Life — April 9, 1925 — page 22: what you’re looking at

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

20 Directed by Basil Dean R. DILLINGHAM has evidently entered on a campaign with Mr. Basil Dean of London, the slogan of which is “Get Barrie!” These two gentlemen have done enough damage to the old Barrie whimsy in the past six months to justify his never whimsying again. If Sir James had once done Mr, Dean a wrong when they were schoolboys, Mr. Dean could not be more conscientious in showing up the elfin knight than he has been in his productions of “Peter Pan” and now “The Little Minister.” As in the case of “Peter Pan,” many of the embarrassing things in “The Little Minister” are genuine Barrie, right enough. Mr. Dean's only blame in connection with them has come in presenting them to public gaze without their elfin trousers on. It is not Mr. Dean's fault that Babbie, when asked whom she meant by “we” in her account of a madcap scamper through the wood, replies: “The moon and I.” That is Barrie, all right, and the worst of it we liked it once. But it is Mr. Dean's fault that Miss Chatterton is allowed to add to its shame by toe-dancing to it. It is not Mr. Dean's fault that Captain Halliwell has to report the actions of the mob in the village by telescope communication, but he did not have to let it be done in the manner of a musical comedy chorus following the progress of an off-stage horse- race—‘They’re off!" “Now they're at the turn!” “Kissing Cup wins!’ The direction of “The Little Minister,” to- gether with that of “Peter Pan” and “Hassan,” gives Mr. Dean the third leg on, and permanent possession of, the cup awarded each year to the Least Necessary Importation from HIS makes it difficult to say that “The Little Minister” is not the play we thought it was, for it still may be, but “the moon and I" is hard to forget. And since the original production we have had so many pl about a cute little woman who makes a stupid, humorless man look silly that we are about ready now for a play in which a cute little man turns the tables on a stupid, humorless woman. There are such, we understand. But so long as Miss Chatterton insists on two-stepping through the play, we cannot judge it fairly, and will constantly be reminded of the fairies in “Tolanthe” who admit: “We are dainty little fairies, ever singing, ever dancing, i ; We indulge in our vagaries in a fashion most en- trancing. If you ask the special function of our never-ceasing motion, We reply, without compunction, that we haven't any notion.” about fabricated dialogue, with the pages of manuscript showing through, that gets us fidgety. We heard the char- acters in “Puppets” talking like characters in a play-writing course, and fled after the first act, having stayed lor enough to see that we were right a long time ago about Dwight Frye’s being a good actor. We learned later that there is a very good marionette scene in the second act; so we went back to see it. It is a very good marionette scene. S in the case of “Is Zat So?” we are happy to be able to report that our endorsement of “The Fall Guy” is not needed. Mr. Gleason (this time in collaboration with George Abbott) has another hit. All we can do is add our enthusiastic vote to the popular verdict. “The Fall Guy” is not so funny as “Is Zat So Tt isn't meant to be. But it is a better play, and pretty well proves that Mr. Gleason, in collaboration, is master of the American idiom and interpreter of the American mezzo-mind. With Ernest Truex to take your heart and wring it dry with the finest acting of a not-unimportant career, and Ralph Sipperly to create a role which has moments of real greatness in its writing, “The Fall Guy” becomes an unpretentious work of art. The rest of the cast, including Beatrice Noyes as the Fall Guy's helpmeet, add to the almost complete excellence of the affair. “ 1E DEVIL WITHIN” is one of those murder mystery plays in which each character (there are seventeen) is told impressively as he or she enters the room that “John Blackwood has—been—murdered.“ Each character then looks guiltily linist in the orchestra and seems about to leave town. Whereupon the man from headquarters says: “Just a minute, please. I would like to ask you a few questions.” The rest of the show is given over to Questions and Answers in which every one but John Blackwood him- self participates. You could read the whole thing in the papers the morning after the inquest. Robert Benchley. at the bass-v comicbooks.com