XLVIII How ashamed of themselves Galsworthy and Shaw, Molnar and Brieux, Hauptmann and Wedekind must feel when they read a book on dramatic technique by a member of the Drama League! XLIX The error committed by the critic who, night after night, goes to the theater in an attitude of steadfast seriousness and in such attitude reviews what he beholds therein lies in his confounding of the presentation with the institution. His respectful attitude toward the presentation is, therefore, under current conditions eight times in ten a direct insult to the institution. L THE AMERICAN ADAPTATION _The Plot of the Play, in the Original_: Gaston Beaubien tires of his wife, Gabrielle, and enters into a liaison with his wife’s best friend, Lucienne. _The Plot of the Play, in the Adaptation_: Gaston Beaubien tires of his wife’s best friend, Lucienne, and enters into a liaison with his wife, Gabrielle. LI Brieux--Jeanne d’Arc on a mule. LII WHY DRAMATIZED NOVELS OFTEN FAIL THE HEROINE (_In the book_) “As nineteen-year-old Faith Draycourt stood there, she seemed for all the world like some breathing, living young goddess come down to earth in a chariot of cloud chiffon tinted orange-pink by the setting sun. Her slender body whispered its allure from out the thin folds of silk that, like some fugitive mist, clung about her. Her hair, a tangle of spun copper, fell upon her dimpled shoulders and tumbled off them, a stormy bronze cascade, to the ground. Her eyes, like twin melodies of Saint-Saens imbedded in Bermuda’s blue woodland pools; her voice, soft as the haunt of a distant guitar----.” THE HEROINE (_From the newspaper critique of the play made from the book_) “The role of Faith Draycourt was ably interpreted by that accomplished and experienced actress, ---- ----, who is well remembered by the older generation of theater-goers for her fine performance of _Juliet_ in 1876 at the old Bowery Theater.” LIII An arm-chair beside a reading lamp is the only place for worth-while drama. If you are one of those who seriously contends that such drama should be acted in the theater, that the stage is the place for such work, that it stands a fair chance there, tell me what you think would happen to Hauptmann’s “Weavers” if, in that wonderful climax to the fifth act, the child actress playing Mielchen should accidentally drop her panties, or to “Hannele” if, at a moment of its poignant pathos, a shirt-sleeved Irish scene-shifter were plainly observable in the wings.... Think of Sudermann’s “Princess Far-Away” with a bad cold in her head and an obviously tender corn! LIV We hear much of the difference twixt the quality of London and New York theater audiences. It may be summed up in a single sentence. In London they do not put a chain on the dime-in-the-slot opera-glasses. LV _A Shaw Play._--A moving-picture consisting entirely of explanatory titles. LVI