He was an exceptional mime and demonstrated unrivalled versatility in creating individual characterisations. He was particularly praised for his vivid characters with eccentric and idiosyncratic and habits, including Fagin, Falstaff and Svengali. His diligent preparation and attention to detail in make-up, gesture, body position and facial expression allowed him to inhabit these roles. He used his expressive eyes to project such varied emotions as "the dreamy languor of Hamlet during his moments of reflection and the baleful hatred of Shylock towards his persecutors to the nervous fear of Richard II during his surrender at Flint Castle. His Malvolio was a swaggering and conceited fool, King John a superstitious and deceitful coward, and Macbeth a neurotic and self-torturing monarch." The literary critic Desmond MacCarthy wrote of Tree: "He could make himself look like Falstaff. He understood and revelled in the character of Falstaff, but his performance lacked fundamental force. Hence the contradiction in his acting: his performance as a whole often fell short of high excellence, yet these same impersonations were lit by insight and masterly strokes of interpretation, which made the spectator feel that he was watching the performance of the most imaginative of living actors."quoted in "Review: Herbert Beerbohm Tree: Some Memories of Him and His Art, by Max Beerbohm, The North American Review, Vol. 214, No. 790 (September 1921), pp. 426–428
