I do not know why I think of vaudeville as I think of a collection of good drawings. Unless it is because the sense of form is the same in all of the arts. The acrobat certainly has line and mass to think of, even if that isn't his primal concern. He knows how he decorates the space on which he operates. To make another comparison, then, Grock is the Forain of vaudeville. He achieves great plastic beauty with distinguished economy of means. He dispenses with all superfluous gesture, as does the great French illustrator. Grock is entirely right about clownery. You are either funny or you are not. No amount of study will produce the gift for humour. It is there, or it isn't. Grock's gift for musicianship is a singular combination to find with the rest of his artistry. It goes with the remarkably refined look in his face, however, as he sits upon the back of the seatless chair, and plays the little concertina with superb execution. There are no "jumps" in Grock's performance. His moods flow from one into another with a masterly smoothness, and you are aware when he is finished that you have never seen that sort of foolery before. Not just that sort. It is the good mind that satisfies, as in the case of James Watts, and Miss Shields.
From elephants carrying in their trunks chatelaines of Shetland ponies, curtseying at the close of the charming act like a pretty miss at her first coming out, to such work as the Four Danubes give you as the closing number, with Irene as a lead, you are, to say the least, carried over the dreadful spots, such as the young man who sways out like a burlesque queen and tells you whom he was with before Keith got him. His name should be "Pusher," "Advance Man," or something of that sort, and not artist. What he gives you, you could find just as well if not better done on Fourteenth Street. He has a ribbon-counter, adenoid voice production that no really fine artist could afford. He will "get by," because anything does, apparently.
One turns to the big artist for relief, even though minor artists like The Brown Sisters charm so surely with their ivory and silver diamond-studded accordions, giving very pleasing transitions from grave to gay in arias and tunes we know. Accordions and concertinas are very beautiful to me, when played by artists like these girls, and by such as Joe Cawthorne, and Grock.
There are more dancing men of quality this season, it seems to me, who are obscured by dancing ladies of fame, and not such warrantable artistry. Perhaps it is because male anatomy allows of
