The manager of the Shaftesbury Theatre is bringing the legality
of discrimination in the application of the Entertainment Tax to a pretty test. He observes, as we all have, that the " cabaret " performances at restaurants are growing in popularity. You pay for your dinner or supper a sum sufficient to include an entertainment provided on the spot. As the perform- ance does not come under the head of a public entertain- ment no tax is levied. The ingenious theatrical manager is resolved to fight what he calls this unjust discrimination against theatres. Why should he and his public pay a tax which the proprietors of restaurants and their public do not pay ? Why if the cabaret is thrown in with the dinner should not a play in a theatre also be thrown in with a purchase of food ? Accordingly, he proposes to sell boxes of chocolates at prices which will include a seat in the theatre—a ls. 3d. box of chocolates for the gallery, a 12s. 6d. box of chocolates for a stall, and so on. He hopes to provoke the Inland Revenue authorities into action. Will they have the face to proceed against him but not against the restaurants ? We shall see. It is a nice experiment staged with extra-dramatic art. * * * *
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