STAGE MACHINERY AND SETTINGS
I have made mention earlier of the ingenuity so often demanded of
the little theatre stage director. The limitations of his stage
often compel him to an inventiveness different only in scale from
that displayed by the great German technicians of the theatre. No
Harvard student who ever shifted scenery for the Dramatic Club in
Brattle Hall can outgrow his enthusiasm for the feats achieved on
that absurd stage. At the Artists’ Guild in St. Louis, it gave us
unbounded glee to set the massive chamber of _The Queen’s Enemies_ on
the cramped stage there. To be confronted with deficiencies of one
sort or another--mechanical or fiscal--which must be overcome, is
unquestionably a spur to ambition. To struggle with material barriers,
space, time, physical means, and accomplish results in spite of them;
to wring beauty out of meagre cheesecloth and tinsel when there is no
money for silk and gold galloon, is a victory of sorts; and without the
fighting and winning of such battles as these, half our little theatres
might never have been, and much of their best work might not have been
done.[5] Practically all modern stage machinery has been devised to
heighten effects of nature, and therein it differs from the machinery
of the theatre of the greatest eras, which was devised to produce
effects _beyond_ nature. The Greeks and Elizabethans left Nature
strictly to herself, but had a fairly elaborate mechanical system by
which they exhibited gods, demons, ghosts, and visions.
[5] NOTE.--I wish to qualify fundamentally my admiration for the
ingenuity of the mechanical features of the modern stage. In fact,
I do not believe they can advance the theatre one jot. They are
marvelously ingenious in denying the limitations of the stage and in
part triumphing over them. Yet I have a persistent feeling that the
recognition of the limitations and the acceptance of them is more
fundamental in the development of an art or craft than the denial of
them and the triumphing over them. Even such a triumph has its ultimate
boundaries, and when they have been reached, there is little to do but
acknowledge defeat. When matter has been twisted and beaten into the
cunningest perversions of its first form, the craftsman is still not
satisfied; for his spirit can soar to further reaches where none of the
elements can follow. This is truer of the theatre artist, perhaps, than
of any other, save the musician (who is, after all, a theatre artist).
The theatre has been, these many centuries, the theatre _because_ of
the limitations that encompass it, not in spite of them. Likewise is
the church (as a field of art) limited, and it is by merit of its
limitations that the church has been great. Utter _churchliness_ owes
little to the style of architecture of any specific church edifice.
And the transcendent theatre art of the Deutsches Theater in Berlin or
of the Art Theatre in Moscow does not hang upon the skill with which
the one has used a revolving stage or with which the other has devised
its scenery. The German theatres have to a remarkable degree increased
natural illusion in scenery and lighting; but in spite of that there
is about as much bad theatre art in Germany as good. Where greatness
is found, where the artist has most truly realized the function of the
theatre, it will be seen that his spirit has transcended utterly the
possibilities of his physical stage; and, like as not, he has made no
effort to strain the capacities of his medium, but has worked utterly
within them. One of the remarkable facts about the stage technique of
Robert Edmond Jones is that he demands nothing impossible to achieve.
His designs are easy to execute, and his scenery easy to handle.
Here, again, is the dilemma which we faced in the discussion of the
approach to the stage lighting problem. There are limits to our
ability to reproduce on the stage the light effects of nature. But
there are practically no limits to the theatrical expressiveness of
light, regarded as a medium, _per se_. There are limits beyond which
mechanical skill or inventive genius cannot alter the obdurate confines
of the physical stage. But there are no heights to which a human
spirit, set in public upon a platform, however narrow and close-walled,
cannot rise. In view of this great spiritual fact, I would solemnly
warn any little theatre or community house that has money to spend
for modernity, not to spend it on the kind of advance stage machinery
discussed in this chapter, but to spend it on artists.
One of the first mechanical improvements of our present-day stage was
the _drehbühne_, or revolving stage, invented by Herr Lautenschlager.
Its purpose is to move, without inordinate intermissions between acts,
scenery far heavier than men can handle. The cult for realism demanded
a greater plasticity in scenery, and consequent increase in mass
and structural complexity. The revolving stage is a great turntable
on which as many as six or seven scenes can be set at one time, and
revealed successively to an audience by revolving the table. The
scenery for the entire play is set up on the day of the performance,
and no shifting of scenes need be done during the progress of the play.
The designing of scenery to fit the revolving stage, developed to its
highest point by Reinhardt, is so little understood in this country
that our few revolving stages are seldom used. The Century Theatre
stage in New York has a turntable, but I do not know of any instance
in which the scenery for an entire performance was set upon it. Mr.
Winthrop Ames had a revolving stage installed in his Little Theatre
in New York; but, as this stage is only thirty-five feet in diameter,
he found it inadequate for the setting of many of the scenes. Mr.
Harry Bishop, in building the Liberty and Fulton Theatres in Oakland,
California, constructed revolving stages of adequate size, but evaded
the problem of devising scenery especially for them by installing a
revolving gridiron also, so that the old-fashioned sky and foliage
borders could ride around the stage with the set to which they belong.
A little labor is saved in shifting scenes during performances, but I
doubt whether the saving equalizes the cost of installation of these
expensive devices.
A device of similar intent is the sliding stage, a great wagon the
size of the stage opening--or, rather, two or three of them--run, as
desired, before the proscenium opening, and capable of being pushed
off, after being used, into houses at either side of the stage or
lowered to the basement, there to be reset for another scene. This
device avoids some of the limitations of the revolving stage, in that
scenes need not be made to articulate closely as they must in order
to fit the circular bounds of the turntable; but it is tremendously
costly, and requires a great stage space.
There are other devices of like intent, such as the Asphalia stage,
built in transverse sections that can be raised and lowered on
hydraulic plungers, and Steele MacKaye’s elevator stage installed in
the old Madison Square Theatre, New York. None of these devices can
serve either the little theatre movement or the art of the theatre.
They are deadening, and divert effort from the true end of all
experiment and advance in the theatre. There is no doubt in my mind
that the sort of theatre that wants to be built is one in which the
machinery is reduced to a minimum,--efficient, controllable, but never
controlling the sort of work that must be done on the stage. In order
to have a modern, well-equipped stage, none of these innovations is
needed.
Of far more purpose, for the modern theatre, are certain tendencies
now manifest that appear at first glance like reversions to an older
type of stage. I refer chiefly to such a stage as that built by M.
Jacques Copeau for his _Théâtre du Vieux Colombier_, which, for two
seasons, was a strange intruder among the more literal stages of New
York. Indeed, save for the use M. Copeau made of modern mechanical
flexibility, his stage was a first cousin to the Elizabethan stage,
though his arrival at its particular form was not a case of atavism but
a philosophic realization of the true limitations of the theatre. His
stage consisted of three parts: a fore-stage, reached from the rear
stage, or from the main floor of the auditorium by steps upward, or
from doors high in the walls flanking the proscenium, whence steps led
down to the stage level; second, the stage proper; and third, an upper
stage, or balcony, engirdling the main stage. This balcony and the
space below it might be variously shut off from the main portion of the
stage, by tapestries, lattices, screens, or sections of scenery, flat
or pierced with windows or doors. Steps could be variously placed to
give access to the balcony.
Thus, without the use of strictly representative scenery, Copeau
had a stage which provided every facility for the presentation of
a play,--entrances, exits, and elevations. It gave scope to the
necessities of action and the agility of the actor. Such a construction
may be said to be as much scenic reform as reform in mechanics, except
that it largely renders the latter unnecessary.
I should not deem it part of the purpose of this paper to mention
scenic matters at all, were it not that, very often, a certain amount
of scenery, like a certain amount of lighting equipment, “goes with
the building”. The contract for the building and its rigging often
specifies also a “garden”, “plain chamber number one”, and “fancy
parlor number three”, or the like. Whether they are thrown in or not,
without extra charge, they should be courteously but firmly refused.
They stunt the timid imagination, and somehow, perhaps because they are
“real” scenery, never get thrown away.
For the scenic equipment of the stage I can do nothing better than
refer the reader to the permanent setting devised by Sam Hume for the
Detroit Arts and Crafts Theatre, of which he was for two seasons the
director. This setting consists of a certain number of interchangeable
units, flats, door pieces, window pieces, arches, and pylons.[6] Its
initial cost is low, far lower than that of several sets out of the
scene painter’s catalogue, and its usefulness infinitely greater. In
addition to this it has beauty.
[6] Mr. Sheldon Cheney in his _The Art Theatre_ has fully described and
illustrated this set, showing the multiple variations it is capable of.
It may be that the stage of the future is to be something quite
different than that we now have. As a theatre of truth supplants the
theatre of illusion, it may be found that the stage of to-day does not
answer at all. The theatre is undoubtedly in a transitional period and
artists are striving for new forms and new methods of presentation.
What directions these tendencies may take it is not the purpose of
this paper to forecast. Nor would it do to advise the adoption of a
type of stage not yet tested or of widespread use. Where there is
an experimental and creative attitude toward the theatre such types
will be evolved without any such rudimentary manual as this. Where a
manual is wanted, a stage should be built that can be used easily,
by everybody who wishes to use it, and which will give readily, in
return for effort spent upon it, a revenue of beauty. These pages will
achieve enough if they go a little way toward eliminating the usual
inept, difficult constructions that for these many years have cumbered
the way of folks, young and old, who wish to entertain themselves in
the theatre. More and more, they seek such entertainment at their own
hands. More and more, their efforts are being fostered by educational
bodies and organizations allied with the theatre. Such aid as this
pamphlet may bring them is hopefully dedicated to their service.
A SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE
Martin Hammitzsch, _Der Moderne Theaterbau_ (Teil I). Berlin: E.
Wasmuth, 1905.
(This is perhaps the best book on the historical aspect, although only
the first volume has so far appeared.)
Edwin O. Sachs and E. A. Woodward, _Modern Opera Houses and Theatres_.
3 volumes. London: B. T. Batsford. 1896-98.
(This monumental and very useful series is generally considered the
standard descriptive and technical work, but is now somewhat out of
date.)
Edwin O. Sachs, _Stage Construction_. London: B. T. Batsford, 1898. (A
supplement to the above.)
Manfred Semper, _Theater_. Stuttgart: Arnold Bergsträsser, 1904.
(Handbuch der Architektur, Teil 4, Halb-Band 6, Heft 5.)
Roy C. Flickinger, _The Greek Theatre and Its Drama_. Chicago: The
University of Chicago Press, 1918.
(Contains the best summary of the conflicting views about the form of
the ancient theatre.)
Arthur Elam Haigh, _The Attic Theatre_. Third Edition, revised. Oxford:
The Clarendon Press, 1907.
(A standard work on the Greek Theatre.)
Brander Matthews, _A Study of the Drama_. Boston: Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1910.
(Chapter III treats of the form of the theatre in relation to the forms
of drama.)
William Harvey Birkmire, _The Planning and Construction of American
Theatres_. New York: J. Wiley and Sons, 1896.
(Contains many plans and descriptions of the older American theatres.)
Max Littmann, _Das Münchner Künstlertheater_. Munich: I. Werner, 1908.
(A monograph describing one of the best small theatres in Europe, fully
illustrated with plans and photographs.)
Julius Bab, _Die Volksbühne in Berlin_. Berlin: E. Wasmuth, 1919.
(Describes and illustrates one of the best large buildings of the
“people’s theatre” type.)
Max Littmann, _Die Königlichen Hoftheater in Stuttgart_. Darmstadt: A.
Koch, 1912.
(Describes and illustrates an excellent example of the institutional or
“court” playhouse, in a building containing two complete theatres.)
TECHNICAL
Edward Bernard Kinsila, _Modern Theatre Construction_. New York: The
Moving Picture World, 1917.
Arthur S. Meloy, _Theatres and Motion Picture Houses_. New York:
Architects’ Supply and Publishing Company, 1916.
William Paul Gerhard, _Theatres: Their Safety from Fire and Panic,
Their Comfort and Healthfulness_. New York: Baker and Taylor, 1915.
Arthur Edwin Krews, _Play Production in America_. New York: Henry Holt
and Company, 1916.
(Contains brief but comprehensive chapters on stage machinery,
lighting, and other technical matters.)
_Bühnen Beleuchtung System Fortuny._
(Describes the important Fortuny lighting system.)
SCENERY
Edward Gordon Craig, _Towards a New Theatre: Forty Designs for Stage
Scenes_. New York: E. P. Dutton and Company, 1913.
Jacques Rouché, _L’Art Théâtrale Moderne_. Paris: Edouard Cornély &
Cie., 1910.
Sheldon Cheney, _The Art Theatre_. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1917.
Hiram Kelly Moderwell, _The Theatre of To-Day_. New York: John Lane
Company, 1914.
_Theatre Arts Magazine._ 1916 to date.
(Contains several hundred illustrations of stage settings, stage plans,
etc.)
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Transcriber’s Notes:
Variations in spelling and hyphenation are retained.
Perceived typographical errors have been changed.