The revival of Lillian Hellman's The Children's Hour has again reminded us that when adroitly treated, whether seriously or humorously, gossip and its handmaiden scandal combine to remain one of the most completely fascinating themes in the dramatic catalogue. (p. 49)

[The Children's Hour] still deserves a repetition of its prosperity on the score of its considerable merit as a piece of playmaking and as a tight and intelligent melodrama, let alone its uncommonly deft triumph over materials that in less gifted hands might easily have been productive only of a cheap showshop sensationalism. It is what Miss Hellman deliberately has not done that lends some size to what, were it tastelessly done to a turn, would have been largely sub-Brieux or the kind of thing with which Al Woods used to scare the very three-sheets off the billboards. Restraint, in a word, has been Miss Hellman's best critical...