The San Francisco Call and Post from San Francisco, California • Page 47

EDITORIAL DRAMATIC SOCIETY VOLUME 66. The NELTING POT in VAUDEVILLE THE literature of the Semitic and no of drama, ancient or modern." Please note the quota- tion marks -which; embrace the unlovely phrase. didn't it. It is a quotation from a work on the drama which I bought, on the Installment plan, many years least it seems many years: ago every time the collector comes. had recourse to the books as a sort of last resort, and in order, I hoped, to get a glimpse at authority; at work on a subject which I had failed; to have illuminatlvely treated by Mr.

Hugh Herbert, star In Aaron Hoffman's little masterpiece. "The Son of Solomon," at the Orpheum. But the book turned out to be more unsatisfactory than the actor, for the latter spoke interestingly matters other than that which I had come to cram on. In my naive way I had thought to find in Mr. Herbert an actor of the race to which he seems to belong every afternoon and evening at the Orpheum, and from whom I might get an interview on Judaism in the drama- I found, however, and to my discomfiture, that Mr.

Herbert belonged a race that couldn't find its way dew dark of the centuries out of Scotland. He couldn't point back to Abraham. Although he couldn't tell me how to spell Shabbus, he told me, perhaps to compensate in a measure for what he could see was a disappointment to me, that in nearly every city where he appears in his characterization of Morris Solomon, a Rabbi in the audience invariably invited him to dinner. But as authority on the Jew in drama, Mr. Herbert couldn't qualify, fact which lamented vainly as as I saw him without his makeup, bis Scotch ancestry being at once an 1 evident, and usual stubborn fact; Therefore, of course, he could tell me -nothing- at, first hand about the type of orthodox his- sketch imposes on him for pori trayal.

He was an actor, who this sea-son Is impersonating a Hebrew of rtheJ old'school, but who next year may-be 'doing" an'ltalian, an a Yankee, or for aught I know, a Chinaman. "Never mind, said I to myself, "I shall find some information about the Hebrew In drama as soon; as 1 get home." For the first time since I bought those books on the installment plan, and signed my name to that accursed slip.promising- to pay sums.of money for -a beautifully indefinite period, during which time friends no doubt I will find opportunity borrow of the first time. I. say. I was i almost inclined to look upon the pur- chase with favor.

At last I was to get some good of them. And this is what I read: "The literature of the Semitic Hebrews and Arabians no trace of drama, ancient or modern." HEBRKYV literature is vital with the Hebrew temperament essentially i dramatic, whether it discloses itself in owning a theater, producing plays in theaters, writing plays for the theater or playing: in the theater. It has always been so. Did. you ever read Isaiah? 5 I mean asi a book? With what instinct for the dra.matie is it glowing: If no theater In ancient days or modern could house such a drama, what then? Charles Lamb surely did not impugn the dramatic powers of Shakespeare when he wrote this about "'King Ivear:" "On tiie stage see nothing but THE San Francisco CALL SAN FRANCISCO, SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1912.

infirmities and.weakness; the. rinipotencefqf rage; while we read it we see not I-ear, bat we are we are I in his mind, are- sustained by a grandeur which 'baffles; the malice of i daughters and storms: in tions of his reason wo discover a mighty irregular power of reasoning-, diaed from the ordinary purposes of but exerting 1 Its as the wind blow's where listeth, at will the corruptions and abuses of mankind. What have looks tones to! do with sublime identification of his age with. that of the heavens themselves when in his reproaches' to them for conniving- at the injustice of his children lie reminds them that "they themselves are If a gentle, wonderful critic found too great for the stage, what shall one say of "Isaiah" wherein the morning star falls, the heavens are rolled up as a scroll and the hosts of heaven fall like fading leaves? In what theater could we rtage the assembling of the nations at the greatest "trial scene" ever depicted? So, carromedoff from Herbert and disgusted with bookish authority, which audaciously declared there was no drama in Hebrew, I return with you to Mr. Herbert, for a few impressions, reserving the right, however, to taiie another whack at the encyclopedic fossil who finds no drama in Hebrew.

IF you have seen Mr. Hugh Herbert in the rule of Morris Solomon and have ever met the type he portrays, you will be startled at the realism of the picture. There is in liis characterization that inscrutable wisdom that of generations on generations of experience with a contrary, inimical, unfriendly world. There is a sense of humor, which is self-restrained and cautious. It is a jovial sense which has survived Walter Anthony even the mournfulness of Babylon and songs in a strange land.

There is the suggestion of thrift thrift which was taught a race which was not for centuries permitted to apprentice its youth; which must needs save and accumulate, rather than create and build. There is, in Herbert's impersonation of Morris" Solomon, the psychological subtleties arising from the admixture of craftiness and generosity; penuriousness and liberality; choler and good humor; hatred and love. The sparkling of inherent racial traits that gave the world its finest heroes and greatest prophets, covered thick over with the acquired tendencies imposed by persecution and self restraint are found in Herbert's Solomon. How marielously Herbert foils the story of the Jew and his six sons. Therein, as Solomon it is Solomon and not Herbert who speaks in the play tells the tale to his pretty daugh- ter Rosie, and the judicious see the whole hUtory of the Jews, and the marvel of their persistence and prosperity.

Solomon is reading the Talmud, it seems; but as Rosie knows no 1 Hebrew, her father explains the story. "The man had six fine stalwart sons," says Solomon, looking up from his book, with tenderness regarding his daughter, "and they were always quarreling. They could not agree on the simplest things and they fought over the weighty matters of the estate. 'Bring me a said the aged father. To the youngest he said: 'Break oft a and the son did so.

To the next the father said: 'You break off a and to the next and the next until the stick had been broken into six pieces. said this wise father of ancient timea, 'put all these six together and and not one of the sons could do it. There," Solomon to "there it la it, the story. United 'is strong, is subtraction." And there. shining through the Aaron Hoffmanism.

la the secret of all Hebraic triumphs from the Red sea Broadway. REMARKABI.K clement in.Her/\ berts portrayal of the a.ged Jew-1 1 is the note of resentment which lurks his querulous voice at- the passingl away of the ancient things and His hold on them is passionate; ljis remonstrance at the inevitable is vehement. lie i likes not the newdays, the son strangers, the daughter reading new books. There is something- "pitiful and tragic in the old man's denunciation of his son's new notions, and 'too, 'of art in Hoffman'st(Hoffman wrote the sketch) deft and humorous way of pointing it. Soloman started, on $125 a week.

His son finds $5 a week insufficient for cigarettes. The old man doesn't underi stand this, and his horror is as huge as. Lear's over Gonerll when his son lights a cigarette on the Shabbus. I touches of art wherewith Herbert's portrayal is made vivid seemed to me I relation, acquaintance and sympathy; but Herbert says: "I just picked up my Impressions of i the type around New York. There are I plenty of the old school left, and they wonderful people.

There was an old clothing dealer in Seven th nue whom I principally studied, and then I kneiw Cliff Gordon's father well, and received many touches my characterization from him. He would no more permit Gordon to smoke on Friday than lie would knowingly commit a arime. A character actor get? these impressions from the type hemselves. I do not know that i ever stopped to analyze the characteristics, or to'figure out what influences had developed them. my Herbert is a very young have been doing stock in stock I have always been the 'character man." This is only my third season in vaudeville and if I am making a success with this characterisation it has been through my.

stock training and the practice I gained in j('ew York of getting material for my every week." One needs become alert for the manifestations of character eccentricities EDITORIAL DRAMATIC SOCIETY i i when one has a new, person to portray every week, and doubtless Herbert acquired his minuteness of observation from his experience wtth Proctor's company and other New York organizations where they play a matinee every day and a performance every and where, in the meanwhile they prepare their work for the following week. sounds like slavery," says iHerbert, "but one may get profit from it, if one is ambitious." HE of THE catholicity of the actorial profession is displayed in the cast -r" of "The of Solomon" pany, to which. seeing that now had an opportunity to subscribe' myself as admirer, permit me to say in passing that it is one most competent little companies that ever put on good drama on any stage in San "Francisco. i This is the personnel of the company 'and their racial religious 'tendencies. Miss Margot Williams, plays Rosie with unforced a i genuousness and sweet the kind of that makes girlhood sweet in all born in Thomas Everett, who plays the difficult role of the son easily, comes from Jacksonville, and Hugh Herbert is from Bingham! ton, N.

T. Miss Williams is a Chris- tian Scientist, and the- two masculine members of the company are Catholics. They piay their "rolesffremote from the ordinary channels of their own sympathies, as it would seem, but with remarkaWe fidelity, sentiment, i.i.||(i|Mm3' sympathy and authenticity. It is truly "The Melting Pot" in faudeville. this company playing "The Son of iSolomon, Orpheum.

Not only is "The Son of Solomon" supplying: esthetic and sane entertainment of the kind provided by "The House Next Door" and Zangwills greater drama, but it is giving it to vaudeville audiences, where until recently, it was generally agreed nothingl that was worth while should be tolerated. Not many yeaFS ago critics and reviewers of stage affairs used, periodically, to bemoan the ascendency of vaudeville. They regarded it as dangerous to the legitimate stage, exerting an influence baleful and growing. It was, they said, frivol from start to finish, and it would, in time, succeed in vitiating the taate of the public so PAGES 47 TO oi. that concentrated attention would be a fatuity and only the sensational and meretricious would survfve.

The prophets are being prove 4to have been in error, for vaudeville is presenting in equal degree with "the legitimate," even proportion otf the I serious and the comic. It is such sketches and productions as Son of Solomon" which Inspire hope in the futute of vaudeville. HUGH HERBERT says that he has never been able to detect the slightest difference in enthusiasm that ffreeta 'The Son of Solomon," no matter what the shifting 1 proportions of Jews and Gentiles may be that comprise the audience. There is difference in the quality, however, and in the planes of applause. As some deft bit of characterization comes forth, such as occurs when the old man remonstrates with his son or explains about the money or denies David the $500, the laughter will go up from young Hebraic throats as the auditor remembers, perhaps, a father whoie native tenderness and love struggled with acquired sagacity and prudence in some similar scene wher? modern extravagance needed the rebuke of ancient thrift.

At such a juncture in the playlet Aaron Hoffman is at his keenest. He is without, offense, because he is sympathetic anri truthful; and he does not fail to 'land his laugh." as they say in vaudeville, because of the candor of his scene and the obviousness of his contrast of the passtog generation with the new Hoffman fails not respect to the. virtues of those of his race who supplied their sons with funds to distribute. He reminds one of Lemh's observation on Thomas Coventry and his kind. "By taking care of the pence," said Ella, "he i is often enabled to part with the pounds upon a that leaves us careless, generous fellows halting at an immeasurable distance behind.

Coventry gave away "0.000 pounds at once: in his lifetime to a blind charity." So with Hoffman's Solomon. He set his son up in business as soon as "one shot from the pistol made him a good boy," and therefore worthy. These and like impressions from Hoffman's play are as refreshingly true and truly refreshing as anything I have heard from a local stage in a long, long time, and "Hoffman, Herbert, Miss Williams and Thomas Everett are doing a kind of Israel Zangwill service to playgoers in bringing multitudes together in sympathy over a pretty, homely story of life and in exhibiting again what everybody knows in theory is true, the oneness of nature in Jew and Gentile. In our thanks to Hoffman and the players I am reminded by Herbert to notice the work of Ben Teal, who staged the play, the perfection of which production is by no means the least of its advantages. "Ben Teal, you remember," said Ker- bert, "was the stage director who put 'Ben Hur' behind the footlights for Klaw Jfirlanger." From "Ben Hur" to the "Son of Solomon" may seem at first sight to be a long step, but it will be found not to be so.

"Ben Hur" does the Jew good to see and helps him to understand his Gentile neighbor, and "The Son of Solomon" is good for a Gentile to see. and everybody apparently enjoys both. SO, denied the outlet of their literary activities in the theater, the Hebrews of old may not have produced Sophocles or Aeschylus, though the dramatic is an abounding: river of emotion through all their writings. Since he has found a theater the contributions of the Hebrew to dramatic literature are among the most notable of our times. Thus is the compiler of the books I bought on the installment plan confounded by ancient and modern history.

Not the least of the modern contributions to dramatic literature from race grave us "Isaiah," 'Job" "The Song of Polonion," is Aa-on Hoffman's little play, 'The Son Soitv.