On The Stage-And Off

When everybody had arrived, the rickety table was brought down to the front, and a bell rung; whereupon a small boy suddenly appeared for the first time, and was given the “parts” to distribute. It was a manuscript play, though well known to the company, nearly all of whom had played in it plenty of times before. All the parts were torn and greasy except one, which was prominently clean. When the boy came to that one he seemed puzzled, not knowing to whom it belonged; so he stood in the center of the stage and bawled out the name on it; and as it was my name, and I had to claim the part, I was at once lifted out of my obscurity, and placed in an opposite extreme hardly more comfortable.

CHAPTER V. A Rehearsal

I HURRIEDLY unfolded the paper, to see what kind of a part I had got. I was anxious to begin studying it immediately. I had to form my conception of the character, learn the words and business, and get up gesture and expression all in one week. No time was therefore to be lost. I give the part in extenso:

JOE JUNKS

Act I., scene I.

– comes home.

It’s a rough night.

– if he does.

Ay. Ay.

– stand back.

(Together) ‘Tis he!

Fall down as scene closes in.

Act IV., scene 2.

On with rioters.

I was of a sanguine disposition at that time, but I didn’t exactly see how I was going to make much of a sensation with that. It seemed to me that my talents were being thrown away. An ordinary actor would have done for a part like that. However, if they chose to waste me, it was more their misfortune than mine. I would say nothing, but do the best I could with the thing, and throw as much feeling into the character as it would hold. In truth, I ought to have been very proud of the part, for I found out later on that it had been written especially for me by my manager. Our low comedy, who knew the whole piece by heart, told me this. Then he added, musingly: “A very good idea, too, of the boss’s. I always said the first act wanted strengthening.”

At last, everybody having been supplied with his or her part, and the leader of the band having arrived, the rehearsal really commenced. The play was one of the regular old-fashioned melodramas, and the orchestra had all its work cut out to keep up with it. Nearly all the performers had a bar of music to bring them on each time, and another to take them off; a bar when they sat down, and a bar when they got up again; while it took a small overture to get them across the stage. As for the leading lady, every mortal thing she did or said, from remarking that the snow was cold, in the first act, to fancying she saw her mother and then dying, in the last, was preceded by a regular concert. I firmly believe that if, while on the stage, she had shown signs of wanting to sneeze, the band would at once have struck up quick music. I began to think, after a while, that it must be an opera, and to be afraid that I should have to sing my part.

The first scene was between the old landlord of an old inn, some village gossips, and the villain of the piece. The stage manager (who played the villain – naturally) stood in the center of the stage, from which the rest of the company had retired, and, from there, with the manuscript in his hand, he directed the proceedings.

“Now then, gentlemen,” cried he, “first scene, please. Hallett, landlord, Bilikins, and Junks” (I was Junks), “up stage, right. I shall be here” (walking across and stamping his foot on the spot intended), “sitting at table. All discovered at rise of curtain.” “You” (turning and speaking to me, about whom he had evidently been instructed), “you, Mr. L., will be sitting at the end, smoking a pipe. Take up your cues sharply, and mind you, speak up or nobody will hear you: this is a big house. What are you going to give us for an overture, Mr. P.?” (I call the leader of the band Mr. P.). “Can you give us something old English, just before we ring up? Thanks, do – has a good effect. Now then, please, we will begin. Very piano all through this scene, Mr. P., until near the end. I’ll tell you where, when we come to it.”

Then, reading from our parts, we commenced. The speeches, with the exception of the very short ones, were not given at full length. The last two or three words, forming the cues, were clearly spoken, but the rest was, as a rule, mumbled through, skipped altogether, or else represented by a droning “er, er, er,” interspersed with occasional disjointed phrases. A scene of any length, between only two or three of the characters, – and there were many such, – was cut out entirely, and gone through apart by the people concerned. Thus, while the main rehearsal was proceeding in the center of the stage, a minor one was generally going on at the same time in some quiet corner – two men fighting a duel with walking sticks; a father denouncing his son, and turning him out of doors; or, some dashing young gallant, in a big check ulster, making love to some sweet young damsel, whose little boy, aged seven, was sitting on her lap.

I waited eagerly for my cue, not knowing when it was coming, and, in my anxiety, made two or three false starts. I was put out of any doubt about it, when the time really did come, by a friendly nod from the gentleman who represented the landlord, and thereupon I made my observation as to the dreadful state of the weather in a loud, clear, and distinct voice, as it seemed to me.

As, however, nobody appeared to have heard me, and as they were evidently waiting for me, I repeated the information in a louder, clearer, and more distinct voice, if possible; after which the stage manager spoke and said:

“Now then, Mr. L., come along, let’s have it.” I explained to him that he had already had it, and he then replied, “Oh, that will never do at all. You must speak up more than that. Why, even we couldn’t hear you on the stage. Bawl it out. Remember this is a large place; you’re not playing in a back drawing-room now.”

I thought it was impossible for me to speak louder than I had, without doing myself some serious injury, and I began to pity the gallery boys. Any one never having attempted to speak in a large public building would hardly imagine how weak and insignificant the ordinary conversational tones are, even at their loudest. To make your voice “carry,” you have to throw it out, instead of letting it crawl out when you open your mouth. The art is easily acquired, and, by it, you are able to make your very whispers heard.

I was cautioned to look to this, and then we went on. The close of the scene was a bustling one, and the stage manager explained it thus: “You” (the landlord) “put the lantern close to my face, when you say ‘’Tis he!’ I spring up, throwing down the table” (a stamp here, to emphasize this). “I knock you down. You two try to seize me; I break from you, and throw you down, and cross center” (doing so). “I gain door, open it, and stand there, pointing revolver. You all cower down.” We were squatting on our toes, as an acknowledgment of having been all bowled over like a set of nine-pins – or rather four-pins in our case – and we now further bobbed our heads, to show that we did cower.

“Picture,” says the stage manager approvingly, as drop falls. “Hurried music all through that, Mr. P. Mind you all keep well up the stage” (“up” the stage means toward the back, and “down” the stage, consequently, implies near the footlights), “so as to let the drop come down. What front drops have you got? Have you got an interior? We want a cottage interior.” This latter was spoken to a stage carpenter, who was dragging some flats about. Do not be shocked, gentle-reader; a stage flat is a piece of scenery. No other kind of flat is ever seen on the stage.

“I dunno,” answered the man. “Where’s Jim? Jim!”

It appeared that Jim had just stepped outside for a minute. He came back at that point, however, wiping his mouth, and greatly indignant at hearing the sound of his own name.

“All right, all right,” was his wrathful comment, as he came up the yard; “don’t sing it; he ain’t dead. What the devil’s the matter? Is the ‘ouse a-fire? You never go out, do yer!”

Jim was the head carpenter, and was a sulky and disagreeable man, even for a stage carpenter. When he wasn’t “just stepped outside for a minute,” he was quarreling inside, so that instead of anybody’s objecting to his frequent temporary retirements, his absence was rather welcomed. He, in common with all stage carpenters, held actors and actresses in the greatest contempt, as people who were always in the way, and without whom the play would get on much better. The chief charm about him, however, was his dense stupidity. This trait was always brought into particular prominence whenever the question of arranging scenery was under discussion.

Fresh scenery is a very great rarity at the minor theaters. When anything very special is produced, and an unusually long run is expected, say, of a month or six weeks, one or two scenes may, perhaps, be specially painted, but, as a rule, reliance is placed upon the scenery, the gradual growth of years, already in stock, which, with a little alteration, and a good deal of make-shift, generally does duty for the “entirely new and elaborate scenery” so minutely described in the posters. Of course, under these circumstances, slight inconsistencies must be put up with. Nobody objects to a library drop representing “‘tween decks of the Sarah Jane,” or to a back parlor being called a banqueting hall This is to be expected. Our stage manager was not a narrow minded man on the subject of accessories. He would have said nothing about such things as these. He himself had, on the occasion of one of his benefits, played Hamlet with nothing but one “interior” and “a garden,” and he had been a member of a fit-up company that traveled with a complete Shakesperian répertoire and four set scenes; so that he was not likely to be too exacting. But even he used to be staggered at Jim’s ideas of mounting. Jim’s notion of a “distant view of Hampstead Heath by moonlight,” was either a tropical island, or the back of an old transformation scene; and for any place in London – no matter what, whether Whitechapel or St. James’s Park – he invariably suggested a highly realistic representation of Waterloo Bridge in a snow-storm.

In the present instance, on being asked for the cottage interior, he let down a log cabin, with a couple of bowie knifes and revolvers artistically arranged over the fire-place; anticipating any doubt upon the subject of suitableness by an assurance that there you were, and you couldn’t do better than that. The objection, that a log cabin with bowie knives and revolvers over the fire-place, though it was doubtless a common enough object in the Australian bush or the backwoods of America, was never, by any chance, found in England, and that the cottage to be represented was supposed to be within a few miles of London, he considered as too frivolous to need comment, and passed it over in silent contempt. Further argument had the effect of raising up Jim’s stock authority, a certain former lessee, who had been dead these fifteen years; and about whom nobody else but Jim seemed to have the faintest recollection. It appeared that this gentleman had always used the log cabin scene for English cottages, and Jim guessed that he (the defunct lessee) knew what he was about, even if he (Jim) was a fool. The latter of Jim’s suppositions had never been disputed, and it was a little too late then to discuss the former. All I can say is, that if Jim’s Mr. Harris – as this mysterious manager was generally dubbed – really did mount his productions in the manner affirmed, their effect must have been novel in the extreme.

Nothing could induce Jim to show anything else that morning, although the manager reminded him of a cottage scene having been expressly painted for the last lessee. Jim didn’t know where it was. Besides, one of the ropes was broken, and it couldn’t be got at then; after which little brush with the enemy, he walked away and took up a row with the gas man at the very point where he had dropped it twenty minutes before.

Scenery and props were not being used at this, the first rehearsal, the chief object of which was merely to arrange music, entrances and exits, and general business; but of course it was desirable to know as soon as possible what scenery was available, and whether it required any altering or repairing.

In the second scene the leading lady made her first appearance, an event which called forth all the energies of the orchestra. It would not do for her to burst upon the audience all at once. Great and sudden joy is dangerous. They must be gradually prepared for it. Care was exercised that the crisis should be well led up to, and that she should appear exactly at the right moment. When all was satisfactorily settled, the cue was announced to her by the stage manager. He said it was “Pom-pom – pom-pom – pom-pom – pom – Pom – POM.”

“That’s your cue, my dear.”

On the stage, everybody calls the actresses “My dear.” You soon pick it up, especially in the case of the young and pretty ones.

“Where do I come on from?” asked the leading lady.

“I can’t say, my dear, until I’ve seen the drop. There’ll most likely be a door in it, and then you can come on from the back.”

Entrances from the back, it may be remarked, are the favorite ones. Indeed, some artistes will never come on from anywhere else. Of course, you make a much better impression on an audience, as regards first appearance, by facing them on your entrance and walking straight down toward them, than by coming on sideways and then turning round. Entrances from the back, however, are sometimes carried to excess, and a whole scene is rendered unnatural and absurd, merely to gratify personal vanity.

I will finish what I have to say about this rehearsal by giving a verbatim report of a small part of it; viz., the fourth scene of the first act. The actual scene is this:

STAGE MANAGER, standing CENTER with his back to the footlights. Close behind him, perched in a high chair, the LEADER OF THE BAND solus, representing the orchestra with a fiddle. Two or three groups of artists, chatting at the wings. THE HEAVY MAN facing up and down at the back, conning his part in an undertone, and occasionally stopping to suit the action to the word. LOW COMEDY AND WALKING GENT., going through scene by themselves in L. 3. E. SINGING CHAMBERMAID, flirting with JUVENILES (only one of them), R. 2. E. PROPERTY MAN, behind, making a veal and ham pie out of an old piece of canvas and a handful of shavings. COUPLE OF CARPENTERS, in white jackets, hovering about with hammers in their hands and mischief in their eyes, evidently on the look-out for an excuse to make a noise. CALL BOY all over the place, and always in the way – except when wanted.

OUR FIRST OLD MAN (standing R. C., and reading part by the aid of a large pair of specs). “‘Er-er – wind howls – er-er-er – night as this, fifteen years ago – er – sweet child – er-r-r – stolen away – er-r-r – baby prattle – er-ears – er-r – shall I never hear her voice again?”

He looks up, and finding that nobody makes any sign of caring a hang whether he does or not, he repeats the question louder.

STAGE MANAGER (severely, as if this was a question that really must be answered). “’ Shall I never hear her voice again?’ Oh! that’s a music cue, Mr. P. Have you got it down? Miss – ”

(stage name of the manager’s wife) “sings a song there, without.”

MR. P. “No, I’ll put it down now. What is it – ’ hear her voice again?’” (Writes on some loose slips of paper, lying before him on the stage.)

“Have you the music?”

STAGE MAN. “Oh, anything dismal does. No matter what, so long as it gives ‘em the hump. What will you have, my dear?” MANAGER’S WIFE (who has just finished a social bottle of Bass with another lady). “Oh, the old thing, you know. ‘Home, sweet home.’” JUVENILES (in a whisper to LOW COM.). “Is she going to sing?”

LOW COM. “Yes, always does it.”

JUVENILES. “Oh, my – !”

MAN. WIFE and THE FIDDLE do first verse of “Home, sweet home.”

FIRST OLD MAN. “‘Ah, that voice – er-er – echo of old memories – er-er-er – houseless wanderer-dry herself’” (crossing and opening an imaginary door). “Poor child – er-er-er – I’m an old man – er – my wife’s out – return and – er – the homeless orphan.’”

MAN. WIFE. “Will there be any lime-light on here?”

FIRST OLD WOMAN (sotto voce). “Oh, let her have some lime-light. She wants to let her back hair down.”

STAGE MAN. “Certainly, my dear. There’ll be a fire-place in this corner, and red lime-light from it.”

MAN. WIFE. “Oh, all right; I only wanted to know. Now, what was it – ‘homeless orphan.’ Oh, that’s my long speech, you know: ‘Is this a dream that I have dreamt before – played here when a child.’”

FIRST O. M. “‘Sweet child – your face recalls strange memories of er-er-er – been just your age.’”

STAGE MAN. (interrupting). “Slow music throughout.”

FIRST O. M. (continuing). “‘Never from that night – er – golden – I can’t believe she’s dead.’”

Scrape from the fiddle, followed by bar, to bring on FIRST OLD WOMAN.

FIRST O. W. (without moving from her seat, and coming straight to the cue with a suddenness which startles everybody). “‘Fold you to my breast.’”

MAN. WIFE. “’ Mother! ‘ – Got the rheumatism again?”

FIRST O. W. “Got it again! It’s never gone yet, drat it – ’ My child!’”

Powerful scrape from the fiddle.

FIRST O. M. “Where am I?”

STAGE MAN. “Left, down stage.”

MAN. WIFE. “We embrace, left center. Knock heard.”

STAGE MAN. (crossing center). “That’s me. * Keep it up: it’s a picture. You and Mrs. – there, embracing, and the old boy down in the corner, when I open the door. – Rain and wind for this scene, mind.”

* That was the way he treated Lindley Murray. We were inexpressibly grieved and shocked – all of us – but what were we to do?

HOVERING CARPENTER (at top of his voice). “Jim! wind and rain for last scene of first act.”

Husky but indignant voice from the flics expressing an earliest desire that every one should go to the devil.

STAGE MAN. (who always rehearsed his speeches at full length, and in a tone of voice as if he were reciting the multiplication table). “‘I am pursued. My life is at stake. Hide me from these bloodhounds who are on my track. Hark! they are here. Thank Heaven, they are past. I am safe. Ha, who is this we have here? ‘Sdeath, I am in luck to-night. Sir Henry will thank me, when I bring his strayed lamb back to him. Come with me, my little runaway,’ Nay, resist not, or ‘twill be the worse for all.’ I catch hold of you. We struggle. ‘Come, I say, with me. Come, I say!”

FIRST O. W. “* Die together!”

Scrape from the fiddle.

STAGE MAN. (loudly, after waiting a minute). “‘Die together.’”

FIRST O. M. “I beg pardon. I didn’t hear.” (Fumbles with his part, and loses his place.)

MAN. WIFE. “He really ought to use an ear-trumpet.”

FIRST O. M. Er-r-r – Heaven will give me strength – er – can strike a blow!” (Shakes his stick at STAGE MANAGER.)

Tremendous hammering suddenly begun at back, eliciting forcible expressions of disapproval from all the members of the company, with the exception of the FIRST OLD MAN, who doesn’t hear it, and goes on calmly with the rehearsal all by himself.

STAGE MAN. (in a rage). “Stop that noise! Stop that noise, I say!”

Noise continues.

JIM (eager for the fray). “How can we do our work without noise, I should like to know?”

STAGE MAN. (crossly). “Can’t you do it at some other time?”

JIM (angrily). “No, we can’t do it at some other time! Do you think we’re here all night?”

STAGE MAN. (mildly). “But, my dear fellow, how can we go on with the rehearsal?”

JIM (in a rage), “I don’t know anything about you and your rehearsal! That’s not my business, is it? I do my own work; I don’t do other people’s work! I don’t want to be told how to do my work!” (Pours forth a flood of impassioned eloquence for the next ten minutes, during which time the hammering is also continued. Complete collapse of STAGE MANAGER, and suspension of rehearsal. Subsequent dryness on the part of JIM.)

MAN. WIFE (when rehearsal is at last resumed). “Just try back that last bit, will you, for positions?”

The last two or three movements gone over again. Then:

STAGE MAN. “We all three struggle toward door. Stand back, old man! I do not wish to harm thee! – I push you aside. ‘Back, or it will be murder!’ – This must be well worked up. ‘Who dares to stay me?’ (to LOW COMEDY). “There’ll be a bar to bring you on. You know the business.”

LOW COM. (coming forward). “’ Shure and I will.’”

Scrape from fiddle.

STAGE MAN. “Well then there’s our struggle.” (STAGE MANAGER and LOW COMEDY take hold of each other’s shoulders, and turn round). “I’ll have the book in the left-hand side.”

LOW COM. “‘Ah, begorra, shure he’s clane gone; but, be jabers, I’ve got this ‘” (holding up an imaginary pocket-book), “‘and it’s worth a precious deal more than he is.’”

STAGE MAN. “End of first act. – Tommy, go and fetch me half a pint of stout.”

CHAPTER VI. Scenery and Supers

WE had five rehearsals for this play.

“What the dickens do they want with with so many?” was the indignant comment of the First Old Woman. “Why, they’ll rehearse it more times than they’ll play it.”

I thought five a ridiculously small number at the time, especially when I remembered my amateur days, and the thirty or so rehearsals, nearly all full-dressed ones, required for a short farce; but there came a time when I looked upon two as betokening extraordinary anxiety about a production. In the provinces, I have known a three-act comedy put on without any rehearsal at all, and with half the people not even knowing the patter. “Business” was arranged in whispered consultations, while the play was proceeding, and when things got into a more than usually glorious muddle, one or other of the characters would come off the stage and have a look at the book. As for the prompter, after vainly struggling to keep them to one act at a time, and to dissuade the hero from making love to the wrong girl, he came to the conclusion that he was only in the way, and so went and had a quiet pipe at the stage-door, and refrained from worrying himself further.

The rehearsals got more ship-shape as we went on. At the fourth every one was supposed to be “letter perfect,” and “parts” were tabooed. On this occasion, the piece was played straight through with nothing omitted, and the orchestra (two fiddles, a bass-viol, cornet, and drum) appeared in full force. For the last rehearsal, props and scenery were called. We had an exciting time with Jim, over the scenery, as might be expected. He had a row with everybody, and enjoyed himself immensely.

I saw our scene painter then for the first time. He was a jolly little fellow, and as full of cheery contrivance as a Mark Tapley. No difficulties seemed to daunt him. If a court of justice were wanted for the following night, and the nearest thing he had to it were a bar parlor, he was not in the least dismayed. He would have the bar parlor down; paint in a bit here; paint out a bit there; touch up a bit somewhere else – there was your court of justice! Half an hour was quite long enough for him to turn a hay-field into a church-yard, or a prison into a bedroom.

There was only one want, in the present case, that he didn’t supply, and that was cottages. All the virtuous people in the play lived in cottages. I never saw such a run on cottages. There were plenty of other residences to which they would have been welcome – halls, palaces, and dungeons the saloon cabin of a P. and O. steamer, drawingroom of No. 200 Belgrave Square (a really magnificent apartment this, with a clock on the mantelpiece). But no, they would all of them live in cottages. It would not pay to alter three or four different scenes, and turn them all into cottages, especially as they might, likely enough, be wanted for something else in a week’s time; so our one cottage interior had to accommodate about four distinct families. To keep up appearances, however, it was called by a different name on each occasion. With a round table and a candle, it was a widow’s cottage. With two candles and a gun, it was a blacksmith’s house. A square table instead of a round one – “Daddy Soloman’s home on the road to London. ‘Home, sweet home.’” Put a spade in the corner, and hang a coat behind the door, and you had the old mill on the Yorkshire moors.