Word: behrman
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...Know My Love (adapted from the French of Marcel Achard by S.N. Behrman; produced by the Theatre Guild & John C. Wilson) may run for years with the Lunts in it; without them, it would hardly last a week. Not since the perfection of the chocolate-covered peppermint has anything so thin also been so gooey. But with that delightful absorption in themselves that renders them oblivious to their surroundings, the Lunts are as arch, as expert and as enjoyable here as elsewhere...
Given half a chance, the pair of them, with their timing, their teamwork, their contrapuntal growls and purrs, can put any scene across. And now & then, amid large blobs of stage custard, Playwright Behrman obliges with a nice witticism about husbands or Boston. But unhappily there are long stretches in I Know, My Love when there is neither any play on the stage nor any Lunts...
There will be few surprises for the theater-wise who are lucky enough to have tickets for the new play at the Plymouth. It is called "I Know My Love" and is an adaption from the French of Marcel Achard by S. N. Behrman. Mr. Behrman has been responsible for some of the more delightful and urbane comedies that have flitted across our stage in the past years and that he has not lost his touch was evident Monday night. That the stars of "I Know My Love"--Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne--have not lost their touch for making...
...last line of the above paragraph might seem to indicate that Mr. Behrman has some thesis or other hiding behind the skirts of his winking Muse, but such is not the case. The plot of "I Know My Love" offers about as much opportunity for character-study as an hour with the old family album. What dimension the Chanler family has is due mainly to the embellishments given it by the actors...
There is even a sudden and tragic suicide during the course of the evening which provides a lively and well-acted interlude to the comedy. The victim is a widely romantic Goethe-reader whom, I fear, Mr. Behrman will never translate from the Gallic...