THE THEATRES.
CHARLES KEMBLE is engaged at the Haymarket, which opens on Monday; but only for the first six nights, the bills say. He is an- nounced to perform successively, Benedick, Young Mirabc4 Dun Felix, Hamlet, and Lord Townley—but he must go the whole round of his favourite characters. We cordially welcome back to the English stage one of the most sensible, spirited, and congenial of actors, in characters where manly feeling, gallantry, and graceful energy are the principal re- quisites. He is the only representative of the true gentleman left—the solitary successor of PALMER, LEWIS, and ELLISTON. We long to see again the lusty vigour of his Faukonbridge, and his light-hearted gayety in Mercutio. But who is there to play to him ? Miss TAYLOR is to be his Beatrice, Bizarre, Violante, Ophelia, and Lady Townley. FARREN also is engaged, but not to appear with KEMBLE ; who is to be the star of one part of the season, and FARREN of the other, we suppose. How these penny-wise pound-foolish Managers do waste their means, and throw away advantages ! All through the last lamentable season at the Great Theatres, when BONN was making a star of that rushlight DENVIL in tragedy, there were .MACREADY", KF.MBLE, and KEAN lost to the town. Why, if they had been announced together with FARREN, WALLACE, and VasineNuorr,—WARDE, COOPER, DENVIT., and KING, playing subordinate parts, and with ELT.EN TREE as the heroine,— what houses they would have drawn in the stock pieces ! This concen- tration of talent—the only justification of the double monopoly, and which would have reconciled the public to its continuance—was.never attempted. Manager BONN must needs reverse the majestic picture, "Thus sit two Kings of Brentford on one throne ;" and behold he sat like one King of Brentford upon two : and the proverbial fate of the man between two stools rewards his vaulting ambition. The novelties of the week are very slight. At the Lyceum, a " farcetta," called Cousin Joseph, makes an amusing interlude between the Sylph or the Sleep-walker and the Shadow on the Wall. Mr..Qinet is serenely happy in the possession of a salary of thirty-three shillings per week, and the expectation of a bride. He is up with the sweep to meet the dawn of " the happiest day of his life ; " and is Just taking "a last fond look" at his spruce person in the looking-glass, and. think- ing how he shall pass the time till breakfast, when be is horrified by the sudden entrance of a very burglarious-looking personage, who un- ceremoniously intimates his intention of taking up his abode for the day, and what is worse than all, of secur4 Mr. Quiet's company also,
Threats and remonstrances are silenced by the irresistiWe argument of a pistol ; and poor Quiet, finding himself compelled to shelter and be- friend "the mysterious stranger," prudently adopts him as his "Cousin Joseph," whose arrival from the country he was hourly expecting'. There is this difference, however, between the intruder and the hourly expected, that Cousin Joe was to contribute a goose-pie to the wedding-dinner, and his ill-favoured representative devours the fowl that was provided for the bridal-breakfast; and, moreover, at his urgent request (and be will take no denial), the ceremony is to be postponed to the next day. The reputed wealth of Cousin Joe reconciles mamma, if not the bride, to the delay, and blinds them to the very suspicious appearance of the country cousin — especially as he has brought with him a tray of plate. The arrival of the real Cousin Joe causes some little perplex- ity; but Mr. Quiet, having the fear of a 1. ullet before his eyes, dis- claims his rustic relative, though laden with the goose-pie ; and the rustic proving refractory, the police are called in by the ladies to eject him. They instantly determine the relationship, by apprehending the soi-disant Cousin Joe, as a notorious burglar, who bad just escaped their pursuit. Mr. Quiet exchanges his agony of terror for a transport of delight; the bride and Cousin Joseph are restored V good-humour; and the goose-pie makes a capital substitute for the vanished chicken.
KEELEY is Mr. Quiet; 0. SMITH the interloper,—and a more per- fect representative of a jail-bird could not be desired. It was amusing to see how, in his attempt to make himself appear a little respectable, he buttoned himself up into a more suspicious-looking figure than be- fore. KEELEY'S helpless wretchedness and alarm—his terror-stricken acquiescence—his endeavours to cheat himself into a friendly welcome of the intruder, and assume an air of freedom, while he is pinned to his side—are laughable in the extreme. The quick succession of novelties at the Queen's, has again left us in the rear. Minors and Majors, Capers and Coronets, Poetical Inven- tion, The Young Reefer, and others for aught we know, reproach us for our unmindfulness of their attractions, by the preliminary announce- ments of sixth, ninth, and nineteenth times of performance. Besides these, there are other favourite burlettas by the same authors, trans- planted from the Olympic with Mrs. ORGER; who has been playing Sally Stock in Hush-Money, and Prudence Mac Intyre in A Match in Me Dark. In the latter piece, Mrs. NISRETT took Vesrais's part of Ellen Marsden ; little COLLIER personating Vellum, the lawyer's clerk, as at the Olympic : and in the former, REEVE supplied LISTON'S place as Mr. Touchwood, and MITCHELL KEELEY'S as Tom Tiller. REEVE does not make an attempt at personation ; and his appearance conveys the very reverse idea of a timid, sensitive man, whose fears distil into hush. money that oozes from his purse at every fresh shock to his sen- sibilities. MiTcriel.r. wants the forlorn look and lack-a-daisieal air of KEELEY; and though he looks the waterman to the life, he is too robust for Tom Tiller. Mrs. ORGER is inimitable. REEVE requires a part that he can perform ad libitum ; as he does Mr. Hatch, a lying adventu- rer in Poetical Inventions; where he crams himself into a Cantab's black suit, and passes himself off for a tutor, after the fashion of Dr. O'Toole. MITCHELL is not made so much of as he might be. Ilis forte is grave burlesque, in which he is unrivalled. GREEN is the light comedian; and a clever, smart actor, though hard in feature and manner. If the new pieces produced here were of more substantial merit, fewer might be brought out, and with more advantage.
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