New Play in Manhattan

A Passenger to Bali (by Ellis St. Joseph) is a symbolical melodrama. It concerns a scoundrelly demagogue, "a dictator in search of a country" (Walter Huston), who gets on a tramp steamer and then can't be got off, since not even the scurviest hellholes of Asia will let him land. He gets the crew rum-soaked and rebellious, but the captain, though driven desperate, is too law-abiding to toss his vicious passenger overboard. Finally, as the ship starts sinking, the captain shoots him.

As melodrama, the play has exciting moments. As symbolism, it makes its point well enough: Fascism and lawlessness cannot be destroyed through appeasement and law; they must be destroyed through force. But the play suffers badly from the prime weakness of symbolism and melodrama alike: a want of reality. There are a lot of people aboard the Roundabout, but not one of them talks, acts, or meets his Maker like a human being.

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