New Plays in Manhattan

Hold Your Horses (libretto by Russel Grouse & Corey Ford; music & lyrics by Russell Bennett, Robert A. Simon, Owen Murphy). ''The locale of this comedy is New York City at the turn of the Century," says a program note by Messrs. Grouse & Ford. "If any member of the audience can detect the slightest error in atmosphere or historical data, the authors would be greatly obliged if he would please keep his mouth shut about it." It would be more to the point if Author Grouse (It Seems Like Yesterday, Mr. Currier & Mr. Ives) and Funnyman Ford should defy their audiences to detect the slightest bit of sanity in the antics of their comedian--Joseph Lytell ("Joe") Cook. Mr. Cook is Broadway Joe, beloved hansom cab driver and a horse's best friend, a devotion which ultimately elects him Mayor of New York. His first appearance is made in front of Rector's. The painted backdrop does not look much like the facade of Rector's; neither does Broadway Joe's cab look like any other ever seen. A washbasin with running water pops out of the top, a shoe-shining device promptly begins whirring over the driver's toes. The seat flops back and a gas range appears. From an icebox which has handily sprung out of the vehicle's superstructure, Broadway Joe extracts the makings of a midnight snack, cutting the bread with a hatchet and finally nailing the sandwich to the roof. An escalator then lowers Mr. Cook to the stage where he relates at length the trip he has just made from Cripple Creek, Colo.--"a good night's work if I do say so." Unknown to him, Miss Ona Munson, a flaxen-haired soubrette with a childish uncertainty in her voice, has stowed away in the cab. For her benefit the undismayed comedian does a complicated tap dance up & down a pair of Tom Thumb steps, sits down at a portable piano and sings the tuneful theme song, "Hold Your Horses," to his mare Magnolia. When he refers to Magnolia's heart of gold a flap opens in her side, displaying a large gilt heart. A midget in a tiny horse's suit runs out on the stage with Magnolia's dinner pail, a feedbag full of oats. Broadway Joe takes the bag, pats the midget, blandly remarking: "That's her son. This is her fodder." Assisted by uncouth Dave Chasen, Mr. Cook finally removes his hack and horse from the stage. Messrs. Cook & Chasen have provided themselves with trainmen's caps. They pour coal into Magnolia's flank. She lights up, chuffs smoke through her nostrils, trembles from flashing fire box to cowcatcher, and finally roars metallically into the wings. Past master of absurdity and surprise, Joe Cook regularly employs three property men of his own to supplement his production's stage staff. He needs all of them in Hold Your Horses. He juggles a whopping hogshead which he catches on the soles of his feet from a steep runway. He directs Dave Chasen to drop down to the corner for some cigars, at the precise moment that Chasen disappears through a trap door. In his mayoral office is a statue which, when dusted, sneezes. He calls for his running pants, and a pair of trousers, propelled by an invisible dwarf, trots across the stage. He occasionally pauses to rattle off, in a manner as modest and conscientiously ingratiating as a hotel clerk's, the most fantastic monologs. One has to do with his career as an actor with Edwin Booth. "I was playing Polonius that night," he recalls. "You play Polonius with five cards and red and white chips."

Just before Mr. Cook has to escape his political enemies by a wild ride atop two white horses galloping thunderously on a treadmill, the perennial Cook machine is somehow interpolated into the mad proceedings. This year the machine is billed as "The Fuller Construction Company's Recording Orchestra." Wearing the bemedaled and lengthy bandmaster's coat which was seen in Fine & Dandy, Comedian Cook picks up his fiddle & bow. The bow has an inflated bladder tied to one end. Mr. Cook plays a few bars, then slaps an attendant across the back of the neck with the bladder. The attendant turns a crank and a small carousel begins to revolve. One of the riders seizes a cardboard milk bottle, breaks it over the ticket-taker's head. In surprise, the ticket-taker heaves a handful of coins on the stage. Some roustabouts who have been holding Dave Chasen above a glass tank of water, dive for the coins. Chasen falls into the tank and sounds the last note of the tune with an automobile horn.

Joe Cook is not insane. People who have known him for years will tell you so. He was born Lopez, orphaned young, raised by relatives in Evansville, Ind. He still talks a lot about Evansville. In his current offering he fondly remembers an uncle who did not pour his maple syrup on pancakes, but cut the cakes up, poured them on the maple syrup. He has trouped with medicine shows, carnivals, burlesque shows and in vaudeville. He considers his first professional engagement the act which he did with his late brother Leo in 1907. He was 17. The act was called "The Juggling Kids." In vaudeville his wife, whom he divorced for infidelity two years ago, used to act as property man. His first big success was achieved with Peggy Hopkins Joyce in the Vanities of 1923. Rain or Shine, his first starring vehicle, opened in 1928, ran two years on Broadway. He has four children -- Joe (17), Josephine (18), Doris (12), Leo (7). He is a Roman Catholic. He always likes to have a midget living with him and in his shows. He thinks they are lucky. His house is full of statues of gnomes.

"Absolutely levelheaded; a great businessman," is what his friends call him. His estate at Lake Hopatcong, N. J. is named "Sleepless Hollow." His motorboat, which is very fast and makes terrifying turns when the owner is at the wheel, is called "The Four Hawaiians," but Mr. Cook has not mentioned the celebrated and inimitable Hawaiians on the stage since the Massie Case (TIME, Dec. 28, 1931 et seq.}. Majordomo at Lake Hopatcong is Ellis Rowlands, a Welsh ex-actor still shaken by his experience in the Black Watch during the War. It is Rowlands, wearing footman's livery, who meets you at the door when you go to see Mr. Cook. Rowlands takes your hat and coat, goes to a window, opens it, coolly throws the garments out. The smiling host then asks the footman to tell Meadows to bring the cocktails in. Meadows, in the dark livery of a butler, appears instantly. Meadows is Rowlands. He sets the drinks down, whips off three and departs. Mr. Cook scarcely notices. "Anybody who thinks Joe's screwy is a nut," an old friend says.

The big meal of the day at "Sleepless Hollow" occurs at 11 p. m. It is always barbecue--barbecued beef, pork, chicken, squab. Shortly before dinner Mr. Cook suggests: "Let's go over to Kelly's for a drink. Let's go through the tunnel." He leads the way downstairs and soon comes to a barred door. A peephole opens. Kelly says he is just about to close up. Mr. Cook finally argues him into admitting the party for just a quick one. Kelly is Rowlands. The ceiling of the barroom is crusted with "everything smaller than a man's hand." The piano has two hearse-lights attached to it. The telephone rings. 'Go on to sleep now, lady," urges Mr. Cook. "We can't be making that much noise." He hangs up. The phone rings again. Mr. Cook asks a guest to answer it. Once he asked Howard Dietz. When Mr. Dietz picked up the receiver the mouthpiece squirted a quart of water into his surprised face. Mr. Dietz does not think that Joe Cook is crazy. By this time Mr. Cook is fighting with Kelly. "I tell you, Shultz has better beer than you have," he declares. "Just to prove it, I'm going to take this crowd over I to Shultz's." Shultz's is reached by a short walk across the Cook golf course. (The first tee is a grassy plot atop a 40-ft. water tower. The first green is funnel shaped, for holes-in-one. Another green is a painted rock. One fairway includes a tunnel and a water hazard crossed by a drawbridge.) Shultz's is a beer garden run by a man with a thick German accent and a heavy black mustache. Shultz is Rowlands. That sort of thing goes on endlessly at "Sleepless Hollow." It is all impromptu. Mr. Cook takes people by the busload to his parties. He spends a great deal of money entertaining. He makes a great deal and works hard. He worked for three months this summer with a bicyclist on an act he thought was going in Hold Your Horses. The act is not in the show. One or two of his intimates will grudgingly admit that Mr. Cook might be just a little bit monomanic, in a professional way.

The only setback to his success occurred last year in London where he was playing in Fanfare. Instead of sending them into stitches, Cook merely bewildered his audience. Notorious for their bad manners in the theatre, the English began yelling: "Go back, Yankee! Speak English! We want British comedians." The Londoners apparently thought Joe Cook was crazy.

Double Door (by Elizabeth McFadden; Potter & Haight, producers). Victoria Van Bret (Mary Morris, malevolent Abbie in Desire Under the Elms}, a tyrannous New York aristocrat of the celluloid collar era, dominates her half-brother Rip and her younger sister Caroline with an insane despotism. When Anne Darrow (Aleta Freel of Both Your Houses}, Rip's nurse during an attack of pneumonia, is about to marry the Van Bret scion, Victoria forbids organ music, refuses to attend ' the ceremony, locks up the wedding presents and denies the bride the Van Bret pearls which are by will her due. After the wedding she has Rip's bride followed by a detective. When circumstantial evidence of misconduct fails to separate the young couple, Victoria frenziedly locks Anne in a secret vault behind the funeral urns of a pair of Van Bret ancestors. Professor George Pierce Baker taught Playwright McFadden the dramatic tricks with which to make such melodrama, ludicrous in bald outline, almost credible. Audiences appear to enjoy Double Door more than anything they have seen so far this season an approval which is nevertheless faint praise.

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