September 15, 1888.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 129
PLAY-TIME AT THE HAYMARKET.
Not by any means a model of construction, conventional in its
dialogue and action, with scarcely a line worth remembering, with
only a glimmer of comedy-humour here and there in the characters of
Lady Betty and old
Seabrook, and with
one strong dash of
misplaced burlesque
melodrama in the
character of the
Demon Butler,
whose part is con-
siderably damaged
Dy the absence of
topical song and
dance, d la Leslie,
us Jonathan Wild—
with all these de-
fects, and in spite
of them, Captain
Swift is, in itself, a
Drama of powerful
dramatic interest,
and so admirably
acted all round, that
it holds an audience
enthralled from the
Dance of the Victim Master and Demon Butler, as (it rise to the fall of the
ought to be) performed at the T.R. Haymarket. Curtain. The story
is clearly told, and the acting is excellent—herein is the open
secret of its success, for success it must have already achieved.
Occasionally marred by some conventional melodramatic starts—
false starts—which with melodramatic asides of the old-fashioned
" Ha! that face!" or, " Ha! that voice! " " Strange!" " 'Tis he! "
pattern,—wrongly supposed to be necessary for einphasising "a
situation,"—Mr. Beerbohm Tree's Wilding, alias Captain Swift,
is a very fine performance. Certainly, the touching and impres-
sive scene of the farewell in the last Act could not possibly be better
rendered than it is by Mr. and Mrs. Beerbohm Tree ; indeed, the
latter I have never yet seen to so great advantage. I do not think
Mrs. Tree ever succeeds in her "make-up" for the stage—too
white, I should say. But to find fault is easy, to suggest the im-
provement is difficult. There is a great natural charm in Mrs. Tree's
impersonation of the otherwise conventional character of a love-sick,
romantic young lady. The faults of this part are the author's; its
virtues tliG fictress'si
Lady Monckton is heart and soul in the very trying part of Mrs.
Seabrook. She seems to be oblivious of the audience, and actually to
be the character she impersonates. The art is less completely con-
cealed than in that exceptionally finished performance of hers as the
wife of Jim the Penman. But this again is the author's fault.
As I consider it all round, I must own that I do not remember ever
having seen a piece so lifted above the commonplace and conventional
by the talent of the actors, as is this play of Captain Swift. There
is a jarring note in the scene in Act III., between Wilding and Mrs.
Seabrook, and it is this:—the audience share with Mrs. Seabrook
the knowledge that she is Wilding''s mother. Wilding is in ignorance
of the fact; so that when Mrs. Seabrook makes affectionate advances
towards him, the unscrupulous Bushranger would see in this what
Captain Haivksley saw in Mrs. Sternholcl's affection for him; that is,
additional profit and safety out of this middle-aged woman's vanity.
The audience, undoubtedly, must take this view of the scene, and so,
when Mrs. Seabrook sits on the sofa, and says, in a comparatively
light and airy tone, "Come and sit beside me," there is a titter
through the house just at a critical moment when the scene, which
requires the most delicate handling by the actors, without any help
from the author, can least bear it. I fancy both Mr. Tree and Lady
Monckton will agree with me on this point.
Melodramatic music played throughout the dialogue of this same
great scene in Act III. is, emphatically, a mistake; it interrupts the
action, and distracts the attention, tires the audience, and hence
it happens that the charming song of Mrs. Tree's, subsequently
"heard without," which should be so effective, becomes an anti-
climax. This Act should have ended with the exit of Wilding,
which should have been simultaneous with the last note of the song,
and the fall of the Curtain. The letter-reading is another anti-climax.
Miss Leclercq attempts too much with the very common-place and,
for her, very poor and uncongenial part of Lady Staunton, who, after
all, is a mere type of the " confidante," or "Charles his friend," in
petticoats. In make-up, Mr. Tree, Mr. Macklin, and Mr. Kemble
are perfect.
Having naturally alluded to Captain Hawksley, I would ask why
adapt the well-worn business of the cigar-lighting from Still Waters
run Deep f It was highly effective in the scene between John Mildmay
and Captain Hawksley; it is singularly pointless in an analogous
scene between Mr. Gardiner and Captain Swift.
Since Mr. Toole made The Butler a popular character on the
stage, there has been a run on butlers. Nowadays, no piece is per-
fect without a butler in it of some sort, comic, tragic, melodramatic,
or demoniac. It is this last type that Mr. C. Haddon Chambebs has
selected for his play of Captain Swift. Mr. Haddon must have had
butler on the brain,—can ne affirm that he Haddon't ?—as the gro-
tesque demoniac character has so little to do with the essence of the
plot, that he may be at once set down as superfluous. This Superfluous
Demon Butler, as impersonated by Mr. Brookeield with genuine
burlesque melodramatic humour, just gives the necessary comic relief
to the play. When Captain Swift is heard making a bag of himself
in September by blowing out his brains off the stage, it is a pity that
the comic countryman Detective (new type, created and patented by
Mr. Charles Allan), and the helpless old Foozle, capitally repre-
sented by Mr. Kemble (another version of Brother Potter, also from
Still Waters), should not have descended all together by a trap
licensed to hold three comfortably, with the Superfluous Demon
Butler standing over them ; and perhaps, if there were room in the
trap for four, 1 should add Lady Betty to the group.
The Demon Butler, who is made up rather after one of the acro-
batic Girards, disappoints every one by not sliding over the tables
and chairs as a genuine Gtrard would certainly nave done. He
is, as I have said, Superfluous; all the use he can be put to is
to help the Detective, and, as far as that goes, the Detective,
"from information received," could get on just as well, even
better, without him. Unless the Demon Butler has a prologue,
an entr'acte topical song and dance, and an epilogue, with final dis-
appearance down a trap-door, he will always he " superfluous" as long
as_ Captain Swift shall run, which ought to be, and I sincerely hope
will be, for many hundred nights. When the inevitable Country
Company go on tour with Captain Swift, the superfluous Demon
Butler might be played without words by a clever rjantomimist, and
called the " Dumb Waiter." This would be at once economical and
effective. Every lover of good acting should go and see Captain
Swift, on the recommendation of Jack in the Private Box.
ALDEEMANO ITALIANO.
At the Guildhall. Prosecution by tlie National Vigilance Society
for publishing Boccaccio's "Decameron."
" ' The hook,' said Mr. Avohy for the defence, ' had been in publication
for oyer 400 years, and at the present time there were three copies of the work
in the English language in the Guildhall Library, and about 200 in the
British Museum.' Mr. Alderman Phillips, who had previously mentioned
that he had read The Decameron, both in Italian and English, said ho did not
intend to send this case for trial, because he did not for a moment believe that
a jury would convict. The case was then dismissed."—Daily Telegraph.
Rather a change from what would probably have happened some forty
years ago, in the good old days of John Leech's and Dicky Doyle's
Aldermen, when there were Corporations within the Great Corporation;
when no Alderman could have been alluded to physically as a
No-body, when Wenison was their Wittles, and Tuttle was their
only soup, and like Sir John Falstaff, they '' babbled," not of '' green
fields," but of " green fat." In those good old days?i had this ease
come before Mr. Alderman and Sheriff Guzzler (of the firm of
Boozer, Swilltand Guzzler, Portsoken Ward), the report mighthave
been on this wise:—
Alderman. Eh? D. Cameron? Donald Cameron, of course.
Counsel {explaining). The Decameron of Boccaccio, your Worship.
Alderman. Ah! I didn't catch his title—Donald Cameron of
Bock—what was it ? There's a Cameron of Loch Something, and
there's a Cameron in the Ward, a most respectable Councillor and
Vintner.
Counsel {further explaining). No, Mr. Alderman, this is a Book.
Alderman, A Book?—eh? Oh, not Bock. Book? Donald
Cameron, of Bookcadgers, did you say ?
And so forth. And then the publisher would have been fined, and
the editions confiscated. And now, "o» a change tout cela," as
the iBelgian Lord Mayor would say, and be immediately under-
stood by more than one decorated Deputy. Did the prosecution
of the Zola translations come before Alderman PniLLirs? No
doubt he has put his knowledge of the French language to as good
a purpose as he has his proficiency m Italian. Pity that he didn't
have the opportunity of saying, ' I've read all these in the—ahem—
in the original French (applause in Court, immediately suppressed
by the usher), and I really do not think that a jury, who couldn't
possibly possess my educational advantages, ought to have a chance
of convicting,—as I am sure they will, if I send the case for trial."
That's the sort of Alderman and Sheriff. " Sheriff thou art, and
shalt be more hereafter! " All hail, Future Lord Mayor! The
expiring Mayoralty wants a few little Italian olives, just to give it
some fillips.
PLAY-TIME AT THE HAYMARKET.
Not by any means a model of construction, conventional in its
dialogue and action, with scarcely a line worth remembering, with
only a glimmer of comedy-humour here and there in the characters of
Lady Betty and old
Seabrook, and with
one strong dash of
misplaced burlesque
melodrama in the
character of the
Demon Butler,
whose part is con-
siderably damaged
Dy the absence of
topical song and
dance, d la Leslie,
us Jonathan Wild—
with all these de-
fects, and in spite
of them, Captain
Swift is, in itself, a
Drama of powerful
dramatic interest,
and so admirably
acted all round, that
it holds an audience
enthralled from the
Dance of the Victim Master and Demon Butler, as (it rise to the fall of the
ought to be) performed at the T.R. Haymarket. Curtain. The story
is clearly told, and the acting is excellent—herein is the open
secret of its success, for success it must have already achieved.
Occasionally marred by some conventional melodramatic starts—
false starts—which with melodramatic asides of the old-fashioned
" Ha! that face!" or, " Ha! that voice! " " Strange!" " 'Tis he! "
pattern,—wrongly supposed to be necessary for einphasising "a
situation,"—Mr. Beerbohm Tree's Wilding, alias Captain Swift,
is a very fine performance. Certainly, the touching and impres-
sive scene of the farewell in the last Act could not possibly be better
rendered than it is by Mr. and Mrs. Beerbohm Tree ; indeed, the
latter I have never yet seen to so great advantage. I do not think
Mrs. Tree ever succeeds in her "make-up" for the stage—too
white, I should say. But to find fault is easy, to suggest the im-
provement is difficult. There is a great natural charm in Mrs. Tree's
impersonation of the otherwise conventional character of a love-sick,
romantic young lady. The faults of this part are the author's; its
virtues tliG fictress'si
Lady Monckton is heart and soul in the very trying part of Mrs.
Seabrook. She seems to be oblivious of the audience, and actually to
be the character she impersonates. The art is less completely con-
cealed than in that exceptionally finished performance of hers as the
wife of Jim the Penman. But this again is the author's fault.
As I consider it all round, I must own that I do not remember ever
having seen a piece so lifted above the commonplace and conventional
by the talent of the actors, as is this play of Captain Swift. There
is a jarring note in the scene in Act III., between Wilding and Mrs.
Seabrook, and it is this:—the audience share with Mrs. Seabrook
the knowledge that she is Wilding''s mother. Wilding is in ignorance
of the fact; so that when Mrs. Seabrook makes affectionate advances
towards him, the unscrupulous Bushranger would see in this what
Captain Haivksley saw in Mrs. Sternholcl's affection for him; that is,
additional profit and safety out of this middle-aged woman's vanity.
The audience, undoubtedly, must take this view of the scene, and so,
when Mrs. Seabrook sits on the sofa, and says, in a comparatively
light and airy tone, "Come and sit beside me," there is a titter
through the house just at a critical moment when the scene, which
requires the most delicate handling by the actors, without any help
from the author, can least bear it. I fancy both Mr. Tree and Lady
Monckton will agree with me on this point.
Melodramatic music played throughout the dialogue of this same
great scene in Act III. is, emphatically, a mistake; it interrupts the
action, and distracts the attention, tires the audience, and hence
it happens that the charming song of Mrs. Tree's, subsequently
"heard without," which should be so effective, becomes an anti-
climax. This Act should have ended with the exit of Wilding,
which should have been simultaneous with the last note of the song,
and the fall of the Curtain. The letter-reading is another anti-climax.
Miss Leclercq attempts too much with the very common-place and,
for her, very poor and uncongenial part of Lady Staunton, who, after
all, is a mere type of the " confidante," or "Charles his friend," in
petticoats. In make-up, Mr. Tree, Mr. Macklin, and Mr. Kemble
are perfect.
Having naturally alluded to Captain Hawksley, I would ask why
adapt the well-worn business of the cigar-lighting from Still Waters
run Deep f It was highly effective in the scene between John Mildmay
and Captain Hawksley; it is singularly pointless in an analogous
scene between Mr. Gardiner and Captain Swift.
Since Mr. Toole made The Butler a popular character on the
stage, there has been a run on butlers. Nowadays, no piece is per-
fect without a butler in it of some sort, comic, tragic, melodramatic,
or demoniac. It is this last type that Mr. C. Haddon Chambebs has
selected for his play of Captain Swift. Mr. Haddon must have had
butler on the brain,—can ne affirm that he Haddon't ?—as the gro-
tesque demoniac character has so little to do with the essence of the
plot, that he may be at once set down as superfluous. This Superfluous
Demon Butler, as impersonated by Mr. Brookeield with genuine
burlesque melodramatic humour, just gives the necessary comic relief
to the play. When Captain Swift is heard making a bag of himself
in September by blowing out his brains off the stage, it is a pity that
the comic countryman Detective (new type, created and patented by
Mr. Charles Allan), and the helpless old Foozle, capitally repre-
sented by Mr. Kemble (another version of Brother Potter, also from
Still Waters), should not have descended all together by a trap
licensed to hold three comfortably, with the Superfluous Demon
Butler standing over them ; and perhaps, if there were room in the
trap for four, 1 should add Lady Betty to the group.
The Demon Butler, who is made up rather after one of the acro-
batic Girards, disappoints every one by not sliding over the tables
and chairs as a genuine Gtrard would certainly nave done. He
is, as I have said, Superfluous; all the use he can be put to is
to help the Detective, and, as far as that goes, the Detective,
"from information received," could get on just as well, even
better, without him. Unless the Demon Butler has a prologue,
an entr'acte topical song and dance, and an epilogue, with final dis-
appearance down a trap-door, he will always he " superfluous" as long
as_ Captain Swift shall run, which ought to be, and I sincerely hope
will be, for many hundred nights. When the inevitable Country
Company go on tour with Captain Swift, the superfluous Demon
Butler might be played without words by a clever rjantomimist, and
called the " Dumb Waiter." This would be at once economical and
effective. Every lover of good acting should go and see Captain
Swift, on the recommendation of Jack in the Private Box.
ALDEEMANO ITALIANO.
At the Guildhall. Prosecution by tlie National Vigilance Society
for publishing Boccaccio's "Decameron."
" ' The hook,' said Mr. Avohy for the defence, ' had been in publication
for oyer 400 years, and at the present time there were three copies of the work
in the English language in the Guildhall Library, and about 200 in the
British Museum.' Mr. Alderman Phillips, who had previously mentioned
that he had read The Decameron, both in Italian and English, said ho did not
intend to send this case for trial, because he did not for a moment believe that
a jury would convict. The case was then dismissed."—Daily Telegraph.
Rather a change from what would probably have happened some forty
years ago, in the good old days of John Leech's and Dicky Doyle's
Aldermen, when there were Corporations within the Great Corporation;
when no Alderman could have been alluded to physically as a
No-body, when Wenison was their Wittles, and Tuttle was their
only soup, and like Sir John Falstaff, they '' babbled," not of '' green
fields," but of " green fat." In those good old days?i had this ease
come before Mr. Alderman and Sheriff Guzzler (of the firm of
Boozer, Swilltand Guzzler, Portsoken Ward), the report mighthave
been on this wise:—
Alderman. Eh? D. Cameron? Donald Cameron, of course.
Counsel {explaining). The Decameron of Boccaccio, your Worship.
Alderman. Ah! I didn't catch his title—Donald Cameron of
Bock—what was it ? There's a Cameron of Loch Something, and
there's a Cameron in the Ward, a most respectable Councillor and
Vintner.
Counsel {further explaining). No, Mr. Alderman, this is a Book.
Alderman, A Book?—eh? Oh, not Bock. Book? Donald
Cameron, of Bookcadgers, did you say ?
And so forth. And then the publisher would have been fined, and
the editions confiscated. And now, "o» a change tout cela," as
the iBelgian Lord Mayor would say, and be immediately under-
stood by more than one decorated Deputy. Did the prosecution
of the Zola translations come before Alderman PniLLirs? No
doubt he has put his knowledge of the French language to as good
a purpose as he has his proficiency m Italian. Pity that he didn't
have the opportunity of saying, ' I've read all these in the—ahem—
in the original French (applause in Court, immediately suppressed
by the usher), and I really do not think that a jury, who couldn't
possibly possess my educational advantages, ought to have a chance
of convicting,—as I am sure they will, if I send the case for trial."
That's the sort of Alderman and Sheriff. " Sheriff thou art, and
shalt be more hereafter! " All hail, Future Lord Mayor! The
expiring Mayoralty wants a few little Italian olives, just to give it
some fillips.
Werk/Gegenstand/Objekt
Titel
Titel/Objekt
Punch
Weitere Titel/Paralleltitel
Serientitel
Punch
Sachbegriff/Objekttyp
Inschrift/Wasserzeichen
Aufbewahrung/Standort
Aufbewahrungsort/Standort (GND)
Inv. Nr./Signatur
H 634-3 Folio
Objektbeschreibung
Maß-/Formatangaben
Auflage/Druckzustand
Werktitel/Werkverzeichnis
Herstellung/Entstehung
Künstler/Urheber/Hersteller (GND)
Entstehungsdatum
um 1888
Entstehungsdatum (normiert)
1883 - 1893
Entstehungsort (GND)
Auftrag
Publikation
Fund/Ausgrabung
Provenienz
Restaurierung
Sammlung Eingang
Ausstellung
Bearbeitung/Umgestaltung
Thema/Bildinhalt
Thema/Bildinhalt (GND)
Literaturangabe
Rechte am Objekt
Aufnahmen/Reproduktionen
Künstler/Urheber (GND)
Reproduktionstyp
Digitales Bild
Rechtsstatus
Public Domain Mark 1.0
Creditline
Punch, 95.1888, September 15, 1888, S. 129
Beziehungen
Erschließung
Lizenz
CC0 1.0 Public Domain Dedication
Rechteinhaber
Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg