Les Miserables Company

              AT LAST!
JEAN VALJEAN
In VICTOR HUGO'S
Les Miserables
The Greatest Dramatic Production Ever Staged


NEW Ramsdell

Saturday & Sunday
Oct. 18 & 19
2:30 P. M. and 8 P. M.

EVENINGS 15c to 50c SEATS SELLING

MATINEES 15c to 25c School Pupils at 15c

Perfected Art NO EYE STRAIN




The Arrest of Jean Valjean the Unselfish Thief




A $100,000 Motion Drama by the best Parisian Actors
NINE REELS, 10,000 FEET, 2 ½ HOURS




THE CONVICT AND THE BISHOP

Figure


JEAN VALJEAN—My name is Jean Valjean.  I am a galley slave, and have spent nineteen years in prison.  I was liberated four days ago.  Today I have marched twelve leagues.  This evening on coming to the town I went to the inn but was sent away in consequence of my yellow passport, which I had shown at the police office.  I went to another inn, and the landlord said to me, Be off.  It was the same everywhere, and no one would have any dealings with me.  I went to the prison, but the jailor would not take me in.  I got into a dog's kennel, but the dog bit me and drove me off, as if it had been a man; it seemed to know who I was.  I went into the fields to sleep in the starlight, but there were no stars.  I thought it would rain, and as there was no God to prevent it from raining, I came back to town to sleep in a doorway.  I was lying down on a stone in the square, when a good woman pointed to your house, and said, 'Go and knock there.'  What sort of a house is this?  Do you keep an inn?  I have money, 109 francs and 15 sous, which I earned at the prison by my nineteen years' toil.  I will pay, for what do I care for that, as I have money.  I am very tired and frightfully hungry; will you let me stay here?

THE BISHOP—You need not have told me who you were; this is not my house, but the house of Christ.  This door does not ask a man who enters whether he has a name, but if he has a sorrow; you are suffering, you are hungry and thirsty, and so be welcome.  And do not thank me or say that I am receiving you into my house, for no man is at home here excepting the man who has need of an asylum.  I tell you, who are a passerby, that you are more at home here than I am myself, and all there is here is yours.  Why do I want to know your name?  Besides, before you told it to me you had one which I knew.

The man opened his eyes in amazement.

Is that true?  you know my name?

Yes, the bishop answered, you are my brother.

((From the novel, Les Miserables.)




THE AGONY OF JEAN VALJEAN

Shall I let an innocent man suffer in my place?



The Mayor Surrenders Himself
He asked himself then what he had arrived at and cross-questioned himself about the resolution he had formed.  He confessed to himself that all he had arranged in his mind was monstrous and that leaving God to act was simply horrible.

He continued to cross-question himself.  He asked himself what he had meant by the words, My object is attained?  He allowed that his life had an object, but what was its nature?  Conceal his name?  Deceive the police?  Was it for so paltry a thing that he had done all that he had effected?  Had he not another object which was the great and true one, to save not his person, but his soul—to become once again honest and good?  To be a just man; was it not that he had solely craved after, and what the bishop had ordered him?  Close the door on the past?  but, great heaven, he opened it again by committing an infamous action.  He was becoming a robber once more, and the most odious of robbers, he was robbing another man of his existence, his livelihood, his peace, and his place in the sunshine.  He was becoming an assassin; he was killing, morally killing, a wretched man; he was inflicting on him the frightful living death, the open air death, which is called the galleys.  On the other hand, if he gave himself up, freed this man who was suffering from so grievous an error, resumed his name, became through duty the convict Jean Valjean, that would be really completing his resurrection and eternally closing the inferno from which he was emerging.  He must do this; he would have done nothing unless he did this; all his life would be useless; all his reputation thrown away.

Well, he said, I will make up my mind to this.  I will do my duty and save this man.

Alas!  all his irresolution seized him again, and he was no further advanced than at the beginning.  Thus the wretched soul writhed in agony.

((From the novel, Les Miserables.)





JEAN VALJEAN AND COSETTE AND THE DOLL

After his Escape, Jean Rescues Cosette


The door opened again and the man reappeared, carrying in his hands the fabulous doll to which we have alluded, and which all the village children had been contemplating since the morning.  He placed it on its legs before Cosette, saying:

Here, this is for you.

Cosette raised her eyes; she had looked at the man coming toward her with the doll, as if it were the sun; she heard the extraordinary words, It is for you.

Cosette gazed at the wonderful doll with a sort of terror; her fact was still bathed in tears, but her eyes were beginning to fill, like the sky at dawn, with strange rays of joy.  What she felt at the moment was something like she would have felt had someone suddenly said to her, Little girl, you are queen of France.

((From the novel, Les Miserables.)




JEAN VALJEAN AND HIS DEADLY FOE

The Police Spy is Entrusted to him to be Slain



Blessed are the Merciful
So soon as Jean Valjean was alone with Javert he undid the rope which fastened the prisoner around the waist, the knot of which was under the table.

Jean Valjean held the pistol in his hand, and they thus crossed the inner trapeze of the barricade.

Jean Valjean forced Javert to climb over the barricade with some difficulty, but did not loosen the cord.

Jean Valjean placed the pistol under his arm and fixed on Javert a glance which had no need of words to say, Javert, it is I.

Javert answered, Take your revenge.

Jean Valjean took a knife from his pocket and opened it.

A clasp knife, Javert exclaimed.  You are right; that suits you better.

Jean Valjean cut the martingale which Javert had round his neck, then he cut the ropes on his wrists, and, stooping down, those on his feet; then, rising again, he said, You are free.

It was not easy to astonish Javert; still, master though he was of himself he could not suppress his emotion; he stood gaping and emotionless.

Begone, said Valjean.

Javert returned slowly and a moment after turned the corner of the Rue des Precheurs.  When Javert had disappeared Jean Valjean discharged the pistol in the air and then returned to the barricade, saying:

It is all over.

((From the novel, Les Miserables.)





THE PASSING OF JEAN VALJEAN

Figure



Supreme Shadow!  Supreme Dawn!
Because things are unpleasant, said Jean Valjean, that is no reason to be unjust to God.

Jean Valjean, almost without ceasing to regard Cosette, looked at Marius and the physician with serenity and the scarcely articulated words could be heard to pass his lips.

It is nothing to die, but it is frightful not to live.

All at once he rose—such return of strength is at times a sequel of the death-agony.

Then his chest sank in, his head vacillated, as if the intoxication of the tomb were seizing on him, and his hands lying on his knees, began pulling at the cloth of his trousers.  Cosette supported his shoulders and sobbed, and tried to speak to him, but was unable to do so.

He had a difficulty in moving his forearm, his feet had lost all movement, and at the same time, as the helplessness of the limbs and the exhaustion of the body increased, all the majesty of the soul ascended and was displayed on his forehead.  The light of the unknown world was already visible in his eyeballs.  His face grew livid and at the same time smiling; life was no longer there, but there was something else.  His breath stopped, but his glance expanded; he was a corpse on whom wings could be seen.

Cosette and Marius fell on their knees, heart-broken and choked with sobs, each under one of Jean Valjean's hands.  These august hands did not move again.  He had fallen back, and the light from the two candles illumined him; his white face looked up to heaven, and he let Cosette and Marius cover his hands with kisses—for he was dead.  The night was starless and intensely dark; doubtless some immense angel was standing in the gloom, with outstretched wings, waiting for the soul.

((From the novel, Les Miserables.)





DID YOU EVER READ AS FINE COMMENDATIONS?

The Book Seems to Live

The performance last night was witnessed by as distinguished an audience as one sees at the high-priced premiere of any play during the regular winter season, and this audience filled the house to the doors.
These players are masters of the great art of dramatic pantomime, and they tell Victor Hugo's tremendous story in action so vivid, and with such fidelity in emotional gesture and facial expression, that it becomes grippingly vital without words.
The astonishing truth is that the very book itself seems to live in flesh and blood before one's eyes.—

St. Louis Post Despatch.



Thousands of Delicate Emotional Reactions

One of those motion picture masterpieces that Europe loves and that America often undervalues is now on view at Orchestra Hall.  It is Victor Hugo's “Les Miserables,” done into a film drama of remarkable excellence.
The interplay of character, the spiritual progress or degeneration of each individual, thousands of delicate emotional reactions, are as clear as they are in the novel itself.—

Chicago Daily News.



Almost Unbelievable

Victor Hugo's “Les Miserables” was visualized at Powers Theatre yesterday, with a dignity and a completeness almost unbelievable.
The film result is so satisfactory that an audience can be held quite breathless for a couple of hours.—

Grand Rapids Herald.



Breathingly Real

“Les Miserables,” Victor Hugo's great Gothic novel, is being made breathingly real to Chicago audiences in Orchestra Hall.
These are motion pictures worth seeing.—

Chicago Evening Post.



The Attention Riveted

There is not a second in the play where the attention of the audience is not riveted on the scenes with the deepest emotion.—
Bay City Tribune.



No Play So Well Staged as This

In all probability no play has ever been so well staged as this.—
Muskegon Times.



Matchless Human Interest

The mayor and other city officials, editors of the daily papers, pastors and priests of the churches, principals and teachers of the schools, have witnessed the spectacle with unanimous and enthusiastic approval.—
Bay City Times.



From an Eminent Clergyman
The Rev. Francis S. White, D. D., Dean of St. Marks Pro-Cathedral, Grand Rapids: It gives me great pleasure to recommend in the most positive manner that all who can should make an effort to see visualized by the cinematograph, Victor Hugo's immortal version of a soul re-born.



Unusual Applause

So well has the play been prepared that the audience at Powers Theatre often broke into applause in appreciation of the tense situations.—
Editorial in Grand Rapids Press.





What America's Greatest Actress Said
Minnie Maddern Fiske remained over Sunday in Grand Rapids and with her company attended the opening evening of Les Miserables.  Beautiful!  Grand!  she was heard by one to exclaim; Superbly acted, elegantly staged; the plot magnificently conceived; the minute detail of Victor Hugo's wonderful imagination vividly produced.  Even the mechanical projection of the pictures, the speed, the light, everything perfect!



TYPOGRAPHICAL UNION LABEL VALLEY CITY