February, all that could be elicited from Webster was: “I simply can’t
say at this juncture.” He added that he appreciated my position and
regretted the daily disappointments to which I was being subjected.
There came the 22nd of February, in the United States the anniversary of
the birth of George Washington. This year in London, the 22nd of
February was the eve of the General Election. Most of the afternoon I
spent with Webster at his flat, going over papers. We dined together
and, as we parted, Webster’s only remark was: “See you at the
performance.”
Meanwhile the pressure on me from New York increased.
“What _is_ going to happen?” became the reiterated burden of the daily
messages from my office.
Other matters in New York were requiring my attention, and it had become
necessary to inform Webster that it would be impossible for me to remain
any longer in London and that I was sailing in the _Queen Mary_ on
Friday.
Election Eve I went to the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, to watch
another Sadler’s Wells performance. In the main foyer I ran into
Webster.
“Can you guarantee us our expenses _and_ a profit?” he asked.
“I can.”
“It’s a deal.”
It was eight-thirty in the evening of the 22nd February that the verbal
deal was made. Five hours difference in time made it three-thirty in the
afternoon in New York. I hurried back to the Savoy and called Mae
Frohman.
“What’s going to happen?”
“It’s all set,” I replied.
Back to Covent Garden I went. In the Crush Bar, Webster and I toasted
our deal with a bottle of champagne.
During Election Day, Webster, “Madame,” and I worked on repertoire and
final details; but, for the most part, we gave our attention to the
early returns from the General Election. After the performance that
night at the Garden, David Webster and his friend James Cleveland Belle,
joined me at the Savoy and remained until four in the morning, with one
eye and one ear on the returns.
The next day I sailed in the good _Queen Mary_ and had a lovely
crossing, with my good friend, Greer Garson, on board to make the trip
even more pleasant.
Mrs. Hurok, my daughter Ruth, Mae Frohman, and my office staff met me at
the Cunard pier; and I told the whole story, in all its intricate
detail, to them.
But there were still loose ends to be caught up, and April found me
again back in London. The night following my arrival, I gave a big party
at the Savoy, with Ninette de Valois, Margot Fonteyn, Moira Shearer and
David Webster as the guests of honor. We toasted the success of the
first American season; drank another to the success of the forthcoming
and much more extended tour.
While in London, we clarified and agreed upon many details, including
the final repertoire for the second American venture--which was to
reach, not only from coast to coast, but to dip into the far south as
well as far to the north.
Back in New York for a brief stay and then, in June, Mrs. Hurok and I
left for our annual sojourn in Europe. This time we went direct to
London, where we revelled in the performances at Covent Garden.
I have always loved London and always have been a great admirer of
London, the place, and of those things for which it stands as a symbol.
I love suddenly coming upon the fascinating little squares, with their
stately old houses, as often as not adorned with a fifteenth-century
church. Although modernism sometimes almost encroaches, they still
retain an old-fashioned dreaminess.
About all is the atmosphere of history, tradition, and the aura of a
genuinely free people. The Royal Opera House itself has a particular
fascination for me. So far as I am concerned, there is not the slightest
incongruity in the fact that its façade looks out on a police station
and police court and that it is almost otherwise surrounded by a garden
market. A patina of associations seems to cover the fabric, both inside
and out--whether it is the bare boards and iron rails of the high
old-fashioned gallery, or the gilt and red plush and cream-painted
woodwork, the thin pillars of the boxes, the rather awkward staircases,
the “Crush” bar and the other bars, the red curtain bearing the coat of
arms of the reigning Monarch. Then, lights down, the great curtain
sweeps up, and once again, for the hundredth time, the tense magic holds
everyone in thrall.
I love the true ballet lovers who are not to be found in the boxes alone
or in the stalls exclusively. Many of them sit in the lower-priced seats
in the upper circle, the amphitheatre, and in the gallery. The night
before an opening or an important revival or cast change, a long queue,
equipped with camp-chairs and sandwiches, waits patiently to be admitted
to the gallery seats the following evening.
There is one figure I miss now at Covent Carden, one that seemed to me
to be a part of its very fabric. For years, going back stage to see Anna
Pavlova, Chaliapine, others of my artists, and in the days of the de
Basil Ballet, it was he who always had a cheery greeting. In 1948, Tom
Jackson closed his eyes in the sleep everlasting, to open them, one
hopes, at some Great Stage Door. He was the legendary stage door-keeper,
was Tom Jackson, and certainly one of the most important persons in
Covent Garden. He was a gentleman in the best sense of the word. Many
were the celebrated artists he saw come and go during his long regime.
Everybody spoke to him in their own tongue, although Jackson invariably
replied in English. He was, I remember, in charge of the artists’ mail,
and knew everyone, and remembered every name and every face. Jackson was
not only interested in his stage door, but took deep interest in the
artistic aspect of Covent Garden. Immediately after a performance of
either ballet or opera, he made up his mind whether it had been good or
bad.
Sometimes it fell to Jackson’s lot to regulate matters outside the
Garden. The gallery queues, as is the London custom, attract all sorts
of itinerant musicians and entertainers to the Floral Street side where
they display and reveal their art to the patiently waiting galleryites.
If the hurdy-gurdies and public acclamations grew so loud that they
might disturb any in the offices above, Jackson, with infallible tact,
stopped the disturbance without offending the queuers or the
entertainers by his interference.
Jackson guarded the Garden inexorably and was relentless on questions of
admission. With unerring instinct, he distinguished between friend and
foe, and was renowned for his treatment of the yellow press and its
columnists, with its nose for gossip and scandal. He is said once to
have unceremoniously deposited an over-enthusiastic columnist in the
street, after having refused a considerable sum of money for permission
to photograph a fainting _ballerina_. He was once seen chasing a large
woman who was brandishing a heavy umbrella around the outside of the
building. The large woman, in turn, was chasing Leonide Massine running
at full tilt. The woman, obviously a crackpot, had accused Massine of
stealing her idea for a ballet. Jackson caught the woman and disarmed
her.
The London stage doorkeeper is really a breed unto himself.
I love opening nights at Covent Garden, when it becomes, quite apart
from the stage, a unique social function in the display of dresses and
jewels, despite the austerity. It is always a curious mixture of private
elegance and public excitement. The excitement extends to all streets of
the district, right down to the Strand, making a strange contrast with
the cabbage stalls, stray potatoes, and the odor of vegetables lingering
on from the early market. The impeccable and always polite London police
are in control of all approaches, directing the endless stream of cars
without delay as they draw up in the famous covered way under the
portico. Ceremoniously they take care of all arriving pedestrians, and
surprisingly hold up even the most pretentious and important traffic to
let the pedestrian seat-holder through. The richly uniformed porters
keep chattering socialites from impeding traffic with a stern ritual all
their own, and announcing waiting cars in stentorian tones.... Ever in
my mind Covent Garden is associated with that sacred hour back stage
before a ballet performance, the company in training-kits, practising
relentlessly. Only those who know this hour can form any idea of the
overwhelming cost of the dancers’ brief glamorous hour before the
public.
Particularizing from the general, from the very beginning, in all
contacts with the British and with Sadler’s Wells, the relations between
all concerned have been like those prevailing in a kind and
understanding family, and they remain so today.
And now at the Savoy is the best smoked salmon in the world--Scottish
salmon. When I am there, a special large tray of it is always ready for
me. It is a passion I share with Ninette de Valois, who insists it is
her favorite dish. The question I am about to ask is purely rhetorical:
Is there anything finer than smoked Scottish salmon, with either a cold,
dry champagne or Scotch whiskey?
The repertoire for the second American-Canadian tour of the Sadler’s
Wells Ballet included, in addition to _The Sleeping Beauty_, the
four-act _Le Lac des Cygnes_ (_Swan Lake_), _Façade_, _A Wedding
Bouquet_, _The Rake’s Progress_ and _Checkmate_, the following works new
to America: their own production of _Giselle_, _Les Patineurs_, _Don
Quixote_, and _Dante Sonata_.
_Giselle_, in the Sadler’s Wells version, with its Adam score, has
scenery and costumes by James Bailey, and was produced by Nicholas
Serguëeff, after the choreography of Coralli and Perrot.
The original Wells production was at the Old Vic, in 1934, with Alicia
Markova in the title role. The production for Covent Garden dates from
1946, with Margot Fonteyn as Giselle.
It requires no comment from me save to point out that Fonteyn is one of
the most interesting and effective interpreters of the role in my
experience, and I have seen a considerable number of Giselles.
_Les Patineurs_ had been seen in America in a version danced by Ballet
Theatre. The Sadler’s Wells version is so much better that there is no
real basis for comparison. This version, by Frederick Ashton, dates back
to 1937. It has an interesting history. It is my understanding that the
original idea was that Ninette de Valois would stage it. The story has
it that, one night at the Sadler’s Wells Theatre, Ashton, whose
dressing-room adjoined that of Constant Lambert, heard the latter
working out dance rhythms from two Meyerbeer operas, _Star of the North_
and _The Prophet_. The story goes on that Ashton was moved by the
melodies and that because “Madame” was so occupied with executive and
administrative duties, the choreographic job was given to him. Ashton
states that he composed this ballet, which is exclusively concerned with
skating, without ever having seen an ice-rink.
I find it one of the most charming ballets in the repertoire, with
something in it for everyone. In these days of so-called “ice-ballets,”
which have little or no relation to ballet, however much they may have
to do with ice, I find here an academic ballet, which is very close to
skating.
_Don Quixote_ was seen in but a few cities. It was the most recent work,
at that time, to be shown. Choreographed by Ninette de Valois, it was a
ballet in five scenes with both its scenario and its music by Robert
Gerhard, with scenery and costumes by Edward Burra.
The story, of course, was the Cervantes tale. It was not a “dancing”
ballet, in the sense that it had no virtuoso passages. But it told its
story, nevertheless, through the medium of dance rather than by mime and
acting. My outstanding impressions of it are the splendid score, Margot
Fonteyn’s outstanding characterization of a dual role, and the shrewdly
observed Sancho Panza of the young Alexander Grant.
_Dante Sonata_ was, in a sense, a collaborative work by Frederick Ashton
and Constant Lambert. Its date is 1940. Its scenery and costumes are by
Sophie Fedorovich. The music is the long piano sonata by Franz Liszt,
_D’après une lecture de Dante_, utilizing the poem by Victor Hugo. The
orchestration of the piano work by Lambert, with its use of Chinese
tam-tam and gong, is singularly effective.
At the time of its production, there was a story in general circulation
to the effect that Ashton found his inspiration for the work in the
sufferings of the Polish people at the hands of the Nazi invaders. This
appears not to have been the case. The truth of the matter seems to have
been that at about the time he was planning the work, Ashton was deeply
moved by the death of a close and dear relative. The chief influence
would, therefore, seem to be this, and thus to account for the
choreographer’s savagery against the inevitability and immutability of
death.
It is not, in any sense, a classical work, for Ashton, in order to
portray the contorted and writhing spirits, went to the “free” or
“modern” dance for appropriate movements. While, in the wide open spaces
of America, it did not fulfil the provincial audiences’ ideas of what
they expected from ballet, nevertheless it had some twenty-nine
performances in the United States and Canada.
The second American season opened at the Metropolitan Opera House, on
Sunday evening, 10th September, 1950. Again it was hot. The full-length
_Le Lac des Cygnes_ (_Swan Lake_) was the opening programme. The evening
was a repetition of the previous year: capacity, cheering houses, with
special cheers for Fonteyn.
The demand for seats on the part of the New York public was even greater
than the year before, with a larger number consequently disappointed and
unable to get into the Metropolitan at all.
From the company’s point of view, aside from hard work--daily classes,
rehearsals, and eight performances a week--there was a round of
entertainment for them, the most outstanding, perhaps, being the day
they spent as the guests of J. Alden Talbot at Smoke Rise, his New
Jersey estate.
The last night’s programme at the Metropolitan season was _The Sleeping
Beauty_. The final night’s reception matched that of the first. Ninette
de Valois’ charming curtain speech, in which she announced another visit
on the part of the company to New York--“but not for some
time”--couldn’t keep the curtain down, and the calls continued until it
was necessary to turn up the house lights.
Following the New York engagement, Sadler’s Wells embarked on the
longest tour of its history, and the most successful tour in the history
of ballet.
The New York season extended from 10th September to 1st October. The
company appeared in the following cities: Philadelphia, Pittsburgh,
Atlanta, Birmingham, New Orleans, Houston, Los Angeles, San Francisco,
Sacramento, Denver, Lincoln, Des Moines, Omaha, Tulsa, Dallas, Oklahoma
City, Memphis, St. Louis, Bloomington, Lafayette, Detroit, Cleveland,
Cincinnati, Chicago, Winnipeg, Boston, White Plains, Toronto, Ottawa,
Montreal, and Quebec.
Starting on the 10th September, in New York, the tour closed in Quebec
City on 28th January, 1951.
In thirty-two cities, during a period of five months, the people of this
continent had paid more than two million and one-half dollars to see the
Sadler’s Wells Ballet. On Election Eve in London, David Webster had
asked me if I could guarantee them their expenses and a profit.
On the first tour the company covered some ten thousand miles. On the
second tour, this was extended to some twenty-one thousand.
The box-office records that were broken by the company could only add to
the burden of statistics. Suffice it to say, they were many. History
was made: the sort of history that can be made again only by the next
Sadler’s Wells tour.
Some idea of the magnitude of the transportation and railroading
problems involved in an extended tour of this sort may be gathered from
the fact that the “Sadler’s Wells Special” consisted of six Pullman
sleeping cars, six baggage cars, and two dining cars, together with a
club-bar-lounge car on long journeys.
I made it a point to be with the company at all the larger cities. I
left them at Philadelphia, and awaited their arrival in Los Angeles.
Neither I nor Los Angeles has ever seen anything like the opening night
of their engagement at the enormous Shrine Auditorium, or like the
entire engagement, as a matter of fact.
Because of a company rule that, on opening nights and in the case of
parties of official or semi-official greeting nature, the entire
personnel of the company and staff should attend in a body, an
unfortunate situation arose in Los Angeles. A Beverly Hills group had
announced a large party to which some of the company had been invited,
without having cleared the matter in advance. The resultant situation
was such that the advertised and publicized party was cancelled.
The sudden cancellation left the company without a party with which to
relieve the strain of the long trek to the Pacific Coast, and the tense
excitement of the first performance in the world’s film capital. As a
consequence, I arranged to give a large party to the entire company and
staff, in conjunction with Edwin Lester, the Director of the Los Angeles
Civic Light Opera Association, and the local sponsor of the engagement.
The party took place at the Ambassador Hotel, where the entire company
was housed during the engagement, with its city within a city, its
palm-shaded swimming-pool.
As master of ceremonies and guest of honor, we invited Charles Chaplin,
distinguished artist and famous Briton. Among the distinguished guests
from the film world were, among many others, Ezio Pinza, Edward G.
Robinson, Greer Garson, Barry Fitzgerald, Gene Tierney, Cyd Charisse,
Joseph Cotton, Louis Hayward.
Chaplin was a unique master of ceremonies, urbane, gentle, witty. As
judge of a ballroom dancing contest, Chaplin awarded the prize to
Herbert Hughes, non-dancer and the company’s general manager.
At the end of this phenomenal engagement, the company bade _au revoir_
to Los Angeles and the many friends they had made in the film colony,
and entrained for San Francisco for an engagement at that finest of all
American opera houses, the War Memorial. I have an especial fondness for
San Francisco, its atmosphere, its spirit, its people, its food. Yet a
curious fact remains: of all the larger American cities, it is coolest
in its outward reception of all forms of art. Even with Sadler’s Wells,
San Francisco followed its formal pattern. It was the more startling in
contrast with its sister city in the south. The demonstrations there
were such that they had to be cut off in order to permit the
performances to continue and thus end before the small hours; the Los
Angeles audiences seemed determined not to let the company go. By
contrast, the San Francisco audiences were perfunctorily polite in their
applause. I have never been able quite to understand it.
In the case of the Sadler’s Wells _première_ at the War Memorial Opera
House, San Francisco, the company was enchanted with the building: a
real opera house, a good stage, a place in which to work in comfort. The
opening night audience had been attracted not only by interest in the
company, but as charity contributors to a home for unmarried mothers.
The bulk of the stalls and boxes were socially minded. They arrived
late, from dinners and parties. _The Sleeping Beauty_ must start at the
advertised time because of its length. It cannot wait for late-comers.
There was an unconscionable confusion in the darkened opera house as the
audience rattled down the aisles, chattering, greeting friends, and
shattering the spell of the Prologue, disturbing those who had taken the
trouble to arrive on time as much as they did the artists on the stage.
My concern on this point is as much for the audience as for the dancers.
A ballet, being a work of art, is conceived as an entity, from beginning
to end, from the first notes of the overture, till the last one of the
coda. The whole is the sum of its parts. The noisy and inconsiderate
late-comers, by destroying parts, greatly damage the whole.
The War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco, although a municipal
property, has a divided executive in that its physical control is in the
hands of the local chapter of the American Legion, which make the rules
and regulations for its operation. I do not know of any theatre with
more locked doors, more red tape and more annoying, hampering
regulations.
There is, to be sure, a certain positive virtue in the rule that forbids
any unauthorized person to be permitted to pass from the auditorium to
the stage by ways of the pass-door between the two. But, like any rule,
it must be administered with discretion. The keeper of the pass-door at
the War Memorial Opera House is a gentleman known as the “Colonel,” to
whom, I feel, “orders is orders,” without the leavening of either
discretion or plain “horse sense.”
On the opening night of Sadler’s Wells, a list of names of the persons
authorized to pass had been given to this functionary by checking the
names on the theatre programme. When Dame Ninette de Valois, D.B.E., D.
Litt., Director of the Sadler’s Wells Ballet, attempted to go back stage
after the first act of _The Sleeping Beauty_, she was stopped at the
pass-door by the guardian “Colonel.”
Very simply she told him, “I am Ninette de Valois.”
That meant nothing to the “Colonel.”
“Madame’s” name, he pointed out, was not checked off. It was not even
printed on the “official” staff. In another part of the programme, there
it was in small type. But the “Colonel” was adamant. Horatio at the
bridge could not have been more formidable. He was a composite of St.
Peter at the gate and St. Michael with his flaming sword.
While all this was going on, I was in the imposing, marble-sheathed
front lobby of the Opera House, in conversation with critics and San
Francisco friends, sharing their enthusiasm, when I suddenly felt my
coat tails being sharply pulled. The first tug I was sure was some
mistake, and I pretended not to notice it. Then my coat tails were
tugged at again, unmistakably yanked.
“What is it?” I thought. “_Who_ is it?”
I turned quickly, and found a tense, white-faced “Madame” looking at me,
as she might transfix either a dancer who had fallen on his face, or a
Cabinet Minister with whom she had taken issue.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“The man,” she said, pointing in the direction of the pass-door,
“wouldn’t let me through.” Crisply she added, “He didn’t know who I was.
This is disgraceful, absolutely disgraceful. Unforgivable, I _must_
say.”
She turned quickly on her heel and disappeared.
I was greatly upset, and immediately took steps to have the oversight
corrected. I was miserable.
I sent for “Bertie” Hughes, the able general manager of the Sadler’s
Wells Ballet company, told him what had happened, explained how
distressed I was over the stupid incident.
Hughes smiled his quiet smile.
“Come on, have a drink and forget it,” he said. “‘Madame’ will have
forgotten all about it within five minutes of watching the performance.”
As we sipped our drink, I was filled with mortification that “Madame,”
of all people, should have run afoul of a too literal interpreter of the
regulations.
“Look here,” said Hughes, “cheer up, don’t be disturbed.”
But the evening had been spoiled for me.
A really splendid party followed, given by H. M. Consul General in honor
of the company, at San Francisco’s Bohemian Club. The Bohemian Club is
one of San Francisco’s genuine landmarks, a famous organization of
artists, writers, professional and business men, whose “High Jinks” and
“Low Jinks” in midsummer are among the cultural highlights of the area.
Dispirited, I went only from a sense of duty. It turned out to be one of
the fine parties of the entire tour; but I was fatigued, distraught, and
the de Valois contretemps still oppressed me. I helped myself to some
food, and hid away in a corner. I was, to put it bluntly, in a vile
mood.
Again I felt my coat tails being tugged. “Who is it this time?” I
thought. It was not my favorite manner of being greeted, I decided,
there and then.
Cautiously I turned. Again it was “Madame.”