New Play in Manhattan

Lace on Her Petticoat (by Aimee Stuart; produced by Herman Shumlin) is a garrulous trifle from England about Victorian existence in Scotland. Harking back to the days of ironclad class distinctions and almost exultant snobbery, it chronicles the brief, foredoomed friendship that springs up between little Alexandra Carmichael, whose mother is a marchioness, and little Elspeth McNairn, whose widowed mother makes the marchioness' hats. Mrs. McNairn herself is courted by a workingman who drinks tea with his spoon in his cup; but though his spoon is in the wrong place, his heart is in the right one.

Much of Lace has the air of a sermon. But it achieves a pinch of satire too, through alternating the McNairns' delight, in Dr. Johnson's phrase, over leveling up with their sniffiness about leveling down. And as Alexandra, young (14) Perlita Neilson brightens several scenes with her urbane self-possession. But the play in general has all the velocity of flowing molasses, and a good deal of its stickiness. Tragically short for the two girls, their friendship comes to seem like a lifelong affair to the audience.

Though Lace on Her Petticoat made a lukewarm impression on Manhattan critics, it impressed Herman Shumlin's fellow producers mightily. Reason: the play, first legitimate production of the new season, cost only $36,000 to put on, and can survive on a weekly gross of $8,100. Despite adverse notices, it appeared at week's end that Shumlin's low operating costs might enable his backers to get something of a run for their money.

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