Life — March 5, 1925 — page 20: what you’re looking at

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

A General Readjustment the evening of the opening of “Cape Smoke,” we finished dinner early, and, tossing off a cordial, decided to spend the hour before theatre-time slumming in the movies watching “The Last Laugh.” As a result of seeing “The Last Laugh" before “Cape Smoke,” we are now completely at sea about every- thing. Our whole system of dramatic valuations has gone to smash, This movie made the subsequent example of the theatre's art seem cramped, tawdry, and old-fashioned. It made us feel that in a hundred years there will be nothing but movies, and that the spoken drama will then occupy the place that the Punch and Judy show now holds. F course, “Cape Smoke” is not a fair example of what the theatre can do, although it is by no means any worse than most of its genre. It has its moments, and an occasional not inconsiderable kick. But it does embody all that is clumsy and phony about the spoken word and fabricated scenery (very well fabricated in this particular case), while “The Last Laugh” embodies all that is easy and poignant in the unspoken word. (There is not a sub- title in “The Last Laugh.” Not one.) We are told that “The Last Laugh” is by no means typical of movie art. That makes no difference. Here is a movie which can make almost any play seem like the markings on a Cro-Magnon cave wall. It may be the only movie which has done so, but the fact that it can be done should be a warning to playwrights and actors. We had much the same ominous feeling about written humor after secing Buster Keaton in “Our Hospitality.” If the movies can capture humor as it captured in that picture, and, with no evident effort, express it as it was there expressed, then we old writing-boys had better pack up our leaden words and wooden phrases and learn a new trade. Follow- ing our experience at that picture, we secretly began learn- ing glass-blowing, and are ready any day now to duck. G3] 2S Fe NCE before we mentioned the odd fact, when you hear of a musical show's being notable for its good singing and superior score, you are likely to find that it is presented by the often-scorned Messrs. Shubert. While the present season offers several productions, such as “Rose-Marie” and “Lady, Be Good!” which are musically remarkable and which are forging ahead under another xgis, the fact still remains that “The Student Prince” and “The Love Song” are in the first rank of shows to which you would not be ashamed to take a real musician, and they fly the Shubert banner. Here again we pause to reconstruct our old prejudices. HOLLY aside from Elsie Janis’ uncanny impersona- tions, she has a darned good show in her “Puzzles of 1925." Jimmy Hussey alone would keep us enthralled for two hours and there is a remarkable jazz band called “The Commanders” (who, no doubt because of their name, wear green coats), the members of which perform individually in every field except horseshocing. Thanks to some one (probably James Reynolds), the settings are the first we have ever seen which had the evident purpose of being simple and effective and which turned out to be both. “"CHE DOVE,” aside from being the most immaculate of Mr. Belasco’s current productions (it contains only at- tempted seduction), is just a barrel of hoke. Mr. Holbrook Blinn is, of course, good in his old réle of the Bad Man, and Judith Anderson makes you forget the broken Mexican she has to speak by the way she speaks it. In addition, Mr. William Harrigan does the quickest bit of gun-work we have seen since our old cowboy days in Boston, Mass. But, on the whole, it is pretty banal fare. This is the third masterpiece this season that the public would have missed had the Wizard kept to his promise last year and left the business. In a curtain speech at the opening of “The Dove,” Mr. Blinn dragged out the unwilling Mr. Belasco (unwilling like the Twentieth Century Limited out of the Grand Cen- tral) and referred to him as “the Peter Pan of the theatre, the boy who wouldn't grow up.” For one week now we have been trying to think up some- thing funny to say about Peter Pan Belasco, but have come to the conclusion that Mr. Blinn’s remark was quite funny enough. We simply quote it, and there rest the case for the State. Robert Benchley. comicbooks.com