THEATRE REVIEWS

1. The Witchfinder (1864) to Alone in London (1885)

[Advert for The Rath Boys from The Times (17 May, 1862 - p.10)]

The Witchfinder from The Times (10 October, 1864 - p.7)

SADLER’S-WELLS THEATRE.

     The announcement that a new play by M. Robert Buchanan would be produced at Sadler’s-wells on Saturday night attracted an audience remarkable not only for its great numerical strength, but for the literary character of many of its constituents. The author has been recognized as one of the poets of the day, and Miss Marriott has regained for her theatre the reputation first acquired under Mr. Phelps of supplying the hungry after intellectual fare with a satisfactory repast. To be brought out as the chief piece at Sadler’s-wells a drama must, at all events, pretend to an aim higher than that of exciting transient applause, and, although such aims seldom prove quite so successful as the dramatic marksman expects, the very attempt to gain perennial laurels excites, when made upon a public stage, the curiosity of that portion of the literary world that still looks hopefully to the theatre. Nor is that portion of the literary world—if the word be taken in a broad sense—by any means small. In spite of all the changes of fashion, there is still a large public believing that a theatre may be devoted to higher uses than the excitement of “sensations,” or the performance of burlesque. In this public Miss Marriott, following in the steps of Mr. Phelps, finds her best supporters; it is by this public, which in a great measure represents a national feeling, that the resuscitation of Drury-lane, under Messrs. Falconer and Chatterton, is hailed as the forerunner of a better order of things.
     Mr. Buchanan’s play, which, though in only three acts, has been written in the style usually associated with five, is entitled The Witchfinder, and is evidently intended to exhibit the careful development of a character, placed under very exceptional circumstances. Mr. Henry Spicer, who was very prolific as a dramatist, when the cessation of the patents awakened a hope for extended “legitimacy,” and whose theatrical productions deserve to be better remembered than they are, wrote a play called the Witch Wife, in which the villain of the story was the notorious Matthew Hopkins, and the audience assembled at Sadler’s-wells on Saturday might expect to find a similar villain in the witchfinder of Mr. Robert Buchanan. But Martin Holt, as he is called, is the reverse of a bad man. Trained among the early Puritan settlers of New England, with whom a belief in witches, which they held in common with most of their civilized contemporaries, was rendered peculiarly intense by the convictions that their enemies, the Indians, were arch-magicians, he has firmly persuaded himself that he is preternaturally endowed with the power of detecting the sorceresses to whom all the evils that befall his neighbours are commonly ascribed. Many a harmless old woman has suffered death on the stake through the mere ipse dixit of Martin Holt, but still he is the honest incarnation of a popular belief, and his only fault is that sort of vanity from which even a successful visionary is not expected to be exempt. When it is universally allowed that the glance of Martin Holt can penetrate into those dark regions that are closed to the natural sight, and that the very lustre of his eye is sufficient to make a witch drop powerless at his feet, it is but human that Martin’s head should be a little turned, and that he should take a sort of gloomy pleasure in the barbarous office which makes him the great man of the town of Salem in Massachusetts. However, while his position is high, it is by no means safe, and he has enemies at his elbow who would gladly see his fall. Though exceptionally inspired as a witchfinder, he seems to be less rigidly Puritanical than some of his neighbours, and his encouragement of his daughter’s love for Walter Vane, a gay young Englishman, whose manners are rather of the cavalier than of the roundhead order, and who—shame on him—does not believe in witchcraft, is a grievous cause of offence, especially to Josiah Jones, a Puritanical villain of the deepest dye, who would willingly marry pretty Ruth Holt himself. A straw will overbalance the fortunes of Martin Holt.
     The straw is at hand. One Mistress Brogden, whose only crime is poverty, is suspected of witchcraft by public opinion, and is declared guilty by the more deliberative Martin. She dies at the stake, and leaves behind her a half-witted son, named Elijah, who has fallen idiotically in love with Ruth, and being an adept in the art of interpreting the language of bells, which is at least as old as the days of Lord Mayor Whittington, takes it into his head that the church peals utter the warning “Be-ware-E-li-jah-be-ware-the-pret-ty-witch,” and thus designate Ruth Holt. When his mother is condemned, Elijah not only curses the witchfinder, but implores his daughter to use her powers of witchery, and by drawing down thunderbolts to save his parent’s life. Mistress Brogden having been safely reduced to ashes, the good folks who have hounded her to the stake begin to look upon her orphan son with tardy compassion, to like Martin Holt a little less than they did before, and to pay marked attention to the idiot’s assertion that Ruth Holt is a witch. Josiah Jones does all he can to strengthen the bad opinion entertained of Ruth, hoping thus to get her into his power, and at last it is settles that she is to be formally accused. As Martin Holt is the only competent detecter of witches, and it will be rather indelicate to ask him to denounce his own daughter, of whom he is dotingly fond, a deputation waits upon him to have the signs by which a sorceress may be discovered without naming the suspected person. Martin, solicited by Ruth, has resolved to give over witchfinding, and to accompany her and her intended husband, Walter Vane, to “Merrie England,” but he cannot resist the appeal of his neighbours, and, unfortunately, all the tests which he recommends as infallible serve to prove that Ruth is a witch beyond the possibility of doubt.
     When Martin sees his daughter dragged to prison in consequence of his own decision, and learns that she is condemned to death, he becomes altogether deranged, and wanders about the country a forlorn old man, with no other companion than the boy Elijah, who now regards him with a strange sympathy. Josiah Jones offers to effect the escape of Ruth from prison if she will grant him her love, but his offer is of course rejected, according to the well-known precedent of Claude Trollo and Esmeralda, and Ruth is freed from prison and Jones too by the half-witted Elijah. The people endeavouring to recapture Ruth while she is defended by Walter Vane and Elijah, the piece ends with a general tumult, in the course of which Josiah Jones kills Martin Holt, to be slain in turn by Walter Vane. Ruth is only saved by the very timely arrival of despatches, declaring that the law against witchcraft has been abolished in England, and that that abolition has been confirmed by the local Government.
     The conception of Martin Holt, the gloomy but honest fanatic, constantly upholding the cause of injustice and oppression, while he thinks himself engaged in a holy work, is very original, and the preternatural side of his character is happily contrasted with his purely human devotion to his daughter. What the author intended by the character of Elijah Brogden, who in prominence stands next to Martin Holt, it is not so easy to decide. The vengeance with which the judicial murder of his mother at first inspires him soon dies away; his love for Ruth is of the least tangible kind, his imbecility seems to come and go at the author’s pleasure, and his strange sympathy with Martin, though much talked about, seems merely to imply that one maniac may be attracted by another, as when Shakespeare’s Lear is fascinated by the assumed insanity of Edgar.
     Mr. Buchanan knows how to make his act-drop descend on an effective tableau. The first act ends with the curse uttered by Elijah, when his mother is dragged off to prison; the second with Holt’s despair on learning that his daughter is condemned; the third with a scuffle that heightens the force of the catastrophe. But in the general conduct of his play he is far from skilful. The interest, instead of being concentrated, is often frittered away by purposeless scenes and insipid personages. Josiah Jones is one of the weakest of villains—a Claude Trollo without the passion, and with respect to the brisk cavaliers and grotesque Puritans, who relieve the more tragic portions of the work, it is hard to say which is the least exciting, the faint brilliancy of the former, or the very dry humour of the latter. The Shakespearian principle of relief should always be adapted with caution, and only by masters of strong comedy.
     The more serious portion of the dialogue is written in blank verse, and much beautiful language is put into the mouth of Martin Holt. Indeed, we suspect that the story altogether would look better in a narrative than in a dramatic form. That concentration which is so essential to the stage is not required for the novel, and such psychological subtleties as the sudden friendship between Elijah and his m other’s persecutor may be rendered clearer by a mixture of description and reflection than by theatrical exhibition.
     Of the acting of Miss Marriott we can speak in the highest terms. Elijah is not only an unintelligible but an unthankful part, for his mental deficiency precludes him from variety of expression. But Miss Marriott presents us with a strange weird figure, with light flowing hair, wandering eye, and graceful movements, that give us a striking picture, where the author has failed to give us a distinctly marked character. Mr. George Melville achieves an intelligent interpretation of the witchfinder. In the zenith of his power he is dreamy and imposing, in the agony of his despair he displays unwonted force. Miss E. Beaufort prettily represents Ruth Brogden.
     The piece is well put on the stage, two of the “set scenes” being at once elaborate and picturesque. Its success was vigorously declared by a storm of applause that followed the conclusion of every act.

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A Madcap Prince from The Penny Illustrated Paper (8 August, 1874 - p.7)

Mr. Robert Buchanan’s new comedy, “A Madcap Prince,” produced at the Haymarket on the last night of Mr. Buckstone’s season, treats of an episode in the life of Charles II, in his youthful days. In fleeing from the Puritans he is harboured by Elinor Vane, who enables him to escape by disguising herself as the King. As Elinor Vane, Mrs. Kendal was particularly winning and charming; whilst Mr. Buckstone was unctuous as ever in the part of a Puritan soldier.

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A Madcap Prince from The Times (23 November, 1882 - p.8)

GAIETY.

     At a special matinée yesterday Miss Harriett Jay, who has appeared at intervals on the London stage, essayed the character of Elinor Vane in Mr. Robert Buchanan’s Haymarket comedy A Madcap Prince. The part demands a certain amount of versatility in an actress, inasmuch as Elinor Vane has to impersonate Charles Stuart (afterwards Charles II.) while that rash young Prince escapes to the Continent. It cannot be said that Miss Jay’s acting exhibits any extraordinary qualities. She has tolerably well mastered the technical requirements of the stage, but her comedy is too artificial and forced to impress an audience deeply.

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Corinne from The Times (30 June, 1876 - p.8)

THE LYCEUM THEATRE.

     Mr. Robert Buchanan’s Corinne, an “original romantic” play in four acts, was produced on Monday night at this house, which has temporarily passed from the supervision of Mrs. Bateman to that of Mrs. Fairfax. This play is, according to a notice inserted in the play bills, a study of the same nature as a tale from the same pen now appearing in the Gentleman’s Magazine, and entitled the “Shadow of the Sword.” It is founded, as we are further informed, on one of many similar cases recorded in the French archives, and is intended to present a picture of society as it existed before the Revolution. But the author’s intention has unfortunately been so feebly seconded by the majority of the company which the present management has collected together, and is, moreover, of itself so inadequately executed, that, unless some very radical changes are wrought both in play and players, it is not, we fear, improbable that Corinne may before long become as extinct as the condition of society it is supposed to represent. From a share of the responsibility of so untoward a fate Mr. Buchanan cannot be absolved. It is true that the actors have not done much for him, but with no inconsiderable show of truth might they urge that he has done not much more for them. That a play written by a gentleman who has acquired what fame he enjoys by his poetry should, as a dramatic composition, show many faults will surprise none who know and can appreciate the almost measureless distinction between writing for the study and for the stage. It is not given to every one, no matter how distinguished in literature he may be, to attain dramatic distinction at a bound, and Mr. Buchanan’s previous efforts in this direction have hardly been numerous enough, or held possession of the stage long enough, to supply him with the necessary experience. That he should, therefore, have proved himself to be lacking in the science of stage-craft is, though unfortunate, not perhaps surprising, and can convey no imputation on him, either as a poet or as a man of letters. But there are worse faults than this in Corinne—faults of style, which should not be found in the work of a man of any degree of literary distinction. The language which Mr. Buchanan puts into the mouths of his characters, and there is a good deal of it, is now poor and weak, now turgid and declamatory, but rarely true either to nature or to art, and disfigured moreover by such grammatical blunders as no “fourth-form” boy would ever venture to commit twice. With regard to this latter fault it is, of course, difficult, without reference to the manuscript of the play, to define the amount of blame to be placed on the shoulders of M. Buchanan. He may have been cruelly treated by the actors, or he may have cruelly treated actors too conscientious to deviate one hair’s breadth from the exact words of their “study;” but an author may hardly complain if he is held answerable for all the literary demerits of a composition bearing his name, and, with whomsoever this particular fault may lie, it is at least due from him to the public, and would be well also for his own interests, that the fault be remedied as speedily as possible.
     It is rather a particular than a general picture of French society that Mr. Buchanan has endeavoured to present. His heroine is an actress, and his intention has been, we presume, to exhibit the peculiar condition of the stage at that time, not from a dramatic, but from a social point of view. He tells us in his little preface, that members of that profession were then not merely denied the rites of burial, but too often the rites of marriage. It is on such an incident that the action of his play hinges, and the general features of the state of things which produced the French Revolution are introduced merely as accessories to this particular idea. But they are too slightly drawn, and too inadequately represented by the actors to add much to the general effect. It is true that there are presented on the stage such real personages as Prince d’Artois, and that “strangest horseleech” of his, Jean Paul Marat, bur the playbill has about as much to say for them as they have to say for themselves, while the other characters are purely ideal characters, meant, indeed, to be typical of the times but possessing but little individuality of their own, nor able to impart much to the play. The principal personage is Corinne, the actress, and on her the author has evidently bestowed care, for which we could hope he will be better repaid. She excites, indeed, at first some compassion for her wrongs, but there is an insufficiency of motive about her subsequent actions, as well as an irrational and ill-directed passion for revenge, not in harmony with her general character, which tends to destroy our original sympathy. She is represented when the play opens, about the year 1780, as secretly married to a young Frenchman, Victor de Beauvoir, of good birth, yet at heart half a Democrat, and so tolerated by Raoul Recamier, her brother, whom an unfortunate passion for a pretty and well-born coquette, the Comtesse de la Vallee, has transformed from an industrious and well-mannered artist into the most bitter and uncompromising of Republicans. When Victor de Beauvoir blossoms into the Comte de Calvador, which he does at an early period of the story, he determines to make public his marriage with Corinne. Her introduction to his relatives, among whom is Raoul’s early love, is met with ominous ridicule, and we are tolerably well prepared for the refusal of the Church to confirm the marriage. Though the ceremony has already been commenced by a more tolerant member of the priesthood, this refusal is pronounced by the Archbishop himself, at the instigation of a certain Abbé de Larose, a conventional type of the elegant and dissolute clergy of the period. This Larose has himself, through the medium of diamonds, professed love for Corinne, but love and diamonds have alike been scorned. The interdiction of the marriage does not, however, benefit Larose, for when De Calvador, awed by the thunders of the Church, relinquishes his bride at the very altar, the unfortunate woman disappears from the world altogether. Some years elapse, about 12, before she appears again, which she does, clad in the blood-red garb of the Republic, in the gardens of the Chateau de Larose. It is the very eve of the Revolution; nevertheless the Abbé is entertaining a distinguished company in the most costly and extravagant manner, careless of the fact that while he is spending thousands of francs on a single feast the people are starving in the very streets of Paris. Among his guests is De Calvador, who still entertains, as is to be gathered from his funereal costume, some kindly feeling for the woman he has deserted. He unfortunately enters upon the scene to find this woman struggling in the embrace of the Abbé, who has but an instant before professed to him total ignorance even of her very existence. Then ensues a stormy scene of mutual recrimination and abuse, prolonged to a tedious extent, and founded on very insufficient grounds, for it has been made evident that the old love still survives in either heart, and neither the situation in which he finds her nor his behaviour at the time to her is a sufficient motive for the violence of their subsequent language. On these two scolding and on the rest of the revellers listening in attitudes of respectful attention bursts the mob of Paris, somewhat feebly represented, and headed by Raoul, and the curtain drops on  what, with more careful management, might have been made an effective and picturesque scene. The fourth and last act is laid in the Abbaye Prison, during those hundred hours “which are to be reckoned with the hours of the Bartholomew butchery, of the Armagnac massacres, Sicilian Vespers, or whatsoever is savagest in the annals of the world.” At the “Strange Court of Wild Justice” here held, Marat is represented as presiding, though, we fancy that, according to Mr. Carlyle, Stanislas Maillard, the hero of the Bastille, filled that office. Among the prisoners brought before them is De Calvador, who, as an aristocrat and the betrayer of their favourite Corinne, is doomed by the Sans Culottes to instant death. One the appeal, however, of Corinne, who promises for him, as her husband, a vengeance more terrible than any pike or sabre can inflict, he is spared. Whether this not too ingenious device eventually succeeds we know not, for before Corinne can free the man she still loves she dies in his arms of a broken heart, and the somewhat premature fall of the curtain, for which the stage is cleared in a rather clumsy manner, cuts short all speculations as to the future of De Calvador. There is, however, an effective scene in this act, when the Abbé is brought before the Tribunal. He is dragged on in a state of abject terror; but on being assured by Marat that he is merely to be removed to La Force—the formula at the Abbaye for death, as the removal to the Abbaye was the formula at La Force—recovers his self-possession to a certain extent, and with a ghastly affectation of his old grace and politeness walks out to his doom. This scene, though again somewhat marred by a clumsy bit of management, is certainly a powerful, though a horrible, one, and is well handled by Mr. Forbes-Robertson, whose picture of the Abbé is, in other respects, somewhat of a colourless one. Here, however, he acts with good effect, and if his emotions of physical terror are occasionally a trifle grotesque, the contrast between the immediate fear of death and the newly risen hope of life is justly conceived and cleverly carried out. It will be seen that though this play has many serious faults, it is not altogether destitute of sparks of dramatic fire. Unfortunately, these sparks are never fanned into a flame, and their occasional presence serves but to render the surrounding barrenness more cold and cheerless. Certain situations, it is true, there are which, as we have tried to show, should be, and might be, made effective, but they are but clumsily introduced, and marred moreover by a terrible prolixity of empty dialogue, and the action throughout the piece, which is intended to be brisk and stirring, is for ever obstructed by a stream of words not only in the circumstances altogether out of place but in themselves of but little value.
     Nor does the acting, with the exception already made, differ much from the dialogue. The unreal and extravagant nature of much of the sentiments and the language, and, to use an expressive phrase, the generally “transpontine” flavour of what he has to do and say, seem strangely to have affected Mr. Forrester, and there is a corresponding air of unreality and extravagance about his acting, for which his later performances had certainly not prepared us. Neither the garb nor the grace of the Court of Louis XVI. is easy to Mr. Warner, who is the Comte de Calvador; and the representatives of the other members of that society to whom we are introduced labour under the same disadvantage. Mrs. Fairfax herself undertakes the part of Corinne, but neither her experience nor, we fear, her powers are at all equal to the task.

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Corinne from The Times (13 January, 1877 - p.10)

[from] THE THEATRES IN 1876.

... The year has closed as it began, with the performance of Macbeth; but during the temporary absence of Mrs. Bateman a play written by Mr. Buchanan was given, Corinne, though dealing with a dramatic, albeit well-worn subject, the French Revolution, was in itself so weak, both in construction and in writing, and, with one single exception, so worse than indifferently acted, that its life was brief indeed, nor is there much probability of its ever being revived from the limbo to which it was hastily consigned.

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The Queen of Connaught extracted from ‘The English Stage: Story of the Year’ from The New York Times (6 January, 1878)

Mr. Robert Buchanan probably finds a new cause for feeling bitterly against all mankind because “The Queen of Connaught” did not make his nor the fortune of Mr. Neville at the Olympic. The drama was not without merit but the action of the play was worked out on the poorest models, and the situations were forced and unnatural. You may possibly have an opportunity for judging for yourself how far London was right in rejecting “The Queen of Connaught” as Miss Ada Cavendish will be with you next year and this drama is in her répertoire.

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[Advert for The Nine Days’ Queen from The Times (19 February, 1881 - p.8)]

The Nine Days’ Queen from The Scotsman (23 December, 1880 - p.5)

“THE NINE DAYS’ QUEEN”

     LONDON, Wednesday night.—A romantic poetical drama in four acts, entitled “The Nine Days’ Queen,” by Mr Robert Buchanan, was produced at a morning performance at the Gaiety Theatre this afternoon. The play is founded on the life and death of Lady Jane Grey, and Mr Buchanan appends the following note to the programme:—
     “Little pretension is made by the author to historical accuracy, but the romantic attachment of the Earl of Hertford for Lady Jane Grey is not without authentic foundation. The meeting of Queen Mary and Lady Jane Grey in the Tower is possibly as justifiable on historical grounds as the famous encounter of Queens in Schiller’s ‘Mary Stuart.’ Free use has been made of Nicholas Rowe’s play on the same subject.”
     Taking, then, the salient points of Lady Jane Grey’s hapless career, the author has certainly given us a sufficiently romantic play, while he is also abundantly justified in claiming for it the epithet of poetical. “The Nine Days’ Queen” is written in vigorous and poetic blank verse, full of nervous English and admirable similes; indeed, the literary merit of the piece is exceptionally high. It may be questioned, however, whether the poet has not to some extent extinguished the playwright, for the piece would be much improved by wholesale excisions, and a general condensation, which would bring the dramatic situations closer together. Still, even with those faults, Mr Buchanan has written a really fine play, which, with due revision, should have a successful career on the stage. He deals with the life of his heroine in a masterly fashion, and the words he puts into the mouths of his various characters are invariably appropriate. We are shown Lady Jane Grey under all the trying circumstances of her life, and special stress is laid upon her love for Lord Guildford Dudley, as well as upon the romantic attachment conceived for her by Lord Hertford; while the latter’s treachery to her cause and subsequent repentance are used with skill and with good dramatic effect. The meeting above referred to of Queen Mary and Lady Jane in the Tower is well conceived, and with a little compression could be highly effective; and another strong situation shows us with much dramatic force the unhappy heroine’s acceptance of the crown which she would fain have refused. There is pathos, too, in the concluding scene, which was well managed, and indeed the whole play is a most welcome change from the adaptations from foreign sources which are now too common among us. It must be said, moreover, that it would have gained a great deal had the blank verse been spoken with more discretion by several of the actors who took part in it. The principal character, Lady Jane Grey, was played by Miss Harriet Jay, a lady who, as the authoress of “The Dark Colleen” and “The Queen of Connaught,” has won a high reputation as a novelist. Miss Jay has only once before made her appearance on the stage, and her performance was indubitably one of high promise. She has, as was only to be expected, much to learn, but still her acting is sympathetic and intelligent, and she evidently spares no pains to embody the author’s ideas. With more experience and confidence, and a more entire abandonment of herself to the situation, she will one day be an acquisition to the stage. Miss Louise Willes was a satisfactory Queen Mary, and Mr Beaumont played the Duke of Northumberland with sound art, and delivered his lines in welcome contrast to the elocution of Mr Arthur Dacre, who slurred them over as if he had never spoken blank verse before. The piece was effectively put upon the stage, and listened to with much attention, while all the principal characters were much applauded at the conclusion, and called before the curtain to receive the congratulations of the audience. In response to a loud demand for the author, Mr Buchanan made his appearance, and bowed his acknowledgments.

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The Nine Days’ Queen from The Times (21 February, 1881 - p.4)

     At the Connaught Theatre the entertainment is now entirely provided by Mr. Robert Buchanan. The evening opens with a play founded on one of Mr. Buchanan’s poems, in which a ne’er-do-well father, excellently played by Mr. Wood, shows his poetical superiority over a self-seeking and worldly son; and next comes the principal drama of the evening, the Nine Days’ Queen, a romantic play which tells the story of the short and unfortunate reign of the Lady Jane Grey. The play was produced at the Gaiety quite recently. As presented at the Connaught it is a series of effective tableaux, which tell with simplicity and force one of the most touching stories in English history. Miss Harriett Jay sympathetically represents the innocent usurper, and Mr. F. H. Macklin gives a manly impersonation of her husband. Miss Dillon as the persecutrix, Mary, and Mr. Edward Butler as Gardiner, the cruel Bishop of Winchester, earn the compliment of hearty hisses from the gallery.

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The Nine Days’ Queen from The Scotsman (22 March, 1881 - p.4)

     GLASGOW THEATRES. — Last night, Mr Buchanan’s new play, “The Nine Days’ Queen,” was produced, for the first time in Glasgow, at the Gaiety Theatre. Miss Harriet Jay, the authoress of several novels, appeared as Lady Jane Grey, and had a good reception, being twice recalled. She was, however, indifferently supported, particularly in one important character, to whose aid the prompter was too frequently in request.

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The Exiles of Erin / The Mormons from The Times (16 May, 1881 - p.10)

     There have been one or two recent changes of less note in the substantial programme of our theatrical entertainments. At the Olympic, for instance, the place of Jo—that version of “Bleak House,” which Miss Lee’s sentimental crossing-sweeper has helped to make so very popular—has lately been supplied by a curious work known as The Mormons, but first appearing as The Exiles of Erin, a title discovered to have been anticipated. The author is Mr. Robert Buchanan, and the principal part is played by Miss Jay, the lady who recently figured as the heroine of the same writer’s poetical tragedy, The Nine Days’ Queen. This later work is not poetical, though certainly tragic enough, with a large mixture of comedy, or farce—the two are now so closely allied that it is sometimes difficult to distinguish them. The piece aroused a good deal of laughter on its first appearance, sometimes in the comic scenes, sometimes in the tragic.

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The Shadow of the Sword from The New York Times (4 June, 1881)

..... “The Shadow of the Sword” has been produced at Brighton. It was a most complete failure. Mr. Buchanan himself wrote it upon the lines of his novel, which is, in its way, quite a modern classic.

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The Shadow of the Sword from The Times (10 April, 1882 - p.8)

OLYMPIC.

     Mr. Robert Buchanan’s “Shadow of the Sword” was a powerful novel. Its scene was laid on the iron-bound coast of Brittany, among the cromlechs and mouldering memorials of the Druidic age; white-capped girls and hardy fishermen moved through its pages, industrious, tuneful, and cheery, but having always impending over their heads the dread of the conscription, the shadow of the sword of the First Napoleon. We should have said that such a novel would form an excellent basis for a melodrama. In fact, the conscription scene which Mr. Boucicault successfully added at the Adelphi a year and a half ago to The Maid of Croissey forcibly reminded us, as we wrote at the time, of Mr. Buchanan’s Breton novel. But surmises must give way to actual experience; and if the experience of Saturday night at the Olympic Theatre is any guide, it must be confessed that “The Shadow of the Sword” in its dramatic form is a failure. It was produced under disheartening circumstances. Scenic effects were Intended to form an important feature in the representation. The management had a disagreement with the workmen, and new hands from Drury Lane came at the last moment. In the result, although the performance was advertised to begin at the comparatively late hour of 7 45, it was commenced, in a thin house, half an hour later. With depressing intervals between the acts, it went on for four hours, and when, half an hour after midnight, a few enthusiasts who remained in the gallery shouted for the author, Mr. Buchanan was well advised not to make his appearance. The play deals with a popular theme. It is a protest against ambitious war. The hero, a Herculean peasant of Brittany, whose father has been poisoned, as he believes, in hospital by Bonaparte, and whose brother has been shot because he refused to join in fusillading a Vendean seigneur, declines to join the Grand Army, although drawn by the fatal lot of the conscription. Strengthened in his resolve by the exhortations of a wandering pastor to concern himself in no deeds of blood, he lies hid in crevices of the rock, and climbs as a consummate cragsman to otherwise inaccessible recesses among the dripping stalactites and stalagmites of an ocean cave. At night he steals forth, and, lurking among the ruins of Carnac, seems to the astonished wayfarer a being of the elder world re-visiting the emblems of a worship which is extinct. To relieve the grandeur and mystery of this sombre figure a woman’s love is entwined with his fate; her and many others he saves from the great flood which on All Soul’s Eve desolates the Breton coast; and then, having emerged from his hiding-place for this work of humanity, he gives himself up to the guard and is about to be shot. But while still hiding in his lonely cavern underneath St. Michael’s Mount he has seen in a vision the coming fate of the Emperor, who has blasted his happiness and that of his family. He has seen in sleep the skies reddened with the flames of the Kremlin, the Grand Army straggling homewards through the snow, and that resistless uprising of the peoples which Professor Seeley has christened the Anti-Napoleonic Revolution. The prophecy of his dreams is fulfilled. The King returns in time to save the rebel against the Emperor. The materials to which we have now referred would seem ample for a melodrama, if skilfully combined. But that is a large “if.” Supposing even the work of the playwright to have been efficiently performed, that of the stage machinist was so backward at the Olympic that justice could not be done to the larger effort of invention, which needs carpenters as well as actors and painters for its due manifestation. To criticize a production so unfinished is labour in vain; had the first night been postponed, the representation might have been very different and much more satisfactory. The work has been played in the country with, we believe, more success. The company were at a disadvantage between scenes which descended when they should have risen, and a curtain which oscillated for two or three minutes betwixt falling and not falling whenever a point was made. The grouping was well studied, and the pathetic interest of the comparatively well-prepared first act found a response in the tears of one or two, at least, in the audience. Mr. John Coleman played the hero, Roban; Miss Margaret Young the heroine, Marcelle Derval; Mr. John Collier represented a veteran who has retired from the army with a wooden leg and a store of tedious oaths and anecdotes; Mr. Brittain Booth impersonated an honest sergeant of gendarmerie. Miss Clarissa Ash played a peasant lass with a song; and one or two local chants were skilfully introduced from Mrs. Tom Taylor’s musical arrangement of the ballads of Brittany.

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The Shadow of the Sword from The Scotsman (10 April, 1882 - p.5)

“The Shadow of the Sword,” by Mr Buchanan, which has already been taken round the provinces, was produced at the Olympic to-night, but in a somewhat perfunctory fashion, and with but little success.

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The Shadow of the Sword from The New York Times (7 May, 1882)

..... Indeed, the United States has become quite a factor in theatrical business. Mr. Coleman’s chief desire was to make such an impression upon the London public with “The Shadow of the Sword” as would justify him in making a tour with it on the other side of the Atlantic. Mr. Buchanan’s dramatic reputation was never of much account, but it has been shaken to rags by his latest failures. He is certainly entitled to commiseration, for, without doubt, there is good material for the playwright in his remarkable novel of “The Shadow of the Sword.”

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The Shadow of the Sword from The New York Times (10 June, 1882)

..... The famous Shakespearean season which Ristori is to open will also see Mr. John Coleman as Macbeth. Mr. Coleman has had a long, bitter, personal correspondence with Mr. Buchanan over the failure of “The Shadow of the Sword.” Author and actor have mutually blamed each other in the strongest of “elegant Billingsgate.” Whether “The Shadow of the Sword” was a good play or not, it seems pretty clear that Mr. Coleman had more to do with the authorship of it than Mr. Buchanan.

[See also the review of Lucy Brandon from The New York Times below.]

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Lucy Brandon from The Scotsman (10 April, 1882 - p. 5)

     “Lucy Brandon,” which was produced at the Imperial Theatre this afternoon, is called a “romantic and poetical drama,” and is founded, as the author, Mr Buchanan, states, upon the late Lord Lytton’s novel of “Paul Clifford.” The plot is certainly romantic enough, but it cannot be said to be particularly interesting. The hero, Paul Clifford, is the captain of a band of highwaymen, who stop a coach and rob a young lady, Miss Brandon, and her friend, Lord Mauleverer. Clifford falls in love with Lucy Brandon on the spot, and then follows her to Bath, where we find him and his companions masquerading as gentlemen, and carrying all before them, after the manner of knights of the road, at the Grand Assembly Rooms. There Paul Clifford wins the love of Lucy Brandon, but at the same time agrees with his accomplices to carry her off, together with all the jewels and booty they can seize in a house to which they have been invited. This vile scheme is defeated, Paul Clifford is shot by one of his companions for betraying them, and then captured by runners from Bow Street. In the next act we find our hero in the condemned cell, whence he escapes by the old device of pinioning Lord Mauleverer, who has come to visit him, and wrapping himself in that personage’s cloak, makes his appearance in Miss Brandon’s boudoir, where he informs the astonished heroine what he has learned from one of his followers in Newgate—viz., that he is the son of Sir William Brandon, the judge who condemned him, and as that individual is her uncle, he is consequently her cousin. In the end this undesirable relative obtains a free pardon, and is to marry Lucy Brandon, a fate that lady has, it seems to us, heartily deserved. The lady is rather a forward heroine, and Paul Clifford is a ranting sentimental robber, who is alternately glorifying a career of murder and theft, and growing maudlin over himself. The play is far too long, and there is too much talk in it, especially in the last act, and it is impossible to sympathise either with the rhetorical robber, or the girl who falls in love with such a showy imposter. Mr W. Rignold did his best with the part of Paul Clifford, and was duly loud mouthed and energetic, but his elocution is susceptible of improvement, and at times he was quite indistinct. Miss Harriett Jay has a good stage presence, and plays carefully and intelligently, but she lacks force and variety, and has yet a great deal to learn before she develops into an actress. The minor parts were well played by Messrs Odell, Percy Bell, David Fisher, and Elmore, while Mrs Chippendale’s airs and graces as an elderly Bath belle were very amusing. The piece was received with many demonstrations of approval from a rather noisy audience of holiday-makers.

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Lucy Brandon from The Times (10 April, 1882 - p.8)

THE IMPERIAL.

     On Saturday afternoon, at the Imperial Theatre, Westminster, a new play was produced, written by Mr. Robert Buchanan, and founded on the late Lord Lytton’s novel “Paul Clifford.” The play, which is called Lucy Brandon, is somewhat less unwholesome than the novel, though there is little in situation or dialogue to redeem it from the commonplace. Mr. William Rignold played the highwayman, with tolerable effect, though his acting was somewhat conventional. Miss Harriett Jay made as much out of Lucy Brandon, the heroine, as the part was capable of, and Mr. Odell manifested considerable spirit and humour as Augustus Tomlinson, the highwayman who makes love to and subsequently robs the vain and elderly widow Lady Pelham. The other parts call for no special comment.

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Lucy Brandon from The New York Times (24 April, 1882)

LONDON HOLIDAY PLAYS

NEW PIECES ON THE BOARDS, SOME SUCCESSFUL, SOME NOT.

ROBERT BUCHANAN’S TWO PLAYS UNFAVORABLY RECEIVED—REVIVAL OF “BABIL AND BIJOU”—BETTER FORTUNES FOR “THE PARVENU.”

     LONDON, April 11.—The Easter holidays have this year been specially marked by some notable new pieces and revivals at the theatres. Mr. Robert Buchanan, poet, novelist, and dramatist, has had the exceptional distinction of filling the programmes at two theatres. Never a popular man, either as author or playwright, it cannot be said that this good fortune has contributed to advance either his interests or his reputation. Endowed, as he undoubtedly is, with somewhat remarkable powers as a picturesque writer in the double domain of fiction and poetry, he appears utterly to fail in the direction of dramatic construction. It is true his experiences of the stage have been more or less unfortunate; his pieces have rarely been either well-mounted or fairly represented, yet he has had some chances as a dramatist which many a better playwright sighs for in vain. To be “put up” at two London theatres during the Easter holidays is surely no small matter, and it is a calamity quite as great for authorship in general, and the stage in particular, that in neither instance has Mr. Buchanan reached even a moderate success. At the Imperial Theatre was produced, on Saturday afternoon, his new version of “Paul Clifford,” founded upon Lord Lytton’s novel. The programme contains the first jarring note of the occasion; the playwright here proclaims that for the first time an attempt is now “made to elevate the subject, particularly so far as concerns the love story of Lucy Brandon and Paul Clifford.” One fails to recognize the necessity of attempting to elevate or to change anything in Lord Lytton’s work; but, the attempt declared, one is disappointed that it is not carried out. The drama is called “Lucy Brandon.” The subject has been frequently treated for the stage. Mr. Buchanan has not succeeded in improving upon his predecessors. The play opens with a scene upon the Bath road, where Paul Clifford and his accomplices are waiting to attack the coach of Lord Mauleverer, who is accompanied on his journey by Miss Brandon and her aunt. In due course the vehicle arrives, and Paul Clifford, after a sentimental soliloquy about his affairs, plunders the nobleman and is excessively polite to Miss Brandon, with whom he falls in love at first sight. Later he finds an opportunity of declaring it to the lady at the Royal Assembly Rooms, Bath, where eventually he plots her abduction. On the point of action, however, he “confesses all” to Lucy, and while in her company is arrested, bringing down the curtain on the third act with a good situation, which, however, does not redeem the dullness of the story as it is developed to the close. He is not the bold dashing character of Lord Lytton, but a somewhat weak-kneed sentimental knave, and when at last it is shown that the Judge who has condemned him to death is his own father; that, under the influence of Lucy, the nobleman he has plundered has obtained his pardon from the King, and that he is to marry his professed first love, the audience feels that he has not merited his narrow escape and good fortune, and that Lucy Brandon has thrown herself away upon a worthless person. Mr. W. Rignold played Paul Clifford, Miss Harriett Jay sustained the part of the heroine, and Mr. Odell and Mrs. Chippendale were in the cast. The general influence of the piece was depressing, although at the close a handful of Mr. Buchanan’s friends made something like a demonstration of applause. The general verdict is unfavorable to the work.
     It is possible that Mr. Buchanan may have consoled himself between the conclusion of this play and the commencement of his next on the same evening with the reflection that “The Shadow of the Sword” had already been presented to provincial audiences with more or less success. One cannot help feeling sympathy for him under these circumstances, judging from some of the notices of the country journals. Relying upon the excellence of the novel and the long experience of Mr. John Coleman, the author had certainly amply justification for expecting a great success at the Olympic Theatre. “The Shadow of the Sword” is undoubtedly one of the most poetical romances of modern days. Whether it presents sufficient dramatic points for a successful drama is another question. I am not prepared to say that it does or that it does not. Reading the novel with a view to the stage, one can only see several fine situations, without, however, a sufficient motive to build them upon. At the same time, the idea of the story is eminently dramatic, and the additions made to it for the stage are full of good intentions. Possibly, well-mounted, well-represented, and accompanied by fine music, the play would “fill the bill” of an important theatre; but on Saturday night it was introduced for the first time to the London public under such a series of painful circumstances that it is impossible to form anything like a trustworthy opinion upon the work. My own impression remains, in spite of the most melancholy night I ever spent in a theatre, that “The Shadow of the Sword” is a play capable of great things. The motive is strengthened for the stage, and the first two acts work up important interests not in the book; but the dialogue is weak and the play is too long. At the same time, one can imagine it brightly produced, the action quick, the situations thoroughly filled, an impressive spectacular play; requiring, however, for its interpretation, a thoroughly experienced company, a beautiful heroine, and a somewhat more dreamy and poetical hero than the view taken of the part by Mr. John Coleman, who relies too much upon the effect of his stalwart figure and melodramatic poses. His interpretation of the character is no doubt formed upon careful judgment, and might possibly be accepted by those who are not imbued with the strange and wild creation of the novelist. The piece was announced to begin at the Olympic Theatre at 7:45. At about 8:15 the orchestra appeared, prior to which there had been some marks of impatience on the part of pit and gallery. The musicians succeeded in filling up a little time, and the play began. It represented (two acts in one “set”) that the Widow Gwenfern, having lost her husband and several sons in the armies of Napoleon, has two boys left. One of them, Philip, is at the wars; the other, Rohan, is at home. Philip has been ordered out, it appears, as one of a shooting party at the execution of a patron and friend. He, however, assists in the escape of the condemned, and finds his own way back to his village, Kromlaix-by-the-Sea. He is pursued here, and is received by his brother and family. When he arrives, he is fainting from his wounds. His pursuers overtake him and arrest him in the presence of his family, and in spite of a gallant defense by Rohan. The fugitive is to be shot. In the meantime, Napoleon and part of his grand army arrive, the famous warrior on an iron-gray horse. Appeals are made to him for the life of Philip; his answer is a wave of the hand indicating his command that the troops shall move on. The firing party are heard executing the boy as the first act is brought to a close. In the second act we learn that since this calamity the widow has been distraught. There is, in the meanwhile, a village festival, during which it is shown that Rohan loves Marcelle Duval (Miss Margaret Young,) and that she has another suitor in Mickel Grallon, a wealthy fisherman, whom she haughtily rejects. Rohan is under the influence of a preaching schoolmaster who denounces war, and he declares that under no circumstances will he ever draw a sword in the cause of Napoleon. It is consolatory to the widow and the rest to know that Rohan, being the only son, all his brothers being dead, cannot be drawn in the conscription. Before, however, the act closes, the news is brought that this privilege is withdrawn and Rohan is marked down for conscription. At this information and the sudden realization of the fact that Philip is dead, (which had hitherto been kept from the widow,) Rohan’s mother falls dead upon the stage, and over her body the son registers a prophetic curse against the Emperor. Those who are acquainted with the novel will see that most of this excellent material is new. The tableaus are certainly dramatic in the highest degree; but somehow they fell flat on Saturday night. There was a long wait between the first and second acts, but this was nothing to what followed between the second and third. Some 35 minutes at least were filled up in a melancholy sort of way by an audience which appeared too depressed even to indulge in banter. The shadow of gloom and melancholy had fallen upon the house, and it was never dispelled during the entire evening. It is not necessary that I should follow the stage story further than the first two acts; the remainder covers closely the lines of the novel, the celebrated cave scene being an attractive picture, the incidents of Rohan’s fight with his pursuers and his “leap for life” being good in their way and bringing down a fair round of applause and almost a hearty call for the leading artists. Mr. Coleman, being in front of the drop-scene, addressed the house. He claimed their indulgence in, as far as I can remember, something like these words: “Ladies and gentlemen, I feel that I owe it to you and to myself to offer an explanation for the shortcomings which may be observed in this evening’s representation of ‘The Shadow of the Sword.’ Possibly some of you know of what the bold British workman is capable. I spare you the atrocious particulars of his conduct toward myself. Suffice it to say that in consequence of drunkenness and general insubordination, I had at a moment’s notice to clear the house of all the work people, and had it not been for the generous assistance of Mr. Harris and a posse of his employes from Drury Lane this piece could not have been presented to-night. These generous assistants, of course, are unacquainted with the method of striking the leading scenes, which has necessarily led, and will lead, to longer waits than I might have wished. Under the circumstances, I feel that I may fairly claim the indulgence of the house.” These words were received with a round of applause, at the close of which a man in the pit at the top of his voice shouted “You’re a liar,” whereupon, on a cry of “Turn him out,” a few vigorous hands were laid upon him, and he was duly put into the street. This incident seemed for a little time to revive the spirits of the audience, but they gradually fell again below zero, and nothing that Mr. Coleman and his company could do ever revived them again. They accorded to the actors every possible indulgence that manager could expect. One or two impatient remarks were made, and an old play-goer in the stalls was heard to mutter, “Give us back our orders.” But beyond this, in spite of the interminable waits and the necessarily spiritless performance of the company so seriously handicapped, nothing happened to offend any one. At the end of the fourth act many persons left the theatre, including some of Mr. Coleman’s best friends, who appeared to suffer greatly from sympathy with the manager, who is an intimate friend of Charles Reade and a successful provincial manager with many years’ experience. The curtain fell at half an hour after midnight, at least half the audience remaining patiently to the close, and doing their best to encourage the management with their applause. The new management of the Olympic is hardly likely to recover from this bitter blow, with which Mr. Coleman credits “the bold British workman.”

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[Advert for Storm-Beaten from The Times (17 April, 1883 - p.12)]

Storm-Beaten from The New York Times (8 February, 1883)

..... Mr. Robert Buchanan is to have “a last chance.” A poet of undoubted power and a successful novelist, he has made several conspicuous failures as a dramatist. This would seem to be a recommendation, however, in England, where the more frequently a writer for the stage fails the more he may be said to succeed. Managers and the public have, however, grown tired of Mr. Buchanan, who, judging from much of his literary work, and taking into consideration his many failures, ought at last to know something of the requirements of the stage. He is to have a new work produced at the Adelphi about the middle of next month. One of the strongest scenes in it will be between two men, (the characters by Warner and Barnes,) at the end of which one of them is killed. It is not rash to guess that it will not be Warner who dies, for he is the leading man at the Adelphi. Although Buchanan has made a host of enemies in the press and in literature, he may count upon fair play. Anybody who can give to the English stage an original and wholesome drama will always find a hearty and appreciative welcome at the hands of the public.

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Storm-Beaten from The Times (17 March, 1883 - p.5)

ADELPHI THEATRE.

     Mr. Robert Buchanan desires his novel “God and the Man” to be regarded as a “monument of the folly and vanity of human hate,” and with characteristic indulgence for human weakness, he has dedicated it to “an enemy” of his own. As produced at the Adelphi Theatre, under the fantastic title of Storm Beaten, it may equally well serve as a monument of the self-abnegation which a professional moralist may see fit to exercise when he has to subject his doctrines to certain fancied necessities of the stage. The moral of the novel disappears altogether in the play, and in its stead we find the lesson very strongly inculcated that villainy of the deepest dye may, in certain circumstances, become a passport to the highest esteem and consideration. It seems scarcely worth while for an author to preach morality so ostentatiously on one platform only to subvert it so completely on another. The condition of things known in nursery literature as “living happily ever afterwards” is no doubt acceptable as a rule to lovers of the sensational drama, and desirable in itself. But the sacrifice of art and of common sense is a heavy price to pay for it on the stage, and Mr. Robert Buchanan seriously compromises both in the dramatic sequel he has given to the family feud of the Christiansons and Orchardsons. No villany could well surpass that of Richard Orchardson as practised upon Christian Christianson. Besides being instrumental in having him and his turned out of their home, Orchardson shoots Christianson’s favourite dog, seduces his sister, seeks to rob him of his sweetheart, and, on board the “Miles Standish.” not only causes him to be put in irons, but endeavours to suffocate him under hatches. It is not surprising that Christianson, in  such circumstances, should owe Orchardson a grudge. The story of their mutual hatred is a powerful one, though set forth at somewhat too great length, and, conducted to the dénouement provided in the novel, it may be regarded as pointing the moral that the author there insists upon. A shipwreck in the Arctic Seas throws both men together upon an ice-floe, where their common suffering, as the only human beings in that dreary waste, thaws the winter in their hearts. Christianson tends Orchardson in an illness, and when his enemy dies he closes his eyes and buries him in the snow with Christian-like charity. Thenceforward Christianson is an altered man. The vanity of human hate, which has had so pathetic and tragic an ending, forces itself upon the imagination; and Christianson’s return to the scenes of his boyhood marks, we can well believe, the close of the family feud. Very different is the turn given to this story in the play. Mr. Robert Buchanan has thought fit to sacrifice his ethical theories for the sake of providing the deserted heroine with a husband, who cannot by any stretch of charity be deemed to be worth having. After some trying experiences on the ice the two men return home as bosom friends, and the only conclusion to be drawn is that Orchardson, by means of his unmitigated wrong-doing, has secured a place in the affections of his friend which he would never have gained as a peaceable and Christianlike neighbour. The public, it must be said to their credit, did not quite relish this sudden conversion of an utterly unworthy scoundrel into an Arctic hero. Orchardson’s return to the arms of the girl he had so basely deserted, and his cheerful resigning of Priscilla Sefton in favour of his friend, called forth on Wednesday night something like a murmur of disapproval; so that the author’s unhesitating renunciation of his own especial doctrines for the sake of a trivial and inartistic stage effect can hardly be said to have had the success he reckoned upon.
     The setting of this play recalls the best traditions of the Adelphi. There is nothing particularly impressive in the rustic scenes amid which the feud of the Christiansons and Orchardsons has sprung up. The crowning of the May Queen, who has just been entreating her seducer to legitimize their unborn child, jars rather with the poetic character of the surroundings. It is an unlooked for outcome of a poet’s fancy, and does not even serve the purpose of the realistic dramatist. But when we come to the deck of the “Miles Standish,” bound for the New World with Priscilla Sefton and Orchardson as passengers and Christianson disguised as a common seaman on board, we get into the path of true Adelphi sensation. The ineffectual firing of the ship by Orchardson is only a prelude to still greater excitement. Towering icebergs drift in upon the doomed vessel, and the curtain falls on the creaking and wrenching of her timbers under the strain and the shrieking of the passengers and crew. The next scene shows the ice-floe, upon which the unfortunate people have debarked and where they disport themselves with pretty much the same good nature as the wrecked passengers of Mr. Tom Taylor’s P. and O. liner on the Mazaffa Reef. Suddenly there is an ominous boom; the whole scene is shaken as if by an earthquake, gigantic masses of ice are seen toppling into the sea, and the vessel, hitherto firmly “nipped,” heaves and groans. The ice-floe is breaking up. There is a sudden scare among the passengers and crew, and all make for the vessel. Christianson and Orchardson alone are left clinging to the broken ice. When next we discover these two men, they are the solitary occupants of an icy desert, and the strange process of reconciliation is carried out amid all the rigours of an Arctic winter. It is not clear that Orchardson when he is howling and shivering with cold at the sight of Christianson’s fire is any more estimable a character than before, but his misery and Christianson’s bitter resolve to save his life for the purpose of torturing him at leisure, furnish a scene calculated to thrill the nerves of even an Adelphi audience. A poetic touch is added by the presence of a beautiful aurora borealis, which waxes and wanes in the northern sky, and which seems to reach its brightest as Christianson gives utterance to his most uncharitable sentiments. Snow and other commonplace effects of an Arctic winter are, of course, not wanting. The author’s fancy also conceives a dream of Christianson’s, while he is tending his prostrate enemy, in which he hears the Christmas bells of his native village conveying their message of peace and good will to men, and this marks very prettily and poetically, though not very intelligibly perhaps to the bulk of the audience, Christianson’s change of feeling. A play so freely charged with sensation is pretty sure of success at the Adelphi. Startling as its principal scenes look, however, they will be found to leave no great impression upon the mind. The reason is that they do not properly appertain to, or grow out of, the action, but are dragged in for sensation purposes. Told without such adventitious aids, the story would be found intolerably wearisome. The relations of two individuals towards each other form too thin a subject for five acts and a prologue, and indeed, as it stands, the play induces in the end a sense of fatigue, due to its want of accumulating interest. Mr. Charles Warner’s portrait of Christian Christianson has all the manliness which usually distinguishes his heroes of melodrama, and attracts a degree of sympathy not altogether due, perhaps, to a character capable of cherishing an implacable hatred. Orchardson also, villain as he is, inspires a certain amount of interest from the frankness and robustness with which Mr. Barnes invests him. The womanly element is singularly weak. Miss Amy Roselle, as Kate Christianson, necessarily plays in a uniformly wobegone key, until the author restores to her arms her worthless betrayer; and Priscilla Sefton, to whom we despairingly turn, is a female preacher or revivalist for whom Miss Eweretta Lawrence fails to awaken anything like sympathy. The other characters tend only to retard the action, never too rapid at the best. While there is the semblance of a great drama on the stage, we never seem to travel beyond one limited though ever-changing situation.

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Storm-Beaten from The Penny Illustrated Paper (24 March, 1883 - p.7)

In melodrama, “The Silver King” maintains its pre-eminence at the Princess’s, and will very shortly—as Mr. Wilson Barrett announced on the one-hundredth night—be played to about 25,000 persons every evening in different parts of the globe. Mr. Robert Buchanan, poet, novelist, and playwright, has made a strong bid in the same direction at the Adelphi, where “Storm-Beaten” has been produced under the earnest direction of Mr. Charles Warner, who throws his whole soul into the portrayal of the rôle of the hero whose mission it is to brave the Arctic seas to wreak vengeance on the seducer of his sister. Mr. Warner is particularly fortunate to be supported in “Storm-Beaten” by a trio of such true, womanly actresses as Mrs. Billington, Miss Amy Roselle, and Miss Eweretta Lawrence, the last-named young lady being a charmingly natural addition to the ranks of ingénues. The acting, indeed, of Miss Roselle and Miss Lawrence in the best acts of the piece, the first three, would be difficult to excel. So winsome and womanly are their scenes that one infinitely prefers them to the sensation tableaux, which are suggestive, very, of the old Adelphi drama of “The Sea of Ice.”

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A review of a New York production of Storm-Beaten is available on the Buchanan’s Theatrical Ventures In America page.

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Lady Clare from The Scotsman (12 April, 1883 - p. 6)

NEW DRAMA BY MR BUCHANAN

     LONDON, Wednesday night.—A new five-act drama by Mr Robert Buchanan was produced for the first time at the Globe Theatre this evening. The piece which is entitled “Lady Clare,” is acknowledged in the programme to be founded on a French romance; but Mr Buchanan might have gone further, for the drama runs so substantially on the lines of Adolphe Belot’s “Le Maistre de Forges” that the adapter can claim but little originality for it. At the same time it must be conceded that Mr Buchanan has very successfully Anglicised his French original, while the last act is, as far as our memory serves us, substantially his own. The plot concerns itself with the fortunes of John Middleton, a wealthy manufacturer, who marries a haughty beauty, Lady Clare Brookfield, the lady being in love with her cousin, Lord Ambermere. Though they are married, Lady Clare denies her husband all marital rights, and they agree to live apart. They go abroad, and she is followed by Lord Ambermere, who has himself married an American heiress, the result being that Middleton and his Lordship fight a duel, which is interrupted by the former’s wife, who falls apparently dead. In the end, however, she recovers, and though her lover pursues her, her heart turns at last to her husband, and all ends in the orthodox fashion.
     Lady Clare is a well-written and interesting play, though the earlier scenes would be much improved by compression, and it will certainly add to Mr Buchanan’s reputation as a dramatist. If it failed to make its mark to-night, it was owing to the weakness of the representatives of the chief male characters. Mr Bucklaw as Middleton and Mr Beck as Lord Ambermere were overweighted with what the author had given them to do, and scenes which would have created a great impression failed to touch the audience by reason of the histrionic shortcomings of these gentlemen. In the ladies who acted for him Mr Buchanan was more fortunate. Miss Ada Cavendish, although she has not got rid of a certain hardness of manner, played with skill and welcome intelligence as the heroine, Lady Clare; and Miss Lydia Cowell played very cleverly and naturally as Mary Middleton. Miss Carlotta Leclerq’s experience was of much value in a minor part, and Miss Harriet Jay played a lad with infinite truth and many pleasant touches of humour. This lady has, indeed, rarely been seen in a part which showed her to so much advantage. Mrs Digby Willoughby and Mr Horace Wigan must also be commended, the former being much applauded. A word must be said for the music played during the piece, which was of exceptional merit, the orchestra being conducted by that popular young composer, Mr Walter Slaughter. “Lady Clare” was warmly received by a large and attentive audience, and at the conclusion the author and the principal actors and actresses were called before the curtain amid loud applause. With due curtailment, the drama should have a successful career before it.

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Lady Clare from The Times (13 April, 1883 - p.4)

THE GLOBE THEATRE.

     It is not to the pages of a French novelist that one would readily turn for trustworthy sketches of “society” as it is known in England. Such, however, would seem to be the source, though the extent to which it has been drawn upon is not very candidly avowed, of both the types of character and the motives animating them in Mr. Robert Buchanan’s new drama of “modern (and presumably English) society” presented at this theatre. It must unhesitatingly be stated that Lady Clare is not what it professes to be—a reflex of English society at the present day. It is a reflex, if anything at all, of the disordered fancy of a Parisian feuilletoniste. The people to whom it introduces us are English indeed by name, but otherwise unrecognizable as such, and the author is certainly a little too sanguine in assuming that they are to be taken at his word as representative English types, or that the sickly sentimentality inherent to such a set of characters is to be carried off by a Tennysonian quotation in the playbill. The kernel of the story of Lady Clare is a loveless marriage between a high-born lady and a wealthy manufacturer, into which a certain amount of dramatic interest is imported by the presence of an unscrupulous tempter of female virtue of the lady’s own rank. It is easy to see how such a subject, which will be recognized as that of M. Georges Ohnet’s novel Le Maître de Forges, must be treated. The reconciliation of man and wife is a foregone conclusion, and the wearisome process of bringing about this result must be relieved by such exciting incidents as the author can contrive.
    That a play constructed upon such lines should fail to awaken the sympathy of the audience is almost a matter of course. The faults of Lady Clare arising from this cause need not, therefore, be insisted upon. There is the less occasion for surprise at the weakness of the play from the fact that the incidents upon which the author relies for dramatic effect have been largely borrowed from such familiar and incongruous sources as The Lady of Lyons, Octave Feuillet’s Tentation, and Victor Hugo’s Marion de Lorme; what is surprising, indeed, is that a sense of the ridiculous should not have deterred Mr. Robert Buchanan from attempting to adjust such romantic material to the conditions of English society at the present day. It is not easy to repress a smile when Lord Lytton’s romantic cottage scene is reproduced in a modern drawing-room. But admitting the possibility of a Manchester cotton-spinner entertaining the same delicate scruples with regard to the modesty of his bride as Claude Melnotte displayed towards Pauline, what are we to say when, at a subsequent period, the author resorts to the grotesque expedient of transporting the whole of his characters bodily to French soil—namely, to the Casino at Dieppe—to allow of the duel being fought which constitutes the turning point of the story? No one need quarrel with Mr. Robert Buchanan for confessing himself unable to adapt the duel into anything English, fisticuffs or horse-whipping being impracticable, owing to the heroine being required to throw herself between the combatants and receive in her shoulder a shot intended for her husband’s heart. But it is not clear why a story so essentially French should have been decked out in English garb at all. Apart from its incongruity in an English play, however, the duel scene, it must be confessed, is a powerful one, and will doubtless contribute largely to what success the play may achieve. The hostile meeting arranged between her husband and her aristocratic persecutor no sooner comes to Lady Clare’s knowledge than she resolves to prevent it, for in the course of the play her indifference to the wealthy manufacturer is supposed to give place to a warmer feeling. But the parties reach the spot; the preliminaries are arranged; the pistols taken out of their cases and examined. Then the combatants are placed back to back; the signal is given; they measure their paces, turn round to face each other, and it is as they are in the very act of firing that the lady interposes her body as a shield to her husband, thus adding to the impressiveness of the duel in La Tentation a touch of the womanly devotion of Marion de Lorme.
     The period of the heroine’s convalescence in the last act brings with it naturally enough her reconciliation with her husband. Long foreseen, this produces, however, little satisfaction to a wearied audience. What is more to the point, as being the only genuine bit of English character in the play, is that the husband threatens to kick his wife’s persecutor downstairs on his again turning up to renew his detestable suit. Miss Ada Cavendish, as Lady Clare, does much to redeem the play by her refined and graceful acting and by her perfect command of “business” down to her sensational fall in the duel scene. But sympathy is beyond her reach. The character, as it has been shaped by the author, is too inconsequent and too superficial to move, or even to interest, deeply. Insolence and vacillation, both of which Lady Clare displays freely, are hopelessly inconsistent with the tenderness essential to a sentimental heroine. Mr. Bucklaw plays the husband with as much manliness and dignity as is compatible with the air of ridicule unwittingly thrown over this character by its author. As a disreputable member of the aristocracy Mr. Beck is wanting in persuasiveness, but he invests the character with some outward distinction. The lighter business of the play is refreshingly supplied by Miss Lydia Cowell and Miss Harriett Jay, at the cost of the latter lady being allowed to masquerade in boy’s clothing, and a picturesque but unpleasant element is introduced by Mr. Horace Wigan and Mrs. Digby Willoughby as an American millionaire and his daughter—”Yanks” of an ultra-vulgar type.

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Lady Clare from The Guardian (13 April, 1883 - p.5)

     Mr. Robert Buchanan’s persistent attempts to win a leading position as a dramatist will probably some day be crowned with success, for in each new play from his pen the fruits of the experience he has acquired of stage work are more and more apparent. “Lady Clare,” performed last night at the Globe Theatre, would have been given under Mrs. Bernard Beere’s management had she not suddenly given up the direction of this house. It is a drama possessing many good and striking qualities. The author acknowledges indebtedness for his story to “a celebrated French romance,” no doubt meaning “Le Maitre de Forges” by M. G. Ohnet, but the piece really owes its chief situations rather to “The Lady of Lyons,” “The old Love and the New,” “Impulse,” “Led Astray,” and several other well-known plays. Miss Ada Cavendish acts very finely as the Lady Clare, united to a man she has married in a fit of pique when jilted by her cousin, a heartless and dissolute young lord. The performance was, indeed, rendered remarkable by the great dramatic power she displayed, her graceful diction, and refinement of bearing. Miss Cavendish gave thrilling effect to the most exciting and novel incident in the piece, when, to prevent a duel between her husband and her former lover, Lady Clare rushes between the combatants and receives the bullet that would have struck her husband. Miss Lydia Cowell played an ingenue part most charmingly, and in some very sprightly love scenes with her boyish admirer (cleverly interpreted by Miss Harriett Jay) did much to enliven the action.

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Lady Clare from The New York Times (14 February, 1884)

AMUSEMENTS.

“LADY CLARE.”

     This play—which is described on the bills as Mr. Robert Buchanan’s exquisite drama in five acts—was given last night at Wallack’s Theatre. The house was full, there was generous applause, and the new play was undoubtedly successful. Mr. Buchanan’s “Lady Clare” had been acted previously in England, and with encouraging effect. Mr. Buchanan—who, at his best, is a strong poet—has not been known here overmuch as a dramatist. His plays have seemed, for the most part, useless and uninteresting. “Storm Beaten,” as an example, was in no way a sound or true work, though it was one of the few tolerably popular plays elucidated for the public mind by Mr. Buchanan. Fortunately, “Storm Beaten” was considerably changed, not to say repressed, before it was launched upon the troublesome seas of the American stage. As to “Lady Clare”—what shall be said of that? M. Georges Ohnet, a bright and inventive French novelist, declared not long ago that Mr. Buchanan had stolen, for the benefit of his drama, a novel written by M. Ohnet and called “Le Maître de Forges.” Mr. Buchanan replied that he had not adapted “Maître de Forges,” he had merely made use of the motive in M. Ohnet’s novel. The distinction is remarkably lucid, especially for a poet. It may be explained that an American arrangement of “Le Maître de Forges” has been prepared already, and that other adaptations of the same work are to be set forward. M. Ohnet’s dramatization of his own novel has been a brilliant success in Paris.
     The French novel is written with thought and spirit. It is sympathetic without being unpleasantly sentimental. It is certainly dramatic. The story which is presented by it is this: Claire de Beaulieu loves her cousin, the young Duc de Bligny. This lively fellow goes to Russia, forgets his fiancé, and returns to Paris at a moment when he learns that Claire is betrothed to M. Darblay, who is the “maître de forges,” the person without family and with a good amount of culture. Darblay is not loved by his wife at first, and Claire is still inclined to adore M. de Bligny. In the end, however, after the usual vicissitudes of human passion, Claire discovers that her feeling for Darblay is love, and that her feeling for M. de Bligny is contempt. This is, naturally, a very slight sketch of M. Ohnet’s complex and carefully elaborated novel.
     Mr. Buchanan has declared that his play “Lady Clare” is not an adaptation of “Le Maître de Forges.” The story of “Lady Clare” informs us that Lord Ambermere loves Lady Clare Brookfield. Then, in his youthful enthusiasm, he deserts her and flies to pastures new. That is to say, he takes up another woman. Thereupon Lady Clare engages herself to John Middleton, a “self-made man.” But Lady Clare is not devoted to her self-made man. He finds himself tied to a loveless wife. After a while, however, she begins to have an agreeable opinion upon the merits of poor Middleton. Then Ambermere turns up again. He professes deep and Stygian devotion for Clare. There is a duel between the two men. Clare is shot in the shoulder. She rises from her ashes, a passionate Phœnix, and throws her arms about the neck of Middleton, who, having discovered, by judicious eavesdropping, that Clare is in love with her husband, not with Ambermere, rushes to her with theatrical celerity.
     The play is told with a fair amount of ability, and is entertaining. It was, as we have said, successful last night. Yet it is somewhat doubtful—the reader is asked to consider the subject in his own judgment—whether Mr. Buchanan’s drama is not a frank adaptation of “Le Maître de Forges.”
     Some excellent acting was done by Mr. Tearle, Miss Coghlan, Mr. Glenney, Mr. Buckstone, and Miss Measor. But Mr. Glenney might be less explosive in his speech.

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A review of an 1885 performance of Lady Clare in New York is available on the Buchanan’s Theatrical Ventures In America page.

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The Flowers of the Forest from The Scotsman (2 July, 1883 - p. 6)

     A curious experiment was tried at the Globe Theatre to-night. Pending the production of a new piece from his pen, Mr Robert Buchanan, emulous of the revivals of the “palmy drama” once given us at the Gaiety, has revived the old Adelphi drama “The Flowers of the Forest;” but what Mr Hollingshead did with a purely satirical purpose, Mr Buchanan does in earnest, though the result in both cases is precisely the same—for the first quarter of an hour the audience smiles at the absurdities of the old-fashioned piece, and during the rest of the evening is profoundly bored. “The Flowers of the Forest” was originally produced in 1847 at the Adelphi, with O. Smith, Paul Bedford, Madame Celeste, Miss Woolgar, and Mrs Fitzwilliam in the cast; and though it was popular enough then, it cannot be said to be the happiest of Mr Buckstone’s contributions to the stage. It is, in truth, a most stupid and bombastic production, full of turgid writing, and situations which are intended to be tragic and impressive, but which are only absurd. It is not easy, indeed, to see why it should have been thought necessary to revive such rubbish, unless it is intended as a foil to the piece Mr Buchanan is going to present next. Nor can the play be said to have gained much from the manner in which it was presented. Mr Charles Kelly looked very picturesque as Ishmael, and did what little he had to do exceedingly well, while Miss Ada Murray was a fairly satisfactory Cynthia. But Miss Clara Jecks was overweighted as Starlight Bess, and Miss Harriet Jay as Lemuel looked like a young lady masquerading in a pretty new velvet shooting coat. Other characters were but poorly supported; but it is, indeed, not easy to make anything out of the dialogue allotted to the queer crowd the dramatist gathers together in this play. “The Flowers of the Forest” was received with patience and some applause by a very scanty audience, and the sooner Mr Buchanan produces his new piece, the better for the fortunes of the Globe Theatre.

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The Flowers of the Forest from The Times (2 July, 1883- p.8)

GLOBE.

     The Flowers of the Forest, a once-famous Adelphi play, is no more than a name to the younger race of playgoers, and it would have been well had the management of the Globe Theatre allowed it to remain on the shelf where it has reposed so many years. Melodrama ages sadly in half a lifetime; histrionic methods and stage effects which commended themselves to an older generation appear weak, strained, and puerile to the present one. Mr. Robert Buchanan, who seems to control the fortunes of this theatre in some occult fashion, has been so far alive to this change of taste that he thought it advisable to preface the performance of the Flowers of the Forest on Saturday night with a rhymed address, spoken by one of the characters, in which he craved indulgence for the revival on sentimental grounds. The feeble response made to this appeal by a scanty audience proved that antiquated melodrama is not to be galvanized into life by a prologue. A dreary evening must have made many sigh for the return of—
          “Murderers in dress suits and swell white chokers,
     “Burglarious mashers and bigamous stockbrokers,”
in preference to Buckstone’s picturesque, but impossible, scenes of gipsy life. The whole spirit of the play divorced it from the sympathy of the house, and the acting certainly did not help to mend matters. It was hard upon so accomplished and refined an actor as Mr. Charles Kelly to ask him to rant and rave in the old-fashioned style of “Smith the terrible;” and it was small matter for surprise that his Ishmael the Wolf, though sufficiently tattered and picturesque in appearance, should appear tame in comparison with the wildness of his sentiments. The representative of Cynthia, too, who kills herself rather than shed the blood of her “gentile” lover at the “Wolf’s” bidding, can scarcely have recalled to old playgoers the romantic and passionate gipsy queen of Madame Celeste. Nor can Miss Harriett Jay’s Lemuel, the gipsy boy, although effective after a fashion, be said to have awakened in the smallest degree the interest or sympathy of the house; while the modern representatives of Wright and Bedford in the comic parts were barely to be tolerated. The only agreeable features of the performance, indeed, were the incidental gipsy dances and the picturesque groupings of the tribe in romantic spots.

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A Sailor and his Lass from The Times (16 October, 1883 - p.3)

DRURY-LANE THEATRE.

     The prime merit of the grand new melodrama produced last night at Drury-lane is that it is set forth in five acts, in no fewer than 17 tableaux. A minor virtue is that it enables Mr. Augustus Harris to continue, in the character of a jack tar, that career of reckless but triumphant heroism in which he has already done so much to shed lustre upon the naval and military services of the country. For the rest, A Sailor and his Lass does not differ greatly from the accepted type of melodrama which a certain section of the public seem to delight in seeing again and again, and which, on analysis, will be found to resolve itself into the persecution of a chivalrous hero by a well-dressed but unscrupulous villain, whose ulterior object is to supplant his victim in the affections of a lady. Assuming that this familiar theme is worthy of being illustrated once again upon the stage, it may be conceded that Mr. Robert Buchanan and Mr. Augustus Harris have displayed great fertility of invention and mechanical resource in their manner of setting it forth. They have laid both land and sea under contribution for thrilling episodes, and not content with introducing a malicious shipwreck and an exciting rescue, and with transporting the centre of interest from the high seas to the bar of the Old Bailey, and even to the condemned cell in Newgate, they shatter the nerves of the house with a dynamite explosion.
     It is, indeed, mainly upon the introduction of dynamite as a factor in melodrama that the claims of this play to novelty must rest. The dynamite explosion is not, perhaps, strictly speaking, new, since a similar incident was introduced by Mr. Pettitt a year or two ago into his Adelphi drama Taken from Life. But here for the first time we are brought face to face with the members of a secret dynamite society in the guise of dramatis personæ and are shown a lurid interior, suggestive of a blacksmith’s forge where the villainous compound is made. Unfortunately this striving after the realistic is not accompanied by a sufficient degree of invention on the part of the authors to justify it from the strictly dramatic point of view. The explosion, which occurs in a scene representing a metropolitan police station, has nothing whatever to do with the story; and even the society to whose agency it is attributable has no raison d’être beyond helping to wreck the ship in which the hero sails. In other and more legitimate ways, however, an abundance of spectacle and incident is provided. Peaceful farm-yard scenes, in one of which a live cow is seen in process of milking, alternate with picturesque views of the docks and the interior of a sailor’s dancing saloon in Ratcliff Highway and the sinking of a huge ship in full view of the house, to say nothing of the more familiar spectacle of a criminal court of justice and a prison interior. In view of so much scenic magnificence, the acting of Mr. Augustus Harris, Mr. Fernandez, Miss Harriet Jay, Miss Sophie Eyre, Mr. Henry George, and the numerous other members of the cast necessarily possessed little importance. The fact remains, however, that a remarkable Drury-lane success has been achieved.

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A Sailor and his Lass from The New York Times (29 October, 1883)

STAGE EVENTS IN LONDON

PIECES FOR SHOW AND THE NEWEST SUCCESSFUL ONE.

BUCHANAN AND HARRIS AND THEIR “SAILOR AND HIS LASS”—
THE ADVANTAGES OF JOINT AUTHORSHIP.

     LONDON, Oct. 16.—Last night the long-promised and often-postponed new “grand nautical sensation drama” of “A Sailor and His Lass,” by Robert Buchanan and Augustus Harris, was at length produced at Drury-Lane Theatre. The repeated postponement of the play was due to more than one cause. In the first place, it is got up with more than usually elaborate scenic effects, the stage “set” being extraordinarily numerous and complicated, especially in the case of a wonderfully realistic ship scene, the machinery of which fairly broke down in the course of rehearsal and had to be entirely reconstructed. Again, the Lord Chamberlain—that terrible authority who watches so carefully over the morals and politics of our stage—demurred to a proposed reproduction of the famous Fenian dynamite explosion in Charles-street, Westminster, which was to form one of the sensational features of the piece, and progress could not be made until the great affair had been so arranged as not to shock his lordship’s sense of propriety. So, Mr. Harris, after many announcements of his intention to produce the piece on a particular night, was compelled to promise the performance with the qualifying and pious reservation of “D. V.,” which irreverent persons have translated as meaning, “If the Lord Chamberlain and the machinist are willing.” However, the great censor of the stage is at last pacified and the Deus ex machinâ has at length allowed the ship to be launched, and so the new Drury-Lane venture has been started on what promises to be a fairly prosperous career.
     The joint composition of “A Sailor and his Lass” is the outcome of a practice long in vogue on the French stage but until lately not so common in England. Somehow or other our dramatic authors have failed to appreciate the advantages of collaboration. Each has preferred to work “on his own hook,” scorning all assistance, and the result has often been failure where success might have been assured. Nevertheless, in a few instances in the past collaboration, either avowed or concealed, has really had the happiest effects. The late Mr. Tom Taylor, for instance, probably never produced a more successful or charming play than “New Men and Old Acres,” which he wrote in conjunction with Mr. Augustus Dubourg, while Mr. James Albery’s happiest effort, “Two Roses,” is believed to have owed its great success mainly to the assistance he received from a judicious stage manager. It is indeed the opinion of our best critics that the dearth of really good acting plays from which we have so long been suffering has been due to the want of a solid experience of stage effect united to literary ability, and these are faculties not often combined in one and the same person. Even a clever novice working with a good practical stage manager may turn out a better play than a man of the greatest literary skill rejecting such help. Of this we have had several examples of late years. Mr. Brandon Thomas, a young and untried author, working with Mr. C. B. Stephenson, a sound old stager, produced a capital play in “Comrades,” and “The Silver King,” one of the greatest hits of our time, is, as every one knows, the joint production of Mr. H. A. Jones, a comparatively new man, and Mr. Henry Herman, an excellent practical stage manager. Nor are even the most distinguished of our literary dramatists now above calling in the help of men experienced in what I may term “stage carpentry.” Thus Mr. Charles Reade not long ago condescended to work with such a thoroughly practical man as Mr. Henry Pettitt, and the joint outcome of their labors was an excellent piece “Love and Money.” Mr. Pettitt, again, has lately been co-operating with Mr. George R. Sims, and the two between them have turned out “In the Ranks,” which is playing at the Adelphi to literally overflowing houses. In the course of a few weeks, too, we shall have at the Princess’s a new piece by Mr. W. G. Wills and Mr. Henry Herman, and meanwhile we find that Mr. Robert Buchanan, who has never, except perhaps in the case of his “Storm-Beaten” at the Adelphi, achieved any marked success on the stage, going into partnership with Mr. Augustus Harris, and composing a play which, with all its faults, at any rate is something that Mr. Buchanan never produced on his own account, a good acting drama.
     I had the privilege of being one of a small audience of some 20 or 30 persons invited to witness a “dress rehearsal” of the new play at Drury-Lane on Saturday night, and the performance under these conditions was equally instructive and amusing. It was instructive, inasmuch as such a trial should teach the captious critic how great are the difficulties with which the most painstaking of managers have to contend, difficulties which can only be appreciated by actually seeing the efforts made to overcome them. It was amusing, as the process of preparation, presenting the performances in their two-fold capacity as, so to speak, public and private characters, give rise to the oddest incongruities. Then Mr. Augustus Harris, the manager, upon whom the whole weight of the work of getting up and directing the performance devolves, plays in the piece the part of a gallant young sailor who is always rescuing people in distress, and who by the machinations of a band of villains is accused of murder, tried, and condemned to death. To give some idea how matters go at a dress rehearsal in these circumstances, let me describe some of the incidents as I witnessed them, premising that Mr. Augustus Harris, with that conscientiousness which always distinguishes him, “acts” as energetically at a rehearsal with only a couple of dozen spectators before him as he does on “the night” to a crowded house. The scene is a court of justice, the barristers assembled in their wigs and gowns and the public gathered to hear the trial. The prisoner guarded by wardens is placed in the dock. A subdued murmur passes through the court. “Louder, louder,” cries the prisoner, “make more noise! You are ready enough to make a row when it is not wanted and now no one can hear you. Now louder!” The buzzing in court being at last loud enough to satisfy the accused man, the jury enter, a shabby, feeble-looking lot certainly. “Now then,” exclaims this extraordinary prisoner, “don’t come sneaking in like that. Hold your heads up and let everybody see you. Then go back and come in again.” But this is nothing to the gross contempt of court of which the prisoner is guilty when the Judges themselves make their appearance. Fancy a man standing manacled in the dock with the weight of the most terrible of charges crushing him down, addressing the great and dignified functionaries who are about to try him for his life in this wise: “That won’t do! That won’t do! You haven’t to hide yourselves under those desks. You have got to sit behind them. Go back, go back! All over again!” And so the ermined Judges, at the bidding of this bold prisoner, sneak out of court and return in a manner with which he at last expresses himself satisfied. The scene changes. It is the condemned cell, and the prisoner sits alone, heartbroken, unjustly doomed to die. Presently the Governor of the jail enters. The condemned man rises respectfully. “I have come to tell you, Harry Hastings,” says the Governor, “that—that”— “You cannot hope for mercy,” whispers a voice in the distance. “Yes—that you cannot hope for mercy. Your time is short—let me abjure you—” “No, no,” breaks in the unhappy prisoner, “conjure you, man; conjure you.” “Yes—I beg pardon—conjure you to make your peace with Heaven.” Here the Governor, overcome by emotion or loss of memory, breaks down, the prisoner orders him to leave the cell, and a gentleman with a manuscript in his hand comes in and delivers the last touching words of the officer of the law. How the condemned man escapes from jail and actually appears in the street outside the walls of the prison in which he is to be hanged, and bullies the Sheriffs who have arrived to superintend his execution; how he goes into agonies of wrath because they will not toll the bell that announces his impending doom, and how, being apparently recaptured, he is pinioned and led toward the scaffold, yet interferes in the most audacious manner with every detail of the last dismal preparations for his own death, I need not describe. Seriously, Mr. Harris worked as hard as manager ever did to secure the success of his play, and he well deserved the enthusiastic applause of a crowded audience which last night rewarded his efforts.
     It is hardly necessary to say more about the plot of the piece than may be gathered from what I have said already, for, to tell the truth, the story, though exciting enough, is not particularly novel. It is little more than a peg whereon o hang a series of sensational scenes, and the literary skill of Mr. Robert Buchanan does not conspicuously shine in it. The scenic effects, however, are for the most part very striking, and in some instances original. Nothing, for example, went better than the real shower of rain in the second act, while the dynamite explosion behind the scenes, accompanied by a tremendous fall of broken glass from the windows of the houses on the stage, duly impressed the audience. The great ship scene, the working of which had given so much trouble, hardly repaid the pains bestowed upon it. The vessel, a two-masted bark, was very solidly built up, and by means of a movable side the cabins and banks, and what was going on in them, were exhibited, as well as the action on deck. But I am afraid that if its details had been criticised by an expert—say, Mr. Clark Russell, the “Seafarer” of the Daily Telegraph—it would not have been found above reproach. Sails do not flap idly against the mast when a ship is bowling along before a fresh breeze, nor is a vessel wholly stationary when a rough sea is rolling beneath her. The piece is played in that robust, energetic style which Mr. Harris seems to have imported from the south side of the Thames, and which has a multitude of admirers even on our more fastidious northern shores. Mr. Harris himself is the life and soul of the play, and acts with an earnestness as the gallant young sailor which is simply irresistible.

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Bachelors from The Times (2 September, 1884 - p.9)

HAYMARKET THEATRE.

     The temporary management of the Haymarket Theatre made a second bid for popular support last night by the production of a new three-act comedy entitled Bachelors, an adaptation from the German by Messrs. Robert Buchanan and Hermann Vezin. The venture is likely to obtain as much success as can be hoped for in an off season. Bachelors is indeed a fairly entertaining piece. The one thing to regret in connexion with it is that the authors have not very frankly avowed the sources of their inspiration. They claim to have “altered and adapted” the story from the German, but how much or how little this somewhat elastic phrase may mean they leave the public to guess—perhaps unwisely, for the experience of the public unfortunately is that adapters apply their ingenuity rather to concealing the extent of their indebtedness than to improving the work in hand. Be that as it may, Bachelors, as here presented, may be pronounced an excellent piece of its kind. It is farcical in plot, but full of character, and smart, if not witty, in dialogue. The dramatis personæ consist of an equal number of both sexes who begin in a state of bachelor, spinster, or widowhood, and end in matrimony. The dramatic motive is trite in the extreme but so ingeniously worked out that although a general pairing off is foreseen from the first, the steps by which it is led up to interest as well as amuse. Mr. Brookfield gives an admirable study of a timid, elderly professor of music, who, aiming at “true happiness” in life, contrives to entangle himself in three simultaneous betrothals, and he is cleverly, though somewhat too noisily, seconded by Mr. Stewart Dawson as a retired “Q.C.,” whose hatred of womankind yields to the blandishments of a mature widow. Both impersonations are striking in “make up,” a branch of art to which some of our younger “character” actors appear to devote much attention. Mr. Conway, Mr. Maurice, and Mr. C. Coote are the remaining male characters; the last-named is an excellent man-servant. Among the ladies, Miss Julia Gwynne distinguishes herself by pourtraying and unconventional type of young ladyhood—an infantine miss whose heart struggles for mastery over her instinct of filial obedience. Miss Kate Munroe is piquant as a young widow, and Miss Victor, Miss Francis, and Miss Marden complete the cast respectively.

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