References

• The Luck of the Navy Age (Melbourne, Vic. : 1854 - 1954), Monday 18 June 1928, page 10 ________________________________________ THE LUCK OF THE NAVY. War-Time Play, at Athenaeum. The Luck of the Navy, a war-time play of three acts which scored successes in London, Canada and South Africa, was produced at the Athenaeum Theatre by Mr. Percy Hutchison and his company on Saturday evening. Only a short Melbourne season of this play is contemplated, the actor-manager referring to it at the close of the first-night production as the fourth and final play to lie presented by him here. If this exciting comedy, which develops in the last act into bustling melodrama can be accepted as an exaggerated version of a true condition of affairs between 1014 and 1018, one really understand why in those fateful years maiden aunts sold up their properties on the east coast of England and moved their goods and chattels to some midland county. The action takes place during the "Gott strafe England" period of the war, and the "strafing" is done clandestinely by a Teutonic matron, who is president of the Anti-Alien League in England; by Baron Schaifer, who masquerades as a Belgian officer; by Ludwig Something, who is a sub-lieutenant on Lieutenant Clive Stanton's submarine, and by a retinue of servants who speak English like the French and talk German when only the audience is listening. Stanton. V.C., R.N.; Mid-shipman Eden, Admiral Maybridge and two English girls are the flies in the web of those former enemy spiders. Early in the play it is discovered that a copy of Stanton's operation order for his next submarine exploit is in the hands of the enemy. But the cypher to interpret that order in code is scribbled by Stanton on the back of his sweetheart's photograph. That is the plot in brief. The success of its appeal to the public must depend chiefly upon those people who are still interested in the intense racial hatred which precipitated the world war. They must recreate that atmosphere which made the writing of this play possible. Without such atmosphere there is little significance in the fact that the characters Stanton and Eden arc drawn from living personalities, and that the lovable Admiral Maybridge is a stage portrait of the late Lord Charles Beresford. Regarded purely as melodramatic comedy, The Luck of the Navy, except for its brilliant second act, is not up to recent Australian standards. As a means of spending an entertaining and amusing evening the play is, frankly, disappointing. But there is some excellent acting achieved by the cast. The hero, Stanton, is played by Percy Hutchison, with a jaunty air of deprecation in keeping with the British navy tradition. Frances Dillon reveals cleverly her admirable talent in a finished impersonation of the spy, Mrs. Gordon Peel, who entertains the navy and the army at her seaside English home. Rayson Cousens as Schaffer and Townsend Whitling as Admiral Maybridge. are capitally cast, while Mary Brackley as the life-like flapper, Dora, Stella Francis as a too serious Cynthia Eden, Watts Weston as the breezy "Snotty," Joan Rogers (Fraulein Anna), Dorothy Stanward (an English maid), Leslie Laurier, Walter White, William Ralston and Frank Lawrence complete the dramatic personae.