... The Theatre By Herbert Far j eon Lot's IV ifo (Aldwych) MISS NORA SWINBURNE is, perhaps, the most cheerful leading lady on the stage to-day. It is, therefore, appropriate that the first play presented under her management should be an extremely cheerful comedy-- a comedy in which, although the modern city of Modos is destroyed by lava even as its prototype Sodom was destroyed by brimstone, ...

... Films of the Day A Mass-produced Model Fails By George Campbell ALL large film studios are, in a sense, factories; and it is a logical result of the factory system that once you make a successful model, you go on reproducing it. Hence this craze for crazy comedy. Somebody with humour and courage took a chance with Three-Cornered Moon, which scored a bull's-eye with the critics; and then ...

... CELEBRITIES in CAMEO No. 103 J. S. Eli as Potted by Charles Gay JULIUS SALTER ELIAS, the man behind the Daily Herald, not to mention the People, John Bull, the Passing Show, the Sporting Life, and even Debrett, began life as a newspaper-boy, getting three bob a week for de livering copies of the Daily Telegraph at 5.45 a.m. in Hammersmith. His father was a Whitby jet salesman who came south ...

... The Theatre By Herbert Farjeon The Com is Green I Duchess I A DISTINGUISHING mark of the autumn theatrical season of 1938 has been, unquestionably, the triumph of the Welsh playwright. True, the most famous Welsh playwright of our time, Mr. Ivor Novello, now appearing as Harry of Wales at Drury Lane, has given us nothing new, though his last offering is still running. But Mr. Charles Morgan ...

... The Theatre By Herbert Farjeon Surprise Item (Ambassadors) MR. MARIUS GORING is now taking a holiday from the macabre. This must come as a relief after play ing so many parts to tear a cat or throw a fit in; and though there are few actors by whom we would rather see cats torn or fits thrown, we do not grudge him his temporary escape from sadism, maso chism, and the various other forms of ...

... By A. G. Mac done 11 IT is very seldom that a true-blue, hard-boiled reviewer, born and bred in the trade-- a tough baby, in fact-- reads a book that makes him want to go and shoot himself. But if ever a book was liable to induce insanity, melancholia, tendencies towards suicide, inflammation of the eyes, and general Dostoievsky- complex, it is A War Without a Hero (Secker: 7S. 6d.). by Miss G ...

... By 44 Junius You will find The Life and Adventures of Aloysius O'Callaghan (Heine- mann; 7s. 6d.), by Thomas Washington-Metcalfe, quite outside the usual kind of novel. It is a brilliant mixture of reality and extravagance. In fact, if the author had not a talent particularly his own-- a talent quite new in novel- writing--- when he disposes of characters for whom he has no longer any use, you ...

... No. 112 Fred Perry Potted by Charles Gay THIS habit of depreciating our Champs.-- noticeable last year in the case of Henry Cotton-- seems to have spread. At Lord's the other day everyone was saying what a good thing it was that the South Africans beat our Test team. At Wimbledon these Little Englanders were openly saying that they hoped Baron Von Cramm would beat Fred Perry. What 's the ...

... By A. G. Macdonell M. ROGER VERCEL has created a remarkably interesting character in the hero of Captain Conan (Constable; 7s. 6d.). The Captain was a little Breton draper whom the war made into the devil of a fighter. He became the leader of a reckless and utterly devoted band of storm-troops, a tigerishly brave soldier and a snakishly crafty one. On the Bulgarian front he performed prodigies ...

... By A. G. Macdonell MR. VERNON BARTLETT, famous for so long as a broadcaster on inter national affairs, sprang nimbly into the public eye the other day with a broadcast on Nazi Germany that caused a good deal of fluttering in dovecotes and also in the eyries of the eagles. He has now followed this up by bringing out a book on the same subject, called Nazi Germany Explained (Gollancz; 5S.). The ...

... Should a Bishop Tell that little White Lie Sketches of Wild Violets, at the Theatre Royal, by Rouson CARRY a situation to extremes and it ceases to be itself and becomes its opposite. Melodrama, exaggerated beyond breaking-point, disintegrates into farce, the line between tragedy and comedy being always a trifle wobbly. Its lack of stability is the theatre's gift to burlesque. When a play ...

... By A. G. Macdonell MICHAEL SHOLOKHOV has written a novel of 750 pages, And Quiet Flows the Don (Putnam; 7 s. 6d.), and to plough through 750 pages is no light undertaking for a conscientious reviewer. The result of achieving this desperate exploit is that I am left with mixed feelings. Mr. Sholokhov is the first writer that I have come across who has tried to paint the hideous and colossal ...