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The setting is an altogether too faithful representation—not of a rathskeller as the respectable public knows or imagines it—but of a "free and easy" situated on a thoroughfare where the morals are notoriously loose. To watch what are known as "women of the street" stroll into a sitting room where liquor is sold and men congregate-to either see the "sights" or the women is not edifying, educational or necessary in vaudeville; particularly the vaudeville of today.
It is not entertaining, but rather an exPose of a disorderly house. "A Night in a Rathskeller" has been well put on by Mike Simons, so well there is no hope for it. It will never, never do. Hammerstein's may stand the piece; there is no other decent house which can. The coarseness may be eliminated, gentle instead of vicious characters introduced, the "conversational song" dropped, but the unclean atmosphere will remain.
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Variety 8:4 (08/24/1907)