Volume 1 — Pugilism's Invasion of the Drama.

A Characteristic Article from the New York "Sun" Affords a Striking Example of the Sort of "Higher Criticism" That Is Now In Order.

The appearance of a former pugilist as a star in a Broadway theater, which for many years was the greatest temple of the Shakespearean drama in the United States, has given a serious jolt to a large number of playgoers who are loath to free themselves from the influences of old traditions.

The relations of ring and stage have been becoming more and more close in recent years, and have constituted a favorite theme for newspaper discussion. It is doubtful, however, whether it would be possible to find a better review of the situation than the following characteristic essay in dramatic criticism which appeared in the New York Sun:

It is long since the playgoers and first-nighters of Brooklyn had such a treat as was tendered them last season by the re-appearance of that bright star in the dramatic constellation, James J. Corbett. Mr. Corbett came back to us with his new drama, "Pals," an admirable vehicle for the display of his singular dramatic talents.

The fact that it was the Lenten season marred somewhat the attendance, otherwise the society folk of Brooklyn might have made it a brilliant function. Yet Mr. Corbett's welcome lacked nothing of warmth or appreciation.

Sacrificed Ring to the Drama.

Since the time when, in "The Naval Cadet," Mr. Corbett took the American Theater by storm, his art has broadened and deepened. It is an older, a more mature, dare it be said a shiftier, Corbett who returns to us. So often of late has the assertion been made that Mr. Corbett is the best actor in the pugilist division of the stage that it is time for a comparison between his art and that of those other eminent gentlemen who have left the ring for the everlasting good of the drama, Messrs. John Lawrence Sullivan, Terence McGovern, James E. Britt, and J. John Jeffries.

It is true that any comparison between the art of these five eminent artists must be superficial, and to a certain extent banal, owing to the diversity of the dramas by which they have seen fit to show forth their talents.

The stanch art, honest and straightforward as a right swing, of "Honest Hearts and Willing Hands," is not to be compared to the romantic yet often superficial "Bowery After Dark," which Mr. Terence McGovern has so ably interpreted, and neither can be compared exactly with the jarring right-cross force of Mr. Jeffries's "Davy Crockett."

As those who observe Mr. Corbett practising his now abandoned profession of pugilism have remarked, he is characteristically lacking in repose of manner. In this, he is distinctly inferior to Mr. J. Lawrence Sullivan. John L.—on the stage—was all repose. Alas for that word was! How those lines, so simply yet so earnestly spoken, ring yet in the ears of old playgoers:

"To hell with the man that strikes a woman!" [Biff!]

In the more delicate and lightsome passages, Corbett's admirers declare he shines supreme; yet, after all, is he as funny as Terry McGovern? Take his delivery of these lines when he is rebuked by the sub-heroine for using too much slang:

"Oh, I'm onto the slang all right, and I'm going to cut it out!"

When the "Blocks" Went Off.

Mr. Corbett's delivery of these lines is certainly humorous, more humorous than he knows; yet has it the genuine comic force of the acting of James Edward Britt, an artist little known to the stage of the Atlantic coast, when, in his drama, "Jimmie Britt the Frisco Boy," he conquers the comic Chinaman in a burlesque boxing bout by slapping him with the end of his pig-tail?

There is considerable dramatic force in Mr. Corbett's delivery of the lines:

"There's my hand, Ned. If you can take it honestly, here goes—if not, you are no pal of mine!"

Yet, after all, would it not be better if, instead of standing on guard when he delivered them, he accompanied them with a side step and a right shift on the solar plexus, as does Terence McGovern when he delivers that famous climax:

"Unhand her, or I'll knock your block off—see?" [Bing!]

Or by a clinch followed by a short-arm jolt and an uppercut, as does Mr. J. John Jeffries in that most intense of all climaxes in the pugilistic drama:

"Carry the woman away? Not while Davy Crockett has a punch up his sleeve!" [Slap! Thud!]

Conscientious and Two-Handed.

To summarize, therefore, Mr. Sullivan was a conscientious, two-handed actor with a great punch; Mr. Terence McGovern and Mr. J. Edward Britt have a clear delivery and a great straight left; Mr. Robert Fitzsimmons—an artist for whose peculiar intensity there has been no room in this brief and necessarily superficial summary—an awkward stage presence, but a fine short-arm jab that has been known to put the villain to sleep six times in one act; Mr. Jeffries, a left hook to the body which always brings home the money, and Mr. Corbett, a comic intensity and great foot work.

A word about the drama which Mr. Corbett had chosen last season. The author of "Pals" violated all conventionalities by failing to have the hero meet the unknown in the last act. He has, however, done one great service to the drama and to an eminent university. Never before has the atmosphere of Harvard been caught for the stage. The first act of "Pals" takes place at Harvard, and presents a haunting picture of college life. From it we learn that the following are characteristic features of life in the great center of learning at Cambridge:

Solar Plexus for College Etiquette.

The 'varsity football captain and the champion hammer-thrower, who are described as the most popular men in college, and so rich that they can't count it, live in a boarding-house, in which the landlady's daughter dusts off the champagne bottles which they keep on the sideboard and is sought as wife by the star boarders.

When the "lady friends" of the inmates come to visit the rooms they go in to dinner arm in arm with the landlady's daughter.

After the 'varsity game with Yale, in which Harvard has scored a great victory, the 'varsity football captain comes back to the boarding-house for dinner, remarking mildly that he is tired, and, after dusting off the sleeves of his jersey, goes in to dinner with the ladies in his football suit.

The freshmen sports wear silk hats and sack suits to the annual Yale-Harvard game.

These shadowings of dear old college scenes brought tears to the eyes of the many Harvard alumni who made part of the brilliant first night assemblage.

Jeffries's Dramatic Recitals.

For weeks Jersey City had looked forward with a pleasurable thrill to the appearance of that eminent artist, J. John Jeffries, in his series of dramatic recitals. The pleasure had not been without a tinge of jealous triumph totally unbefitting the social season; for Jersey City, that modest home of the arts, was the first community on the Atlantic coast to extend to Mr. Jeffries in "Davy Crockett" the welcome which must have been as new wine to the true artist he is.

To what end will not managers go in their sordid and squalid zeal for advertising? Evidences of this tendency flamed on every hoarding in Jersey City; flaunted themselves on every fence. For the managers and press representatives had been attempting to create a false and fatuous interest in this eminent artist by advertising him as champion pugilist of the world.

What does it matter to their art that Forbes Robertson loves canaries, that Edwin Booth was fond of waffles? What does it matter how Mr. Jeffries amuses himself in his leisure hours? Yet in the large and fashionable audience which assembled at the Bijou Theater there were evidently many persons who were drawn by no other motive than a curiosity to see the champion pugilist of the world.

These made their presence felt by ejaculating in Mr. Jeffries's tender yet stalwart love passages:

"Uppercut her, Jim!" Or by crying out at that supreme moment when Mr. Jeffries defied the villain:

"Soak him, kid! Soak him!"

It may be said in defense of Jersey City that not all of this was due to the blindness of her citizens toward great art. Some of it may be laid to the incompetence of the Bijou bouncer.

"Davy Crockett," which this robust and sterling young artist had chosen as the medium of introduction to the stage of New York, is a drama which has not been seen of late on the American boards. Mr. Jeffries brings to it a freshness and a style all his own.

The Heroine is Nifty.

Right here is where the gent who has being doing falsetto pulls off his wig, shows the genuine whiskers, and strikes low G on the bass clef to show that he can do it.

You see, the villain is after the bunch of calico. She's certainly nifty. The villain has staked out his nephew to be her steady company, but the minute she trims her luscious lamps on Crockett, any dub can see that he's her candy kid.

The orchestra rips off a few yards of the "Flower Song," while Jim sinks his voice down to the solar plexus and puts her wise that she's his'n and he's her'n, only it can never be.

But in the next act Davy rescues her from the wolves by putting his biceps against the door while the property man wiggles three stuffed wolf heads through the chinks in the cabin and the gallery helps out on the howls.

But the villain drops in with the deeds that he's forged on her uncle, and Davy is foiled. And the girl has put him wise to young Lochinvar, so in the next act Davy drops in just when they're going to marry the girl.

Jim rolls up his sleeve and holds out his right and the girl hops up on it like a canary on a perch, and it's all over but the foiling of the villain and the marriage in the last act.

The Lady Takes the Count.

The girl was pretty nearly down and out in the second act, and took the count of nine, but by clinching with Davy she managed to stay the act out. Jim's love-making was great. He never bored in so hard that there wasn't room for a breakaway, and any one could see that he was all ready to break the clinch the minute the girl loosed an uppercut.

When Jim crinkled up his forehead and looked on her with a love smile that reached the remotest boundary of his face, he looked just the way he looked at Ruhlin in the third round. But the girl didn't seem to mind. She knew he was only funning, and she cuddled right up to his solar plexus and said:

"I am your Nell, the same saucy Nell that sported among the daisies when we were a little boy and girl together." That statement made Jim look sincere.

It must be confessed that the epilogue was the most successful part of the piece. The epilogue was a more or less rapid three-round go. Mr. Yank Kennedy, an eminent pugilistic artist from California, was advertised as Mr. Jeffries's support in this scene. But the cordial welcome of New Jersey society had proved too much for the artistic temperament of Mr. Kennedy.

Mr. Hennesy of Princeton University was announced by that eminent impresario Mr. Billy Delany as Mr. Kennedy's understudy. Mr. Hennesy's acting was finished in leading and countering, but sadly deficient in guarding and side-stepping. He was entirely overshadowed by the great artist who played opposite him.

At one period of the performance the shadows grew so thick that Mr. Hennesy went down for the count of nine. It was plain, however, from the cordial, if somewhat unsteady, handshake he gave Mr. Jeffries as the curtain fell that Mr. Hennesy harbored no artistic jealousy.