II, Theaterstücke 5, Liebelei. Schauspiel in drei Akten, Seite 862

Liebelei
box 11/4
5. 1
ADÖLF SCHUSTERMANN
ZEITUNGSNACHRICHTEN-BUREAU
BERLIN SG. 16, RUNGE-STRASSE 25/27.
Zenung. Weser-Zeitung
Adresse: Bremen
Datum:
=Aiüist, Wissenschaft und Literatur.
—„Liebelei“ in London. G. Valentin Willi¬
Ams hat, wie dem Verl. Tagebl. berichtet wibd,
dig #g¬
Arthur Schüers „Liebglei“
lische Bühne Beghekund Rige Adersehichg wird
„Light
in London ahn 14. Mi unter dem
tre“, das in
o'Love“ im sogenannten Asternoon
#re unterge¬
Beerbohm Trecs His Majestys
bracht ist, zur Aufführung gelangen. — Das Aster¬
noon Theo“; wurde im vorigen Herbst gegründet
und nimmt die Stelle eines bekanntlich in London
bisher sehlenden Repertoire=Theaters ein.
stellt sich die Aufgabe, Werke hervorragender eng¬
lischer und ausländischer Bühnenschriftsteller aufzu¬
Fführen und hat sich mit der Inszenierung von
„Liebelei“ das Verdienst erworben, die erste öffent¬
liche Aufführung Arthur Schnitzlers auf Englischi
zustande zu bringen. De Afternoon Theatre
gelungenen Vor¬
wurde seinerzeit mit einer
stellung von Gerhart Hauptmanns „Hannele“ ein¬
geweiht, und seitdem sind unter anderem „The Ad¬
mirable Bashville“ von Bernard Shaw, „The High
Bid“ von dem Amerikaner Henry James und „The
Sonls Fight“ von Louis Tiercelin über die Bretter
gegangen. Sein Programm für die jetzt beginnende
Londoner Saison ist ganz besonders interessant.
Augenblicklich wird Ibsens „Ein Volksfeind“ (An
Enemy of the People) von William Archer übersetzt,
mit Veerbohm Tree als Dr. Stockmann, gegeben.
Ihm folgen am 14. Mai „Liaht o'Love“ und am
4. Juni ein neues Stück von Bernard Shaw „The
Sbewing Up of Blanco Posnet“. (Die Entlarvung,
von Blanco Posuet), vom Autor als „Eine Predigt
in Melodramen“ bezeichnet. Wie übrigens der Name
des Theaters besagt, finden Vorstellungen nur
#nssmitt#ns statt; und zwar dreimal in der Woche.)
de Intees
zDAT, MAT 15, 1909.
THE AFTERNOON THEATRE.
* LIGHT O‘ LOVE.“
(Liebelei) by Aurnun Scharrzzen.
Translated by G. VALENTINE WILLIAMS.
Mr. HENRY AINLEV
Fritz Lobheimer
Mr. H. R. Ilioymrr
Hans Welring
Mr. CHARLES MAUDE
Theodor Kaiser
Mr. JAMES HEARN
A Gentleman
Miss Manoauer HALSTAN
Christine
Miss MAnoAkEr Busst
Mizt Schlager
Miss HErrv KENYON
Lina
.Miss SyDNEY FAIRBROTHER
Katherine Binder
This play, which, as we understand, is very success¬
ful in Austria and Germany, has a simple story.
Fritz Lobheimer, an oflicer in an Austrian Dragoon
Fregiment, has been carrying on an intrigue with a
married woman, and another at the same time with
Christine, the daughter of old Hans Weiring, a
violinist in a theatre erchestra. The husband of
the married woman challenges him and kills him;
and Christine, on learning the news, rushes out in
despair, to commit, as we are led to believe, suicide.
That is the skeleton—simple, and strong enough to
bear a body of genuine tragedy. Towards clothing
it with genuine tragedy the author has gone a good
way. We learn very early in the play that Christine
is not, like her friend Mizi Schlager, a mere light¬
o%-love, despising all men, but equally ready to take
any lover she can get and to bid him a cheerful
good-bye when she can keep him no longer. Christine
takes theaffair very serlously. She has in her a pretty
strong dose of the will to keep. Fritz is her first
lover—for hitherto she has been quite respectable—1
and he will be her last. Fritz looks at the matter
in atotally different light. Even abthe merry supper¬
party in the first act his head is at least as full of
the married woman as of Christine. And after that
party (Fritz is entertaining his friend Theodor Kaiser
and Theodor’s“ friend'' Mizi, and Christine, and they
have been drinking Bruderschaft and doing all sorts
Tof amusing Austrian things) has been interrupted by#
the enraged husband with his challenge, he bas, of
course, an additional reason for insisting to Christine
that this sort of thing is only temporary. It
is all no use. The will to keep in Christine is only
Intensifled in the sccond act by Fritz's very chartning“
way of saying what he knows, but Christine docs not
know, to be probably a last farewell, vowing (whatt#
was doubtless true at the moment) that he really didt
love her. And so it happens that in the third act,#
when the news is brought to the girl that her lover is
not enly dead, but has been shot in a duel about
another woman, she is driven practically mad by herg
loss.
Madness, it has been said, is only exnggeratedl
selfishness. It may be so; in any case the
madness—that is, the character—of Christine is just
what, in our opinion, has prevented this play from##
becoming a genuine tragedy. It has affected it in
two ways. The first, and least important, is this!
Christine has been, all along, a negative person.)
She appeared to have only one positive quality—.
that pretty strong dose of the will to keep. And so,
when tbis negative, inarticulate creature suddenly;
breaks into eloquence and pours out, disjointedly;
but with acute point, rage and scorn and grief, wen
feel that this is not Christine herself speaking, but
the author. The girl herself—at any rate, as we saw
her yesterday—mighr feel these things dimly, but
she never could say them. It is the author who feels
ichem acutely for her, and uses her inappropriate
mouth for theexpression of them. A more important.
matter is this, that we see in Christine no trace of!
Pregret for the man who is dead. Nota single“ Poor
Fritz!“ passes her lips. It is herself she is thinking
Tof, the slight put upon her by the intrigue with the
other woman, the fact that Fritz on bis way to thef
duel talked to Theodor of other people and things
1 besides herself; and these are the subject of her
ontburst. So Christine sbrivels under our cyes.
Her sorrow is only an intensification of that
worriting“ to which we had scen her subject her
lover before; and tragedz is not made of women like
this.
Still, the play is a sincere, artfully-constructed,
and occasionally moving piece of work; and it is
admirably acted under the superintendence of Herr
Max Behrend. We suspect that Fritz was intenden
mnore of a“ gay dog