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A LONDON COMMENTARY.
London. December 1 1921.
(By Harrison Owen.)
November is generally regarded as the
monthe for fogs in London. This year it
almost looked as if it was going to [?]
its [?] reputation in this respect, but
in'the last week of November the repota
_?n was justiaied with a vengeance. For
*hree days a dense fog __ - over r_e
metropolis, and for the greater port <_
.-is period London -was surrounded for 39
'____? on every side by an almost impene-'
ttaWe belt Railway time tables went by
the board, aad omnibuses and teams ran
_s best they could. For bonis at a t___
Wood traffic mas almost entirely suspended,
?Jid a strange, uncanny ____> reigned
'?over the arity. Although all" street lamps
were burning t!_-__g_c_t th_ day, tisey
were able to produce nothing more than a
saint golden haze, visible at a dktance of
ay —tw yards. Tehide __np_ beoame mere
pin points of li~_- Some omnibus drl
ve_s . kept t__ar buses moving along the
?_—aston. ai a snail's pace until the kerb
?*s_ft was no longer __lie: dhen they had
t_ "park^ the vehicles while their pas
sengers ptcceeded to grope their way
through the strangely -Sent city. The
_jondon police, as usual in an emergency,
ild _o___rful work. For hour after hour
<____£, for the time being blind men and
-Women, -were guided across ___s by
i—_9_ly "-bobbies," whose lanterns were
__i__y able to ___r the way for more than
_ Boot or two =?—-.-I Even the most
_k_._i__ motor car ___d_g_t_, theH__?-*?-;__?
Bis of which so frequently con
__ae pedestrians, became mere
?glow _____ while the fog was
at its thickest-. Meteorological officials
state that it jras the worst fog exp-riencei
for some years, and as they refuse to be
be more dpfinire, the many peopl_ who ar_
firmly convinced that n.thirg which mar
happen in this degenerate age can comp. c
_? with the event, cf the past have been
busily engaged pointing out that __ log I
at the beghmhig of the preie-t week was
a mere "Scotch mist." When d_ivea
into a corner, by debaters eager t. de
fend the modern world agunst th_ charge
of *"deg__e__y_" they stoutly assert thit,
whatever sort of fog this late.t fcg nuy
.have been, it certainly was not a "London
par, Ccolat" . Preasely how a '"London
parlfi_it?rw dil _er_ from other brands of in
tense fog I am unable to say, but it is
* something ti_tt is talked cf in tones of
awe or bragged about in voices of tri
umph by "oldest inhabitant.." It _ee__
lo be generally, agreed that the fogs of re
?_art yeace have not been so bad as t:ose
of what may not inappropriately be callad
the "dim pa—,;" bo, presumably, the
Smoke Abatement Society ha. succeeded
.to some extent in mitigating the nnisance.
S__, the statistics relating to this par
? tK__r fag (id-ether it was a, "London par
ticnlar" does not greatly matter, which
have been p____ed in the newspapers,
_re_^ suffioently . impres ive. A* one
period (ire are informed by the superin
tendent of the Advisory Committee _n At
- ___pherie PoU-tlon), betwezn 180 to -DO
tons of soot woe scspended over London,
and at-noon on one day every adult in
London was breathing '"about nine in_e
of soot, particles par hour," -which cal
. eolation, 1 take it, -was made on the as
sumption ___ the _a___ble -apply of
-Oct particles was shared by the -dolt
population on a strictly soc____ic bads.
Biogiaphi-al Play.. ,
Some critic-, who hare evidently forgot
ten many dramatists of the
- past - . (md-ding William Shake
. pecre) accuse iMr. John Drinkwate.-
"Abi—ham Lincoln" has just been
__tbd__rn a__r a second rt___ka_iy s__
_Bssf-1 London _nn^-of having .nvemted"
the biographical play. Mr. Drinkwater
__m_e'_ would he die last to make such a.
_rf__l_us ohtun; bet lie can certainly be
pointed -to as the pioneer of a modern re-
I rival in drama of this _a__ In the last
Je^w___ Camr b_jgr_p_U_l p_.ys have
*een produ—3d here, and -ithough none
equals Lmeoln," either in dra
, 11—-tie __c___ce cr p-pnlar appeal, each
. jt?s m______tg in its way. I write "was"
teeanse three have already been.' with
drawn, two of the plays holding the boards
: only for a few nights. Obviously, the____.
jteijPiib_cjiid not^ock to TA-zaham Lia
cgai. merely ______ its hero was a _____
___o__al character; they did so because it
.happened to be an exceptionally interesting
. p_y. "Bthaxan," trans ated by Mr. Gran
.. -£te Bari-ar from _ie French of Sacha-
Gnitry, -was in rhymed verse, of rather
poor quality. _ The famous French actor
-O——d _—a it wa? written was -caicely
?_t in heroic mould, and the story of
his lore and his sorrow was not possessed
. otAjety strong -flpeaL nctwithstandjig
ttc .fine acting 01 Mr. Ucbert ______ in
__c __x_e part, and the e__.fient perfonn
~ nnce Of an actress (Miss Madge Titheradge)
- ___i__ar to Am s___an theatre-gDess. in the
, o-vensh-dowed <_ha____* of Marie Duples
. s_- A moire „u__,y and m____ing effort
to*. Haieott G_>re_ b
prodficed at the ___jus "Old Vie," which
has foe long been the chief ______ _____
_ : ?rf._____pea__an d_u__ - "Wat ____**
was not Tasking jn dr-matic qualities, and
-o___med ranch vyutous, _r_l-written dia
logne; bat, possibly beoanse of its __ng
_ra_i_t_-is_peeches, it was not to the public
' taste. T__te ____ -ailnre of this cfc__ was
_______ Xl __n__s__j_ s The Pilgrim of
Eteririty" tbe title being the net v?ry fai
<_|o_s phrase in -which Shelley e____oel
Byroti. Brabatily the Byrcn of this play
___ not -he Byron in whom one mijht
Vtnost reasonably have expected the ___9_
igoi-g pu-Ga to be i____ste_-^_iat is to
. esy, the Byron who was both a poet and
a lover. . True, two ti JSyron's .love?--
M_ria_na Segals and "the Cohntoss Guic
cMJ-H_g__ed as.ehara—_rs in "The PH-
- jorhn of Etcrnitjv* and true _3so'. the
_tage Bjron endeavored to convey the in.
jii__ion that he _s a poet by spouting
lus verses at __q_ent interval-; but the
3_ay was for the most part, concerned
. ? ?i_i Byron, as the. apostle of revolt. His
conn—ction w__t Carbonarism - was _rea—ly
. exaggerated, ?& largely imaginary conflict be
tween the poet and the C_rdin_. Legate
ai.__cv____. was-introduced, and the pie
. tdre of Etyron which remained with one
' after .easong the theatre was of a melo-
Aramaf-c postuier, who epenh __?_ of his
_hne me—dling in an amazingiy indi___et
. -Banner in the domestic poH-us of Italy.
.. ..The play loaded when he was about to
depart for Greece to _cad" the Greets
against _he Turks. i__get_er "The Pil
grim of Eternity" was a di9ppi___ng
p'.ay, and one was left wondering why
the author, who had er_de__y been at
.'great pains to collect £u_s regarding the
3?et. should; hare fojpd it _e__si__r to
sni _^lc- them.- \_£h'go ? _?"_? ??_,i_!__—??"
fiction. "Wig -iliakespeare," at the
Shaftesbury. Theatre, is the most interest
ing-, of these recent biographical plays. It
iai-ljfte work of Miss Clemenoe Dane, who
__T-eyeral excellent novels to' her cre
dit., and whose first play, "__ B_4 of
DiviM-Knent" has been running for __any
months at fit. -Martin's Theatre. and
e.CWB no signs of wanu-r popa"—ritv. Like
the __t_or of .""The -fs__a <_ Bternitv,"
__3B Daae has -mixed fact with fiction,
bat she is careful to label her play
as ' "an - invention," and states that
" she _as _i_r_y sought to "sug^st. the
nature of the experience which went to
?the de_-opment of Shakespeare's genius.
Some of thes; "suggestions" are undeniably
anda(^o-e. bat "Mjbk Dane handles her ma->
_____ _r_h _o._n_h artistry that, even
?H-.i-rli one may __je<_ her -"suggestions" it
is ______ not to admire the uterarr qua
lities of ber play. We are shown Shakes
peare leasing 'Cruy. Hathaway <who is re
presented as having induced him to marry
ber by a trick __n_r to that which was
played on Mr. .Hardy's "Jude the Ob
-cure") to go to London. He_? he be
comes infata-ted with Mary Fitton (whom
Mist' Dine, like Mr. Bernard _ haw and
Mr. Fran_ Harris, identifies with the
"Dark lady of the sonnet.), and has for
his rival Christopher "Marlowe. Accord
ing to literary history Marlowe was killed
in a tarem bn.l. his own knife _arm*
been turned against him by a. serving man
on whom he had drawn it. Miss Dane
has replaced the serving man with Shakes
peare, and suggests Mary Fitton ss the
cause of the quarrel. It is audacious, cer
tainly, and yet the incident, led ap to n
the -vay it is by Miss Dane, does not
wholly fail in being artistically convincing,
however greatly it may be at variance
with fact. ""Will Shakespeare" is writ
ten in blank verse, which _t times attains
a high degree of bea-ty, a speech towards
tie end, in which Queen Elizabeth urges
Sbakespe-re ts embody his dreams in lite
__y form, so that an Englishman may
rank first among the world's poets, rising
to a height of poetic eloquence not fre
quently achieved in modem blank verse.
A Cinema __velo____n_ j
Mir. Wi_ Dyson, the A__t__i__ artist, j
who came to 'London eight or nine years j
ago and won fame as a cartoonist, greatly
adding to his reputation during the war
by his well-known "Kuitur Cartoons," is
now coming _nier public notice as the j
pioneer in England of a new development
in moving picture production. As the
result o: IS months of strenuous experi
mental work, Mr. Dyson has perfected
a number of mechanical figures .hitrh,
under his control, are capable not only of!
oU the normal ge.t_r_; and changes of ex
pression employed by screen actors, but j
which go through contortions and ac.ieve :
effects—such as the darting of eye-alls ;
from their sockets and the -omically
"-risible" swelling of a gent__tan who has .
eaten a hearty meal—no merely human
octor could a_campl_b. These puppets,
which I have had the privilege of seeing
both on the screen —in two experimental ?
pictures privately shown—and in Mr. Dy- ]
son's studio, are modelled in the manner
made familiar by the artist's own carica- |
tares, and the way in whici these ex- j
agzeratedly tall, fat, or thin figures be-.
have upon the screen is at once as life;
like and as grotesque as the best class of
caricature. Representative, o. tbe cinema
trade who have inspected the film? are, a_
qsmmercial men, chiefly intet__ed in the
broadly comic possibilities of the figures:
but Mr. Dyson and a Dumber of other well
known artists, see much greater scope for
the development' of the idea. The op
portunities for employing the figures with
fine artistic effect in tales of *-he gro
tesque and arabesque" (not necessarily
those of Poe, but of a _i_ilsr order),
-would seem to be enormous, and it is to
work of this class that the artist is now
devoting his attention. In addition to
modelling the figures, Mr. Dyson design,
dresses for his puppets, somen Hat after
the manner of Leon Bakst, and construct.,
bizarre stage .sittings not unlike those of
Picasso. Th_ eomolete control of every
side of his production.—for his "actors-"
of. conn., do only what their creator wills
—probably accounts for the satisfying sense
of artistic unity conveyed by the exper:
-[ mental films which Mr. Dyson has com
pleted.
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