Alexandra Carlisle (1886-1936)

"MR. SHERIDAN"
By Miss Gladys Unger.
Produced at The Garrick Theatre, London.
Reviewed in Lloyds Weekly News - 10th March, 1907.

In her new play, Mr.Sheridan, dealing with incidents in the life of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, and brought out at the Garrick theatre on Wednesday evening, Miss Gladys Unger carries us back to the period 1795, when the famous, wit was in his 44th year and was manager of Drury Lane theatre. He had been a widower some four years and had then taken to wife Miss Esther Ogle, the daughter of the Dean of Winchester.

It soon appears that Mr. Sheridan is the object of the concealed affection of Esther, whom he has desired to see wedded to his son, who, however, has set his youthful affections on Mrs. Prudence Bundle. Tom Sheridan's love letter to Mrs. Bundle falls into her husband's hands, and when he comes in hot haste to Sheridan's house to demand satisfaction, it is the father, and not the son, who is prepared to give it him. When Esther, who has declared her intention to comply with her mother's wishes and to marry her cousin, the foppish Lord Cray, has interrupted the duel which has been arranged between Bundle and Sheridan, the letter declares his love for her, and an elopement is planned and carried out.

This brings us in the last act to a country inn where Kitty Montmorency, a disappointed actress from Covent Garden, is now mistress. Here Sheridan contrives to bamboozle the sheriff's officers, who have been sent in pursuit of him at the instigation of Lord Cray, and here, having married Esther, he is relieved of his financial embarrassment by the information that his employers haver placed some 15,000l. to his credit.

Mr. Bourchier bore well his responsibilities as Sheridan, and Miss Alexandra Carlisle played very charmingly as Esther Ogle. Miss Nancy Price made quite a hit with the tragic airs of Kitty Montmorency. The new piece had a favourable reception.

"THE MOLLUSC"
By Hubert Henry Davies.
Produced at The Garrick Theatre, New York.
Reviewed in the New York Times - 2nd September, 1908.

WELCOME FOR COYNE AND MISS CARLISLE
In Mr, Davies's Pleasant Comedy, "The Mollusc," at the Garrick Theatre
ENGLISH ACTRESS PLEASES

Mr. Hubert Henry Davies's new play, "The Mollusc," which was enjoyed at the Garrick Theatre last evening, is a sort of wine-jelly comedy, very pleasant and palatable, with just enough tang to make it agreeable to palates that have grown tired of a stronger food. In London where it was produced last season, it was heralded as a sort of little masterpiece. But it appears likely, after last night's performance, that something of the enthusiasm with which it was then greeted must hve been due to the presence in its cast of Sir Charles Wyndham, one of most popular artists on the English stage, and Miss Mary Moore, whose ability in certain lines of comedy is unexcelled.

Here Mr. Joseph Coyne, returning after a long absence and heartily welcomed, has the role played by Sir Charles Wyndham. Mr. Coyne is an excellent comedian, and his work shows steady and gratifying improvement. In this case however, he is not particularly well adapted to his role. He has neither the particular manner nor the facility which the occasion especially demands.

Miss Alexandra Carlisle, a very beautiful Englishwoman, is more happily suited. She has a face for petulancy disguised with cloying sweetness. She has a charming and attractive waywardness that fits the role, and fits it very well.

In a sense Mr. Davies's little comedy is unusual. It's action, which occupies three acts, engages only four characters, and the telling of the story is accomplished with grace and ease and with a very fair share of bright and witty lines. The satire is unmistakable. Pretty little married ladies are going to find it hard to forgive Mr. Davies for showing up their bag of tricks. Mr. Davies has invented a word, and he has found an application. And it is one that tired husbands are likely to find on their lips too often for the comfort of their better halves. Maybe, if things go far enough, the pretty little married ladies, who rule by force of charm and sweetness, will cease to be regarded as the better part. The one phase of molluscry will cease. Mr. Hubert Davies will not have lived in vain.

The mollusc, according to Mr. Davies, is not always the gelatinous thing described in natural histories. You will find them everywhere, he says, especially in places of opulent respectability, where comfort is not necessarily the reward of effort and merit. Molluscry, we are informed, is sort of first cousin to laziness. But being a new and politer word it involves a difference. The lazy person just drifts with the tide. The mollusc uses it's energy to stay just where it is. It lets some other person do the drifting and the moving. Mr. Davies beleives that molluscry is not confined to either sex. However, and for that the men will bless him, he is content to show the female mollusc. Possibly the other specimen is rarer. Be that as it may, Mr. Davies has put the lady mollusc into a play.

She is a Mrs. Baxter, one of those delightful, tantalizing creatures who sit around while others fetch and carry. But she manages the enslavement of all about her with such a pretty air that her selfishness in almost unnoticed. Her husband must listen for her lightest word, but she has no interest in anything that he is doing. The family governess, Miss Roberts, is another slave. And while they are moving heaven and earth to please her - while one rushes here to get her handkercheif and the other there to bring the paperknife, she sits by serenly idle.

Miss Roberts, not being attached legally and morally, as is the husband, finally decides that she will give notice. That would all be very well, but how to give notice to a mollusc? The mollusc hasn't time to hear. Some other day, perhaps, not just now - the mollusc is in no mood to listen. In the meanwhile she thinks of other little thats demand infinite attention - some other person's attention - in this case the attention of the long-suffering Miss Roberts. Then Tom Kemp, Mrs. Baxter's brother, arrives on the scene from Colorado. He tells us what a mollusc is, for he was was once a mollusc too. So were all his family. But he has been in a country where molluscry simply must give way to hustling. And now he decides that he must cure his sister mollusc. Firmness, the affectionate, sensible firmness of a brother, will do it, he thinks. Tom begins on a simpler task, He insists that his sister must bring and arrange the flowers for the drawing room. But the charmingly perverse mollusc is not easily persuaded. Tom ends by getting the flowers himself. He then proposes a picnic in the woods with Miss Roberts and the children. But again smiling obstinacy is victorious.

At this point something unexpected happens. Mrs. Baxter sees the governess in her husband's arms. In reality, as he explains later, the governess's nerves had been suddenly overwrought and she collapsed; he was merely trying to be soothing and sympathetic. Mrs. Baxter has some doubts. But, in any event the brother urges that it is time to get rid of Miss Roberts. To be sure. But not at once. That is not the way with the molluscs. She is going to have an attack of nerves herself, and she must have the governess to look after her while she is ill. Her illness is unnecessarily protracted. In reality nothing is so pleasant to a mollusc as to be well and lie in bed and think that she is ill. Also she is an artful little schemer. With her husband and the governess dancing attendance on her there will be no opportunity for any "carryings on." But, clever as she is, Tom is a bit cleverer. He sees the possibilities of the situation. He gets the husband and the governess out of the room and then pours doubt into his sister's ear. What are the pair up to? The mollusc arises and goes forth to see. Things are not serious. For before she returns Tom has won the governess and the pair are looking forward to a honeymoon in Colorado.

It would be gratifying to record a triumph for Mr. Coyne, for his Danilo in the English production of "The Merry Widow" revealed him as a comedian of greater possibilities than have been indicated hitherto in his work in musical comedy. But in this play he lacks variety and distinction, and his diction needs improving. The honors of the evening go easily to Miss Carlisle. Miss Beatrice Forbes-Robertson plays the role of the governess very charmingly, and Mr. Forbes-Robertson fills in the negative qualities of the mollycoddle husband very satisfactorily.