No Exit, the play row running at the Embassy, had no entrance either on Saturday night. It was almost a full house.
Any distant relation, however poor, of Ten-Minute Alibi would be sure of a welcome, and No Exit has been received with open arms. However, it is commonly admitted that it is better to be born lucky than rich, and No Exit certainly has all the luck.
Its authors, George Goodchild and Frank Witty, have not been able, in No Exit, to imitate the plausibility of Ten-Minute Alibi. Their plot centres around an unreal joke which becomes grim reality. But the unreality of the joke communicates itself to the rest of the play, and from the beginning everything seems unreal.
Villainy Incarnate Most fantastic is the character of Cyril Anstey, played by Edward Ashley. He is villainy incarnate, and that he is destined for some horrid purpose is a foregone conclusion from his first entrance.
However, the problem of No Exit is not who did it? but how was it done? No one for one moment believes that such a useful and pleasant person as Robert Douglas could be convicted for an accident which he is unable to explain, nor that such a poisonous individual as Cyril Anstey could be allowed to pollute the general atmosphere by an existence prolonged beyond urgent necessity. For all its superficial transparencies No Exit holds its ultimate mystery well veiled to the end. Tension does not snap, nor does interest flag, and it is not necessary to be prophetic to foretell a busy box-office at the Embassy until the end of the play's run on Saturday, February 8. No Exit upholds its traditions.