The Manager of Covent Garden has prudently determined on opening
the theatre only three or four nights in the week, until Christmas • and the actors have agreed to submit to a reluction - of their salaries one half during this period. We never meddle with matters behind the curtain ; yet we cannot but think that there are many subordinates whose small pittances may be ex- empted from this necessary proceeding, while there are a few by whom a larger sacrifice would be less felt.
M. LAPORTE has engaged T. P. COOKE; who played his favou- rite part of William in Black-Eyed Susan on Monday, with his accustomed success as a tapster of tears. But why is he engaged for six nights only? Is it that this capital performer in melodrama has raised himself so high by the flood of tears that he draws from the eyes of women and children and sentimental apprentices, that he is to be engaged at a nightly salary ? These are the sort of engagements which cripple managers. Miss KELLY is likewise engaged at this theatre, and is to appear on Monday, in the Innkeepers Daughter. She is also announced as the heroine of a new drama in one act, called the Irish Wife. Of course the interest of the piece will centre in her forcible represen- tation of strong natural emotions. But why, we ask, is this genuine actress, whose talents are as versatile as they are power- ful, confined to the development of painful feelings in rnelo- dramatic heroines, where there is no character to personate? It is the fate of Miss KELLY to be the victim of her consummate 'skill; for she is invariably put into—characters we cannot call them, but situations, where there is nothing for her to do but to give proof of her possession of extraordinary talent. We do hope to see her in dramas of a higher order than the Innkeeper's Daughter, where she is placed on a level with T. P. COOKE. It is said that Miss KELLY cannot personate the woman of fashion or the heroine of tragedy. We would recommend M. LAPORTE to put this dogma to the test; and be may chance to find that it is merely a vulgar assumption. FANNY KELLY and ELLEN TREE together would indeed be a treat. We cannot tolerate Miss SYDNEY in comedy, while we know that Miss KELLY is in the company.
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