Life — February 24, 1898 — page 12: what you’re looking at

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

It’s All Right, Girls. “OSE SUMMER'S DAY” is innocuous almost to the point of what should be desuetude, In it Mr, Charles Frohman presents Mr. John Drew as the putative father of a gypsy lady's but the imputation is removed in the last act and Mr. Drew is therefore restored to his position in good society, notwithstanding Mr. Frohman’s efforts to drag him down. None of the details of the de is presented to the view of the is very homeopathic indeed compared with some of the drastic doses lately administered to New York audiences, The Society for the Promotion of Vice (alias the Theatrical Trust) s this instance to have weakened in its crusade, Perhaps, tho it has only paused to take breath, and the innocuous the harbing ighty plays indeed for escapa Summer’ y be er of very ni ‘urmmer's Day” itself, as said before, is miess tothe point of insipidity, Even its most thrilling incident —the chucking THE ONLY PLACE WHERE GEORGE WASHINGTON WAS EVER WORSTED. Said Rev. Rectangular Square , ” Te say Mar I'm lost is ner fair; Fer, Meugh you have found That I never am round , Yeu Knew all the tine | was tere.” entleman into a very shallow pond —occurs behind the nd the nearest to realism we get is when he comes on the Je upto look as though he was wet, The plot makes John Drew, as Major Dick Rudyard, the father of a son who is not really his, but his deceased brother's, The gypsy mother comes around to collect blackmail, and the interview between her and Dick is overheard by Maysie, a nice girl with whom Dick isin love, and who loves him, Result, Vaysie starts in to accept and marry Phil, a |y-appearing cad, who knows the truth but conceals it to for his wife. At the proper moment he weakens, tells -Vaysie the truth, the hazy offspring is opportunely run over by a horseless carriage or something and killed, Dick proposes, is accepted, and all ends well, It will be seen that this does not provide much of a medium foracting. What the piece needs is the diving-bell scene from ‘The White Heather,” and afew of Mr, Carton’s brilliant epigrams from “The Tree of Knowledge.” These, with Mr, Steve Brodie or Mr. Chuck Connors as a contrast to Mr. John Drew, would give the play that certain something which just now it seems to lack, Mr. John Drew as Major Dick Rudyard is extremely dis- appointing. The truth is bitter but must be told, though the heavens fall, He wears the same clothes from start to finish, and they are not dress clothes either. He is as wonchalant and polished as ever and his methods of acting are unchanged, but the play gives him no situations and no changes of costume. The only way for Mr. Drew to average up in this latter detail is to play alternately an act of this piece and an act of * A Marriage of Convenience.” In the cast the honors go to Miss Elsie de Wolfe, who impersonates the gypsy lady, and whose charms make pos- sible the little episode of her youthful admirer’s stealing his sister’s beads for a love-gift. Miss Isabel Irving is still fair to look upon, but her progress in acting is after the manner of the crab, Miss May Buckley, of * First Born” fame, has little to do and does it, The prematurely old and wise tough boy is of an English type that probably appeals to English audiences, but whose presence in the play is a mystery here. Ie is not essential, and adds nothing to the interest. “One Summer's Day” will pass an evening for people who have no knitting or other exciting occupation, It provides no vehicle for Mr. Drew's talent. It will add nothing to the gayety of nations, and its only possible use fs to earn royalties for its author. are getting even with England. It is reported that Barnum and Bailey’s highly moral aggregation of WwW elephants and monkeys is daily taking more money from