the sacred subject of matrimony too
flippantly? And should the play, in order to be effective, have a
moral tag, or should it be, what on the surface it appears to be, a
series of realistic scenes about people whom one cannot admire and
does not want to know intimately? Some of the writers found the
picture not to their liking--that is the effect good satire sometimes
has when it strikes home. Yet when Grace George revived "The New York
Idea" in a spirit so different from Mrs. Fiske's, nine years after, on
September 28, 1915, at the Playhouse, New York, the _Times_ was bound
to make the following confession: "A vast array of American authors
have turned out plays innumerable, but not one of them has quite
matched in sparkling gayety and wit this work of Langdon Mitchell's.
And the passing years have left its satire still pointed. They have
not dimmed its polish nor so much as scratched its smart veneer."

The play was written expressly for Mrs. Fiske. Its hard, sharp
interplay of humour was knowingly cut to suit her hard, sharp method
of acting. Her interpretation was a triumph of head over heart. Grace
George tried to read into _Cynthia Karslake_ an element of romance
which is suggested in the text, but which was somewhat
over-sentimentalized by her soft portrayal. There is some element of
relationship between "The New York Idea" and Henry Arthur Jones' "Mary
Goes First;" there is the same free air of sporting life, so
graphically set forth in "Lord and Lady Algy." But the American play
is greater than these because of its impersonal strain.

In a letter to the present Editor, Mr. Mitchell has broken silence
regarding the writing of "The New York Idea." Never before has he
tried to analyze its evolution. He says:

The play was written for Mrs. Fiske. The choice of subject
was mine. I demanded complete freedom in the treatment, and
my most wise manager, Mr. Harrison Grey Fiske, accorded this.
The play was produced and played as written, with the
exception of one or two short scenes, which were not
acceptable to Mrs. Fiske; that is, she felt, or would have
felt, somewhat strained or unnatural in these scenes.
Accordingly, I cut them out, or rather rewrote them. The
temperament of the race-horse has to be considered--much
more, that of the 'star'.

When I was writing the play, I had really no idea of
satirizing divorce or a law or anything specially
temperamental o