The Playgoer

A new comedy by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman entitled "The Man Who Came to Dinner" opened its two weeks engagement at the Plymouth last evening; the title sounds laborious, but the humor is uproarious, and the entertainment glorious. In short, the boys who wrote "You Can't Take It With You" have not lost their touch.

Monty Woolley, as a belabored and not too lovable commentator of the Woolcott school, has a meaty part and takes full advantage of his opportunity. In the process of the play, he manages to make himself a most unwelcome guest, and, in the words of his secretary, well played by Edith Atwater, he is an egomaniac of the first water.

There is not much more to the plot, and the comedy arises more from well selected epithets and a number of choice expressions and apt phrases than from comedy of situation. This type of humor is bound to pall at times, and it does in this play in the third act. What might be called the "heart of gold scene" is not good, and the "denouncement" is worse, but in such a criticism one tends toward carping.

The Christmas atmosphere predominates, and it is evident the authors have high hope for the comedy's extended success; perhaps they are not overly optimistic. The play is a fluffy and inconsequential thing, but one cannot fail to enjoy it since it makes no pretense toward being anything more than good entertainment.