"MR. TODD'S EXPERIMENT."
A new terror--or else a new attraction--has been added to the British
Drama. Mr. WALTER HACKETT has brought the scent of the cinema across the
footlights. When he wants to inform you of certain episodes in the hero's
past career, or let you know what he is doing when he is out of sight, he
throws the main stage into darkness and lights up a smaller one on which he
gives you as many as six little tabloid plays within the play.
Such a scheme has its obvious conveniences for the playwright, and should
greatly simplify the difficulties of stage-craft. Those introductory
statements which are required to explain the opening conditions and need
such adroit handling will no longer be necessary. You just put everybody
wise by a series of _tableaux parlants_. No longer need the author worry
about the best way of conveying to his audience the details of any action
that takes place off the stage; he just turns on a playlet and there it is.
Altogether, with a couple of the unities disposed of, he ought to have a
much easier time.
On the other hand he is going to have trouble with his principal stage and
put his actors to the inconvenience of playing in a painfully congested
area. Thus, in _Mr. Todd's Experiment_, the permanent scene was the hall of
a house, with a large tapestry occupying more than half of the wall.
Lurking behind this tapestry was the stage for the tabloids, and the
general company had to crowd themselves into the remainder or wander
forlornly about in the space in front of the tapestry. The playlets again
are almost bound to be just concentrated episodes, probably elemental in
theme and certainly elementary in treatment.
The excuses for their interpolation in _Mr. Todd's Experiment_ were not
marked by a very great subtlety. There was really none for the first three,
which simply relieved _Mr. Todd_ of the tedious recital of the hero's
disillusionments in love. The next two were introduced by way of
illustrating his alleged gift of clairvoyance; and the last served frankly
to fill in the interval while the rest of the company was away at dinner.
The general effect of all these desultory little _Guignols_ was perhaps
rather cheap, and not very complimentary to the intelligence of those of us
who had outgrown a childish _penchant_ for peep-shows.
[Illustration: _Willoughby Todd_ (_Mr. HOLMAN CLARK_). "BE YOUR OLD TRUE
SELF. MAKE THE WOMEN ADORE YOU."
_Arthur John Carrington_ (_Mr. OWEN NARES_). "YOUR ADVICE IS GOOD. I WILL
NOW TAKE OFF MY BEARD AND BE OWEN NARES ONCE MORE."]
_Mr. Todd's Experiment_ (for I have spoken only of Mr. HACKETT'S) was to
restore a _blasé_ and valetudinarian young man of thirty to a proper state
of energy by recalling the memories of his past loves and so reviving in
him a desire to stand well in the eyes of the sex. For this purpose he
produces (1) a bunch of wood-violets to suggest (through the nose) the
environment of his first passion; (2) a specially-tipped brand of
cigarettes to revive (through the mouth) the sentiment of his second; and a
gramophone record to recover (through the ear) the associations of his
third.
So well does he succeed that the hero pulls himself together, shaves off
his beard, becomes our OWEN NARES again, and sallies forth, habited for
conquest, to pay calls on all the three. From all the three he retires
disillusioned, having found them as egoistic as himself, and in the end
finds solace rather shamelessly, in the love of a devoted slave who might
have been his for the taking any time in the last several years.
The matter was pleasant enough, but its interest must, I think, have left
us indifferent if it had not been for the diversion afforded by the
playlets. While the idea was original, the presentation of it seemed to
have a touch of amateurishness, though I would not go so far as to agree
with the old fogey, played by Mr. FRED KERR, who pronounced the scheme to
be "all Tommy rot." With the exception of one character--the devoted
slave--the lightness of the dialogue, mildly cynical, was due not so much
to its wit as to the absence of ponderable stuff. The easy trick, so
popular with the modern playwright, of letting the audience down in the
middle of a serious situation was illustrated by the hero when, being in
deadly earnest, he tells every woman in turn that she is the only woman he
has ever loved.
As _Mr. Todd_, Mr. HOLMAN CLARK was as fresh as he always is; but Mr. OWEN
NARES could hardly hope to satisfy the exigent demands of adoration in the
part of young _Carrington_. Who, indeed, could sustain his reputation as a
figure of romance when addressed as "Arthur-John"? Mr. FRED KERR, who
played _Martin Carrington_, the cantankerous uncle, cannot help being
workmanlike; but he was asked to repeat himself too much. The best
performance was that of Miss MARION LORNE, in the part of the hero's one
devout lover, _Fancy Phipps_; her quiet sense of humour, salted with a
slight American tang, kept the whole play together.