Beatrice Forbes-Robertson (1883-1967)

"SATURDAY TO MONDAY"
Comedy by Frederick Fenn and Richard Pryce.
Produced at The St. James's Theatre - Opening 14th April, 1904
Review from Black and White - 23rd April, 1904.

Seekers for a moral in Mr. George Alexander's production, Saturday to Monday, will decide that if you invite people to spend a week-end at your country cottage, it is wisest to name a definite date; otherwise you will find inconvenient people arriving and breaking in a delightful tete-a-tete. Still if the visitors had not come to Mrs. Wendover's cottage at Thames Filton on a Saturday when no one but Lord Culvert of Alcester was expected, there might have been no play; for Mrs. Wendover would not have learnt that as Agatha did not love Lord Culvert, she might accept him without fear of conscience. Agatha, by the way, is one of the most disingenuous but charming young people it has been our fortune to meet for a long time, on the stage or off; and as played by Miss Beatrice Forbes-Robertson, she quite takes one's heart, and makes one envy the sandwich-eating Probyn Dyke (Mr. Vane-Tempest has a gift for eating sandwiches on the stage, which tends to make us forget his other abilities).

Still, Lord Culvert does not care for Agatha, but he does care for Mrs. Wendover, and these two couples are properly sorted out at the close. But Lady Diana Porchester (Agatha's mother), Miss Toop, the curate's sister, and her friend, Miss Skeat, are disappointed; for they believed Lord Culvert was proposing to them in real earnest when he was only doing what Mrs. Wendover "dared" him to undertake. And putting them off by saying it was on Probyn Dyke's behalf and not on his own only led them to the "backwater where the lilies grow," and to disillusion. "Saturday to Monday" is a merry farce, which is spoiled only by the touch of bad manners in Lord Culvert's behaviour to these three ladies; Miss Lilian Braithwaite seems unable to adopt the attitude of farce, but nothing better could be desired than the portraiture of the two ladies (Miss Ursula Toop and Miss Skeat, her friend) by Miss Frances Wetherall and Miss Alice Beet. Messrs. Fred Fenn and Richard Pryce have also provided good opportunities for Mr. Hignett and Mr. E. Vivian Reynolds as the Rev. Lemuel Toop, the curate of Thames Filton, and Mr. Stanley Pidding, an elderly society idiot. Mr. Alexander reverts to his earlier manner, but has not regained all the qualities which made his Dr. Bill so amusing, and, of course, Saturday to Monday is not on the same plane as The Importance of Being Earnest.