The Best Plays

The Best Plays

These arc the plays which, in the light of metropolitan criticism, seem most important:

Drama

THEY KNEW WHAT THEY WANTED --California grape vines and chattering Italian dialect are the background for a primitive tragedy of the old husband, the young bride and the handsome man-of-all-work.

WHITE CARGO--Under the Harsh suns of Africa, the morals of men curl up and crack. In this instance, the suns are assisted in no small part by native women.

DESIRE UNDER THE ELMS--The bitter loneliness and granite atmosphere of a New England farmhouse blended by Eugene O'Neill into a gaunt tragedy of infidelity.

THE DOVE -- Mandolin melodrama below the Mexican border in which the smart American outmaneuvers the oily Mexican and wins the girl.

THE WILD DUCK--One of Henrik Ibsen's grim contributions to the world's progress. Proves that idealism is a brutal boomerang.

WHAT PRICE GLORY?--The season's champion in which war is described in terms of mud, wine and oaths instead of the customary medals, music and marriage.

Comedy

THE FALL GUY--In which a small and futile fellow forges suddenly forward into a crook detector and a hero.

Is ZAT So?--Riotous adventures of a couple of pugs (prize fighters) in the hallowed mansions of the rich.

THE FIREBRAND -- Irreverent comment on the methods and manners of old Italian love-making in the days when Benvenuto Cellini was on earth.

THE GORILLA--An obvious tumult in which mystery plays are all rolled together and burlesqued shamelessly.

THE SHOW-OFF--The middle-class American with the empty brain and the restless vocal chords who makes "Good evening" into a political oration.

THE GUARDSMAN--A smooth and scintillating performance of a fluffy theme which proposes that a wife will not know her own husband in a beard and boots.

LOVE FOR LOVE--Restoration ribaldries revived to show that Congreve's report of infidelities and such still has a general application.

THE POOR NUT --College cutups salted with just enough true satire to make them tart and generally diverting.

Musical

In the matters of mirth and music, the following preparations are most confidently prescribed : Rose-Marie, The Student Prince, The Mikado, Ziegfeld Follies, Louie, the 14th; Lady, Be Good.