The Man on the box

   Opening on 3 October 1905 at Hoyt's Theatre, the "polite parlor farce with melodramatic trimmings" by Grace Livingston Furniss, from the novel of that title by Harold MacGrath, ran for 111 performances. Henry E. Dixey played a lieutenant home on leave, who plans to surprise his sister by taking the place of her coachman to drive her home from a ball. He unwittingly responds to the wrong carriage call, drives the young woman and then gives her a brotherly embrace. She responds by calling a policeman. Of course, they are destined for each other, but only after two more acts of comic complications that include a Russian spy.