National Arena

I-. Broadway: A Critic Looks Back Lavery Drama, Hartman Revue Atkinson’s Scrapbook Recalls Dozen Years Coming Up By tht Associated Press of An Amusing Analytic Mind Emmett Lavery is the author of a new play premiering on Broad- By Jay Carmody way Tuesday evening at the Mans- One of the challenges flung to drama critics by persons who would field Theater. A revue, starring the Hartmans, much prefer flinging the critics over cliffs is: Why don’t you write fashionable comedy ballroom danc- something better? ing team, is the week's other hope- Some day in reply to this query, a modest, reticent little man in ful arrival. the drama reviewing trade will reach into his inner coat pocket and “The"Gentleman From Athens" is pull out a long list of titles which prove this already has been done. the name of Lavery’s drama, the He will start, perhaps, with Shaw’s “Critical Opinions and Essays,” action of which takes place in where the two volumes which have retained their popularity for half a century Washington, gentleman of the title is a member of Con- and which deal, in large part, with plays which otherwise would have gress. Sam Wanamaker is the di- been dead an interval. equal rector, Ralph Alswang is the de- There Are Dozens Such Books. signer, Martin Gosch is producing, He will go on from there to half a dozen titles by Max Beerbohm, in association with Eunice Healey. The cast includes a dozen and one half by George Jean Nathan, a handful by John Anthony Quinn, Edith Atwater, Alan Hewlitt, Feodor Mason Brown, Burns Mantle and a number of others. If the demon- Chaliapin and Creighton Thompson. at the time, he can strative critic is feeling passionately eloquent On Wednesday Paul and Grace bad make quite a convincing case that in writing about mostly plays, Hartman, usually associated with the poor devils in his field have produced some surprisingly readable the fancier supper clubs and hotel books. dining and dancing rooms, turn to the In the sense of endurance, if only as works of reference, these their attention Broadway stage when an intimate revue, m feverish compositions written on maddening deadlines are “better” which they are interested both as In an absolute sense, to be sure, this “better” may than their subject. stars and at the that also is writers, premieres not be very good, but it provides one answer to a question Coronet Theater. The title, "Angel not very intelligent. in the Wings.” The sketches are it is endlessly surprising mat tne piays wmcn Dareiy survive unui by Ted Luce, Hank Ladd and the aforenoted Hartmans. Carl Saturday night attain so much of dubious immortality in this fashion. Paulette Has a 'New Look’ Sigman and Robert Hilliard wrote the score, What is more, it surprises no one more than the reviewers who meet Donald Oenslager designed the set- 8 of 10 deadlines with a sense that two more dis- perhaps out every It’s a Domestic One, Acquired Since Her tings, Edward Noll the dances. The tasteful compositions, the playwrights and their own, are out of the cast Includes Hank Ladd. Viola way. And, of course, will both be forgotten within a few days. Marriage to Meredith Roache, Bob Stanton, Elaine Stritch, Nadine Gae and Peter Hamilton. Through a Dozen Years. By Sheilah Graham The noncommercial theater also A new man has just made the discovery that he is only half right HOLLYWOOD. the footlights again. "It bores me will have a Broadway first night in this assumption. He is Brooks Atkinson of the New York Times and Paulette Goddard is wearing a to do the same thing night after tonight, when Charles Laughton that critic since 1926. His will be pub- papier's “Broadway Scrapbook’’ “new look”—a domestic look—and night,” she explains. "I was in lends his name, stature, ability and Inc. It is a collection of Atkinson’s lished tomorow by Theater Arts, on Paulette it looks quaint. For in- ‘Winterset’ for a month; after the good wishes to the first seasonal critical writings over the last dozen years and it is an extraordinarily stance. I found her in her dressing first two weeks I was ready to premiere of the Experimental The- readable volume of Broadway history in terms of its most Influential room on the set of her latest pic- scream!” Paulette, however, made ater of the American National The- In the old sure that the would be written ater and at the Maxine critic. ture, “Hazard.” days play Academy Paulette would have been counting up in the British press. She brought Elliott Theater. The play, "Galileo," In his embodiment of those virtues and the evasion of the vices her jewels. Yesterday she was mak- over a boatload of London critics Is an adaptation by Laughton of of his it is to evaluate Mr. Atkinson as the most satis- — profession, easy ing a pair of bedroom slippers as at her expense, naturally—includ- the Bertold Brecht drama about the He fying critic in the theater today. has remained conspicuously a a Christmas present for husband ing famous Hannen Swaffer, to 17th century scientist, and the cast journalist, especially for a man so determinedly inconspicuous. His Burgess Meredith. review the play on the first night. for the short run of the play in- Paulette never is at the cludes John Carradine, Joan Mc- nightly identification with the theater has not turned him into a But don’t get Paulette wrong—she asleep switch when is to be had— Cracken, Wesley Addy and Hester clown, a wit, or a mimic of the exhibitionists he encounters. He has still has jewels. In fact, since her publicity even when she had all that trouble Sondergaard. T. Edward Hambleton remained urbanely and amusingly himself, a droll and scholarly man, COMIC ON THE LOOSE—It is. need to he told, Bobby Clark romping through Victor marriage to Burgess the collection you hardly in London over her hairdresser. is producing for the Experimental He the Clark ■■ has grown. The habit or acquiring who takes his job seriously and himself not too seriously. accepts Herbert's “Sweetheartswhich has been revived with such success by presence. If remember, Paulette took Theater. Joseph Losey Is the direc- jewels is too strong to be discarded you the responsibility to be informed, intelligent, just and just personal above, he seems to have become, withoid surprising Anthony Kemble Cooper, the foppish Hairdresser Mjorud with tor. Directly just because she’s happily married Hedwig to conform to the forlorn truth of his trade, that a critic’s man ivith the a to do the ironing. On the right, Mr. Clark ! her when she went to London to enough young monocle, maid-of-all-work family and is enjoying a new way of life. Gateson. Mr. Clark and “Sweethearts' star in “An Ideal Husband" for Sir judgments are individual and fallible. lurns up as a suave, gay rake, leeringly wooing Marjorie Paulette, still in her new role, Alexander Korda. Schedules It are due at the National tomorroio to embark on a two-week stay. I she never has cards in Today’s is sometimes difficult for Mr. Atkinson's colleagues to compre- night says played AMBASSADOR—"It Had to Be her life. To watch her fumbling “I arrived at the studio one hend how one of their kind can be at the same time so readable and so You”: 1, 3:10, 5:25, 7:35 and prettily during gambling scenes for morning and everyone walked out.” respectable. Their rowdy humor, a kind of studied low-lifeness, and its 9:55 p.m. the picture—she plays a gambler in So Paulette went back to her suite oppxxsite %xpression, an acidulous aesthetic disdain for their subject, It on the Fourth CAPITOL—“Golden Earrings”: Durante Makes "Hazard” — is something I never at Claridge’s and hid Hedy. That Try 7:20 and 10 are equally far removed from his pjersistent practice. I’d live to write about. made it much more of a mystery 1:55, 4:35, p.m. thought 6:35 He can be without even 12 as more of a news- Stage shows: 1:15, 3:55, dignified being dull, years later, a the Has Achieved Neither did Paramount. At Paulette’s and, consequently, After Career of Many Ups and Downs Comedian and 9:20 p.m. “Broadway ScraDbook" Droves. insistence they hired a card expert paper story—until the British studio COLUMBIA—“Body and Soul”: Success to teach her how to shuffle and deal hairdressers agreed it was okay for He Welcomes the New. Hollywood 1:15, 3:20, 5:20, 7:20 and 9:25 Lasting the cards and how to play “21,” poker Paulette to be coiffured by her own Mr. Atkinson is second to no man in his field in his lively af- By Harold Heffernan and roll dice. Between scenes Paul- p.m. fection for the theater. He it as a world of ideas, even if the HIPPODROME — "Green f o r regards ette couldn’t resist her Later—and here is a side of Pau- HOLLYWOOD. before he burst on the white way, the only man to “get inta da act” dropping majority of them are bad, and of personalities which are colorful ma- too— lette that few Danger”: 2:15, 4:05, 5:50, 7:30 he served and with it! knitting—yes, she’s knitting, people know—Hedy The most up-and-down character "surrounded by assassins," get away and 9:10 p.m.

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