“It is not from what you emancipate yourself, it is for what.”—Let us see whether the Washington Square Players have really liberated themselves from the Broadway tradition of “getting it over,” from the sacrifice of the artistic for the opportune, and from the fear of offending the generous critics of the New York Press and incidentally a gullible public. “What have they done that has an element of daring, invigorating thought,” was asked of one of the members of the producing staff. “_My Lady’s Honor_, one of last year’s plays,” was his answer. To those who were unfortunate enough to have seen this pseudo-feminist tract—George Broadhurst supplanting Ibsen in a free theatre—I need not tell what resentment that remark aroused. Nor could those who saw _Moondown_ on the same bill be more antagonized than I was when I heard so fatuous a statement as “If we had more plays like _Moondown_ we would establish the equivalent in America to the Celtic renaissance.” Is this “for what” the Washington Square Players have emancipated themselves? Even if _Moondown_ had any value in itself would they deserve any credit for an aspiration that is only a conditional imitation? I take these casual expressions of members of the organization critically because there is a most noticeable absence of persistent, highly individualized effort, because there is a majority rule, the odorlessness of an insipid mixture prevalent in the atmosphere about the Band Box. They are successful—unfortunately. Consider the present bill. Has the play-reading committee shown any distinction that differentiates it from those Broadway theatrical agencies that supply syndicated thrills on demand? Have they not arranged their programme without any regard for balance, to the vaudeville formula in this manner: One curtain-raiser on a current topic—of course the war; one play cut and measured for the star, a misfit, to prepare you for the middle piece, in this instance an amazingly clever satire by Phil Moeller; and then the end-up—(Yes, they have outgrown Broadway; they don’t wave a big American flag as a grand finale number)—in this spirit: “wouldn’t a fancifully pagan thing be very nice to show that we have a conception of the beautiful?” Voilà—the whole is the sum of its parts, mathematically accurate, yes; but “who knows whether two and two don’t make five” in the science of Esthetics, if there is such a thing.