New Play in Hoboken

Star of Bengal. Novelist-Essayist Christopher Morley has already produced two oldtime dramas (After Dark, The Black Crook) on the dismal Jersey shores just across the Hudson River from Manhattan. Since their ancient modes seemed absurd to modern playgoers, these Hoboken theatricals became a fad. Audiences which were always rowdy, however fashionable, hissed the villains, cheered the heroes. Mr. Morley's latest attempt to make money exploits Joan Lowell, touted literary hoax-mistress (The Cradle of the Deep). It is a maritime melodrama, written by her husband, which permits her to maneuver in the shrouds and employ the nautical idiom. But it is not funny, either in itself, or in the manner of its predecessors.