San Francisco Minstrels

“A very enjoyable and varied programme is offered this week by the San Francisco Minstrels, at their pretty little hall on Broadway, near Twenty-ninth street. The vivacity of these comedians never flags, and their entertainment is more original than most others of its kind. It would be difficult to find two funnier men than Backus and Birch; a sweeter-voiced singer of ballads than Wambold; a more solemn speaker on temperance than Add Ryman; a more wonderful impersonator of women than the performer billed as ‘the Great Ricardo,’ or two more agile dancing ‘darkeys’ than Messrs. Mackin and Wilson. A burlesque on Ristori’s ‘Medea’ presents Ricardo as the wicked woman, Mr. Ryman as Jason, and Messrs. Backus and Birch (who act and talk in this sketch remarkably like the players recently seen at the Lyceum) as the two sentinels. The time-honored sketch of ‘School,’ always favored at negro minstrel entertainments, gains new life from the efforts of Mr. Ryman and his scholars. Mr. Backus makes an excellent dunce, and Mr. Birch is a very natural bad boy; and the knowledge the children have of current political topics and social foibles makes the brief glimpse we get of the rural educational institution none the less acceptable.”

Program changes from last week.