Life, 1891-04-16 · page 12 of 14
Life — April 16, 1891 — page 12: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis This page contains two distinct pieces of theatrical criticism from Life magazine. **"He's Not In It"** (top sketch): A domestic comedy showing a wife apparently scolding her husband while others listen. The caption suggests the husband has cleverly avoided a "curtain lecture"—a period term for a wife's private scolding delivered behind closed curtains. The humor lies in marital dynamics of the era. **"Old Heads and Young Hearts"** (main review): Criticism of a Boucicault play revival at the Lyceum theater. The reviewer discusses actors Mr. Kelcey and Miss Cayvan in period costumes, praising the historical accuracy. The review critiques Mr. Lemoyne's performance as "Jesse Rural" (appears to be a character name), claiming he exaggerates the role's senility rather than capturing dignified "high comedy." The reviewer suggests his inexperience in this genre shows through excessive, dotage-like portrayal rather than subtle acting. The page is primarily theater criticism aimed at contemporary audiences familiar with these productions and performers.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
HOW A WILY HUSBAND ESCAPED A CURTAIN LECTURE. OLD HEADS, YOUNG HEARTS, AND OLD FASHIONS. HE costumes are the most interesting feature of Mr. Frohman’s revival of Boucicault’s “Old Heads and Young Hearts,” at the Lyceum. To see Mr. Kelcey biting his nails in a beaver bell-crown two or three inches higher than the hats of the present day, lends an additional charm to that always interesting process. To see Miss Cayvan arrayed like the sweetest little old grandmother that ever graced an ancestral frame, saves the old costuming from a universal reproach, for which, perhaps, after all, the portrait- Painters are mainly responsible. The difference in the costuming of fifty years ago and that of to-day is probably nothing like so great as will be the difference between ours and the apparel of fifty years hence. And if we find these costumes ridiculous, how idiotic may we expect to appear to our enlightened posterity. “Old Heads and Young Hearts” depends so much upon the acting of Jesse Rural that Mr. Lemoyne’s work deserves special consideration. A comparison with Mr. Gilbert’s portrayal of the same character is the first thing to suggest itself, but it is hardly a fair one, as Mr. Lemoyne's experi- ence has been entirely in other lines than those of high comedy. The faults of the present portrayal are what were to be expected from this very cause ; that is, Mr, Lemoyne leans too far towards exaggeration and eccentricity. He gives the old minister too little of the dignity of his profession, and the mellowness of his years. The senility of Jesse Rura/ is made too literal, too much like dotage. comicbooks.com