Theatre Production - After The Girl

It is many a long year since the Gaiety housed a musical comedy company that was not in direct line of succession to those whose names had become theatrical passwords, but with the departure of "The Girl on the Film" and its representatives to New York it became Mr. George Edwardes' business to make good their absence with other artists of established reputations. This has been very successfully accomplished and so it is that we see Lew Hearn and Bonita, Muriel Hudson and Clifton Crawford, (all from the "other side"), Miss Isobel Elsom, a charming debutante, Mr. William Stephens, a quaint comedian, Mr. W. Volpe, an actor of tried work, and Miss Mabel Sealby and Mlle. Caumont, who have both served with distinction under the Edwardian banner.

Mr. Paul A. Rubens has done yeoman's work in providing both the libretto and music, and in assisting Mr. Percy Greenbank with the lyrics. The chase after the naughty school-girl enables Mr. Rubens to almost circumvent the European continent, to the great delight, I am sure, of the scenic artists - Messrs. T. E. Ryan, A. Craven, A. Terraine and J. and Phil. Harker, who have provided beautiful and realistic scenes of the Paris Bois, the Belgian Frontier, the Market Place, Amsterdam, the blue Danube and its palaces, the exterior of a Berlin Variety Theatre, and the dining room and palm court of the Carlton Hotel, Haymarket. It is a wonderful scenic scheme, and it provides the eyes with a series of charming and piquant pictures, to say nothing of the scope it gives the costumier and the milliner, and the opportunities it affords that masterly "producer" Mr. J. A. E. Malone.

PRESS REVIEW

(Lloyds Weekly News [London, UK] - 8th February, 1914)
"REVUSICAL COMEDY" AT THE GAIETY - Novelty Warmly Received by Old Patrons Last Night.
"AFTER THE GIRL" - Charming Young Heroine of Nineteen Scores Marked Success.

A spontaneous success was scored by Miss Isobel Elsom, the nineteen-year-old actress who appeared as the heroine last night in the Gaiety production of Mr. Paul Rubens's "revusical comedy" (the author's own description), "After the Girl." The possessor of a small but vastly pleasing voice, the newcomer is a delightfully graceful dancer, and her beauty is of that sugary sort, which means much to our dealers in picture postcards.

"After the Girl" is so typical of the Gaiety that it is not easy to see why Mr. Rubens should have gone to the trouble of coining for its definition a word which suggests a mixture of revue and musical comedy. In the plots of the Gaiety pieces the people concerned have always been after something. Once they sought a tulip, more than once they sought a precious stone, and now, after seeking other things besides those mentioned, they are after the girl.

The girl is Doris (Miss Elsom), daughter of the eccentric Cincinnati manufacturer, Mr. Pitt (Mr. Lew Hearn), and everybody's after her - a young man, of course, into the bargain - because, instead of going back to her boarding school, as she had been told to do by her comic little father, she makes a tour of foreign lands with her maid-companion and another girl, and thus greatly helps the "scheme' of the Gaiety's staff of no fewer than five scene-painters by dragging the various characters over the Belgian frontier, leading them into the market place at Amsterdam, drawing them on to Buda-Pesth, enticing them to the summer gardens in Berlin, and landing them finally at the Carlton Hotel in London. Misunderstandings as to identity on behalf of the Hungarian police provide useful work for the comedians, while the constant change of locality opens up a fine field of exercise for the talents of the costumers, who are deserving of much praise for some admirable designs. Indeed, it may be said without hesitation that "After the Girl" is the best-dressed Gaiety "Girl" we have yet been incited to admire.

Another feature typical of tihe Gaiety is Mr. William Stephens's Edmund-Payne-like Bill Dabsley, the ex-Covent Garden porter who acts as servant to the hero, Freddy Charlston, a part played on Joseph Coyne lines by Mr. Clifton Crawford; and still another is the Hon. Eddie Stone, a "nut" impersonated with mild competency by "Mr. W. Cecil," otherwise Mr. Randall William Gascoigne-Cecil, a grandson of the late Marquis of Salisbury, and a' nephew of the present peer, and of Lord Robert and Lord Hugh Cecil. Thus the vacancy made by the departure of Lord Dangan from the Gaiety for an aristocratic stage aspirant is adequately filled.

Among last nights musical numbers the favourites were Miss Elsom's "Merely Walk Right on," which ended in a dainty dance performed lightly even in clogs; an ingenious and tuneful song on '"Ampstead and Amsterdam," given by Mr. William Stephens; a charming duet by Miss Elsom and Mr. Crawford, "If someone meets us"; and a quaint trio for Mr. Crawford, Mr. Lew Hearn, and Mr. Stevens. Mr. Paul Rubens has probably never written so many numbers of quaint and original melody as those which delighted last night's enthusiastic audience.

The story is concerned chiefly with the adventures of Doris Pitt, the daughter of a Cincinnatti millionaire, who has just completed her education in Brussels and has come to Paris to meet her father and stepmother. At Amiens, however, she encounters Freddy Charlston, a young man who has done a little bit of everything, and with the frankness of youth she asks him to meet her parents at lunch.

Mr. Pitt is furious at this breach of decorum, but does not know that the young man to whom he has taken such a fancy is the hero of the Amiens episode, or probably he would not have been so vehement in his determination to give "the fellow a darned good hiding." But the worst is to come. It is determined to send Doris back to school to learn restraint and better manners, but the young lady has a will of her own, and instead of going to Brussels she takes tickets for herself and Emma, her maid, to Amsterdam, where lives a Dutch school-friend. As she is leaving she sends a message to her parents of her refusal to go back to school, and then the search begins - Doris must be found.

They trace her to Amsterdam and when the scent grows hot, Doris hurries off to Buda-Pesth, where she has a Hungarian school-friend, and thence on to Berlin, to make her appearance as a variety artist at the Summer Palace. Here she only escapes capture through Mr. Pitt being hauled up in a basket to the window of her dressing room, while she and Emma, with the assistance of Freddy, leave by the stage door. Then every one turns up at the Carlton, and there is a merry night at Mr. Pitt's New Year supper party.

It is not difficult to see at the first glance, that Lucile's artistic touch has been at work in the lovely colour schemes of the original and delightful frocks worn in "After the Girl" at the Gaiety Theatre.

In the first act Mdlle. Caumont wears a very charming gown of palest grey marquisette over white lace; the bodice of the same tone of chiffon with black belt. This gown is so artistically draped and arranged that it gives added height to Mdlle. Caumont, and seems to decrease the fulness of her figure. Very dainty, too, is the Royal blue accordion-pleated satin dress of Miss Mabel Sealby, the lively maid-companion, Emma. The bodice is of the cross-over type with the new long white lawn roll collar that finishes at the waist.

Miss Isobel Elsom's travelling costume is composed of white charmeuse. The dress itself is draped as only "Lucile" can drape, and has a novel narrow stole effect in front, that controls the graceful folds of the drapery from the waist, and half way down the skirt. This stole has Wedgwood blue and white buttons set rather close together, and the cufs and belt are of Wedgewood blue velvet. The travelling coat worn with this is also of white charmeuse, in the long straight shape with low down belt and large buckle of Wedgewood blue velvet; the same tone is carried out in the collar, cuffs and buttons.

In the third scene, Doris wears a pretty and simple frock of saxe blue voile with lawn collar, very charmingly draped in tunic form, showing a lace underskirt, and her companion Emma - Miss Mabel Sealby looks delightfully fresh and fascinating in a pretty frock of old rose crepe voile, coatee effect in the corsage and the white lawn collar turned back. Mdlle. Caumont, too, in this scene is resplendent in orchid satin. This is swathed round the figure and held in position by bands of velvet in a deeper tone, with velvet collar and cuffs. With this is worn a deep violet tulle hat with violet feathers.

Some of the gowns, too, worn by the frequenters of the Bois, in the first scene are very picturesque. Amongst these, also made by Lucile, ius a Romney picture dress in green shot taffeta, caught up with white flowers, and with green velvet at the waist. Miss Jarvis as Betty, Doris' Dutch friend, looks well in a quaint dress of yellow satin and blue chiffon fashionable tunic, giving a onesided effect that is most original. Mdme. Bonita, as Bijou, has a lovely old-gold brocaded gown, with touches of orange ninon and the corsage in a paler shade of tulle.

Miss Elsom, in the second act, wears a most graceful dress of white charmeuse, with the three-tier tunic of white tulle, each tier being edged with a double piping of silver and green, setting out the tunics as if they were wired. At the waist two shades of green form the ceinure. The corsage and sleeves correspond and the underskirt is of silver lace.

Mdlle. Caumont in this act also is magnificent in rose velvet-brocaded ninon, the bodice of the same tone of chiffon, brocaded with diamonds, the belt in green and pink shades. Another handsome gown worn by Mdme. Bonita was in sapphire blue satin, with gold embroidery and edged brown fur.

The Dutch costumes were pretty and the Hungarian costumes picturesque in the extreme. Altogether this, the latest production of Mr. George Edwardes, gives us an insight into the national costumes of more than one of the continental cities, that form a very pleasing and bright contrast.