WHISPERS FROM THE WINGS

Concerning the Flopper, a New Cohan-Packard Comic Character, and Other Theatre-Folk

Acton Davies

ENTER the Flopper!—something quite new in the line of comedy creations. If you have read Frank Packard's novel, "The Miracle Man," you will need no introduction to this extraordinary freak of fiction when you meet him on the stage, but if you have not read the novel, then you go to see George M. Cohan's dramatization of "The Miracle Man"; if there be one predatory instinct latent in your nature, the Flopper will make an instant appeal to you by the facility and grace with which, in spite of his apparently maimed and distorted hand, he annexes the country hotelkeeper's watch before the curtain has been up five minutes. To be sure, if later in the play the Flopper did not become converted when he falls under the influence of the gentle old faithhealer, the Patriarch, who cures him both of the errors of his ways and the crimes of his hands, it would be obligatory to regard the Flopper as a distinctly unmoral creature. But the Flopper, as Mr. Cohan has dramatized him, not only points a moral but he adorns the tale. Interesting and unusual as are the many types of crook and saint depicted in "The Miracle Man," the Flopper outshines them all in both dignity and impudence. For he really becomes dignified after his conversion.

By trade, he is a professional cripple; by profession, he is a particularly able member of the lightfingered gentry. He is wheeled into the story in an invalid's chair — which he insists upon calling his "Buick" and occasionally, when only his friends are present, he begs for some one to sing "God Save the King" so that he may be able to stand up and stretch himself legitimately. With his crooked legs and misshapen hands he presents a picture of distortion which would be harrowing were it not for the alacrity with which, when left to himself, he unties himself and demonstrates conclusively that outside of his professional moments he is sound and perfect in mind as well as in limb. This complicated role in the hands of James C. Marlowe becomes a rare and unusual piece of character work.

ENGROSSING as "The Miracle Man" proved to be, the audience which crowded the Astor at the first night's performance was almost as interesting a spectacle to watch. Never did an author face a more loyal gathering of adherents. It was composed almost exclusively of George M. Cohan's friends from every walk of life—men and women who have followed him from his childhood days in the variety shows, through all his long life of musical comedies and farces, and had invariably proclaimed the last of his works to be far greater than any which had gone before. There was probably not one in fifty of that audience who had ever heard of "The Miracle Man" until Mr. Cohan undertook to dramatize it, and not more than one in a hundred of those who took the trouble to read the novel even then, so for the most part the big gathering of Cohanites came to the performance with clear and unbiased minds, so far as the story of the play was concerned.

"The Miracle Man" puzzled them at first. They could not make head or tail of it. There was nothing Cohanesque about it. Here were many of the New England types which George, as they all affectionately call the author, had burlesqued and made fun of in his musical comedies and farces, time and time again, but now they were represented in an entirely new and kindly light. Even the crooks in this story conducted themselves in a manner which was not at all according to the methods of that famous Cohan standby, "Get Rich Quick Wallingford." All through the rather mystifying first act, it was the Flopper, and the Flopper only, who seemed to breathe and express the old-time Cohan spirit of mingled fun and irony. The entrance of the white-haired Patriarch and the discussion of faith and its works which ensued rather awed the audience; in fact it was a rather vividly tinted variety actress who, as the curtain fell on the first act, summed up the general frame of mind of the audience when she exclaimed, "Great Scott! what do you think of that now—I'll be darned if Georgie M. hasn't gone and got religion." But once having accepted the fact that their idol was aiming at higher things—in a dramatic sense at least—the audience accepted the new point of view, sat back in their chairs and took "The Miracle Man" to their hearts.

It is a long time since I have seen an audience so touched and awed as this one was at the scene in which the old Faithhealer calls the lame boy to walk. The remarkably adroit handling which Mr. Cohan gave to this most difficult situation proclaimed this young, many-sided genius, a dramatist in the best sense of that abused word.

TALK about the ruling passion! The vivacious and very charming wife of a famous war correspondent accompanied her husband abroad recently when he sailed to report the European War. Previous to her marriage young Mrs. War Correspondent had been one of the brightest lights of the Musical Comedy stage. Recently for certain good and domestic reasons the young wife was advised to return home, leaving her husband to cope with the European situation alone. The day after her arrival two actress friends of hers eager to hear all the horrors of the war hurried to call.

"Now tell us, Bessie," exclaimed one of her friends unable to further restrain her impatience for news from the war zone, "tell us what was the most wonderful of all the sights you saw?"

"Well, I'll tell you, girls," was the enthusiastic answer, "the most wonderful, the most tremendous thing I saw over there—well, girls, it was so wonderful that I can scarcely describe it to you—it was the greatest'thing I ever saw in my life." "Yes, yes," exclaimed both actresses eagerly.

Mrs. War Correspondent paused a second and then exclaimed, "It was the way they've got Elsie Janis billed all over London."

"HEAVEN knows I am the last man on earth to make a joke about this awful war," remarked Otis Skinner, as he was hurrying to a rehearsal of his new play, "but something did happen over in Philadelphia which gave me one of the biggest laughs in my life. It's really a neutral war story, so there's no reason why I shouldn't tell it.

"At breakfast the other morning, Mrs. Skinner read aloud to me the advertisements of the Fall Opening of Paris model frocks, which was to take place that day at a certain Philadelphia shop. It was the first time in my life that I had ever taken any interest in a Paris gown, except it was on my wife's back, or on that dismal day when I would have to pay the bill for it, but there was something so thrilling—so breathless in the description in the advertisement of how these models had been brought out of the very jaws of Paris and death at the risk of life and limb, that my heart went out to these poor beautiful rags of refugees as it were. I was filled with a wild desire to get at least one fleeting glimpse of them, so when Mrs. Skinner announced that she was going to the Opening I very humbly asked that she take me along.

"In addition to being a personal friend and a staunch supporter of President Wilson, the proprietor of this shop was for many years a great political power in Washington. No one is more desirous than he that in the present war situation this country should maintain its strict neutrality. The day before the fashion opening took place he had hundreds of little cards printed and had given orders that they should be hung or posted in every available and conspicuous place throughout his shop.

"Well, we reached the hall where the dress parade was to take place. I won't go so far as to say that the frock parade was actually opened with prayer but the tones of the presiding floorwalker in his introductory speech in which he fully described the hairbreadth escape of the gowns, was quite as impressive as a funeral oration. Many of the women under the spell of his oratory were reduced to merely tears. These gowns according to the dramatic way in which he heralded their adventures might have been the sole survivors of the charge of Balaklava. Then came the grand march of the manikins—all dressed up and the whole length of the hall to go. But I only took one glimpse at them. In their enthusiasm to carry out religiously the proprietor's orders, the clerks had attached one of the small cards to the skirt of each of these model gowns and the card ran like this:

"'Kindly refrain from all discussion of the war question while in this establishment. We are neutral.'

"The idea of any genuine Paris gown being neutral on the war question was too much for me—I fled!"

SPEAKING of neutrality, here's the other side of the shield: In Hamilton, Ontario, the other night an American vaudeville company was playing to a crowded house. All had gone merry as a marriage bell, until a troupe of trained dogs came on the stage. Now they were exceeding clever dogs. So clever in fact that as far as the eye could see, or the brain of a man could argue out, there was no reason why they should not be received with as much enthusiasm at Hamilton, Ontario, as in any other berg on this particular hemisphere. But for all that, the instant the poor canines appeared, they were greeted with boos, catcalls, curses and other epithets from all parts of the house. Pandemonium broke loose, but through it all the dogs proceeded with their performance blissfully wagging their tails and secure in their consciousness that no violation of neutrality could be laid at their doors. Not so their trainer, however, one Abraham Kaiser, of Newark, N. J. Consummate dog trainer, as he was, he could make neither head nor tail of this hostile demonstration. Furious at the indignities which were being thrust upon his pets, he rushed to the local manager and demanded an explanation. "It's your name—you -fool," retorted the manager, equally furious. "What do you mean by bringing to Canada an act called 'Kaiser's dogs'?" For the rest of the week the dogs appeared regularly at all performances and were greeted always with kind applause. But they were now announced as "Kelly's Dogs."