Theatricals

is to be the date of Commemoration Day this year. The entrance lobby, the library, and VIth Form Room will be built first with the funds already promised. We want i,000 more to complete the scheme. What an improvement it will be to be able to move the " temporary " Army hut, though it has served us well. We are confident that this 'i,000 will soon come from our friends, when they see the Library started.

THEATRICALS.

" THE CREAKING CHAIR."

Produced by the St. Peter's Players, Christmas, 1927.

Our Players seem bent on shaking the nerves of our audiences. Last year we had " A Message from Mars," with its weird and hair-raising wonders. This year we have a thriller, with murders, Egyptian idols, stolen jewels and all the rest. It is of course, in dramatic and literary value, not to be compared with most of our previous productions. It is purely a thriller with plenty of comic relief ; but as a thriller it is quite good and was on the whole, under Lt.-Col. Harington's careful production, a successful entertainment. At any rate the audience was enthusiastic and was genuinely startled by the thrilling episodes, the pistol shots in the dark, Holly's (Mr. Toyne) dash into the garden from the darkened room at the end of the first Act, the tom-tom beating, Mrs. Latter's (Mrs. Atkinson) scene with the knife, and the many coming and goings of the creaking chair. This creaking chair gave a very successful performance throughout ; it was quite horrible.

The acting was very good indeed. Mr. and Mrs. Toyne as Holly and Rose respectively gave some very effective comic relief as the butler and maid. We would hesitate to say that Mr. Toyne was specially fitted for the part ; he seems specially fitted for every part in which we have seen him. At any rate he was thoroughly convincing, Mr. Rhodes, as Sir John Prestick, gave an adequate presentation of the specialist. But Mrs. Atkinson, as Mrs. Latter, was more than adequate. Her acting throughout was most convincing, intense and thrilling. Her part, in poor