May Yohe (1869-1938)

"Nitouche"
A musical play from the French
Produced at the Court Theatre, London.
Reviewed in the Daily Mail [London, UK] - 2nd June, 1896

MISS MAY YOHE'S REAPPEARANCE

The sun came to a standstill for Joshua, it is understood. Well, he seems no less obliging for Miss May Yohe. Precisely three summers have passed over the saucy locks of waggish Mam'zelle Nitouche sincs last she frolicked among us - at the (then) Trafalgar Theatre - and most of us, in consequence, are precisely three years graver, greyer, and less young. Not so Miss Yohe. She is, if anything, livelier, droller and more radiant than of yore. For this the Court management and ite patrons . have reason to be thankful. Art always plays a very subordinate part in such a production as "Nitouche." Nature has the "lead," and when Nature has so bountifully bestowed her riches on charm and beauty and humour as in Miss Yohe's case, a play of this paltry kind may be permitted to pass muster.

Without Miss Yohe "Nitouche " would be quite a cariosity, even in "musical comedy." For comedians who are everything but comic, singers who cannot act, and actors who cannot sing buttressed by much horseplay and more expletives, furnish but little amusement, to any but the noisy friends of such incapables. Mr. Robert Pateman and Mr. Arthur Playfair must be specially excluded from this censure. Here are gentlemen of humorous invention, clever and tactful in everything they do. The fire-eating Major of the one, and the mincing mass of effeminacy most comically reproduced by the other, were to be hailed as acting - where what generally won the heartiest applause was paroxysmal imitation of Mr. Arthur Roberts or mere swaggering conceit.

At the best the play is woefully thin; with it's disconnected threads of plot, its penny-a-line libretto, and music-hall wit. But in this revival it wears more starved look than usual. Mr. Frank Wyatt is a sad loss, and Miss Florence Levey lacks weighty force, and dramatic instinct for the part of the capricious diva, which she lightly dances through. Still, there is compensation for all in the delightful presence, the merry acting, and the melodious singing of Miss Yohe. Moreover, there is plenty of colour in rich dresses and simple but pretty scenes.

So, presumably "Nitouche" will enjoy another spell of favour. But to make sure of this, Miss Yohe should bespeak the good offices of her at present too ardent friend the Sun.

A. A. B.

MISS MAY YOHE'S DRESSES

Miss May Yohe comes back to us in the guise of a demure little convent girl, with a short skirted grey frock, transparent muslin sleeves, and the most coquettish of white aprons and lace-edged collars. But where, oh where, did she manage, to obtain within the convent walls those voluminous lace underskirts which are so fully displayed later in the first act, when demure propriety gives place to madcap merriment?

Afterwards, she arrives in the green room of the "Pontarcy Theatre," in a terra-cotta pelisse, falling in straight folds from the gathered yoke, her piquant face framed by a Leghorn hat wreathed round with dog-roses and trimmed with rosettes of black velvet. She looks a veritable child among the gaily attired artistes who crowd around - some in daring costumes of green silk and velvet embroidered with marguerites, others representing pansies in shaded mauve silk and velvet glittering with an embroidery of silver, and a design of the chosen flowers, while others again have chosen various shades of pink satin, wreathed with roses, their powdered hair crowned by huge rose-trimmed hats.

Then there is Corinne (otherwise Miss Florence Levey), in gauzy draperies of a tender green, which melts into pink, and which are all glittering with a shower of gold sequins, while clusters and trails of delicate mauve convolvulus are twined round the lithe, graceful figure, and crown the fair hair; but when Corinne has-departed in wrath, Nitouche treats us to a vision of another lovely costume, and the little schoolgirl is lost in "the fair Parisienne," clothed in filmy yellow gauze, which is sewn thickly with gold sequins and crystals, and held in at the waist by a sash of golden yellow satin, embroidered and fringed with crystals.

Finally we have her in a French bugler's costume, with peaked cap, drab military cloak, and scarlet breeches, which give place to high riding boots - those same boots which so nearly betray her on her return to the convent - and this is undoubtedly the costume which best becomes Miss May Yohe.

PHOEBE.