New Plays in Manhattan

Smiles, produced by Florenz Ziegfeld, is very pretty, very big, very quiet. It contains four of the most charming personages on the U. S. musicomedy stage: Fred & Adele Astaire, Marilyn Miller, Eddie Foy Jr. Producer Ziegfeld is one of the few entrepreneurs who can distribute elaborate scenery, lovely costumes and beautiful women about a big stage and at the same time keep the decoration from becoming Levantine. But Vincent Youmans has written far more distinguished music (in Show Girl, Rainbow, Great Day) than he has provided for Smiles and the book never gives Tom Powers (onetime partner of Joe Cook) a chance to be half as amusing as he can be.

The thin little story of Smiles has to do with a War orphan who is discovered and cared for by three comics and a tenor. When she grows up the orphan turns out to be Miss Miller who is universally loved and cherished. She avoids marrying a rich young man (Fred Astaire), weds the tenor (Paul Gregory). Most risible part of the program is supplied by the Astaires when they cavort in front of a smalltown band. And at one point Eddie Foy Jr., tipsy in Paris, can be heard singing a few bars of a song with lyrics by Ring Lardner:

You've done everything you can

To make it pleasant in Japan,

But, why ain't I home?

Art & Mrs. Bottle. Jane Cowl has introduced this comedy by Benn W. Levy (adapter of Topaze) to alternate with her performances of Twelfth Night. The play is well above the average as to script, is ably acted. Miss Cowl assumes the role of a lady who, having run away with an artist who later abandoned her, returns to her husband, son and daughter after 20 years. She finds her son in love with a model, her daughter in love with her seductive artist, her husband in a quandary. The final unraveling of all this is perhaps overlong, but splendid are the queenly gesturings, the three velvet dresses of Actress Cowl; the noble rascality of Leon Quartermaine as the painter.

Marseilles is a work of Marcel Pagnol (Topaze), originally titled Marius. One reason for the acclaim which the play received in Paris was the Provenc,al dialect of most of its actors. This effect, of course, is completely lacking in the U. S. production, somewhat limiting the power of the original play which was largely a collection of swift, thoroughgoing character sketches. The action takes place in a waterfront saloon, the son (Alexander Kirkland) of whose ponderous proprietor (Dudley Digges) is sea-struck. He must choose between going to the South Seas and remaining with his sweetheart (Frances Torchiana), both families being longtime friends. Throughout this tale of youthful self-sacrifice are interpolated visitors to the estaminet: a pompous ferryboat commander who is touchy on the subject of his wife's fidelity; the roguish, lovable saloonkeeper; able Guy Kibbee (late mortuary supply salesman of Torch Song) who is in love with Miss Torchiana. Marseilles is not a particularly strong play, but it is worth seeing.

Vinegar Tree. Laura Merrick (Mary Boland) had had an affair with some sort of artist in her youth, was titillated when, years later, she was to entertain in her home the one she believed to have been her lover for an afternoon--Max Lawrence (Warren William). Vinegar Tree then proceeds to unfold some uncommonly good comedy for three acts, during which the artist finds himself entangled by Miss Boland and her younger sister and her virginal daughter. After the younger sister and the artist have gone into the garden together in Act III and the daughter is safely in the arms of her fiance, Playwright Paul Osborn shoots his bolt: Miss Boland is informed by her husband that her oldtime seducer was not Painter Max Lawrence but Pianist Lawrence Mack. The play is sustaining, sophisticated, recommendable.

Schoolgirl. Last year Carman Dee Barnes, 17, onetime student at Ward-Belmont School (Nashville, Tenn.) wrote a book "all by herself" called Schoolgirl. Therefrom this play has been made with the help of A. W. Pezet, who learned his playwriting at Professor George Pierce Baker's celebrated Harvard "47 Workshop." He is a onetime editorial adviser of Horace Liveright Inc., publishers of the Barnes book.

Schoolgirl reveals an attitude toward love and morals among the very young in the South. Naomi Bradshaw (Joanna Roos) plans to elope with a boy, is thwarted by the same father who spoke the same epigrams in Coquette (Charles Waldron), is sent to boarding school. Miss Barnes advances the theory that if her heroine had not been sent off to school she would not have been seduced by her boy friend, later to be pardoned by her erring parents. The play is embarrassingly bad for the most part.

Tonight or Never is about an opera diva (Helen Gahagan) who, although a lady of affairs, is unable to become a great singer until she falls in love--specifically, when Mr. Melvyn Douglas, in very gentlemanly fashion, bites her on the neck. It is the second production this season by David Belasco, who is ailing, and he has supplied characteristic touches: real rain, real flowers, a not particularly real play. Two years ago Miss Gahagan went abroad to study music. In Tonight or Never she sings snatches of Tosca very satisfactorily.

Pressing Business. This is a Jewish-Irish show with the scene laid in a dry-cleaning establishment owned by two Hebrews. The people address each other in loud low-comedy style. They spray cleaning fluid at one another, punctuate much of their conversation with a vulgar oral noise known variously as "the bird," "the Bronx cheer," "the Chinese kiss."

An Affair of State. It seems that the Archduke and Archduchess had been unhappily married for ten years without issue. So the populace demanded an heir and the wily Prime Minister persuaded both rulers that he would provide the means, a captain who had three children. But the Archduchess falls in love with a lieutenant (the captain's three children had been got by the Archduke anyhow), so in the end everybody is made happy: the people, the Prime Minister, the Archduchess & lieutenant, the Archduke & captain's wife, the dowager duchess. The latter's part is played by Jessie Busley, who smokes cigars, drinks brandy, gives the rest of the cast a lesson in acting.

Sweet & Low. This attraction has plenty of talent--Fannie Brice, George Jessel, James Barton--but lacks adequate material. Yet it is not an unpleasing show. It includes Borrah Minevitch and his harmonica players, a troupe of ragamuffins who produce astonishing effects. There are also Hannah Williams, a pleasing crooner, and the peerless dance team of Moss & Fontana. But a new low for theatrical prurience is reached by Mr. Jessel with an act in which stereopticon slides are titled with famed advertising slogans.

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