STAGE AND SCREEN The Theatre
"White Cargo." By Leon Gordon. At the Cambridge IN the programme of this revival acknowledgments 10 dons who have supplied the theatre' with " properties " are fora.- in number. Cigarettes anii:"sound equipment. were foregone conclusion and hardly count ' the two 'rentaia ing reasons for managerial gratitude are whisky and gin. So, when We note that "The action of the play takes place in a Bungalow On the West Coast of Africa," we know what to expect.
We are not disappointed. Nerves are frayed up-country, and before the curtain has been up for five minutes one'of the characters has referred to " the pitiless sun "--a phrase, as everyone knows, .constantly in use among residents of the tropics. Le cafard is rife in the compound, and interest centres (liiefly on the question whether the greenhorn Langford van remain white or will show the yellow streak: The problem, tiots chromatically. stated, has deeper, darker ramifications h) colour, for " mammy-palaver " (or miscegenation) is the. Coast's last card, and the first curtain falls with a well-developed half-caste lady silhouetted on the steep.
Then: is only one mysterious thing about the boldly, crudely drawn characters. What are they all (except the missionary) doing there ? This company, which from London controls their destinies with the help of a quarterly mail-steamer-- yid* does it deal in ? Is it copra or coconuts, ivory or essential oils ? The dialogue gives us never a clue ; the etit:station is maimed by a staff whose sole, absorbing concern appears to be degeneration, They arc adepts at the business. The little doctor, exiled by alcohol these 20 years from rich women's bedsides to the white man's grave, is played fOr much more than he is worth by Mr. Horace Hodges ; and Weston, though he has to rely only on dirty ducks and bad' Manners to support his reputation for cynicism, is suitably haggard and compelling in the person of Mr. Franklin. Dytidl. There is a premium on prigs when licence is presented as sordidly as it is here ; but the Langford of Mr. Walter Sondes is hi voice and manner too nearly related to Eric,Or Little by Littlei to escape the pitfalls of overstatenient with which the Play is riddled. Miss Olga Undo, rattling Tondeleyo's beads, gives a full blooded performance of the dusky charmer in an accent recalling too vividly Miss Yvonne Arnaud. The Production, by Miss Ida Molesworth, is heavily traditional,. und'eHining the playwright's ?mire addiction to the obvious.
This revival should please the town, but would hardly have 'deserved mention in theSe coluninS but for one general question which it poses: People are for ever discussing con- temporary drama, but nobody ever refers to contemporary melodrama. Why ? The reason appeared at this revival.
White Cargo is—save that there is too little action and praCtically no suspense---in the true traditioli of melodrama. The language and the situations arc " strong " ; the atmo- sphere is laid on with a trowel. When we hear of the ravages. of the all-pervading damp, we knoW quite .well that the single. picture hanging in the bungalOw will, sooner or later," fall as the string rots ; that is what it is there for. This is none of your slick, American-style hurly-burlies, with a east of 50,' a revolving stage, and sufficient topicality and purpose to ensuire (a) that it will be hailed as a "scathing indictment" of this' or that, and (b) that it will never be revived. This is good,. meaty melodrama, which ought to stand the test of time as well as East Lynne or The Silver King.
BUt it doesn't stand the test of time. • Already, in the few yeara that have elapsed since it was first produced, it has dated. A faint air of barnstorming, an aroma of the/cid/Won, clings to the good, strong lines, without, however, being definite enough to give them that " period " appeal which enhances the dramatic value of the works of—for' ifistanee-Toni Libertson. The doctor's whisky, the siren's hips, the green- horn's clean young limbs—all the impeccable ingredients forth a mixture which' is perilously near to parody.
We arc getting too sophisticated.- It Would be untrue to say.. that the age has no stomach for melodrama ; but its palate rejects anything more robust, more uncompromising, than the understatement which has become its staple diet, and no great melodrama was ever made of understatement.
FLEMING.
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