The Man of the Hour

Man of the Hour, The (1906), a play by George Broadhurst. [Savoy Theatre, 479 perf.] Alwyn Bennett (Frederick Perry) is a rich, idealistic young man who has gotten himself elected mayor on a reform ticket. Charles Wainwright (James E. Wilson), a rapacious financier, and Richard Horigan (Frank MacVicars), the local political boss, set out to obtain a perpetual monopoly on the city's public transportation. When Bennett refuses to grant the franchise and announces he will fight it, the men determine to use every means to destroy him. Bennett's problem is compounded by the fact that he loves Wainwright's niece, Dallas (Lillian Kemble), whose fortune is tied to the success of the franchise. On Bennett's side are James Phelan (George Fawcett), an alderman who has long opposed Horigan, and Henry Thompson (Geoffrey Stein), Wainwright's private secretary, who unbeknownst to Wainwright is the son of a man Wainwright drove to suicide. Together they succeed in frustrating the monopolists while saving Dallas's money. The “virile melodrama” was one of the big muckraking hits of its day, on the order of The Lion and the Mouse, although more careful not to pattern its characters after specific, well‐known figures. More than one critic found it “a valuable service to the community” in exposing political greed and corruption.