Old Play in Manhattan

The Green Bay Tree (by Mordaunt Shairp; produced by Shepard Traube) seemed a better play 17 years ago, and unquestionably received a better production. It is still a reasonably interesting theater piece; it still provides a brittle, glassy surface for certain emotions to skate over if no longer cut beneath.

In the new production, it is rather a sybaritic than a homosexual Mr. Dulcimer who has brought up his adopted son Julian to have the most expensive tastes and play a purely decorative role. Then at 23 Julian falls in love. Mr. Dulcimer can only counter by saying that marriage means being cut off without a button. Love, with a spineless young man who hates work, proves no match against luxury. At the end, Julian has not only inherited his guardian's money, but has adopted his fastidious ways.

The end is pat, as the whole play is perhaps too prettily made. Psychologically. The Green Bay Tree doesn't always hold water; but that is not terribly vital, since it was meant to be filled with Pernod. Playwright Shairp clearly sought to develop an unnatural situation as much on a basis of tone as of truth. As currently produced, it offers less than it might of either. Denholm Elliott sufficiently captures Julian's wishy-washy charm. But Joseph Schildkraut reduces Mr. Dulcimer to a mere fussy epicure; and such is Schildkraut's own personality that he comes off rather more a continental bon vivant.

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