Cash On Delivery

Examiner of Plays' Summary:

This is a bright and amusing affair. The plot is ingenious and should be effective. Its complications are difficult to describe briefly, but the gist of them is as follows. The period is just after the war; military training is in force and this involves some of the characters. Mr Clover the ‘seed king’ a millionaire, gardener, is condemned by a new law to give up half his property to the stage. He can, and wishes to, hand it over to his nephew, one Fane Bell, but only if his nephew is married. Fane is on a voyage, and his friend Chuddles, has told clover he is married. He returns, with only a day to produce his wife. He has got engaged to Peggy Goode, but does not know where she is. Chuddles produces one Maria Anderson to pretend to be the wife. But ultimately face persuades Pamela, wife of Romney Bright, the artist, to do so. Very well; they go to Clovertown; the uncle’s place, and there they find both Peggy, who is Clover’s secretary, and Bright, who is there to paint her, also Lady Upright, Pamela’s aunt. The succeeding tangle is almost indescribable. Fane is mistake for Bright, Peggy thinks he is false, Chuddles and Maria turn up, and Maria is muddled up with Pamela and so on. Then Bright is arrested as a deserter from his military training and face too, being mistaken for bright, with fresh confusions. Of course things are cleared up at the end. I do not think there is anything to object to. There is some comic military business, but that has nothing to do with the actual army, really, as the men are supposed to be ‘civilian soldiers’ doing their training, as the Hampshire Highlanders. Maria Anderson suggest Mary Anderson, but I do not think that is our affair. She is spoken of, by the way, as a ‘reserve French’ - meaning she is to pose as the wife if the right one is not found - and that suggests an innuendo a la Tristram Shandy, but here it is, I am sure, merely a casual military metaphor and I should not notice it. Recommended for license. G. S. Street