... . By C. A. LEJEUNE. A BIT far-fetched is the way I heard one hoary headed picturegoer describe WONDER MAN (Leicester Square). And since Danny Kaye, in the film, walks through stone walls, squirts water from a drinking fountain through the top of his head, and plays identical twins, one of whom melts into the body of the other at will, the descrip tion is probably not exaggerated. ...

... Reviewed by PHILIP PAGE SPRING 1600 (Lyric, Hammersmith).-- This gently romantic comedy by Emlyn Williams, produced by the Company of Four can hardly be called a revival. It is true that it was first seen in 1934, when it was a failure, which it did not deserve to be. So completely has it been re-written, and with such skill, that it is practically a new play, which will probably, and ...

... MR. ROBERT PAYNE'S novel, LOVE AND PEACE (Heinemann. 8s. 6d.), is now being translated into Chinese. That is a fact worthy of a good deal more than passing com ment, particularly since the book is the story of the chil dren of a noble Chinese family and as such must be considered almost unassailable in detail and in spirit by its future Chinese publishers. Mr. Payne has planned his novel as ...

... Spring 1 600 (Lyric, Hammersmith) SOME ten years ago, as you may remember, this delicately sentimental picture in water colour of Elizabethan stage life, cleverly placed and lighted by Mr. Gielgud, hung for a few days in the West End. In spite of obvious faults, it was admired by the discriminating and might have drawn the town, but a ten-day pea-soup fog came down like a blanket and when at ...

... . By L. P. HARTLEY. IN the first sentence of Showman Looks On, Mr. Charles B. Cochran confesses himself a hero worshipper. I see nothing to regret in the fact, he adds. Nor can the heroes or heroines of Mr. Cochran's worship. All idols are indebted to their devotees, but surely Mr. Cochran's owe more than most. Not only has his pen added lustre to the fame of countless celebrities, living ...

... . By L. P. HARTLEY. THE Scots are a serious race, and childhood in Scotland is a more serious matter than in some other countries. Certainly it was so at the turn of the century, or a little after, when Robert Shannon, aged eight, left Dublin and came to live with his grandparents in Levenford. He had nowhere else to go, for he was an orphan, his Irish father and his Scottish mother having ...

... Reviewed by PHILIP PAGE UNDER THE COUNTER (Phoenix).-- Can Black Market activities be funny? One would not have thought so. But the answer in this case is that Miss Cicely Courtneidge could make almost anything funny. Here is a musi cal of an original type, in that there is too much plot and too little music instead of viceversa. Fortunately that cumbersome and not always amusing plot has ...

... THE one thing that seems to emerge from the accounts of resistance movements that are now being published is the complication, and sometimes the confusion, of their internal ramifications, even in cases where the delineation between friend and enemy was sharpest. In Albania, it seems, not even this situation was clear, and a British officer, parachuted into or landed on the Albanian coast ...

... reviewing BOOKS ELIZABETH BOWEN Cornwall WEST-COUNTRY STORIES (Macmillan; 8s. 6d.) is prefaced by the author, A. L. Rowse, with a word as to his choice of title. He says: I use the word stories in its older sense, going back to the Middle Ages, to include narratives both of fact and fiction. In any case, the stories of in vention, even though mostly ghost stories, have a foundation of fact ...

... THERE is little music in this musical play, the scenery can scarcely be said to change, and the story travels neither very fast nor very far. Are these shortcomings? Possibly. But nobody notices them. The entertainment is a sustained bout of light hearted fooling by Miss Cicely Courtneidge; and time cannot stale the infinite variety of her burlesque. Only a husband would have the hardihood to ...

... The Sacred Flame (St. Martin's) SUCCESSFUL young actresses wishing to test their range are sometimes tempted to allow themselves to be violently miscast at the risk of finding out what they cannot do, but few fail to get the better of temptation. The requisite nerve is lacking. Success, so hard to come by, is not lightly to be imperilled. But Miss Sonia Dresdel's ambition is of sterner stuff ...

... reviewing BOOKS ELIZABETH BOWES Young Ladies of Bath THE eighteenth century has given us novels of its own. Contemporary pictures of life in those days, contemporary reading of character and comments on town and country, manners and morals, enrich the work of Fielding, Richardson, Smollett and Fanny Burney. (Sterne, one might say, made a timeless world of his own.) Jane Austen, born in the ...