Rose Called Cohen

The most popular play that ever ran in Manhattan was Abie's Irish Rose, which closed with its 2,400th performance on the night of Oct. 22, 1927. No one ever learned what glib compelling secret Anne Nichols had put into her play to make so many people want to see it. She herself has not been able to repeat its success; imitators have been unable, in story, play or cinema to duplicate its homely attractions.

One cinema, The Cohens and Kellys, which dealt with the same situation (Irish-Hebrew romance), achieved some box-office attention. Accordingly, last week, Anne Nichols, asking $3,000,000, was in court to sue Universal Pictures Corp. for plagiarism. The trial proceeded in the higgly-piggly fashion of plagiarism suits, with interminable memorabilia, mentions of long-forgotten vaudeville skits and old plays from which The Cohens and Kellys might possibly have been derived. Some Universal adman had written an advertisement in which The Cohens and Kellys had been called "another Abie's Irish Rose." This was discussed. Universal discredited the advertisement.

The trial grew to resemble a literary symposium. The names of Shakespeare, George Jean Nathan, Aristotle, Gorky, Ibsen, Bernard Shaw and many another were spoken. Author Nichols' "dramaturgical expert," Moses L. Malevinsky of O'Brien, Malevinsky, & Driscoll, proceeded to a comparison of every entrance and exit in Abie's Irish Rose with every entrance and exit in the cinema.

From the witness stand, Anne Nichols said:

"I don't have time to go to plays. They don't amuse me. . . ."

"I don't remember my play. I haven't read it for a long time. . . ."

"An author's work is an inspiration. He writes from the heart. You get a situation and dq.the best of your ability to get it down on paper and send' it to Washington to be copyrighted. . . ."