Continuous Vaudeville

Al Fields' (Fields & Lewis) mother and father came from Berlin. Father teaches stuttering people not to stutter. One day he was busily beating time for a pupil to talk to, when the bell rang; he went to the door and a boy handed in a bundle, saying,

"Frank Brothers."

A couple of days afterwards Mother said to him,

"Papa, haf you seen a pair of slippers come by der house for Mama?"

No, Papa had seen no slippers.

"It iss funny iss," said Mama. "Two days ago yet I buy me a pair of slippers from Frank Brothers; unt they say they vill sent them by a boy to the house."

"From who iss it?" asked Papa anxiously.

"From Frank Brothers."

"Gott in Himmel; I thought the boy said 'Frankfurters'; they are the ice box in."

Al and his father were sitting at the breakfast table.

"Where iss it that you go next veek?" asked Papa.

"Birmingham," said Al shortly.

At this moment Mama came in from the kitchen, and overheard.

"No, Allie," she said quickly, "it iss not the ham vat iss burning; it iss the eggs."

In the "George Washington, Jr.," Company there was a young lady who laid great stress on the refined atmosphere in which she had been brought up. Everything in her home had been just a little more refined than any one else had ever enjoyed. One day at the table the subject of coffee-drinking came up; some thought it harmful, others did not; finally Carter De Haven asked this young lady what she thought about it.

"Well," she said, in her precise way, "I don't think it hurts anybody. I know Papa always drank five and six saucersful every morning, and it never hurt him."

THE OLD SHIP OF ZION

Old Dennie O'Brion had looked upon the wine when it was red in the cup so long that he was about down and out; no one would hire him any more, even in the most menial capacity. His poor, hard-working wife had at last taken the pledge not to support him any longer in idleness, so it was up to Dennie to do something desperate. The most desperate thing he could think of was to swear off. So before the priest he took a solemn vow not to touch a drop of liquor for one year.

And he managed to retain his seat on the wagon splendidly – for thirty-six hours.

On the evening of the second day Mrs. O'Brion, in appreciation of his desperate efforts to conquer the demon rum, took Dennie and their twelve-year-old-son Mickie to the theater. It was a rollicking, up-to-date, musical comedy. The boys and the girls of the chorus at the rise of the curtain gayly quaffed huge quantities of imaginary wine from near-golden goblets. The Comedian was a jolly, jovial souse who never, during the first two acts, got sober but once, and then got into trouble by it.

The first act took place in a Parisian café, where the chorus men were all American millionaires buying wine for the Chorus Ladies.

The second act took place in a brewery, where the Comedian fell into a beer vat and was only saved by the number of champaign corks he had in his pockets, which acted as life preservers.

'Twas a fine play to take a man to who was only thirty-six hours on the water wagon.

At the end of the second act, when the Comedian had just been rescued from the beer vat, Dennie scrambled to his feet and began climbing for the aisle.

"Where are ye's goin', Dinnie?" asked Mrs. O'Brion anxiously.

"Let go me tail," says Dennie. "Me foot's asleep; I must get out." And tearing his coat-tail away he hurried up the aisle.

"Mickie, darlin'," said Mrs. O'Brion to her young hopeful, "follow your father! Don't let him get into a saloon! And if he does, stick to him! Bring him home! Hurry, now."

Mickie hurried out and caught the old man just as he was making the swinging doors.

"Here, Father, Father, come out av that!" he cried, catching Dennie by that muchly pulled coat-tail.

"Oh, to h – wit you!" says Dennie. "Go back to your mother!"

"But, Father, you promised the priest! You took a solemn vow not to touch liquor for a whole year."

"What av it?" says Dennie.

"Well, the year is not up," says Mickie.

"G'an!" says Dennie. "Go back to school! read your program! Look," and Dennie pointed to the program which he still clasped in his hand; "read that! 'Two years elapses between the second and third acts.'"

Leaving the dumbfounded Mickie there on the sidewalk, Dennie hurried into the saloon; but he did not hurry out. Meanwhile Mrs. O'Brion went home and Mickie waited at the door.

An hour later Dennie came out – endways. With a number nine boot just behind him. Mickie tenderly assisted his father to his feet and started him homeward. Dennie had now reached the crying stage; nobody loved him; he thought he should commit suicide; in the morning.

Now it so happened that on this night the Salvation Army were conducting an all-night session at their barracks. Dennie and Mickie had to pass these barracks on their way home. The lights and the music caught Dennie's wandering attention, and he insisted on going in. Mickie tried to tell him that it was no place for him, a good Catholic, but Dennie shook off his detaining hands and staggered into the hall, down the center aisle, tripped over an umbrella handle, and fell flat on his face right up against the platform. Mickie meanwhile stood back near the door horror-stricken.

The old, white-haired officer who was speaking as Dennie made his unexpected appearance at his feet, was quick to seize the opportunity and he delivered a beautiful and touching oration on the Heavenly hand that had guided the feet of this poor erring brother here to the Throne of Grace, and he finished up by saying,

"And now, brothers and sisters, let us all rise and sing that beautiful hymn, 'The Old Ship of Zion.'"

Three minutes afterwards little Mickie burst into his own home and threw himself into his mother's arms, sobbing as if his heart was breaking.

"What is it, me darlin'; what is the matter? Where is your father?"

"He's dead; he's dead," sobbed Mickie. "He wint into the Salvation Army, and he fell onto the flure, and they all stood up and begun to sing – 'The Ould Mick Is Dyin'!'"

From a letter published in The Player:

"The theater is a dump, owing to the unsanitary condition of the house and management."

Little Miss MuffetSat down on a tuffetIn Churchill's new Café.A Pittsburger spied 'erAnd sat down beside 'erAnd they couldn't drive Miss Muffet away.

Special attention is called to the fact that this is the only collection of stories about actor folks ever published, that does not have the one about the man in the spiked shoes stepping on the actor's meal ticket.

From an English Theatrical paper I clip the following names:

Price & Revost; Bumps the Bumps.

Niagara & Falls; French Acrobats.

Boston & Philadelphia.

Merry & Glad.

Willie Stoppit.

Nat Haines was playing poker; Laloo was one of the players. Laloo was a freak that came to this country some years ago, and at one time commanded a salary of a thousand dollars a week. He was a very handsome young fellow, but had growing out from his breast the body of a small female. He had no muscular control of this secondary body, but could take hold of its hands and arms and work them all about.

After they had been playing a while Nat discovered that Laloo was cheating; he said nothing at the time, simply throwing his hand down and passing out. But when the hand was over and some one else was dealing, Nat leaned over to Laloo and said,

"Say, Kid; you do that again and I'll give your sister a kick in the neck."

FIREMAN, SAVE MY CHILD

A comic opera company was playing Moose Jaw, Canada. I don't have to say what kind of a company it was. The fact that they were playing Moose Jaw is enough.

(And by the way, who knows how that town got its name? And a bright little boy at the foot of the class held up his hand and said – "I know!" And the teacher said, "All right, Willie, you may tell us how Moose Jaw got its name." And Willie said – "It is derived from an Indian expression which means, 'The-Place-Where-the-Man-Fixed-the-Wagon-With-a-Moose's-Jaw-Bone.'")

There was no regular theater there, so the company appeared in the fire station. The engines were run out in the street and the show was given there. There were big corridors on the second and third floors where the firemen slept; there was a brass rod running down from the upper to the lower floor for the firemen to slide down in case of a fire. The firemen all slept up on the third floor this night, giving the second floor up to the ladies for a dressing room.

It was at the end of the first act. The girls were changing for the second act. The change was complete; tights and all. And an alarm was rung in. B-r-r-r-r!! went the big gong downstairs. And swish! swish! went the red-shirted firemen down the pole. The girls thought the firehouse itself was afire and ran shrieking around the room begging to be saved.

There were eighteen firemen upstairs that night and only two of them got to the fire.

On the stage of the Orpheum Theater in Montreal hangs this sign:

WHERE THERE'S SMOKE THERE'S FIREYOU DO THE SMOKING AND I'LL DO THE FIREINGMANAGER

I came near leaving the stage while playing in Montreal and going into the portering business; said change being suggested by the following advertisement in the Montreal Star:

"Wanted: A porter to drive bus and a dining room girl."

GOT ANY EXPERIENCED BABIES?

Wanted: Nursing; experienced babies. 10X Globe Office. – (Toronto Globe.)

PLAYING THE ENGLISH MUSIC HALLS

An American talking act going over to England to play has got a big job on hand. The trouble is going to come from a totally unexpected source too. It is because we do not speak the language. We say that we speak English; but we don't; that is, mighty little of it. We speak mostly plain, unadulterated, United States language, which is very different from English. So when we go over there, in addition to talking about things that they do not understand, we are also using a language that they don't know.

For instance: We opened up in Manchester with a play called The Wyoming Whoop. Now out of that title they understood just one word – "The." They did not know whether "Wyoming" was a battleship or some patent skin food. And "Whoop" was still worse.

During the progress of the play one of the characters speaks of having left the day's ice on the steps all the forenoon; I say —

"Has that piece of ice been out in that Wyoming sun all the forenoon?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, you take a sponge and go out and get it."

After two or three shows the manager came to me and asked me what that line about the ice meant; was it supposed to be funny? I told him it was in America. He wanted to know why.

"Well," I said, "you know Wyoming is the hottest place in America, don't you?"

"No; is it?"

"Well then, you know that if you left a piece of ice out in the sun all the forenoon it would melt, don't you?"

"No; would it?"

Upon investigation I found that there was probably not one person in ten thousand in those manufacturing towns of England who ever saw a piece of ice. They didn't know but that you could bake it.

It took me only three days to discover that I was in wrong with The Wyoming Whoop. So the next week in Liverpool I switched to Bill Biffin's Baby. Now we were on the right track. We had a subject, Babies, that they understood and liked. But on the second show I began writing it over – into the English language. I found that in twenty-four minutes I was using thirty-two words that they either knew nothing of, or else meant something entirely different from what I intended they should.

For instance: Take the words Trolley Car. An American player spoke of having seen a lady riding on a trolley, and the audience went into fits. The player was astounded; he hadn't told his "gag" at all yet – (and, by the way, it isn't a "gag" there; it is a "wheeze") – and the audience was laughing. And then when he finally told his "gag" not a soul laughed. Upon investigation he found that over there what he meant by a trolley car was "a tram." And what they called a "trolley" was the baggage truck down at the railway station that they hauled trunks around on.

Another of their "gags" was —

"I saw you coming out of a saloon this morning."

"Well, I couldn't stay in there all day, could I?"

Received with more chunks of silence.

He meant a place where they sold liquor. He should have said "a Pub."

A "saloon" there is a barber shop.

The ticket office is the booking office.

The ticket agent is the booking clerk (pronounced "clark").

A depot is the railway station.

You don't buy your ticket; you "book your ticket."

A policeman is a "Bobbie."

You drive to the left and walk to the right.

An automobile is a motor car.

The carburetor is the mixer.

The storage battery is the accumulator.

Gasolene is petrol.

Ask your way and instead of saying "second street to the left" they will say "second opening to the left."

If they bump into you instead of saying "excuse me" or "pardon me" they say "sorry."

Your trunks are "boxes," and your baggage checks are "brasses."

Your hand baggage is "luggage."

I found English audiences just as quick, just as appreciative and even more enthusiastic than our American audiences —if you talked about things they understood and in words they understood.

But the average American talking act is talking what might just as well be Greek to them. I never realized until I played in England what an enormous lot of slang and coined words we Americans use.

Another thing that we Americans are shy on, both in speaking and singing, is articulation. I always had an idea that I enunciated uncommonly clearly – until I went over there, when I learned more about speaking plainly in three days than I had in a lifetime here.

You will notice you can always understand every word and syllable uttered by an English singer.

One of the funniest things I saw over there were English actors trying to play "Yankee" characters. The only "Yankee" they had to it was to spit and say "By Gosh."

Upon the occasion of our first show in England, at Manchester, I said to my wife,

"Now we are closing the show, so let's get made up early and watch the other acts, and in that way we can get sort of a line on the particular style of humor that appeals strongest."

So when the show started we were right there in the wings, watching and listening.

The first act was a typical English "Comic Singer" of the poorest type, although we did not know that then. He had a pair of trousers six inches too short, white hose, an old Prince Albert coat, buttoned up wrong, a battered silk hat (called a "topper," by the way) and a violently red nose. His first song was about his recent wedding; he had evidently married an old maid of rather sad appearance. The first verse told of the wedding and the wedding dinner; and how they then went upstairs to their room, and, as soon as they got into the room she wanted him to kiss her. But he looked at her and said —

(Chorus)

"Not to-night, Josephine; not to-night;Not to-night; not to-night.For I've had such a lot of pork and beans;Gorgonzola cheese and then sardines.And now you ask for a kissOn a face like yours, old kite.Well, I wouldn't like to spoil the lovelyFlavor of the beans,So not to-night, Josephine, not to-night."

Wife and I looked sadly into each other's eyes, clasped hands, and walked sadly to the dressing room. We knew we didn't have anything strong enough to compete with that.

After three weeks "in the Provinces," as they call everything outside of London, we went into the Palace Theater, London. We had had time to learn the language and sort of get acclimated so we did very well there.

But we kept bumping up against new quirks in the language. For instance, somebody asked me if we didn't "play two houses a night in Portsmouth?" and I said No. But I then discovered that "two houses a night" did not mean playing two different theaters a night, but playing two different shows in the same house each night.

I also discovered that several words which had a perfectly innocent meaning in America had entirely different meanings in London. I nearly got licked twice for using improper language.

I discovered that what we would call a Tramp over here was a Moocher over there. I could see a lady in the street but I mustn't see her on the street. I could go up the street two squares but I mustn't go up two blocks. I did not get my salary; I got my treasury. You did not "kid" anybody; you "schwanked" them (spelling not guaranteed) or perhaps you were "spoofing" them.

The big Artists are all "Toppers" or "Bottomers." A "Topper" is one who is always billed at the top of the list of players. A "Bottomer" is the act that is considered next in importance to the "Topper," and is billed in big type at the bottom of the billing.

One thing that makes it hard to please an English Music Hall audience is its widely different classes. Admission to the gallery is from four to six cents while the orchestra seats are two dollars and a half.

While you can see a first-class Vaudeville show for four cents, it costs you twenty-four cents to sit in the gallery of most any Moving Picture show; and sixty-two cents downstairs.

The Palace Theater in London is probably the highest class Vaudeville theater in the world. This is very nice, but it has its drawbacks. The audience applauds by gently tapping two fingers together and nodding heads approvingly.

Oscar Hammerstein asked Mrs. Cressy how she liked the London audiences.

"First-rate," replied Mrs. C., "only you have to look at them to see whether they are applauding or not."

"Look at them?" said Mr. H. "You have to ask them."

George Whiting had just had his hat cleaned.

"How does it look?" he asked of his partner, Aubrey Pringle.

"Looks all right enough," said Pringle, "but it smells like a monkey wedding."

It was Tuesday afternoon in St. Paul; the show was going very badly; the first three acts had gone on and come off, without a laugh; then Frank Moran went on. After he had come off, and was on his way to his room, one of the ladies who had been on before him called from her dressing room,

"Did you succeed in waking them up, Mr. Moran?"

"Um – yes – I woke up a couple of them," said Frank.

"What did they do?" asked the girl.

"Went out," said Frank.

We had received a letter from a European Booking Office requesting us to play an engagement at Glasgow, Scotland.

"I would like to know what they think we could do in Scotland," I said; "those chaps never could understand me."

"Well, my goodness," said my wife, "if they can understand each other they shouldn't have any trouble understanding us."

Probably the line that has been jumbled up and spoken wrong more times on the stage than any other is

"I am still fancy free and heart whole."

Try it; and see how many ways there are to go wrong on it.

At Keith's Theater in Boston one week the program announced that two of the acts to be seen that week were —

"Cressy & Dayne; The latest importation in trained animal acts."

and —

"Barron's Dogs, in Mr. Cressy's one act play, Bill Biffin's Baby."

"WOODIE"

"Woodie," of the old musical act, "Wood & Shepard," has grown quite deaf, and he tells many funny stories at his own expense. Upon one occasion he came into the Orpheum Theater at San Francisco and met Jim McIntire, of McIntire & Heath.

"Hello, Jim," said Woodie.

"Hello, Woodie," said Jim; "how are you feeling?"

"Half past ten last night," said Woodie.

Woodie was playing at Pastor's Theater in New York. He was living on Thirty-eighth Street. One night about two o'clock in the morning he got on to a Third Avenue elevated train to go home. The only other passenger in the car was a drunk, asleep in the corner. At Twenty-third Street Charlie Seamon, "the Narrow Feller," got on.

"Where are you living?" asked Seamon.

"Thirty-eighth Street," said Woodie; "where are you living?"

"Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street," said Seamon.

"Where?"

"Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street," said Seamon, louder.

"Can't hear you," said Woodie.

"One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street," howled Seamon.

"Gee Whiz," yelled the drunk, as he scrambled to his feet, and made for the door, "I've gone by my station," and off he got at Twenty-eighth Street.

Woodie was practicing on his cornet in the San Francisco Orpheum. The management sent back word that they could hear him way out in front; Woodie laid down the cornet, thought a moment, sighed, and said,

"Well, perhaps I can't play very good any more, but I must play loud."

A CORK MAN

We were going out to visit Blarney Castle. Not that I felt any particular need of kissing the Blarney Stone myself, for I had managed to talk my way through life so far without so doing, and saw no reason to doubt my ability to do so in the future, providing the United Booking Offices would continue to book us. But of course when you go all the way from New Hampshire to Ireland you just sort of have to see all these things. And then, of course, it would sound kind of cute to say, "Oh, yes; I kissed the Blarney Stone." And I still think it would sound cute; only I am not saying it. For when I took one look at that dinky little piece of rock stuck in the side of a wall one hundred and twenty feet above terra firma, and looked at the hole I was supposed to hang down through to get at it, I said to myself – "Not guilty." So any Lady-Manager or Booking Agent can still converse with me with perfect safety. I have not kissed the Blarney Stone.

But that is not what I started in to tell. Of course I could have gone out there in our automobile; but that would be a fine way to visit Blarney Castle, wouldn't it? Yes, it wouldn't. When you are in Ireland do as the Romans do. So we put the auto in a garage (and over there that word does not have any of the French curlicues we put on it, with the last syllable accented. It is pronounced to rhyme with the word carriage) and embarked in a jaunting (or jolting) car.

Our driver was a regular lad; several years ago I wrote a monologue for Marshall P. Wilder, and during this trip this driver told me the whole monologue. And then he had some other encore stuff too.

We were passing an insane asylum and he said that the previous summer he had driven a doctor from Philadelphia out to this asylum; and while there a very funny thing had happened. As the doctor was passing along through one of the wards – Now the driver of an Irish jaunting car sits way up in front, right over the horse's tail, and the passengers sit back of him, facing off sideways; so the driver has to turn his head to talk to the passengers. Up to this point of his story this driver had been turned toward me, telling his story to me; but now he happened to think that it would be more polite to tell it to the ladies; so he turned around back to me and told the rest of it to them. I did not hear a word of it; but when the finish came, and the ladies laughed, I laughed, just to be polite.

And when the laughter had died down I said,

"That puts me in mind of a story I heard over in America. A man was passing an insane asylum and he noticed a clock up on one of the towers; but there was some half hour's difference between his watch and the clock; and while he was standing there trying to figure out which was right, one of the patients stuck his head out of a window right beside the clock. The man below saw him and called up to him,

"'Hey, there: is that clock right?'"

"And the patient replied,

'No; if it was it wouldn't be in here.'"

Honest, if I hadn't known I was in Cork, Ireland, I should have thought I was playing Toronto, Canada; there wasn't a ripple; the driver gave me one disgusted look, hit the horse a cut with the whip and drove on in silence. My wife looked at me angrily and shook her head.

"All right," I said to myself. "You are a Mutt audience and I shall relate no more episodes of a comic nature." And I didn't.