HIGHLY artificial plays such as Congreve's Love for Love and
Oscar Wilde's An Ideal Husband require exquisite production and highly accomplished acting to do. them justice. The present production of An Ideal Husband, directed by Jack Minster, rivals John Gielgud's production of Love for Love. The scenery and costumes designed by Rex Whistler are a delight to the eye, and the acting is of a high order throughout, even such a minor part as Phipps, the servant of Lord Goring, is so brilliantly played by Townsend Whiffing that the scene between him and Roland Culver, who plays Lord Goring, remains a sheer delight in one's memory. There is not a weak part in the cast, while there are several really remarkable performances. We expect and get a brilliant tour-de-force from Irene Vanbrugh as Lady Markby, but Martita Hunt's Mrs. Cheveley is on an equally high level, so is Esme Percy's Earl of Caversham. It is interesting to discover that on the stage this play of Wilde's is as witty and amusing as ever, but also at the present moment it brings back such an air of civilisation and refreshment that it is not surprising that the audience at the Westminster welcomed it with an enthusiasm that it certainly would not have met with ten years ago. To point out the defects in an artificial comedy so brilliant as this is like criticising a box of fiest-rate crystallised fruits, you either delight in them or you do not.
Miss Agatha Christie's effective thriller, Ten Little Niggers, begins well and provides a- clever series of shocks. It is well acted and it was particularly agreeable to see Henrietta Watson again, and in a part she played to perfection ; but I am one of those for whom thrillers of this sort become monotonous as one death inevitably
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