R530426D. Colombe’s Birthday.
The Morning Chronicle, 26 April 1853, p. 6.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 19, 380.
Haymarket Theatre.—We regret that the extreme pressure upon our columns prevents us from offering to our readers aught save the merest outline-idea of Mr. Browning’s Colombe’s Birthday, which was produced last night, and which re-introduced Miss Helen Faucit to the Haymarket stage. The play is in five short acts, and it is due to the author to say that it was written for the closet, not the stage. Had the contrary been the case, it is probable that much psychological talk, and subtle analysis of varying and shifting mental impulses, would have been left out, and more purely dramatic matter substituted. The first three acts flow clearly enough; but in the fourth and fifth the play turns into a mere metaphysical contest of wits, in which the heroine, Colombe (Miss Faucit), the quasi Duchess of Cleves, and Valence (Mr. Barry Sullivan), an energetic and chivalrous lawyer, the advocate of the people of Cleves, are at once the lovers and the speculatists. The gist of this portion of the play is the change which the power of mind and the intensity of the passion displayed by the humble lawyer operate on the character of the Duchess, who, after much wavering and chopping of sentiment, at length, and after more than one metaphysical misconception, abandons a prince’s hand, the duchy of Cleves, and the prospect of being the Empress of Germany, for Valence the advocate of Cleves. We have no room for describing the dramatic scene or two which in the early portion of the play lead up to this dénouement. It must serve to say, that the real right to a German duchy centres in Prince Berthold (Mr. Howe), an ambitious but a generous soldier, and Colombe is prepared to resign what she imagined her inheritance. Valence prompts her to other thoughts, and promises the warlike aid of Cleves. But the generous offer of Prince Berthold to make her the duchess, and prospectively the empress, sways her. In an interview with Valence she mistakes his sentiments of love for her as intended for another, and it is not until after the riddles of a complicated mental plot have been cleared up that Colombe finally gives up the duchy and the empire, and flings herself upon love and Valence.
The dialogue of Colombe’s Birthday is in Mr. Browning’s medium style, thoughtful, graceful, and occasionally rising to points of undeniable poetry. But there is still evident his characteristic tendency to redundancy of metaphor and superfluity of imagery. This original drama was considerably curtailed in the representation, yet, though the play was short, the labour of following the subtle disquisitions of the latter portion was not such as ordinary playgoers could at all be expected successfully to undergo.
Miss Helen Faucit has returned with her old style exaggerated rather than modified. We fear that country acting has had no improving effect upon this lady, as she more than ever exaggerates sentiment into sentimentality, and infuses a continued artificiality of manner into her whole performance. If Miss Faucit thought more of being a woman than a fine artiste, her great natural powers would possess their free scope. Many characters she plays with high poetic feeling, but we certainly did not, with the exception of certain points, think that she gave an effective version of Colombe.
Mr. Barry Sullivan made a chivalrous advocate and an energetic lover, while Mr. Howe gave a manly and effective impersonation of the Prince.
Miss Faucit and Mr. Sullivan were called on at the fall of the curtain.
Reviewed:
Colombe’s Birthday (RB), performance, London, 25 April 1853.
___________________
