me believe a show is much better than i long Manuel ) Balboa Infanta, light it for me willing to agree that not only is Marie Dressler the most beautiful woman I have ever seen but that the scene in whch the chorus girls come out representing flowers and put their heads together in the center of the stage at the finale is a great novelty. wh is the frame of mind, the spiritual faith, that tobacco im- parts to me. It was with a cigar in my mouth that I voted for Woodrow Wilson. I SEEMS TO ME that the Shuberts have cert ERE ARE, to be sure, some theatrical exhibitions at which one does not care to smoke. For example, such things a drama by Charles Rann Kennedy or play by the Hattons. They spoil tl taste of the cigar. But if ever there was a place to smoke, that place is a music hall. A music hall without smoking is like a dinner without drinking. Half of the pleasure disappears. Thus while for all I know the present Winter Garden show may be a good one, it doesn’t seem so good to me as the other ones used to. This may not be dramatic criticism, but what has dramatic cri m to do with a girl and tune show? The all-important thing to me about a girl and tune show is not whether Mr. J. Ranken Towse con- siders it up to the tremendous esthetic heights reached in 1736 by the Sussex Operatic Troupe when the latter played The fidget who shakes the whole row. by George Jean Nathan the Liverpool Coliseum, but whether. it tickles my own idioti yon this or that particular night in 1 And such a show fails to tickle that fancy when I am made by the management to feel unduly dignified and for Aman who feels thus unduly dignified and formal is not the likeliest receptacle for jokes about transplanted glands, songs ‘about the wimmin, and numbers in which a sou- brette dressed up as a top-hatted dandy dances down the line of girls and chucks cach in turn under the chin, In order ap- ate jokes about transplanted glands, songs about the wimmin and numbers in which a sou- brette dressed up as a top-hatted dandy dances down the line of girls and chuc each in turn under the chin it is neces- sary for me to get myself into the proper mood. Smoking is the other way for me to do it. Embellish my facade with a luscious Sevilla Ingleterra Malecon y Vedado Carmelo de Morro Castle Per- fectiona El to Superbissimo Ex- tremo Grandioso, and I am ready to laugh, and cheer and clap my hands with all the enthusiasm that my brother re- viewers display over Rudolph Schild- kraut’s whiskers. But take the cigar away from me and I am indeed a sour one. There I sit with professorial frown, look- ing like a misplaced owl, the while the folks to the left and right of me appear to be having the time of their lives. Iam a wet blanket, a kill-joy, a stomachache. TTuererone, so that the pleasure of the theatergoers who are forced to sit near me in the Winter Garden may not be spoiled by my lugubrious and objectionable mien, I urge the Shuberts, in the interests of theit paying patrons, to let me smoke as they used to. After sending me two boxes of excellent gift, they ed to have me r commen generosity and good will and was fragrant acumen-confounding smoke in the smoke-rooms and. lavatories of the theaters of their rivals, Being something of a gentleman, with a gentle- man’s constant regard for punctilio and good form, I should feel it a scurvy and thankless trick to betray the Messrs. Shubert by smoking one of their emi- 13 No Smoking nently toothsome cigars at, say. a Dilling- ham show, and thus be brought to give the show a better notice than it would otherwise deserve. It is, ordingly, the duty of the Messrs. Shubert, as see it, to help me out of the embar predicament in which they have pl me. I want to smoke their cigars where it will do them the most good. I want to iprocal. Therefore, if they will let ke them in their Win arden, | both profit. I'll give them such about the jokes on transplanted glands, the songs about the wimmin and numbers in which a soubrette dressed up as a top-hatted dandy dances down. the line of girls and chucks each in turn under the chin as will make my colleagues’ hallelujahs to John Barrymore and Jackie Coogan seem like so many death chants. M2 xvi, however, I am by their 4 will and decree forced into a dubious silence. Arriving on the scene with two pockets full of perfectos, panatelas, fancy tales, belvideres, puritanos and” what not, and apprised at the gate as I entered that no smoking would be allowed, I found myself so occupied for the rest of the evening with worrying over whether rs would break before the show was over that I could pay little attention to what was going on on the stage. Just as what seemed to be a very good tune began to reach my ears, I would feel a crackle in my pocket and before the con- sequent necessary investigation was com- pleted would find that the s was finished without my having heard it. And so with the jests and the girls and the big costume numbers. I missed nine-tenths of them. Applause rang out on all sides, but only further to confound and bewilder me, for my mind was not upon the business in hand. It was ever far afield, meditating upon the happy Winter Garden nights of the years before, ere the Shuberts had joined the Anti-Tobacco League and when still silver clouds born of sweet- smelling leaves from down San Cristobal way floated lazily up to the ng and made jokes about transplanted glands, songs about the wimmin and numbers in which a soubrette dressed up as a top- hatted dandy dances down the line of girls and chucks each in turn under the chin such stuff as the joy of dreams is made on . . .