New Plays in Manhattan

Rhapsody in Black. Producer Lew Leslie, who used to put on an annual Blackbirds review with colored chorus girls, funnymen and blackouts, has evidently become very serious about the Negro's part in the art of the theatre. Rhapsody in Black spurns the traditional habiliments of a blackamoor review, presents instead "a symphony in blue notes and black rhythm." That is to say, the show is not very amusing. It is not boring either.

All of the divertissement's activity takes place before a severe black velvet drop. A good band (Pike Davis' Continental Orchestra) is placed onstage and blares forth from time to time as a background for the production's various musical numbers.

You will like Ethel Waters singing "What's Keeping My Prince Charming?" You will encore the inimitable Black Berry Brothers' dancing. You will probably be indifferent to a colored woman named Valaida who dances, needlessly directs the band, sings "The Three Guitars" in Russian.

Her Supporting Cast. There is little need to go further into this vapid comedy after recording that on the inside of the program the title is spelled "her supporting cast." It seems that the girl (Mildred McCoy of It's a Wise Child, is more or less kept by three very dull fellows, each of whom imagines her to be his own true love. One is a banker, another an artist, another a fisticuffer. She milks them all for money, then the stockmarket crash comes, leaving her men broke. But Miss McCoy, being such a smart girl, has invested their money wisely. She brings them all together, gives their money back, goes out of their lives. It is an awful show.

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