Men in Shadow." At the Vaudeville Theatre ACTORS should never
be allowed to produce the plays in which they have a leading part. There are exceptions to this rule as there are to everything. Otcasionally an actor of genius will have the artistic passion so intense that it will not permit anyone, even himself, to destroy the balance. A good producer, in my opinion, would never have allowed Mr. John Mills to pull out his clasp- knife almost every other minute, open it, stick it in:o the table and then put it back into his pocket. It only emphasised the weakness of this play, which is that for about nine-tenths of it nothing what- ever happens. When Henry Irving thrilled his audiences (so we are told) in The Lyons Mail merely by the way he put on his boots, it was because something terrible was about to happen, and did happen. " Business " on the stage as well as gesture, must have a meaning to be significant, and though I admit that the meaning Mr. Mills probably wished to convey was the sta:e of nervous tension of the character, yet his knife " business " did not have this effect, but was just an added irritation which kept me wondering when something was going to happen.
The scene of the play is the loft in a mill on the French coast where some Englishmen are carrying- out effective espionage on the Germans. There are only two brief moments of action. One is when a German disguised as a British flying officer is unmasked. This is ruined by an atcredible fisticuff duel in which Mr. Mills (the English spy-leader) knocks the German out—incredible because the single combat is improbable and unnecessary, and one feels that it is another of the producers' desperate efforts to put some punch into the play. The other incident come; only at the very end, when Mr. John Mills hoodwinks the German officer who is investigating the mill, by pretending to be the idiot son of a French peasant. The remainder of the play's three acts is just 'padding, and nothing is more boring than an obvious effort to sustain a non- existent tension for more than an hour and a half.
JAMES REDFERN.
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