The Edge o' Beyond

A play in four acts by Roy Horniman and Ruby Miller, adapted from the novel by Gertrude Page. Opened at the Garrick Theatre, London, August 9, 1921. Closed on January 14, 1922, after 192 performances.  Producer: Holman Clark; Presenter: Julian Frank; Stage Manager: Alfred S. Barber; Asst. Stage Manager: Seymour Beard; Stage Director: Alfred F. Mansfield; Set Design: Paul Gill; Music Director: Leonard Hornsey; Scenery: J.C. Frazer; Costumes: Dresses by Anne Goodrick Ltd., Riding Habit by Busvines Ltd., Hats by Terrigane and Heath, Boots and Shoes by H. and M. Rayne; Business Manager: Harold Carson; Licensee and Lessee: Charles B. Cochran

Basil Rathbone played the role of Dr. Lawson in this story of life in Rhodesia in the early twentieth century. The Edge o' Beyond was based on a 1908 novel by Gertrude Page. In 1919 a British film was produced starring Ruby Miller as Dinah Webberly and Owen Nares as Dr. Lawson. Ruby Miller and Roy Horniman adapted the story for the stage. Prior to opening in London on August 9, 1921, the play toured the provinces for six weeks. The tour began at Devonshire Park in Eastbourne on June 20.

What follows is a wonderful, detailed plot summary taken from the August 31, 1921 issue of The Bystander. The author, Arnold Golsworthy, is a drama critic who used the pseudonym "Jingle."

THE EDGE O' BEYOND at the Garrick

It takes this play a good deal of time to get off the mark—a whole act to be precise. The delay in the movement is doubtless due, however, to the desire to create first of all the necessary Rhodesian atmosphere, which is certainly very convincingly suggested in due course. We are first introduced to Billy's Hut in Rhodesia. Billy has two partners, and they are all supposed to be engaged in the farming industry, though they would seem to have a distinct predilection for sprawling at full length on packing cases, and drinking whisky-and-soda at noonday. I have always understood this last to be an imprudent habit.

Billy's partners are named respectively "Beauty" and "Ugly Bug." I do not suppose that these were the names given to them by their godfathers and godmothers in their baptism; but we get no other clue to their identity. Their nearest neighbour is a self-sufficient young man named Oswald Grant who kicks his animals and bullies his wife. But Mrs. Oswald Grant is indifferent to her husband's ill-treatment of her since she has just become a mother, and life, which was formerly a desert place to her, now blooms as the rose, or something of that sort. The sensation of the first act is the arrival at the Hut of Billy's sister, Dinah, who has come to pay the partners a brief visit.

As the arrival of a sister on the premises, important as the event is, hardly suffices to fill an act, some comic business is introduced, doubtless so that we may have time to assimilate the local colour. For instance, two of the partners wear grimy shorts, scarcely reaching to the knees of their very brown legs, and a pointed comment on the scantiness of their attire is good for two laughs at least.

Then Dinah washes and starches some clothes. One of the stock jokes of the world relates to a lady who starched her husband's pyjamas; and this joke is duly worked in here. Later on, the pyjamas are brought on and are shown to be as stiff as a piece of cardboard, and in carrying them round the stage one of the players creates more amusement by tripping and falling. The Kaffir "boys," being called on to serve tea, walk on in the attire of seaside minstrels, and that helps to fill up the time a good deal. But although humour of this kind does not actually convulse me with mirth, it is right that I should record the fact that it was all received with shrieks of laughter on the occasion of my visit. The authors of the play evidently know very well what the thinking public wants.

Basil Rathbone as Dr. Lawson

Basil Rathbone and Ruby Miller

With the second act the real movement of the play begins. Miss Ruby Miller who, as Dinah, is merely a frivolous butterfly in the first act, becomes a strong and well-defined character. Her dainty appearance and charm of manner naturally bring about her a swarm of admirers, and there is one in particular, Ted Burnett, who is an old friend of the family, and whose overtures are backed by brother Billy. Burnett is in Rhodesia because he loves the country with its wide spaces, rich sunsets and great silences. Dinah thinks she could stand that sort of thing for a little while; but she feels that it is a little too far away from the London season and Paris frocks, and the nicer amenities of social life. Still, the plain honest love of Burnett is not a thing easily to be forgotten, even though life for her in Rhodesia is not to be thought of. Besides, there is the awful example of Mrs. Oswald Grant for instance. Everyone pities the poor woman for her loneliness and for the rough treatment she receives at her husband's hands. Dr. Lawson, a visitor form London, who helped to bring her baby into the world, goes farther than that. It is written that pity is akin to — love; and even if it had not been written someone would probably have mentioned it over the garden fence. Mrs. Grant, however, while thanking him for his king and not altogether unwelcome attentions, means to stick to her husband as long as possible. This much, though, she will agree to — if she should every be in serious trouble, she will call Lawson to her.

Then, to the general regret, Dinah leaves the Hut and its neighbours and returns home. Dr. Lawson, who is a Harley Street man, sails with her, and in due course we meet them again in London. In the meanwhile a tragedy occurs in the little community Dinah has left behind in Rhodesia. One stormy night Mrs. Grant dashes through the driving rain to the Hut tearfully imploring that one of the men will swiftly ride away for a doctor. Her baby is ill; and her fatuous husband, with almost incredible brutality, declines to turn any of his precious horses out on such a night for what he regards as an entirely unnecessary journey. In his opinion the baby is not ill at all. Grant even follows his wife to the Hut to bring her back home, and about the same time news comes that the baby is dead. The acting of Miss Doris Lloyd as the unhappy Mrs. Grant reaches here a very high level of excellence indeed. The agonised mother turns with hysterical fury upon her now subdued husband, and lashes him with shrieking condemnation till her emotion overcomes her and she falls fainting to the ground. It is an extremely powerful display of acting, and the applause is deservedly torrential.

Then we come to a London drawing-room. Dinah is back once more in her own world, with all the little luxuries that are so necessary to her within easy reach. She tries to forget  Rhodesia and its roughness and discomfort, but she cannot keep her thoughts from straying in the direction of the sturdy upstanding man she has left behind at the edge o' beyond. One of her London admirers is Major Egerton, who is reasonably good-looking, middle aged, and very rich; and it is understood that in the majority of cases the ladies ask for no more than that. But when the Major proposes, Dinah is obliged to refuse him; and he thinks he can guess the direction of her thoughts. Speaking to her in a fatherly way, he advises her for the sake of her own real happiness to go back to Rhodesia and give Burnett another chance. But Dinah, who now no longer disguises her feelings, very naturally protests that she cannot do anything of the kind. It would seem so awfully obvious, wouldn't it? The answer, as they say in another place, is in the affirmative. So what can the poor girl do?

The riddle is solved by the obliging god from the clouds. Dr. Lawson hands to Dinah a cable he has just received from Mrs. Grant. Her baby is dead, and this is her call to her friend. While Dinah was in Rhodesia Mrs. Grant came to love her very dearly. Dr. Lawson suggests that Dinah should accompany him back there and play the part of nurse to a stricken mind. To Dinah the idea is at first impossible; but she wrestles bravely with herself, and somewhere about the tenth round she emerges triumphantly from the fight and announces that she will go where duty calls, or words to that effect.

The acting of the play throughout is of unusually high quality; but Miss Ruby Miller's performance in the later scenes is of outstanding merit. the gradual evolution of the frivolous and worldly girl into tender and devoted womanhood is exceptionally well presented. The spirit of the play, with its very proper tribute to our men at the outposts of the Empire, is expressed with a fine virility; and it is not without its usefulness in these unsettled times. I hope the production will prove to be a popular success.

Jingle

Dinah prevents Oswald Grant from beating her house boy

Charles Carson, Ruby Miller, and Basil Rathbone

Although most of the critics described the play as overly sentimental and unsophisticated, it received an enthusiastic reception from the audiences. Gertrude Page's novel had been quite popular, so it naturally follows that the play would also enjoy some measure of popularity.

The critics did not agree on whether or not the play adhered to the plot of the novel. Some of them wrote that the play closely followed the plot of the novel. Others claimed that the adaptation strayed so far from the novel that it was hideous and absurd. Regardless of what the critics thought, Gertrude Page, author of the novel, was pleased with the stage play, which she watched on opening night. Early on during the run of The Edge o' Beyond, Gertrude Page expressed a desire that the company should perform the play in South Africa and Rhodesia. Ruby Miller did indeed take the play to South Africa and Rhodesia in 1922, but without Basil Rathbone. Only some of the original cast members were able to make the tour.

On September 6th, the entire company flew to Portsmouth (in Hampshire) for a matinee performance of The Edge o' Beyond at the King's Theatre. They returned to London for their evening performance.

In her autobiography, Champagne from my Slipper, Ruby Miller wrote, "The Edge o' Beyond was so heavily booked that we had to play three matinees a week. We even had the police complaining that pit and gallery queues were overflowing the pavement and impeding pedestrian traffic!"

The play celebrated its 100th performance on October 29, 1921. The entire profits of the evening were donated to the Disabled Soldiers' and Sailors' Workshops Charity. The play continued to delight audiences.

The week following the London premiere of The Edge o' Beyond, Patrick Annesley, also known as Viscount Glerawly, son and heir of Earl and Countess Annesley, joined the cast. His part was that of a footman. The press was amused to see a member of the British aristocracy playing the role of a servant.

At the Garrick Most people will have read Miss Page's story so it is needless for me to tell the plot of the play upon which it is founded, since it follows the original pretty closely. That it will be a popular production is almost certain. There are so many simple-minded "souls" who love to watch men and women on the stage playing at real life like children and listen to them uttering sentimental platitudes. Happily the play is quite admirable acted. Miss Ruby Miller, as Dinah, was surprisingly good. I say "surprisingly" because she has up to the present been chiefly known as one of the beauties in musical comedy and light farce. As Dinah, however, she breathed vitality into a part which would have been hopelessly artificial in less clever hands. Mr. Basil Rathbone had so little to do as the Doctor—who eventually married the ill-used wife—except to be tender and grave and kindly that there is nothing to criticise, except to say that he was all these things quite satisfactorily. Messrs. Wilfrid Seagram, Antony Holles, and Charles Carson succeeded most cleverly in preventing the "Irresponsibles" from being also "Insufferables"; and Mr. Martin Lewis, although he didn't suggest overmuch the type of man for whom life in Rhodesia was the only life he could possibly live and breath in, and also suffered under his nomenclature of "Beauty," came out triumphantly as a lover and man in spite of them. The rest were all as excellent as their roles allowed them to be. There is far too much trivial "talk" in The Edge o' Beyond to make it a good play, and far too little action to make it an exciting one. But it possesses large doses of popular humour and popular sentiment, and I dare say that the fact that it is laid in Rhodesia will prove attractive—except to those who know that part of the world, but even they will probably have a good laugh over it.  ARKAY —The Tatler, August 31, 1921

"Opportunities for earnest and strong acting are given to Mr. Charles Carson, in the proposal made to Dinah by Captain Burnett, that ex-Hussar, described in the play as 'the best-dressed man in Rhodesia,' being shown in white coat and breeches and 'beautiful' brown high riding boots; to Mr. Rathbone, especially admirable in the Harley Street specialist's feelingly played scene of farewell in the first scene of the second act; to Mr. McNally, suitably grim and dour as Grant; and to Miss Lloyd, who on Tuesday roused the house to enthusiasm and gained several calls for her emotional delivery." —The Stage, August 11, 1921

In the end Dinah decided that she prefers Rhodesia and love to London society. She is welcomed back by the three "Irresponsibles," whilst the other love affair—that of Joyce and Dr. Lawson—has also come right. Above are Antony Holles, Ruby Miller, Wilfred Seagram, Martin Lewis, Basil Rathbone, and Doris Lloyd.

A candid photo of Ethel Baird, Basil Rathbone, Ruby Miller and Julian Frank, shown here with Miller's 40-h. p. Lanchester.

"It must be very difficult to write so crude a play as this, even if you have taken a novel by Miss Gertrude Page as your foundation. ... It was sad to see Mr. Basil Rathbone mixed up in this business (a very far cry from Iago), but he did his skilful best with a part which promised but failed to become interesting, and he managed to give us some of the few moments of real feeling." —A. P. H., The Westminster Gazette, August 10, 1921

"As a stage love story, nothing could be more artificial or further removed from life. Fortunately for the dramatic value of the piece, there is a supposedly subsidiary interest. A smug teetotal settler bullies his wife and causes the death of his child, and the bereaved mother's agony, as expressed by Doris Lloyd—a new and brilliant young actress—brings the curtain down to a roar of applause. That incident is really all that matters in The Edge o' Beyond. The rest is platitudinous claptrap, cunningly coloured up for the pit and gallery, who fell to it greedily at the premiere. Ruby Miller, albeit none too well suited to the role of Dinah, gives an agreeable nippy performance and looks attractive in her fetching frocks. Her leading man, Basil Rathbone, is wasted on the part of a medical Adonis." —The Sporting Times, August 13, 1921

"Mr. Basil Rathbone, as the doctor, is the hero of one of the secondary love stories, but his performance is never less than distinguished." —Truth, August 24, 1921

Basil Rathbone and Ruby Miller offstage

Basil Rathbone and Ruby Miller taking a ride on a new Rudge-Whitworth

"The Edge o' Beyond, at the Garrick, is likely to repeat the success of Paddy the Next Best Thing, at the Savoy. The play is a typical specimen of that naive unreality which, somehow or other, succeeds. ... And Mr. Basil Rathbone, as a lover in distress, will flutter every diaphanous blouse in London." —The Graphic, August 20, 1921

"The Edge o' Beyond has proved successful. It is from a novel by Miss Gertrude Page, much more serious in character than the same author's lighthearted Paddy the Next Best Thing, which has now been running at the Savoy since April of last year. The adaptors, Mr. Roy Horniman and Miss Ruby Miller, have taken a good many liberties with Miss Page's Rhodesian love story, particularly in supplying a happy ending. Their treatment is very episodical, and therefore constructively weak, and much of the quality and the effect of the book is missing." —The Stage, December 22, 1921

Rhodesia on the Stage Popular as it has been as a novel, Miss Gertrude Page's Rhodesian story, "The Edge o' Beyond," did not provide much dramatic interest in the stage version which was produced at the Garrick Theatre tonight. such a verdict may seem contradictory to the applause which followed some of the episodes and dialogue, but that appreciation was a tribute to the bits which were good rather than a judgment upon the play as a whole. Besides, it was perfectly obvious that the hand-clapping and the laughter, which came mostly from pit and gallery, were prompted by recognition of familiar incidents and speeches of the novel. As a picture of life in Rhodesia the play is hardly good publicity, for as shown in the settlers there, that section of South Africa seems to develop only solemn prigs, such as Oswald Grant; dandies, such as Ted Burnett; or loafers, like "Beauty Bill" and "Ugly Bug." As the three months' visitor from home, Miss Ruby Miller did her utmost to impart an air of sincerity to the role of Dinah, but her efforts were seriously handicapped by the artificiality of the drawing of Major Egerton and Ted Burnett. As the much-enduring wife of the priggish Grant, Miss Doris Lloyd had one or two moments of emotion which evoked honest enthusiasm. As Dr. Lawson, Mr. Basil Rathbone failed to create sympathy with his medico-cum-lover role. —The Aberdeen Daily Journal, August 10, 1921

On December 21, 1921 Basil Rathbone sailed to New York in order to play a role in The Czarina.  Richard Lindsay replaced Rathbone in the cast of The Edge o' Beyond. The play closed at the Garrick Theatre on January 14, 1922, after 192 performances. 

After the play left the Garrick Theatre, it did a six-week tour of the British provinces before sailing for South Africa. The Edge o' Beyond played in South Africa and Rhodesia for several months. Unfortunately, Gertrude Page died in April 1922, so she never got to see the play performed in her beloved Rhodesia.

Basil Rathbone and Doris Lloyd reunited in Hollywood in the 1930s and 1940s — on the sets of A Feather in Her Hat (1935), Kind Lady (1935), Tovarich (1937), and The House of Fear (1945).
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The Garrick Theatre in 1902

The Garrick Theatre in 2007

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All original content is © Marcia Jessen, 2021