The Theatre: The Best Plays: Apr. 21, 1924

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These are the plays which, in the light of metropolitan criticism, seem most important:

Drama

OUTWARD BOUND—A moving, plausible introduction to the Hereafter, letting the deceased down easy.

RAIN—The old, old story of Thais and the monk, done in the best style.

THE OUTSIDER—Lionel Atwill and Katherine Cornell in a somewhat tricky play of a medical charlatan fighting conservatism.

SUN-UP—Carolina mountaineers in grip of the World War, and not liking it any more than the folks who wore collars.

TARNISH—The philosophies of sacred and profane love and their application to the modern youth.

SAINT JOAN—Bernard Shaw showing that he can be serious, though it takes a saint to move him.

THE MIRACLE—Religion dressed up in its Sunday best and looking like $1,000,000.

HELL-BENT FER HEAVEN—A naturalistic study of Kentucky mountaineers giving hypocritical virtue its own reward.

Comedy

FATA MORGANA—A sly, artful satire of a married woman who would have her fling for one night, and a country youth who took love too seriously.

BEGGAR ON HORSEBACK—Brilliant fantasy of the eternal struggle between art and commercialism.

THE SHOW-OFF—A comedy redolent of life, dealing with a bounder whose nerve borders on genius.

THE GOOSE HANGS HIGH—A fairly adequate picture of the American household living up to the best in itself as soon as father cries "Wolf!"

CYRANO DE BERGERAC—Walter Hampden in a superb performance of this French classic which puts to rout the adage about all being fair in love and war.

THE SWAN—Royalty and morganatic love are mixed like gunpowder and jam.

THE POTTERS—A salty, amusing picture of an American family being saved from its own priceless mutton-headed ways.

THE NERVOUS WRECK—Still pretending that the West is a place where weaklings are shot on sight, but getting good laughs for all its papier maché plot.

Musical

The musical comedy complex can be fostered by feasting on Poppy, Stepping Stones, Music Box Revue, Ziegfeld Follies, Mary Jane McKane, Runnin' Wild, Chariot's Revue, Kid Boots, Sweet Little Devil.