The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, August 14, 1904, Page 19

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, AUGUST 14, 1904 ORPHE Week Com'cing Sunday, A i Rosner’s Original Hung | K. X. BOSNEE. D March—*Paris" DORFF RS AND TIIT-MUSIC / 5 OWNE My — /¢ S j ¢ | | - - = = : M "HO CHARMED THE ORPHEUMITES. j - - = irl From That is e May on g her. ggle perb cheer- ot a little im- ed and 1 giggle . y the ear, however, s sudden tinkle of such a young, pipe—like 1 wanted scenes life long, sweet gig- the lugubriou i sunny hair flashed The not tall, who seemed of amateur car- May trunk, I recog- Albaugh, who makes love n the play. In the play, as girl promises “square meal” d-—he has f depriving h desired breakfast. Out dn’t wonder if one 1's preferences was for ced our little play ay beamed, and gh echoed. He is “John ke 1: (‘mrougr v,” I agreed. elty, its brightness— acting.” ah! there was the 't go, Jack g0, Mr. Albaugh,” I re- and talk.” 1 think he to go. I think he prob- the May giggle quite hailf 1 do. Besides, I liked Mr. Albaugh. I liked the quiet, dark, strong face, th gentle and unob- trusive And Mr. Albaugh elected ¥ and talk.” I asked the photographer to “take” him as well as M May. Mr. Albaugh “wished the photographer would ‘take’ his cold.” “He’s had one ever since we came here,” Miss May said, seating herself against a sage green wall that immedi- became a noble background. “Is it always like this here—so cold and foggy?” “No, indeed,” I said. “In August, now—" “But this is August!” gurgled the ady. So it 1s,” I owned, “I meant Sep- tember."” “We haven’t been enywhere at all vet,” the actress began with a pout and ed up with a giggle. “Hold still?” (this to the photographer.) “Long time between grins,” she laughed, as he re- leased her after a four-second ex- posure. “Where ought Oone to go?” Mr, Al- baugh asked: “I'm not going to let this cold keep me in any longer.” “Really, Jack!™ Miss May caroled. 1 enumerated glibly: “The Clift House, Chinatown, Golden Gate Park, etc., etc.,” ending up by recommending that excellent Bohemian, Matias, as host for their desired Mexican dinner. We came to Matias by way of Mr, Albaugh’s Mexican accent. He owned to having tried to strengthen it with tamales. Pulque had also been recom- mended. Did I think it would impro’ it? Honestly, what was my opinion “I think it must be correct,” I grant- ed, “because it is like Dorothy Donnel- Iy’s in ‘A Soldier of Fortune.’” Mr. Albaugh groaned and Miss May “You should have seen “Mr. Stewart?” “H'm she nodded, and repeated, “You should have seen Grant when we were reh: Mr. Albaugh would say desp: ‘How is this accent, Grant? Poor fellow, he'd been holding up Po ese and all sorts of people vould look wise”—Olive = attempt to “look wise” was the thing she did—"and say, right, Jack,’” she was fin- n and frowning in a 8¢ gly po rous fashion. 1 develo ped giggles myself. So would you if had sat opposite that in- carnate giggle. Her very hair seems to laugh. And I can answer for four wisdom teeth where the laugh it ever ended. Even Miss prettiest of figures chirps the same tale—"laugh and grow fat.” “Mr. Albaugh took the part at very short notice?” I tried to say, but suc- ceeded only in snickering. “But haven't I heard something about the gentle- man’s life being saved by his engage- ment with you?” “Really, yes,” Mr. Albaugh interpo- lated, “at least—"' “But I know I did,” Miss May cried, with a childlike swagger. “How did it happen?” I asked. “I was at the club one day and just about to leave for Brooklyn,” the un- grateful salvage related, “when a wildly hysterical note was brought to me, running something like this: ‘Dear Mr. Albaugh—I need your assistance immediately and most direfully. Yours, Olive May."” ““Wildly hysterical,” live objected. “I thought it was a joke at first,” the gentleman pursued, “and I hadn’t the least thought of going. Then I thought it might be what it purported to be and went. If I hadn’t gone, I should have been in a2 raflway smash- up, in which there were twenty-five people injured and one man killed. And who know: “There now, end—if indeed!” Miss Miss May's tone be- spoke arcaq.an satisfaction, She looked over at Mr. Albaugh—well, rather nicely. He looked back at her—it was perhaps because his chair was lower than hers that his up-look seemed— well, rather worshiptul. “But he saved your life, t00,” I re- minded her. “He! 2! he! Yes!" the actress owned. “We call ourselves the mutual life saving company.” “What were you doing before?” I asked Mr. Albaugh Miss May replied: “Oh, he was a very big person. He’'s been a manager. And he was acting in a playlet written by himself, ‘Trenton.” " “Ah,” I commented, and asked, “And what did you manage, Mr. Albaugh?” “My father's theaters in Washington and Baltimore,” the gentleman mod- estly put it ““He had a stock company,” Miss May put in. “And did you take part?” “l1 played juvenile leads,” the actor <> replied. “Then I played in ‘Colorado’— between us we've covered lots of terri- tory—eh ?” The lady nodded. “?" from me. “I was the original Bonita in ‘Ari- zona,’” Miss May replied. “That was the longest part I ever played. Played it in London, too, by the wa Which reminds me that there is much 2 with Miss May. She was d to shake the royal fists of King ward and the English Queen, be- nv E cause their owr were so pleased with her E She is the daughter of Cc 1 May—by the way—and sis- ter, cousin, niece and granddaughter of a whole regiment of statesmen and such. Her Mays came over—NOT in the Mayfiow but round about 1640, and were all “rattling good Americans.” > didn’t tell me this during the talk. wears m—uher her dramatic nor other accomplishments on her sleeve. ide after I went in to Kansas” for a second bobbed up car as Miss May would #irl From Kansas' bears sec- ond seeing better than mo: She Then to Miss May's *“Arizona” Mr. Albaugh be to add other territory covered by the “team.” A Colorado’—both Gus Thomas plays, curious coincidence—and now ‘A Girl From Kansas,' with its scene in Mexico,” quoth he, “what's the matter with us for wild Westerners? ““Colorado’ is the play in which the whole cast and 1.11'( of the audience gm: shot, isn’t it?” I asked. ‘No they don’t,” said the actor. “We were talking about that only the other day, weren't we?” The other half of ** firmation. “There are really only two shots fired in the plav,” the actor protested, “but the cartoonists had the dead all over the shop.” “And you played ‘Arizona’ in Lon- don?” 1 turned back the talk a page or two. “Did you like London?" “Wouldn't want to live there,” Miss May owned. “Yet they are very kind if like you—" “And that's where New York isn't,” the actress sighed. “You have to make a hit with every part—" “Still, artistically, that better—" “No, it isn’t,”” Miss May contradicted, still serious. “One may get a bad part, you know.” . She supplemented then: “You may find—for you simply cannot tell un- til you try it on the public—that you are conveying an almost exactly oppo- site, or”"—a thoughtful moment—“a quite different impression from the one you believe yourself to be conveying.” “In which case?” “In which case,” Miss May cheer- fully decided, ‘““you simply have to change the whole thing—the public is the only final appeal.” Mr. Albaugh continued {t: *“You wouldn’'t like the sort of surprises in- volved in our work. You often get a howl where you expect a tear.” “Have you?” I insinuated. ‘“Haven’t you?” he retorted. Somehow then I became aware of the identity of the book upon which I was scribbling. ** ‘Plutarch’s Lives,’ " I cried, holding it up. “Oh yes!” Miss May giggled, her big blue eyes looking as if they had never scanned anything heavier than “The Duchess.” “I got that the other day for 25 cents. Wasn't it a bargain?” “What did you buy it for?” I de- manded. “Anything to fill up the trunks,” she laughed and spread her cheerful hands. And then under the table I spied “Marcus Aureliu I looked accus- ingly at the lady. “Oh, 1 don’t sleep very well,” she explained, “and I have to dip into one of those dull old persons like Epictetus to quiet my seething brain.” “Oh!” I commented, but I took in while I was about it the delicate aquiline of the May nos~ and a mighty smiled af- they once is perhaps broad brow that hides under her sun- ny mop of hair. Then I ventured: “Are your politteal opinions like those of the ‘girl from Kansas'?” I scented new women and all sorts of feminine depth under the attractive May disguise. “My political opinions,” the suspect~ ed one tinkled, “oh, they're just like the girl's in the play—aren't they, Jack?” “She’'s a black Republican,” testi- fled Mr. Albaugh. “Never mind,” I sald meaningly. “But you may tell me now what you have done in the dramatic arena, stock or 4 “No, I've never been in stock—at least, only in the Empire and Lyceum companies, and the plays run there generally for a whole season.” “I've told her that a stock experi- ence would be useful to her,” the ac- tor advanced, looking at her with fra- ternal pride. “I don’'t know—'" Miss May threw a lazy, round arm over the end of the lounge and contrived to look even more gracefully comfortable than she had been looking all the afternoon, “I don’t know that I'm so keen for work as all that.” ‘““What have you done that you liked particularly?”’ I asked. “I'm fond of Bonita—comedy, of course, is my forte, that sort. I was almost coming here With John Drew and Maude Adams in ‘The Butterflies,” by the way. That is another play I'm very fond of. He, he, he! A Boston man interviewed me when we were playing it in Boston. We just talked— as we're doing now—and I nearly col- lapsed when I saw the pageful of pearls of wisdom that I'd spilled the next day. Talk about La Rochefou- cauld's Maxims—" “We didn’t talk about La Rochefou- cauld’s Maxims,” I grinned. “I sus- pect you, Miss May, of being a miser- able bluestocking.” “Oh dear, oh dear!” she gurgled. “How dreadful! Where was I? Oh, ves, I used to be with Stuart Robson— a splendid gentleman—and last season I was with ‘A Japanese Nightingale’ and ‘The Spenders.’ There, that's the story of my life.” I inquired: Nightingale? ” “It went finely so long &s we papered the house,” the lady giggled lusciously again. “And you were to come here with Maude Adams and John Drew?” I re- verted. “And I'm eo sorry I didn't come— you're all so kind. One has such fun, too, with John Drew—" “Fun! John Drew!” “He’s such a guyer—" “Guyer!” I could say no more, “Why, nothing made him happler than to break me all up,” Miss May related, “and I could do nothing but snort when he did it—like this,” and like another girl I know Miss May snorted Ilke an amused and musical pony. Immediately then I understood the temptation of John Drew. ‘And you think we're nice?” “Every one has been so kind,” Miss May said, “kind to our play and kind to us. I'm so glad, too, for Mr. Stew- art’s sake. You'll hear more of him, some day.” houldn’t wonder,” I said Oh, and the flowers he “And the fine restaurant “The roses—" “The terrapin—" “The gay crowds—" both. “The cheapness of things—" both. “lI saw a man with an armful of American Beauties the other day—" she, ‘“How was ‘A Japanese Tust have got reckless and blown himseif in for at least $3,” he. “Oh, come and see us again when you don't have to, won't you?" thus, kindly, both. “She’s kinder pretty, ain’t she?"” said my friend the elevator boy. He had caught the backwash of that beatific giggle. I knew the wretched diplomat meant she was “a ngumr peach,” but I said only “kinder.” G gt GOOD FARE PROMISED BY MEN WHO PRODUCE LOCAL THEATER BILLS “Joseph Entangled,” the new Henry Arthur Jones comedy, produced so successfully by Henry Miller last Mon- day evening at the Columbia Theater, will enter to-morrow evening upon its second and last week here. The plece Is to be numbered among the most pronounced of the Miller successes. It is consistently diverting and has been unanimously enjoyed by the large au- diences that have seen it. Mr. Miller himself has an excellent part and 1s capitally supported throughout the cast, that includes Hilda Spong. Bk e As Pete Quilliam, in man,” White Whittlesey that will perhaps be best liked by those of his admirers to whom his romantic phase least appe: Mr. Whittlesey gives a virile and convinc- ing characterization. The piece goes on at the Alcazar to-morrow evening. R At the Grand Opera-house James “The Manx- has a part Neill and his company will revive the favorite comedy, “The Lottery of Love.” e Theodore Kremer's melodrama, “For Her Children’s Sake,” a “stupendous” New York success, will wave at the Central this week. A new leading lady, Miss Ethel Clifton, gorgeou ed, will make her debut t e The California puts on “Just Before Dawn” this afternoon. The local summer engagement of Miss Florence Roberts will begin at this theater in two weeks. e “The Toreador” is running most successfully at the Tivoli. Forest Dandy Carr comes to take the place of John Dunsmure, who is due in New York. P “The Whirl of the Town” continues at Fischer’s. & e Emmett Devoy and his company of comedians, including Miss Hermine Shone, will make their first appear- ance in San Francisco at the Orpheum this afternoon. promises well. The rest of the bill Four new acts will hold the board at the Chutes this coming week and the entire programme will be one of the best ever offered at this popular place of amusement. (7 el 2 IN MUSIC OFFERINGS PRESENT AND COMING THERE IS MUCH CHARM One hears with pleasure the news of Beatrice Bronte’s (Beatrice Michelena, and wherefore Bronte, O Bee!) latest engagement as Peggy in “Peggy from Paris.” Miss Bronte is the excellently pretty and clever daughter of Fernando Michelena, and made a successful ap- pearance here recently in that odd Smith and Company musical melange, A Girl From Dixie.” She begins her season early in September, and may be heard here during its course. The caste includes also another Call- fornia girl, Grace Orr Myers, the daughter of the only Annie. Miss My- ers, who has been singing Alice Niel- sen roles in “The Fortune Teller” and other operas, will have the part of Lutie Plummer in the George Ade piece. i e Talking of the Henry W. Savage pro- ductions ,of which “Peggy From PBaris” is one, reminds of a significant note I lately received, concerning the Savage grand opera season in Pittsburg. Pitts- burg has recently had two weeks of the Savage opera, Including produc- tions of “Lohengrin,” “Tannhauser,” “Carmen,” “Otello,” “Il Trovatore” and “Bohemian Girl.” The point is this, however, that Pittsburg then heard the “Otello” for the first time. How long is it, Tivoleans, since that old master, Salassa, first rolled out the “Credo?” Long enough and often enough for its seductive chromatics to come to the tongue almost as easily as “La Donna e Mobile.” Yet a few weeks ago only Pittsburg, with its Victor Herbert, its symphony orches- tra, its nearness to the musical base of supplies, was listenng to explana- tory “Otello” lectures by the local ‘Walter Damrosch, Bradford Mills, on the occasion of the opera’s first pre- sentation there. It is facts of this kind that bring home to one the value of the Tivoll to the eommunity. Not only “Otello,” but operas like the Boito “Mefistofele”; the new masterworks, such as “La Tosca,” ““Andre Chenier," aza'’; the rarer old operas, like “Pa Sonnambula,” “Lucre- zia Borgia,” “Don Pasquaie” and prac- tically the whole of the routine Italian repertoire, have been familiarized for us by the Tivoli, and in some startling- 1y good performances. One is very cu- rious to hear Mr. Savage's English grand opera company. With that of New Orleans there will be found no more sympathetic audience than the local one in all America’if the company be found worthy. They are to come here next February. “Parsifal,” by the way, is to be one of the offerings. The list of names of the artists who are to expound “Parsifal” in English for us will be found suggestive. The English of it seems to stop with singular abruptness at the ca: Still, Mr. Savage claims only to give “opera in English,” not yet American opera, sung by Americans in English. The list, a very promising one from the vocal side of the performance, includes, how- ever, yet another Californian in Put- nam Griswold, now a noble Frank- forter at the opera-house there. The whole cast, by the way, is now engaged in absorbing “Parsifal” at Bayreuth and will take in the whole half-dozen performances of the opera. Here are the people: Alois Pennarini, the prin- cipal tenor of the Stadt Theater in Hamburg; Christian de Vose of the Netherlands Royal Opera, Amsterdam; Hanna Mara of . the Stadt Theater, Breslau; Johannes Bischoff of the Stadt Theater, Cologne; Putnam Griswold of the Frankfort Opera- house, Franz Egenieff of the Theater des Westens, Florence Wick-" ham of the Royal Conservatory of Mu- sic, Francis MacClennan of the Moody- Manners Opera Company and the two conductors, Walter H. Rothwell and Moritz Grimm. Mme. Kirkby Lunn, who has just closed her season at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden, London, has been detained in England by im- portant concert engagements, but she will join her colleagues at Bayreuth in time to hear the last two performances of “Parsifal.” Fo return to the Tivoll for a moment. As regards the week’s “Toreador.” Per- haps “The Toreador” counts Ilittle musically, but its production, as well as that of the preceding “Robin Hood,” marks a new era in Tivoli history. Fun you ceuld always count on in the Tivoll comic opera, spirit, originality. But, generally speaking, it was comic opera in its shirt sleeves, with a short pipe and a pot of beer in front of it. Only those that have seen the last named productions will understand the ad- vance that has been made. Nothing smarter than “The Toreador” has been seen here. Its scenery is glitteringly fresh. Its chorus gowning and girling are as spick and span as youth, money and good taste can make 'em. The stage management has simply chuted into excellence. A completer contrast to the happy-go-lucky, go-it-alone, any- thing-goes sort of drill of the old re- gime cannot be imagined. Things move with all the polish, pomp and circum- stance of a comic opera “Durbar.” The orchestra,is as good as it always was, with the best comic opera leader in the country behind it. The cast—well, we have had good casts in plenty at the Tiveli, but this one and the last have added style, wads of it, to ability. In fact, one feels that only one's best frock can do justice to the new Tivoll first nights. “The Toreador” should be seen—not simply for its style. The piece has been greatly improved since its open- ing, by the way. The second act moves now as swiftiy as the first. There is to see Teddy Webb as an English “tiger” in one of the cleverest bits of character work seen on the local stage. Willard Sims has another as a haw-haw Eng- lish milord. John J. Kennedy con- tributes a capital grotesque as an ani- mal trainer. John Dunsmure con- tributes a splendiferously musical and picturesque toreador. Meiville Ellis, who with Ferris Hartman is to be J- V- ALBAUGH + Jo ACTOR-MANAGER WHO SCORES 1\ VAUDEVILLE. | o thanked for the stage tactics, person- ally contributes clothes and a manner. Kate Condon and Dora de Fillippe take admirable care of the e singing, Mary Young and Carri nolds being unimportantly vocal. Condon, too, adds a fine, Carmen-like Spanish damsel to the picture, and Dora de Fillippe a chic and comical figure as a girl in man’s disguise, while Be Tannehjll as a smart widow must not be forgotten. The chorus is un- reservedly to be praised. In fact, the only thing lacking anywhere is with Mr. Steindorff. I hoped he'd find it out. For one delightful moment I thought he had. But they were, alas, another’s! I could almost have cried when I saw the same old, plump, 1 fatherlanc er hands brooding over that patrician performance. Where are they, Mr. Steindorfl—the suave, snowy, honorif- ic white kids of a Frank Palima? PROMINENT PL\‘L ERS PREPARE FOR COMING YEAR OF HARD WORK E. H. Sothern and make their first joint appearance in “Romeo and Juliet” at the Illinois Theater in Chicago on September 19. R Mrs. Patrick Campbell opens her next American season at the Herald Square Theater, New York, on Octo- ber 2. Julia Marlowe et Virginia Harned starts her season at the opera-house in Cleveland on Octo- ber 3 in “Brother Jacques.” ! R, Frederick Warde and Kathryn Kid- der begin their season in Wilkesbarre on August 2 R William Gillette starts at the Prin- cess Theater, in Toronto, on October 3. ey g Ethel Barrymore resumes at Powers Theater, in Chicago, on September 5. PR Mrs. Gilbert begins her career as a star at the B Street Theater in Yhiladelphia in “Granny.” T e begins her tour in at Norfolk, Va., Maude Adams “The Little Minister™ on October 13. lel e Annie Russell is to open her season in Buffalo at the Star Theater on Octo- ber 24. & we Ben Greet's company will open in San Francisco at the Lyric Theater on October 3. AR ol it The Rogers Brothers begin at the Star Theater, Buffalo, on Augut 29. Blanche Walsh starts her season at the Grand Opera-house in New York on September 12 Ve e After an absence of two seasons, while winning new triumphs in the East and in Europe, Sousa and his band will make a tour of the Coast in the early fall. . . James T. Powers, who has not visited San Francisco in & number of years, is coming. with John C. Fisher's pro- duction of “San Toy.” Powers will be seen in the role he created when the musical success was first brought out in New York. seorge K. Fortescue, also of the original cast, will be seen in the forthcoming production. s s = Kyrle Bellew has arrived in New York from Engiand. He has brought his company together and. after a few rehearsals, will come direct to San Francisco, completing arrangements here for the opening of his second sea- . son In “Raffles, the Aamateur Cracks- man.” & o Fannie Francesca sails for America aturday of this week. She stops ov. at Le¢ n and New York a few days each before coming to her native city. The singer has been away for over ten year —_———— DISCUSS v THE OC British Aeronautical Society Considers Plans of Making Long Aerial Trips. LONDON, Aug. 13.—Members of the Aeronautical Soc gravely discussed the possibilities of crossing the Atlantia by balloon, while General Baden= Powell sat in the chair and talked of the ue of kites in making meteoro~ logical observations Charles Harding said Walter Powell, M. P, who was killed in a balloon ac- cident in 1881, desired to cross the At- lantic from th s but he himself thought the w as better the other way. Another member thought the notion of starting from England should not be abandoned, but Mr. Harding hoped aeronauts would not risk their necks. PR it nased Queen Delighted With Auto. THE HAGUE, Aug. 13.—Queen Wile helmina and the Prince Consort made their first automobile trip this week, The Queen wore a white cloak and the Prince a military uniform. M. Verweg, the owner, steered. Three other auto- mobiles were in attendance. Their des- tination was the church, where one of the Queen's former ladies in walting was married. The return journey was made in another car, a twenty-four horsepower, four-cylinder machine, and a high speed was attalned over the good roads. The Queen was delighted with her new experience. —_———— Butcher Cuts Off His Leg. GENOA, Aug. 13.—Carlo Nervi, & young butcher of this place, having contracted a disease of the leg which baffled the doctors, became frightened at the appearance of blood poisoning marks, locked himself in his room and tying a handkerchief under his knee with a sharp knife severed the lower part of his limb, taking care to stom the flow of blood from the arteries. A surgeon who was summoned found that the operation had been well per< formed, and the young man is rapidly recoverin; i e tietenet Passing of Historlo Oaks. Our historic oaks are, with every great storm, diminished in number. Dumorey's oak, in Dorsetshire, 2000 years old, disappeared from this cause in 1703, Wallace’s oak, at Ellersile, was 700 years old when it was blown down some fifty years ago. We have still, however, the Cowtherpe oak, near ‘Wetherby, in Yorkshire, estimated to be over 1600 years old, and Willlam the Conqueror’s oak, in Windsor Great Park, has attained the ripe age of 1200 years. Perhaps the finest oaks of great antiquity in the land are to be found in the dukerfes. About half a mile from Welbeck Abbey is Greendale oak, credited with 1500 summers and now a mere ruin sustained by props. Through its hollow interior a coach and four has Ppeen driven.—London Chronicle. — e ——— William Redmond, M. P., loves to tell how he once refused a crown. It was during his youth, when traveling for snort in Africa, he fell into the hands of King Ja Ja, who took such a fancy to him that he offered to make “Willie” Redmond his Prime Minister and heir apparent.