The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, January 11, 1903, Page 13

pocke 2zling practical w s excuses a & »f his com what Iyrics progress! you besides e if g its his Jove story and e course of e. N he can really as he wants It to r e writes merely the story e. In doing this he provides for tra 0 and exits and the the finales of his acts. s! That's where he plashing around and om, i he hasn't got f creating laugh anical or aid from re legiti tricks must bring 1 as a at clowning tha ar «t to dellberately soak another by holding the stream of seltzer on him. It quired nc »r gift of humor to invent t plece of business and the public sghs at it, not because it contains umor—for it does not—but purely from ce of habit On the ways in wh r hand, there are the same identical bu many is done In a legitimate and artis 2 thus becomes honestly funny and much T aughable. Among the numerous cases of this kind in my own experience one came up when we were putting on “The Idol's Eye.” You will recall that in the title role 1 was, among other things, an aeronaut, and you will not have forgotten my startling ntrance in Act I The scene was the rior of an East Indian temple. At the previous act I had made my 2 balloon idenly there was in the lofty dome of the and amid a shower of broken was seen to fall - llke a shot ugh the dome and Into the cellar of with the ragged remnants of sed balloon hanging to me. t of course was unique and it 1o me;gbut I argued that it was, came down to nothing elaborate and massive case of ose of the temple my cc v and I hesitated about using The very first night we played it be- fore ijence 1 discovered to my de- jight that I had been entirely wrong in my reasoning. verlooked the real which the fall from the balloon, but my demure and uncon- . strance from the cellar, a mo- ment after the fall, as happy as ever and none the worse for wear. There never was a laugh on the fall; but the moment the audience saw me bob up serenely from the cellar there was a roar all over the house. T! became & good legitimate, and a crafty comie opera trick in the “Wizard of the Nile,” for instance, durlng one act 1| wore a short skirt in my disguise as an HEgyptian izard. It is here thikt the canny Scootchmun, with his disagreeable habit of appearing at all sorts of disconcerting moments, suddenly starties me with his thunderous *“‘Hoot, mon.” Every time I heard this ““Hoot mon”™ it was part of my stage business to lose my ekirt through fright. About the third time this happened it used to strike the audience as hilariously funny and with each succeeding repetition it seemed to be eve avghable. Tt wae acc by having a lit Saie . which was looser 1 by a spr 1 admit that the tr ck was not a tus, bu t was not | y AS a Cr v k for the reason thz Scotchman he sk n off the s t ac nor “myself known ring the was consequentiy ed as it 8 wt t did not fit Another case s in dence in “Miss ty,” my latest comic opera at the 1a, when for a few moments jn an attempt to escape 1 disguise as an Indlan chief in full regalla, and every little while, as if by accident the long tail of my ceat, or whatever the Indians call it, jumps up and stands out straight behind. This is also done with a spring concealed under the garment behind Throughout ““Miss Simpilcity” my char- acter is joking, meddlesom., restless | 1 ‘when in my discom fort in b an suit 1 accidentally make the coat tafls act as if they were animat- ed 1 am ty “in character.”” Oa the other hand, if 1 were to do some equally silly thing out of char: er the point of the joke would be he pure and simple. The same principle saves my entrance fn “Miss Simplicity” from be.ng cheap In this case I am cataputed clear across the landscape from the explosion of an automobile; but the point of the effect is rot made until I appear without a blem- i=h, blow a clo f roadside dust out of my mouth and say, “Holy smoke! full of gasoline!” In “The Ameer” in the last act that had a bad shooting straight t in the four feet and then dde leaving its helpless occupa upon it with a sickening alr to drop | v thud. I'm we used a trick throne habit of abonut retiring, < This was accomplished ‘on the catapult system, The throne seat was fastened to a piston rod, which ran down through the stage, where it ended In a crossbar. Here two husky men lifted the bogus Ameer at the propsr cue signal and dropped him as suddenly. It we had depended on the mere me- chanical trick of shooting the man finto the afr and letting him drop“t would have been horse play. The real point of the joke was that the man on the throne was rot the real Ameer, but his ambitious servant in disguise, while the real Ameer played by yours truly was disguised as his, or rather my own, had taken this means of servant, and I discouraging other aspirants for my throne, while at the same time shifting my troubles with a gang of avenging brigands upon the THE SUNDAY CALL. o2l shoulders of my poor, disguised court fool There was a situn- tion in the joke that had brains In it and gave some good excuse for the eccentrieity of the throne, nother test that I some- times apply to a trick to make sure before trying it that it s legitimately funny js to get a clear picture of the business in my mind and then sk myself, “Now, why do you 1t the thing has a laugh at that?” point that !s susceptible of Intelli- gent explanation and If this point is sufficlently clear 80 that it needs no explanation, I give it a verdict as a legitimate joke./ But if I can't con- celve of a rational reason why the thing should make a laugh, even though I am sure the laugh will be there, I cast it out on the ground that it is horseplay. There was a situation in the joke that had brains in it and gave some good ex- cuse for the eccentricity of the throne. Scme one has sald that the difference between high comedy and low comedy is that In the former the audience laughs with the comedian and in the latter they laugh at him. Of course, all comle opera fun comes under the head of 1ow comedy; but I want to insist on my bellef that it low comedy s to be deservedly classed as art the comedian must not only make 13 = N ‘N his audiences laugh at him, but he must create the laughter in such a way that the audience will laugh with him, too. In other words, for an audience to re- spect a low comedian it is essentlal not only that he should appeal to the brains scross the footlights. but that he should i = T T Bresony “24l55 SHIFLICITY Phora THLET SIHELL GIRL" 24 Br THE COLUMEIH demonstrate that he has brains himseilf. There s a “survival of the fittest” in the theatrical business as well as in other walks of life; and, while I say nothing out the theory of evolution, I must ad- mit the fitness of things that relegates comedians who can only make monkeys of themselves to the : craft. Up to a short time ago the lnoleum were printed. By new machine the various ccl lald, so that the patter