Bruce Morgan and Franklyn Gates, showmen of the first water, proved the laughing and applaud hit of the bill. Morgan is an ideal straight man and a wonderful dancer, while Franklyn Gates is a comic who relies on lines and facial expressions to put him over. The boys look like a two-dollar show. They sing and dance and convulse the audience with their talk. They are doing a new encore since last being seen here, and then they found it flopping they made a switch to their old bit which proved sure-fire.
Bob and Peggy Valentine disappointed, refusing to go on No. 2, and Nell O’Connell was substituted. Nell must have been filled in at the very last minute, as her clothes seemed to need pressing and her voice had a peculiar rasping sound. She sang three numbers and closed with “Buddha” coming back for an encore with an Irish ditty. She just didn’t. And the little applause she did get was of the sympathetic nature.
Margaret Taylor opened, hurting herself with a song in “one” to start off the bill. Singing is not her forte. Being programmed as a wire walker further prejudiced her essay at a jazz ditty, and following Sophie Tucker in with the same number, Miss Tucker being probably the world’s foremost delineator of the type of creation, killed it altogether. When she got on the wire she did nicely, going to a split for a finish and a light hand.
Marie Nordstrom makes her bow as a headliner. Topping, single-handed, the majestic Majestic, Miss Nordstrom caused some lifting of eyebrows. She is not especially well known here, having played as a single now and then without causing unusual comment or arousing marked attention. When she came on Monday evening she got not one tap of recognition. “Tick, Tock,” the act which was extensively reviewed as new in the East, is not new here. Miss Nordstrom did all of it last year except the finishing number, the one in which she dies in the dressing room after doing a dance “with a leaking heart.” She also stages her Jap and luncheon numbers in pony sets within a cyclorama.
She got goodly appreciation, as becomes a splendid little artist, but failed to qualify as a draw or star. Five empty rows on the main floor on a Monday in perfect fall weather told the story. Miss Nordstrom is an attractive young woman, a keen impersonator of types (except Japanese) and a first class vaudeville single. But the responsibility imposed on her seems to call for more “weight.”
The DeWolf Girls, who swept the State-Lake a couple of weeks ago, all but perished here. The changes were neat and becoming and they jockeyed like experts for the bows and hands, but it was a bust. They had to throw in their regular encore number gratis, and not by request.
Mullen and Corelli quaint tumblers and jesters, were not so much hurt by the early No. 2 position as the extraordinary apathy of the house, which muffed many a nifty. These men are satirists and in the main they are subtle and fast. Perhaps if they worked in character instead of in Tuxes they might be able to point their wheezes better. They deserved far more than they reaped, as vaudeville merit goes.
Texas and Walker opened, a rope spinner and a girl. On pretty late because of the two pictures this team had a better chance than usually fails to the ice breaker. They worked in “one,” and got almost nothing until a whirlwind rope jump at the end which got the finish a hand for a bow.
It is a matter of opinion as to whether William Gaston and Co.,. or Johnny Burke were the laughing hit of the bill. Both acts scored big. Gaston in a playlet written by Rupert Hughes gave the audience a bit of what they want. He works very hard and puts it over, being ably assisted by Rosalie Mathieu, Betty Davis, James Hester and Jack Pierce.
Lou Reed and All Tucker were placed in a bad position on the bill, but, nevertheless, these two “cut-ups” mopped up with their clever showmen and were forced to play an encore.
The house was packed by the Labor Day holiday crowd, and the bill started off the Eary and Eary in a “whirlwind novelty” routine, in which they use iron hoops and pull themselves through them. The act received rounds of applause.
