Chief Star in Parody of "Alice in Wonderland" Fails To Shatter Illusions of Back-Stage Life

"If you were anybody, you wouldn't bother to be here; if you were somebody, you wouldn't be here." This unspoken awareness partially ended a make-shift interview with Harland Dixon, playing in "Alice on Broadway" at the Uptown. Irrelevant recollections of G.B.S., "A.E.", and P. G. Wodehouse overtook the CRIMSON reporter, and for a number of reason she offered the purely hypocritical question as to what he might print.

"Print? Anything that won't put me in jail or cost me my job. . . Yes, I agree with what you're thinking. It makes no difference what I say. You'll write your own 'copy.' The reporter's interview of a reporter, with some conventional color, is an old cry.

"Chorus girls? Another recurrent subject. Well, legs become a means of transportation, and the chorus girl, a Sphinx without a mystery. Sorry if this disappoints. No thanks, I haven't touched a drop for three years. Here's Tony. Give it to him; he's got to rewrite the show tonight for the Sunday performances--just one of our difficulties with your pleasant Boston blue laws."

The reporter poked around the grim dressing room and drew another remark out of the actor. "Right, you've got to be careful what you say and do. You're just one among several millions of attentive germs on concrete space, and audiences as well as actors (with a chuckle) are 60 to 40 per cent ego, which is 40 to 60 per cent vanity and the substance of our existence.

"Boston audiences brainless? (Enter Mr. Dixon's practical nature.) Oh, they're not so stupid, and a stupid audience is probably the most painful thing I know. (Mr. Dixon's frankness returns.) No, I should say that the Army intelligence tests are too generous." Here the conversation followed a tangent into the merits of a Harvard education, but the actor's knowledge of literature exceeded that of the reporter, who departed, leaving the former before his glaring mirror, which might not have been as brief as the candle.

But the reporter was reconverted to Christian hope. Leaving the theatre, he overheard Miss Ida May Sparrow, who plays the leading feminine role. She complained to the manager concerning the imperfect acoustics of the stage. (Mr. Dixon, the reporter then recalled, was afflicted at the time with a hoarse throat.)