... The Theatre By Herbert Farjeon Important factors in the case Old Jim (Gordon James and Queenie (Leueen MacGrath Saloon Bar Wyndham's) THE action of this play takes place in its title, which is a good one; and since the scene, so warm and well-polished, so bright and gaudy and comfortable, is even better than the title, let high credit be given at once to Michael Relph, who designed it. As soon ...

... The Theatre By Herbert Farjeon Ton of the World (Palladium) HAVING pleonastically described this show on the programme as an Extravagant Extravaganza, the management at the Palladium can hardly object if it is accorded a Critical Criticism. True, there is some Brilliantly Brilliant fooling by the Crazy-Gang Crazy Gang at the start. But Most of Most of the Rest of the Remainder is either ...

... By V. S. Pritchett PEKING during the diplomatic picnic and before the Japanese gate crashed and ate up everything-- that is the Ann Bridge country and very nice it was, too, for the picnickers. This time five of them go up on a rough inland tour to the Great Wall, collect flowers, catch colds, keep a stiff upper lip ready for the bandits, while Miss Ann Bridge nags away at two of the party for ...

... The Theatre By Herbert Farjeon IPar, Revues, and The Playboy t Duchess i AFTER a period of considerable anxiety and inactivity, the West End theatres are gaining heart and scope once more, and managers who have managed to carry on are making hay not only while the moon shines, but even while it doesn't. The population of London may be smaller than it was, but the percentage of playgoers may ...

... By V. S. Pritchett Once you get a taste for it, Anglo Ireland is an irresistible subject. Of course, one means Anglo-Ireland of the landlords; outside of that there was a sub-Bournemouth gentility, and Mr. Bernard Shaw's horror of the middle classes was really based, not on the museum pieces of Kensington, but on the fossils of Kilkenny. In the Irish eight eenth century the riff-raff of an ...

... By V. S. Pritchett IN the last twenty years there have been many attempts at a Victorian revival, but it must be admitted that the Victorians wilt again very quickly. They are defended but not admired; our real admiration, and one for which we shall, quite rightly, be duly damned, is still the eighteenth century. It is the easier subject. As Mr. Peter Quennell says in his urbane and witty ...

... The Theatre By Herbert Farjeon In Good King Charles's Golden Days New MR. BERNARD SHAW'S play on King Charles the Second, described on the programme as A History Lesson in Three Scenes, is immeasurably more entertaining and instructive than most of the history lessons in our schools. That, of course, goes without saying. The choice of characters and period enables the author to discuss all ...

... By V. S. Pritchett MR. CHARLES MORGAN has a place of his own in contemporary fiction. It is not at the top. He is not one of the good good novelists nor one of the good bad novelists. He belongs to that curious mixed company of the bad good, the faux bon. I dreamt that I dwe-elt in ma-arble halls describes the sensation his books give to one. One wakes up in one of those literary nails ot ...

... Films of tlie Day Advance Notes on an Epic By George Campbell AN American spy on whom I rely for information now and then has been trying to dig up some information about The Great Dictator. After putting an official of United Artists' Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Culture to the question, my informant succeeded in breaking through the veil of secrecy with which Chaplin surrounds his ...

... The Theatre By Herbert Farjeon Lunchlime Shakespeare Strand IT may be said that the theatre these days is getting along like one o'clock-- though why one should get along faster or slower than any other hour, nobody has ever been able to explain to me. One, however, is now unquestion ably the popular entertainment time, possibly because, in addition to its status as an interval, raid or no ...

... The 64 Bystander Bookshelf Shades of the Prison House By V. S. Pritchett THOSE who read Mr. Jim Phelan's Lifer guessed there was an auto biographical story behind it. Here it is: Jail Journey (Seeker and Warburg; 12s. 6d.). Its importance as a study of the English prison system from the inside is steadied by its lack of hysteria; it is an astonishing and moving human document of considerable ...

... Films of the Day From Criterion Theatre to Plaza Cinema By George Campbell THERE were two schools of thought about French Without Tears, which made such a hit at the Criterion; and the film version will not convert either of them. The masses who laughed uproariously when a character spoke French no worse than their own, or compared another character's face to bedroom crockery, will find the ...