Mann Trio, three boys with good voices, lots of vim and vigor, sang several popular numbers, their high spots being “Si Si Si Si Senor” and “Chili Bean,” putting these other [sic] with their original way of putting harmony songs over, prove themselves a worthy asset on any small-time bill and can make a good showing on the two-a-day.
Rosa Valyda, with her unusual deep voice, sang several selections, mostly ballads. The act seemed to drag, and Miss Valyda can do a better performance by far; but perhaps this is due to the fact that it was still morning and she might have been sleepy. They seemed to like her more, but she walked off, failing to come back even for a bow.
Mons. Herbert opened the bill in “two” with a table set for dinner, this being his musical paraphernalia in disguise. These instruments have the bell sound and far from being the sweetest music, but Monsieur works hard and gets by with a good hand.
Princess Radjah and Co. followed, and danced her way around the audience and into their hearts, making way for Frank Gaby, who stopped the show. He opens as a photographer and gets a lot of comedy out of this bit, also impersonating an English lord and doing his specialty, the ventriloquial bit. His accomplished mannerisms of putting this original stuff over proves him a showman of high grade.
Everest’s humorous and famous monkeys closed, suffering badly through the exodus already begun and reaching the proportions of a stampede before the curtain rose on the final offering. The turn worked neatly and fluently to the ingratitude of receding backs.
Rekoma opened, a gentlemanly athlete in a series of rapid stunts, equilibriums and leaps. This turn did not go by the boards, as most icebreakers do, but went warmly with those who came promptly.
Miss Tucker, the ambitious and aggressive girl who is forging new history in these parts in vaudeville and café work, issued an entirely changed program since last week at the same stand. Her “Kid from Madrid,” which she made a household gag at Reisenweber’s, kicked over a bang with a comedy Spanish tambo dance to close. Her baby-spot ballad was “Rockaby Lullaby” and she eased in a novelty in a “Floradora” sextet number, in which she wore the famous garb of that collection of historic vamps of a generation ago. She was driven to an encore and a speech – two speeches – and a third.
James H. Cullen, the beloved Jim who has played this section since many nowadays fathers were children, ambled on quietly, as always, and got a noisy hello. Cullen is as annual as Winter and a whole lot pleasanter. His boyish, innocent face conceals behind it the subtle mobility of the royal jester, the suave and unctuous wit. Jim said many a deep, wise crack off the tip of his smooth and ready tongue. One about Mary Garden was a classic. He could have remained for supper and keep the guests intact.
This without the next-to-closing turn in the running and Nellie V. Nichols, tried and sterling performer, running below her grade. Miss Nichols followed two singing acts, but since there were six in a row almost every one did. Miss Nichols, however, followed several hundred, using material which in the main was trite and frazzled with wear.
At this day, in Chicago, a routine containing “Portuguese,” Moving Picture Ball,” “Wait Till You See,” and “Rose of Washington Square,” is handing out a lot of vets. In addition she did a special called “Don’t Let the Same Bee Sting You Twice” and a brief one incorporating the old gag about the Sunday school teacher talking about her twenty-one children and the stranger asking what part of Ireland her husband came from. She also did a Wop, in which Tony rhymed with macaroni and was from San Antonio. Miss Nichols holds an honored and established position in vaudeville; like an ambassador to a foreign capital, she should “support the position as befits.” She needs true, honest character songs and is big enough to have her own, with a popular one here and there, perhaps. If she does not want exclusive ones she might keep refreshing the ones she does want. She did not “go” as an artist of her caliber should.
Oscar Loraine, with his fiddle, had them eating out of his hands when he stepped out, and before he was through they were howling. When he uncovered his plant in the box he proved a knock-out. And how that plant can sing, though she could do away with that shimmying with credit to herself and the act.
