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The light effects were not smoothly handled on Monday evening, although the whole lighting up of the boat at the finale made it prettily effective. A searchlight on the upper deck, trained upon the audience and boat during one selection, is a neat idea.
There is some original music by Emil Breitenfeld, pretty in melody for the most part, with a marked exception in "Dreamy Eyes," sung bv Llouwella Smith. Miss Smith is the ideal tanned acrobatic summer girl, but she cannot sing. A singing number is taken from "The Red Mill" and the first part of this can stand betterment
The exterior of a house boat, moored to the dock, is shown and across the stream are other similar summer homes on the water. The scene brings back a loneliness for vacation time. The action takes place on the decks, the time being set at the Fourth of July. A young party, correctly chaperoned, is making a trip, and while anchored is joined by visitors until there are nine all told, five girls and four boys. A lively time is had by the young people, who make good but not overloud fun of one another and sing.
Whoever issued the order that no encores be taken should have a floral wreath. The action was not retarded for a moment. Some time could be taken out, for instance the "speech," which while used for a comedy point, is even too long for that, and the "Dreamy Eyes" song. If a manager wants to have a new entertaining number he must secure "A Night on a House Boat." Louis Hooper staged the production. It is likely to stand as a model vaudeville piece for a very long time.
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Variety 10:1 (10/05/1907)