Best Plays in Manhattan

SERIOUS

PORGY--Black Magic applied to the doings of Negro fishmongers (TIME, Oct. 24).

COQUETTE--Helen Hayes as the favorite who makes a fine finish in a small-town tragedy (TIME, Nov. 21).

STRANGE INTERLUDE--Judith Anderson replacing Lynn Fontanne in Eugene O'Neill's lengthy and provocative biography of a lonely lady (TIME, Feb. 13).

MELODRAMA

THE TRIAL OF MARY DUGAN--In which a chorus girl's brother is compelled to demolish her reputation in order to save her life (TIME, Oct. 3).

THE SILENT HOUSE--Those charming poisons, administered by an expert Oriental (TIME, Feb. 20).

DIAMOND LIL--A sight-seeing tour of the old Bowery, with Mae West as the principal attraction (TIME, April 23).

FUNNY

BURLESQUE--Hal Skelly and Barbara Stanwyck still exploiting the sorry splendor of backstage love (TIME, Sept. 12).

PARIS BOUND--What nice people do when divorce threatens (TIME, Jan. 9).

THE ROYAL FAMILY--Entertaining glimpses at the family life of our foremost stage stars (TIME, Jan. 9).

THE BACHELOR FATHER--June Walker making bastardy a fit subject for drawing-room conversation (TIME, March 12).

VOLPONE--The Theatre Guild's riotous revision of Ben Jonson's farce, whose central figure is notable for his lecherous rapacity (TIME, April 23).

MUSICAL

Hot-weather friends: Good News, A Connecticut Yankee, Show Boat, Rain or Shine, The Greenwich Village Follies, Blackbirds of 1928, George White's Scandals.