The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, October 4, 1903, Page 46

6 THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SfUNDAY, OCTOBER 4, 1903. Fa e i b BRI, . e T was from Mr. Sothern's room, aye, from Henry Miller's former quarters, wherefrom, too, the thoughtful face of Dave Warfield haa looked out at me, that Jess Dandy's volce, sur- mounting the thrilling shirt and gray trews of “The Prince of Pilsen's” first act, sald, “Come fn.” There was no need of introductions. Dandy off the stage Is Dandy on. Ex- cept &s to the halr. That he held in his hand. He used the other plump paw to drag in & chair for me from Miss Fra- ganza's room across the alley, for, needs not be sald, this was behind scenes at the Columbia. The comedian was making up for the He had come in late, to find the rubber band that holds his star wig on broken. With a quick “You'll excuse me if I g0 on? have gone wrong,” Mr. Dandy gave me his round phiz in the make-up mirror and a back view of an opulent plumpness. “Don’t let me bother you,” I said, not sorry for the chance to look about me. I noted first that Hans Wagner's up~ holstery is all Dandy’s own, except as before said, the hair. His own is shy and darkish. At his elbow Arthur Don- aldson, once of the Tivoli and as a youth a protege of Ibsen, was donning the war paint of the Prince of Pllsen. The stage manager's dog, small, shaggy, blase, camped under the washstand. Outside, running up and down the alley, was a performance, and troubled about his wigs. -brilliant flutter of girls, chiffoned and I'm late, and of course things- spangled in all the colors of the rain- bow, and humming, pipmg and whistling ““The Prince of Pilsen” as if they did not get it eight times a week and Sun- days. Perhaps this is because they are all young, wonderfully young, slim bits of girls mostly that haven't turned up their hair yet. An occasional chorus man —he is rapidly becoming a curiosity—dec- orated the procession, and over all was the warm, electric, unmistakable odor of the theater. Mr. Dandy was now trying on rapidly and critically two other shocks of stub- born, sandy locks, and apostrophizing the effect in the mirror. “Won't do. What do you think of that? Awful, isn't 1t?” He returned then to the first, that sat but loosely upon his moist brow, and ex- plained: *“We had an understudy reheags-+ % Jess Dandy, Successful Comedian, Who Thinks the Climb to Top of the Ladder Is Easy. e S Ly al this morning and my understudy broke the thing.” 4 “Larger head than yours, Mr. Dandy, I suggested. I hadn’t seen all around his I-ness’ of Zinzinnati’s then! ‘“Couldn’t it be tacked on?" “‘Or I could fasten it with a string to my collar button,” he laughed good hu- moredly. Then he turned to his “heiper” “Quick, Frank, ask Mrs. — ;;; lcome here and take a reef in my back " % In a moment the black robed, white aproned wardrobe mistress flew in, and with a tremblingly threaded needle took a tuck in the neck of the wig, while Mr. Dandy sighed importantly: *Ah, the pub- lic little thinks on what trivial things a great production hangs.” WITH ‘THE P?LA AND THE MUSIC FOLK YERS Comfortably wigged now, the comedian turned his attention to his eyebrows and to me, offering first a cigar to the artist. '—a nice large one, Mr. Printer. please, even if i myself have to go with- out an “I" to me name, for Mr. Dandy speaks—"I don’t know if I can give you what you want. It—this—well—is—prac* tically—my first interview.” I expressed the expected surprise with- out difficulty, for Dandy is an unctuously humored comedian ‘ on stage, and prompted: “It is just a little chat about you and your work that I want, Mr. Dandy. Modestly resigned then to being the hub of things generally and of “The Prince of Pilsen” in particular, the comedian gave me a chat to that effect. He had struck me as being a good deal of a hub in “The Prince of Piisen,” but I never, never suspected the depth of his hubbi- ness until he told me all about it him- elf. sl>le began, deftly shoveling on another evebrow the while: “Well, I took up this business rather as a joke, would you be- Heve it7" “The deadly serious business oflbelng funny as @ joke!” I protested. “Fie, fle, Mr. Dandy!” “I did, indeed,” scotching a fun furrow round his mouth. “I've only been in the business five years—since 1 was 26—"" “Oh, Dandy!” I murmured. I had given to be a commercial traveler “A delicate matter,” he delicately put ft—"ladtes'—" AR “And waists. I am a dandy on shirt walsts. I studied medicine for nineteen months before that. But it was because 1 told such good stories on the road—best story-teller on the road they called me— that I came into this. They used to get me into all the free shows going to per- form, and I thought I might as well get paid for it.” “What did you do first?” “First verse of the Widow,” cried “Frafk.” “You're too pale to-night, Dandy,” Donaldson’s suggestion. “This wig's not going to stay on,” de- spairingly from the comedian. Then he desperately plastered its edge to his brow, and slapped the suggested blush on his broad cheek. “Say, she's off,” Frank yelled and flung the comedian into his top hat, coat and scarlet vest—the last gilded button of it finding its hole as he raced on the stage— in less space than it takes to say ‘‘Jack Robinson.” He sang out parting bless- ing to the poor fellow: “Fix your hat; there's dirt on it.”” “Oh-0-0," 1 sighed breathlessly. “Quick work,” Frank said, coolly smil- ing. He's used to it. Then he began to lay out the 25 cents’ worth of starch and shirt that Dandy spoils nightly in the fountain he wallows in. He put out, too, the large, white vest, another wig, a pair of rubber boots and the dress suit that accompany the ocecasion. Thirty-five cents it costs in laundry every night for that five minutes,” he put it. “It's worth more,” I sald, with a remin- iscent grin. Then, off with Mr. Dandy, I turned to Mr. Donaldson, whose reputed connection with Ibsen had naturally fascinated me. A fellow of enviable inches this, a big, breezy, wholesome personality, poles apart from the Oswald person in “Ghosts" that Mr. Donaldson tells me is one of his favorite parts. “Yes, I know Ibsen very well,” the ac: tor replied. ‘“He and my father were great friends at home—I'm a Swede, you know—and that is how I came to know him. Yes, I think him the greatest liv- ing playwright, our Scandinavian Shake- speare. I've played most of the malp parts in his plays—yet here I am in musi- cal comedy,” he ended with an uncom- fortable little laugh. *‘But that’s because it is the rage”—Mr. Donaldson fascinat- Ingly says ‘“‘wage. . & sen and Shakespeare. Why play more of Ibsen’s dramas is to me sur- they don't prising. But he will be popular when America gets more serfous and thinks nct so much of the almighty dollar. Now, people must work too hard for the dollar, They do not want to think at night. They must be amused. Do you not think so?” 1 nodded assent and then told Mr. Don- aldson of our own Ibsen productions, of Blanche Bates and Nance O'Neil's Hedda Gabler, and of the latter's Lady Inger of Ostrat, ending up by asking whether “Gaibler,” as the O’'Neil has it, or the ““Gahbler” of the rest of us is correct. - “Gahbler, of course,” the Ibsenite cried, and Nance O’'Neil would never do it again if she had heard his shocked tone. “‘Tell me more of Ibsen, though.” “He's a pretty hard proposition,” the Bwede Americanly put it. “Looks very stern, so!”—but Mr. Donaldson had not the lionlike mane for his picture—“says bitter, stinging things, many. But he doesn’t mean them. Winks his eye, you know. I imitated him on the stage once in Stockholm in a little two-act comedy. Lord, how the people laughed!” “What did he sav?” “Laughed, too, if he heard of it,” the actor sald confidently. “Ibsen used to be & newspaper man at first,” he went on ‘“editor of a daily paper.” “Lovely!” said this newspaper person. ““There’s hope yet.” “Then”’— but here Mr. Dandy returned. His noble brow was beaded with hon- est toil, but he took up the interview where he left off. ‘“Now, then, where was 17”7 “You had just been born,” Mr. Don- aldson prompted. *“Ah, in Rochester, New York, thirty- one years ago,” Dandy innocently con- tinued. ‘“Vos you effer in Zinzinnati?” I asked obviously, “Yes, and a good enough town it is,” the New Yorker said, “but Frisco's good enough for me. There's plenty of things to keep an actor out of his bed here, even after New York.” “Praise from Caesar,” I murmured, “but you were telling me about your start in this business.” ““Well, I began in vaudeville,” Mr. Dan- dy replied, tossing off a glass of water with peculiar relish for a brewer, “and it was no trouble at all for me to attain almost the top notch in eight weeks.” “Really!"” “Yes. I did a Hebrew monologue—very refined—and I got my $150 a week on the Keith circuit in no time. Then I got an engagement, $150 a week and fares both ways, on the Orpheum circuit here. ‘Why I didn't get to Frisco was because they objected then to the Hebrew mono- logue in the Orpheum, and somehow I didn’t want to come here after that. But they've had Julian Rose since, who emu- lates my performance very thoroughly— and is lower priced—and I hear he mada quite a success with the people. If he did, I should have eaten them up!"—a real, sizable “I" please, Mr. Printer, “That I'm sure of, Mr. Dandy,” I en- couraged. “I always wrote my own monologues and parodies, you know—it was mostly a musical act mine. I wrote most of the verses of ‘It Was the Dutch,’ that I hear made no success here at all until I sung it.” “A fine comic song, and excellently sung,”,I subscribed heartily. He rushed out here again and I “tackled” my Ibsen man, now resplendent in full regimentals. > “What parts did you play under Ibsen’s own direction?” I asked. “What an in- spiration!” “He is a master of stagecraft, isn't he?” Donaldson said. “I played most of them, really. Oswald, in ‘Ghosts,’ is my favorite.” “We have not had that here.” “Because it Is ‘nasty,’ as the English the actor asked. “Believe me, Miss Partington, if I had a young son and daughter, I would not hesitate to send them to any Ibsen play. Think of the lesson of ‘Ghosts’ to any young man. Nothing could be more valuable. Then for political morality there is ‘The Pillars of Society.” All of the plays have some lesson.” very time I take my hat off”"—Mr. Dandy has returned—"I have to hold the wig on. It's awful. It takes away ail th v “*Spontaneity— “Ease,” the comedian preferred, “from one’s playing.” Does it make you nervous?” “Oh, no; I'm of very unnervous call- ber,” he sized himself up. “But I was telling you how I came to be here. Mr. Ransome played this part of mine in the original ‘Prince of Pilsen,’ you know. Then came the time to send out a second company. Well, Mr. Savage, our man- ager, !s a man who doesn’t send out bad coples of the original company, but tries to improve on the first, you see. They got most of the people together, easily enough, but then came the problem of filling Ransome’s place. Mr. Savage tried innumerable men, rehearsed dozens and dozens of 'em before he got to me. You see, there’s a pecullar personality re- quired for the part. I fitted it, however, and here I am.” “And you're enjoying it?” “Every minute of it,” said the come- dian, heartily. “I've renamed the tour, with the approval of the entire company, ‘Henry W. Savage's pleasure tour with , there isn’t any immediate cessa- tion of this In prospect,” Mr. Dandy proudly confessed, “I'm signed for three vears with Mr. Savage and am most like- ly going to Europe with the company in this comedy. And, of course, since I've made good in this I've had stacks of of- fers.” “You me?" ““There is a double understudy for every part In the company,” he informed me. “There’s one of 'em on to-night, the un- derstudy of the English lord. Clifford, who has the part, broke two ribs falling down over a piece of peach peel to-day. The other chap is doing very nicely, but we're all a bit nervous for him. Of course it lacks the zip! zip!"” and Dandy snapped his fingers eloquently. The artist then humbly asking the com- edian to hold still for a second or two brought out: “Frank Mostyn Kelly want- ed to draw me before I came out, for the —. I used to do newspaper stuff my- self.” this to me. “That was for the New York Sun. Baseball stuff. No trouble at all to me, as I'm a baseball sharp.” “You don’t seem to make much trou- bie of anything, Mr. Dandy?” have an understudy, you told And 1 sel- “No, I'm pretty easy-going. dom get angry. times It's years between the 1 remember to have been Then she yips!—oh, Lord! He returned later to tell me that I should have soon to vacate the dressing- room for his ch: of costume, “People t with a comical attempt to be pa e, “that the theatrical life is all ple. But I tell you that witn changing costumes—I strip to the skin the fountain scene—of and with a matinee everything 3 y we put in. Donaldson here's had it for a year and a half now.” “You were with the original company?" 1 asked the interpreter of the role of the real Prince of Pilsen. He nodded an affirmative and volun- teered, ““And in my opinion this company is the better one.” 3 “In other people’s opinion, too,” Mr. Dandy said, “in places where we have followed the first company.” “That's nice,” I said, and followed Mr. Dandy among the butterfly girls floating about, to his next scene on the stage. [ had a little chat there with Nick Long, neat, slim, chipper, who was bewailing the fact that his and Idalene Cotton's specialty, “one of the most difficult turns of the kind in the business,” didn't come on until 11 o'clock. thought it a pity, too, and said so. Miss Fraganza passed me, a flame of scarlet, lit by two big brown eyes, lda- lene Cotton's neat ankles and flaming halo added zest to the scene and the cur- tain of the first act went down on a bil- lowy mass of girl and uniformed man. Ve bade good-by to Mr. Dandy then. As he said it, wondering if he had been “I-ing” himself too much, he recalled: “I have some photographs of myself that might be useful. I will let you have them if you will be very careful of them. They were taken at 6 months, at 3 years, 4 years and 6 years old. Mother gave them to me when I came away, thinking they might come in.” Tuesday’s Concert Closes a Half of Symphony Season ITH next Tuesday afternoon’s con- W cert the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra will close the first half of its highly successful season. The second half will not begin until March next, for we must share Mr. Scheel with Philadelphia—or Philadelphia with us, and the fraternal city’s season is now almost due. Possibly this last Scheel season has been the most instructive of the many sym- phony seasons we have had. It has been more forcibly demonstrated than ever that the local material is almost sufficlent to a good symphony concert, and that the local appreciation is ripe for this highest form of music. Mr. Scheel expresses him. self most pleased with the devotion of the local musictans. Much has been said— mayhap at other times with justice—of the indifference of our orchestral musi- clans to the furtherance of the symphony art. Mascagni had nothing to say on this head. He knew better, save when his Latin enthusiasms led him into a little florid grumbling. Still less has Scheel to say. On the contrary, the famous con- ductor has nothing but cordial praise for the men who have worked so earnestly and faithfully with him. Here, where practically every man in the symphony orchestra is employed at thea- ter or cafe, no small sacrifice has been r. volved in the rehearsals necessary for the symphony concerts. The Tivoli men, for good example. Running coincidently with the Scheel season has been the Tivoli's grand opera season, the last named in- volving the rehearsal of two new operas a week. At the cafes the musicians are in little better case yet In spite of this the men have given half an hour, an hour, an hour and a half even over the two- hour rehearsal of the symphony, for pure love of the work and their conductor. It has meant going without a meal some- times, and working like a horse at all times, and one should not forget to be grateful for these things. The man and the time are both here, for that is what this all means. What it means to the next half of the season is even more important. Confidence in the Scheel leadership has led to the full sup- port of the musical union, and to its con- sent to the entirely sensible design of im- porting for the rest of the concerts the half dozen or so musicians who are nec- essary to the full stature of the orchestra. These will be of the best the world af- fords. All kinds of plans are in the air for next Season. One innovation, most important, is that of giving the concerts in the even- Ing, which will give at least a doubled audience. Anotheér that will add import- antly to the popular interest of the serles is the engagement of soloists for the con- cert, Mme. Schumann-Heink being among those mentioned. The season will begin in March next, to last until the following June. Like all our good things, we shail have our symphony in the summer. And now, for the farewell Tuesday con- cert will be given the lovely Schubert symphony No, 10, the Beethoven overture No. 3 and the Lizst rhapsodie No. 3. The novelty bf the afternoon will be H. J. Stewart's Incidental music to Monteguma, that will then be given for the first time outside of the sacred precinets of the Bo- hemian Grove. I hear very good things of it. This, and the fact of it being the last concert, with gratitude to the condue- tor, the men and the S8an Francisco Sym- phony Society, should insure the most crowded house of the season, where all have been good. R, el Gregorett's Figaro, a superb present- ment of the part, was the event of last week’s opera. The Tivoll's new barytone is eminently the Tivoll's most successful investment of the season’s new people. He gave us first an Amonasro second only to Salassa’s wonderfully poetic conception of the part, then a Count d} Luna and a Monsieur Duval unequaled here, and now the best Figaro that we have had. This week we shall have Gregorett! in new veln, In the role of Iago, in which he will have to challenge comparison with the historic lago of Salassa. Comedy seems to be the barytone’s stronghold, his Figaro the most affluently funny per- formance I have seen of the role, but we shall see what we shall see. In its humorous side the tremendous difficuity of the Figaro role is frequently forgotten. The “Largo al Factotum™ is among the most tongue-tripping songs in all the range of opera. Gregoretti's per- formance of it was simply priceless, his articulation a marvel. Not only so, but every word of it brimmed with meaning. You didn’t need any score to know what he was talking about, and it was so throughout the whole performance. The recitativos in which the opera abounds were also models of that not easy art. One remembers gratefully too Trava- glini, whose Don E o was another pleasing effort in a gallery of good things, Though Travaglini's voice has neither the opulent fiber nor smoothness of Dado’s, the basso is an artistic and thoughtful singer. His “La Calumnia” was most 's Rosina, though a little fldg- was much the best thing she has She was piqua and charming to to begin with, vivacious in the reason frequently for her title, Venetian Nightingale."” But the little soprano must cease from the high note abomination. It is tearing that delicate little throat of hers to pleces, and rap spoiling a charming volce Even if the hoi polloi cannot be depended upon to applaud without the stretched t note it is still not worth while, The others ety, done. look at, acting, and one will, and the voice be worth while thinking about, ben. Tedeschi, who showed at first a sav- ing virtue in this regard, be indulging in the habit. To him, also, one would say “don’t.” Tedesehi and t} clever Cortesi as Almaviva and Dr. Bar- tolo respectively, completed “The Bar- ber’s” cast. It should not be forgotten among it notabilities that the performance, wh 3 un, stopped always this Boheme" will alternate with “Otel- this week, and in this well beloved opera comes Agostini’'s chance. De Spada, who is doing admirable work this season, will be the Mimi. If only some one would teach this clever singer what to do with her hands! P i Augusta Cottlow—she 1sste when she came here last, a pale, bright- eyed lassie of 14 or thereabouts—will be the first planist of the present seasom. Miss Cottlow, whom one remembers as a poetic and imaginative young girl, returns to us with the reputation of a thoroughly capable and mature artist. She has won all kinds of favor since her visit here, particularly in fastidious Berlin, where she appeared no fewer than three times as planist with the Philharmonic orches- tra. Miss Cottlow appears three times here, at Lyric Hall on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, October 13 and 15, and on Oc. tober 17 in the afterncon. Wilk L. Green- baum, under whose management Miss Cottlow appears, has also arranged the additional attraction of some ensemble numbers, In which will be heard with the planist Natorp Blumenfeld, a young vio. linist who has the cachet of Mr. Scheel's approval, and Arthur Weiss, the well known local “cellist. The artists will give at the first concert the Rubinstein B flat major trio. Miss Cottlow will play on the same evening the Busoni arrangement of the D major prelude and fugue for organ; the B mindr capriccio of Brahms, Tschat. kowsky’s “Romance” in F minor, some Chopin movements and other fmportant numbers. Mr. Blumenfeld's solos will be Bruch’s “Kol Nidrel,” part of g Bach scnata and Wienlawski and Vieuxtemps movements. The second affair will be pw - istic. Miss Cottlow will nllyp x?."r’::. jor ballade of Chopin and the thirty-rvey variations In C minor of Beethoven, The pianist will also be heard in Onp; the 16th. e, . Raymond Hitcheock “The Yankee Consul,” has been n, of his election as associate mem:::fl:: the Arlington Egyptologists’ Soclety in recognition of his services In the nterest of archaeology. Hitcheock off the st is a very close student of archaeology :3 his library on that subject is one of the best In the country. He read a paper last summer before the Arlington e “The Mythology of Cheops, tracted much attention. In his leisure moments from “The Yankee Consul™ Hitcheock is extending this Paper and ex- Summeg, Pects to publish it during the . the comedian of