The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, April 27, 1902, Page 13

BUNDAY CAL 13 gers dealt in cold hand to you or pr ation. They delight g those lured by the fatal footlizhte. old my t the box win- e stage; whom shall ized from the office very much I fe talent that wa 02 K he said, with ar es- y-own wave of v & Bryant?” T asked the little boy wh e door, for 1 saw 1t ' tion from the box of- a e's manager along passage that was wa o stage properties was a king's & throne there ar emblazone r. a bathtub on end P . of paper palms. stage ager,” read a a cheery voice in an- e The ice seemed sor 2 en aging in when I told him w s chance for w %5 per week and furnish You might have a 4 You might, if ¥ou : month and then Now, if you ait your chance, do it. Put the into some other 1l repay you fourfold h the constitution of work—long hours, re- bility of costuming. e is mo small v where we pro- next veek's p' oy rehearsed from 10 night’s perform ek's play needed to 1 called a rehearsal we went over one ou would have to go take = bite make up for the even- te e theater, when you are all 1t T hand you an not t hours, girls from going answered the man- . ifyou call it discour her just what she will have a girl of deli- wded with work. A kill that girl rt and shows half closing his maid who does part of the picture She is deter- hard work and patience. to come in,’bow the carriage waits." Perhaps be- ture around the ager decides to cause she has become a theater and the stage n ick—the girl who has been a chance Is given the udience are in scious of that black mass footlights—the side of the ening eager public, She has that consciousn: success—the has deserved it. and bitter apprentice- has arrived. u find twenty who are im- ho grudge every moment of Some take it IT TAKES A GIRL WiTH ThE CONSTITUTION OF A HORSE TO DO THE WORK jLoNG HOURS,REHEARSALS, THE RESPONSIBILI~ TIES OF COSTUMING AND LEARNING LINES ALONE, ¥ —sual affront. They feel that they are sMghted for some reason. They neglect the work and spend their time nursing their shattered ambition and knocking the leading. lady. ‘“Temperament is the first essential. “You can’t tell by the looks of a frog how far he can jump,’ and you can’t tell by the looks of a girl just what she can do. Those who appear at first glance to be most promising often become frightened at the work and drop out of the ranks. The most insignificant looking have often surprised both the public and themselves. “A good education is one of the first essentials. Brains are necessary to gauge the emotions and to interpret parts. Me- chanical training is not all nor does it follow that bécause one can take well parts taught him he will have brains enough to create character: for that's what interpretation of a part means. A great actor sets his individual stamp on the character he interprets and malkes the personality of the character stand out. “To be a well-rounded actress requires a capacity for infinite painstaking. That's what it all amounts to. That's what a manager is continually hammering at in one way or another. Acting is a profes- sion. It should have the same prepara- tion and constant keeping up with the times that is given to any other profes- sion. One intelligent in the art of acting should be conversant with the history of the stage. It is an interesting history— the evolution of. the stage; and one whose life’'s work is on the stage should cer- tainly be interested to the extent of knowing it. “If you leave your name and address,” said Mr. Bryant, opening a large book and turning over pages and pages of names and addresses, “I'll send for you when your turn comes.” And I placed my name and address at the end of the list of the “aiso rans,” thanked Mr. Bryant for his advice, which I told him was no dcubt good, and retraced my steps under the palms past the tub and throne and up into the light of day. The ordinary stage-struck girl would think twice, I pondered, after that éxcel- lent talk. Nevertheless I crossed the street to the Orpheum. “I want to go on the stage,” I confided to the man in the box window, this time rather timidly, for I half expected a scoldicg for presuming on such an am- bition. “Come around Tuesday morning—that’s when they try out the new ones.” Tuesday rcurning found me and a dozen other would-be leading ladies at the Orpheum, each waiting to do her turn. They ranged all the way from 18 to 60— some trembling with expectation and some with a set hopelessness on their faces. “We're not trying any new talent,” sald orrisey, “unless they are cracka- jacks.” And he gave me a look which sald plainly that he did not consider me “a crackajack.” “What can you do—have you had any experience?’ he askad. “No—no,” I hastened to reassure him, fezrful that he might ask me to get up and do a turn. A mite of a girl was singing and trilling to the great empty house. ‘“Has she ever been on the stage? I asked. “No, but there was a pull brought to bear in her case. An old friend of mine came to me and said: ‘John, I have a friend who wants to go on. I wish you'd look her over and see what you think of ker. 'What are you going to tell hes™ “I am going to ask her if she has » home here, and if she has I'll tell he to go home and be a comfort to the old folks. That girl isn't fit for the stage Imagine her knocking around the country doing one-night stands! She’'d probaBly sit down and cry if her trunk didn’t ar- rive on time. She'd better go back to the old folks. Ill not let her run away with the idea that she has any talemt.” So I left it to John Morrisey to shatter the little girl's air castles while I slipped out of the door and headed for the Tiv- oli. My little speech—*I want to go on the stage”—had by this time become auto- matic, and a disapproving look in answer I expected as part of the programme. Imagine my surprise then when Man- ager Leahy took it all as a joke! “You want to go on the stage, do you? Poor girll What do you sing—soprano or contralte?” Sing! I had never sung a note in my life, but now I remembered that they did sing in the Tivoli chorus, but I had al- ways thought “limbs’” were the long suit. Neck and arms I knew counted nothing, for my mental stage pictures included many & bony neck and scrawny arm. “Say, you, come around to-morrow at 10 and sing for Director Steindorff, and then as you go out you'll hear him tell me how rotten it was ricrures of rea: singers humg around the office, and out of reverence for them I declined to desecrate the art, but I ask~d Manager Leahy what he considered the first essential to success on the stage. “Here you have got to make good on a volce. For success in capital letters you should have three things—a good figure pretty face and a good voice. Here we consider the voice first of all, but in soms of the Eastern citles a pretty face goes a long way. Here, besides all these, you ought to know something about dancing and carrying yourself properly. Did you ever stop to think that it is not an easy thing to walk across the stage properiy?” “But how do girls ever get on the stage at all when they are so persistently di couraged by everybody?" I asked. “Well, there are two now,” answered Mr. Leahy, motioning in the direction where two young ladles were waiting to speak to him. “They have sung for Stein- dorff, and he says they’ll do, and now they are waiting for a chance in the chorus.” “And T hope they’ll get it,” said Tas T fled and left the way clear for the two that Steindorff had O. K.'d. Next 1 headed for the Central, and hers again I was met by Belasco. “Didn’t Bryant encourage you?" said he, and I thought I saw a twinkle in his eve. “No,” 1 said, “he didn’t. But I have been in amateur theatricals with great success, and when I go to the matinees and sit in the front rows and watch the leading lady it just makes me crazy to act.” “You don't know what you are talking about. It takes years and years to be- come a leading lady, and what looks the easiest from this side of the footli probably took hours of patient rehearsal. It isn't an easy matter to faint gracefully and without jarring the house. It is an art. .'When my brother Dave was rehears- ing Blanche. Bates in ‘Madame Butterfly in New York they would go to the theater in the morning—it was in the summer time and almost too hot to stir, but there they would work all day. She went over and over that little play hundreds of times, experimenting. trying for the most effective way, and when he'd call the re- hearsal off she would say, ‘Oh, Mr. Se- lasco, let me g0 over it just once more.’ “Stage-struck girls don't think of the work; they only think of- the triumph But it's a land of long hours and short pay, headaches and heartaches—a land of many temptations, with now and then a triumph; but not one girl In a hundred that goes on the stage meets with sue- cess, and many drop out at the very first sign of work. “But 1f you are determined to go on I think we have a mob scene in a play four weeks hence—or is it five,\Bill?"" question- ing a young man in the office who was counting over the tickets “Five or six, Fred.” “Well, if you leave vour name and ad- dress we might get you on as a super.” “A super?” I repeated “Yes, a supernumerary—one of the mob, you know.” X “Oh, yes; T did go on once in a mob sceme, and my friends all said I was gr— a4 Tet's go get a drink, 'Bill." said Be- lasco. I have my doubts. but let us hope they drank to the health of those aspiring to stageland—a land where m: are called and few are chosen: a land where it's hard to get in and hard to keep in, and the favorites are forgotten more easily than they are remembered. ISABEL FRASER.