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Fashion, or Life in New York. A milestone of the drama, this American comedy of manners was first produced in 1840 when the metropolis was only beginning to bustle. Its revival demonstrates how far the Theatre has advanced since its so-called Golden Age. Merely to recite its plot indicates that the very cinema has progressed beyond this stage. Snobbish Mrs. Tiffany, by aping the extravagances of French society, drives her husband into forging. That puts him in the power of a confidential clerk; but stay! he is saved in the last act by an old friend, a wealthy upstate farmer.
The Catteraugus philanthropist turns out to be the grandfather of the family governess. Furthermore, there is a count present who is exposed as a chef before the play is done. Fashion is fluffy with crinolines and sentiment. Many of the stock characters, and some of the lines, are still doing reliable service, barbered in the prevailing mode. But playwrights no longer luxuriate in soliloquies, nor hurl asides at the audience like bombs.
It is presented with a fine, youthful sense of travesty, even to the period programmes and the scenery with chairs painted on the walls. Occasionally the characters blare out songs, without provocation. Clare Eames teases her part a trifle, but Walter Abel and Mary Morris are a joy in their monumental solemnity. Its naivete is good fun, for average citizens as well as antiquarian.
Myrtie is an addition to the sob drama. Author Goodhue seeks to arouse your pity for a bad girl, bent on going wrong for the sake of the silk stockings she'll get. Then she meets a priest, falls in love with him, tries to go straight, to win his smiles and maybe his kisses. When he repulses her advances, bang goes another convert! After a year with another man, again the wages of sin are a baby. The play groans under a load of sentiment. The characterization is conventional, enlivened by small-boy efforts to say something risqué.
In strong contrast to the sentimental nature of the play is the informal atmosphere which prevails in the theatre. Between the acts the audience is invited to adjourn to a balcony for dancing; smoking is permitted; tea and coffee are served.
Saturday Night A shopgirl out for a blow, who seems to be derived from O. Henry, is worshipped by a jazz-drummer with a soul above percussion. Naturally, like any stage shopgirl, she falls prey to a wily villain with a wife. When the wife and a cop turn on the girl in a gaudy den of pleasure, she jumps out of a, window as the best way to avoid an explanation. Unfortunately, a tree outside breaks her fall. She lives. The play doesn't. It is a violent melodrama, a case of theatrical hiccoughs,.