The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 50

i'lllj! 111 HP' Mil 1 ynLi-zb tjl "A 'THE VORTEX' IS SECOND IN RAMBEAU REPERTORY AMBITIOUS SEASON IS MAPPED BY GUILD I .1 1 11 v''Mfi Usually actor folk of prominence rost up on Sundays, and particularly after they liave undergone Iho strain of rehearsing a. new Plav while still acting the Carrerit one. Hut not so with Uarjorie Ilambe-au, who has oven resisted the allurements of a week-end on her walnut rancli Jn Contra Costa county. She will take part tmiight in the last performance of "The i'oiiean'' at ho Columbia end a rare thing it is, a Sunday night show at the Columbia, which is one of those conservative houses that prefer to keep dark that night. And tomorrow evening she will begin a run of "The Vortex." which is one of Xocl Coward's dramas.

"The Vortex'' has to do with the fast set In London, and the Very bad fix a certain mother and her son find themselves in. after going fast and loose with the giddiest of them. It is a play notable for its increase of dramatic tensity as it proceeds, and Us third act is one of the strongest written in years. It opens in. the boudoir of the mother, Mrs.

Florence Lancaster, who has been maintaining relations with a youth no older than her own. on. Here, here son, after wringing a confession from her as to her misdeeds, admits that he has bo-come a narcotic' addict. In the horror of her discovery they vow to each other that they will raise therfrselves out of the vortex. Alien Vincent will play his Original role of the son.

Herbert Heayes the neglected father and Ben Taggnrt will have the role of an English fop. Richard Lancaster and Jerome Young wi'l have importnat parts. Others in cast include Dorothy Desmond, Thelma Barnet, Elizabeth Wilbur and Irving Kennedy. 5S With the third Players' Guild production on at the Community playhouse, it would appear that all Is well with the group. The present bill is something of a novelty, for Shaw is rarely played in San Francisco.

It is the Irish dramatist's comedy of quips and puns on the playwrights and drama critics, "Fanny's First Play," and is on the Guild boards for four more stagings this week beginning Thursday night, with a Saturday matinee. Reginald Travers and Manager Stanley MacLewee promise "a new play every two weeks" so it behooves Shaw devotees to save some night this week-end for a view of "Fanny" before the production closes. And herewith comes an announcement about the talance of the season, which the Guild may well regard as its most ambitious. Following the Shaw comedy, there will be eight performances ot Clare Kummor's "Hollo's Wild Oat." Then Sem Benelli's Florentine tragedy, "The Jest." Tha opera version was recently done at the Auditorium under the name "La Cena Del Beffe." Noel Coward's "Easy Virtue" follows, which is still one of the new things on the East coast, and then there will be given an elaborate production of Stephen Phillips' "Xero" treating of the pompous days of the Tribunes. Cameron Prud'homme may play the Caesar and Emelie Melville, Agrippina, Along about this time Mart Connelly's wistful comedy, "Tha Wisdom Tooth," will be given, and there will bo a production of on or both of the John Howard Law-son "expressionist" plays: "Boger Bloomer" and "Processional" tha latter having a jazz band parading up and down the aisles.

There may be a production of John Van Druten's "Young Woodley" which was one of the big hits on Broadway with Glenn Hunter; and wa are told that for a certainty Frana Werfel's "Goat Song" will be done. About early summer there will be given a play by a California playwright, plans being afoot to conduct a contest and choose tha winning play for premiere presentation, efforts to be made to take the play East if It is successful here. It is planned to close tha season with a brace of Shakespearean plays, "The Tempest" one of the most seldom seen works by the Bard of Avon, and possibly, "Hamlet." Something of immediate interest is the commencement of midweek; matinees. These will bo given on Wednesday afternoons, commencing November 2, and will be given over to plays by Ibsen, Pirandello, Ervine, etc. The first bill will ba Gilbert Emery's "The Hero" a tense, emotional work; the other plays of tho special midweek series to bo "Right You Are If You Think You Are," "Jane L'legg," "A Bill of Divorcement," "Waltz of the Dogs," "In Abraham's Bosom," "The Wild Duck" and "John Ferguson." w'i Mary Brian plays the daughter of W.

C. Fields in "The Side Show," tho first Fields-Chester Conklin co-starring production. 'Caravan Trail' RUTH LOCKWOOD, a member of the "Gay Paree" company at the Curran. The revue, which starts its final week tonight, is a gtrly-pirly show with singers, dancers and comedians galore. MARJORIE RAMBpAU, who will appear in "The Vortex," the second play in her repertory list at the Columbia tomorrow night.

"The Pelican," the first offering, will end tonight. w'N "Chic" Sale, Star Comedian YftH "Gay Paree' Portrays Diversity of Bucolic Types By IDWAL JONES THERE is in show parlance a wider guit than can be spanned by Webster's Unabridged betwe'en the terms, artist and performer. Artist. I take it, means anybody on the bill, including acrobats and the fat lady that pivrs-tlie trained dog a lump of sugar. But a performer is an artist who is watched by the stacrc hands, concealed behind the arras, at evcy performance, for days and weeks.

These include John Earrymorc, Mr. Leo Beers and Charles, yclept "Chic," Sale, who happens to be in "Cay Pnree," the Ken Maynard, 'Western star, 'as host to his former loss, John Ringling, when the big tent show played Los Angeles recently. Ken was with Kingling's circus for ten years and there is a strong bond of friendship existing between the two men. As it happens. Maynard is now making a circus -picture, called "Tha Caravan Trail." It is a story an early day tent show playing the Western States and the numerous trials and tribulations endured by the players of thoFn days.

Ringling told some cf the. experiences of his early days when the troupers traveled by wagon from town to town, and of the battles against weather conditions to meet play dates. "The Caravan Trail" is to be an authentic story of circus life, for Maynard knows all the angles and technical details. Others in the cast are Marion Douglas, Maurice Costello, Paul Weigell, Fred Malatesta, George Davis, Charles Ellis and Hay-Bard's wonder horse, Tarzan. Harry J.

Brown is directing. 1 I. Richard Arlen. who has just completed the leading role opposite Bebe Daniels in "She's a Khelk," is to play the lead in Zane Grey's "Under the Tonto Rim." PEPITA GRANADOS, Spanish dancer, at the Orpheum this week with Harry Holbrook- baritone In a skit called "A Spanish Serenade." Miss Granados is billed as "The Queen'of the Castanets." On the 6ame bill are Adele Rowland, musical comedy favorite, and Nancy Gibbs in a musical romance called "Dear Little Rebel." the Puritanic ago and the posfers are a gasp or two ahead of tho times. There is nevertheless talent in the show, but the most considerable person in its breezv personnel is the performer aforesaid, 'hic Sale.

Now that Denman Thompson is gone, Chic is our leading exampler of the rube, type. Thompson was never funnv, but Chic always is. lie gives portrayals that are rich, because they aKe built up of innumerable details and infused with the comedy spirit. The nearest to mm in art is Jimmy Barry, who Is less versatile, and still sticks to the rubo who wears celluloid collars and pitches horseshoes in front of the barber shop. Chic is the non-singing troubadour of America.

Nobody can fail to recognize his types. The old lady in Dubuque rocks with glee when Chic plays Klmer, the Eagle-Eyed 'Watchman, because she, like everybody else, knows Elmer. FINE CHARACTER BIT. There is small doubt that the portrayal of Elmer is one of the two or three finest bits of character acting to be witnessed in this country today. It is a gem coquettish twist that devastates the landlady at the railroaders' boarding house.

I never knew an up-and-coming crossing watchman that was not always the star boarder and got a second helping of liver and onions. Klmer is slightly pop-eyed, defiantly humorous, aloof and quizzical, and a gentleman in the respect that he is perfectly at ease in court, to tho extent of woolen shirt and a boomer tie. He has put on a new pair of cheap canvas gloves for the occasion. He has a game leg, and probably had been hit by an engine in tho switchyard, otherwise he wouldn't have been put on that crossing job. His hair has boen dressed with a comb dipped in the' drinking bucket at the crossing shack.

His red moustache is shiny and curled, not in the dapper way that has no more to do with Its setting, with "Gay Paree' than had Adeline Genee's dancing in the lickerisTi "Soul KIsjs" of years ago. Here you have a finely wrought sketch of a crossing watchman, who is by way of being a railroad man. As is well known, 'but always overlooked, the railroad man is of a race apart. He has pride of craft, and a language of his own. Look at Elmer.

He has a blue panorama at the Curran. Of anything even remotely Gallic, there isn't a chemical in the Fhow, though some of the ladies wear costumes made familiar to those who have studied their French in "La Vie Parisien-ne." They display an unwonted stockiness, being the grade that showmen term squabs. I prefer more But that Is neither here nor there, and most persons find squabs appetizing, t'nlike Pooh Bah, they don't "decline to sing and dance," but as this is a modern musical revue, there isn't much music, excrpt among the fiddles in the pit. I suppose I should make some skittish reference to "display of cuticle, and all that, but I won't, for while there is a sufficience, this is still of the old barkeeps, but with the (Continued on 1'aye Column 3) MUSICAL SHOWS, COMEDIES AND VAUDEVILLE NUMBERS VIE FOR FAVOR mm L. ,,,,1.

lL MISS MARY, one of thffiffiSfi "THE JOY GIRL," in the screen at the Pan- CLAIRE BRANDT, appearing In "What Anne RICHENDA STEVICK, in the Guild production KATHERINE KIDD, star of "Oh, Kay!" the ZEDA REED, one of the players in "Pies I at the Golden Gate Maddock Tncks tages, has Olive Borden in the title role. Six Brought Home," the comedy at the President, of Bernard Shaw's "Fanny's First musical comedy at the Lurie. Bootlegger the John Golden comedy which rHenrv Duffv I miniature mus.cal revue in which Jo, acts of vaudeville are presented on the same It's the story of a girl who went shopping and Play." This is the second of a series of plays jokes, girls and snappy tunes account for tha is presenting at the Alcazar Many 2 I IQlvaa Ewtunfi featured, Program, brought back a frusband. b. presented thii season.

popularity, of tht players are seen ia the cast ManyneW!.