HENRY IRVING
Before Ellen Terry gratefully and gracefully acknowledges the great roar
of welcome that greeted her on her first appearance on the Lyceum stage,
it seems right to say a few words concerning Henry Irving and his
position in the theatrical world at the time when (not far short of
twenty-five years ago) he made this all-important engagement. He had
already achieved far greater things than he could have dreamt of in his
toilsome 'prentice days, and for some time had deservedly been
recognised as the head and leader of his profession, as an actor whose
name will live with those of Burbage, Betterton, David Garrick, Edmund
Kean, and the other histrionic giants of the past, whose memories we
cherish. Not suddenly, but by dint of sheer hard work, the victory had
been won, and those who had in his earlier days detected his genius were
very proud of him.
I had seen him in the days when he acted as a more or less obscure
member of the good old provincial stock companies, when he was often
called upon to appear in three plays on one night, and earned little or
no money for his services. He has told me of an engagement when with his
poor salary in hopeless arrear he was compelled (armed with a
well-studied appeal) to thrust himself into the managerial presence, and
to be rewarded with--a _cigar_!
Never had a young actor so many formidable conditions to face. His first
appearance on any stage was at Sunderland, in the September of 1856,
and, in representing the small part of the Duke of Orleans in Lord
Lytton's "Richelieu," the first words he uttered, behind the footlights,
were (surely there was something prophetic about them!), "Here's to our
enterprise!" How little did those who acted with him that night, and
looked down upon him as a novice, think that as Richelieu himself he
would ultimately win that chorus of applause which forms the world's
tribute to genius.
But poor young Irving's "enterprise" at first appeared to be a forlorn
hope.
While at Sunderland he suffered terribly from nervousness, and, being
cast for the subordinate part of Cleomenes in "A Winter's Tale," he
broke down. He had been called upon at very short notice to take the
character, and, through no fault of his own, had inadequately studied
it. He got through the first four acts well enough, but when in the
fifth act he had to speak alone, his presence of mind, and his memory,
entirely left him. He could not remember a word of his part; he merely
muttered, "Come on to the market-place, and I'll tell you further," and
rushed off the stage in despair.
Then the local critics were down upon him, and his friends warned him to
abandon an effort that was evidently beyond his powers. But young though
he was, and disheartened though he must have been, Henry Irving had
faith in himself, and determined to overcome all obstacles. He had to
work hard, and he had to live hard, but his career, though often crossed
by the forbidding stream of discouragement, was one of steady progress,
and his comrades of these struggling days have told me that whatever he
had to endure (and the endurance must have been as bitter as it was
long), he never forgot to be that thing so impossible of definition, and
so capable of recognition--a gentleman. Indeed, having from the very
outset keenly watched his public career, while I have for many years
been privileged to enjoy his personal friendship, I have often thought
that Henry Irving might have taken for his motto the well-known lines:--
"The World has battle-room for all,
Go! fight, and conquer if ye can;
But if ye rise, or if ye fall,
Be each, pray God, a gentleman."
One of his most charming characteristics is that he has never forgotten
an old friend. _Videlicet_: in the troubled days of 1856 there was
playing at the Sunderland theatre a comedian named Sam Johnson. He never
achieved great things, but he encouraged the anxious aspirant with
kindly words, and in the after years he found himself an honoured member
of the famous Lyceum company.
In these early days I did not see any performance by Henry Irving that
could strictly be called impressive, and yet, to me, and to many others,
there was something in his appearance and manner that was singularly
attractive. We did not realise it then, but no doubt it was that subtle
charm that, for want of a better name or definition, we call, in an
actor, "magnetism." Added to this was his wonderful capacity for
painstaking, which, according to Thomas Carlyle, is the very essence of
genius. For some time he was a member of the well-conducted stock
company of the Theatre Royal, Edinburgh. The late Robert Wyndham, the
genial and highly-esteemed proprietor of that historic playhouse, once
told me that though in those early days he did not look upon Henry
Irving as a particularly promising actor, he was always struck with the
intense care that he took over any part entrusted to him, however small
and insignificant it might be. "I am certain," he said, "that Henry
Irving, without being in the least degree a fop, would have gone without
his dinner in order to buy a 'button-hole,' or any such trivial
adornment that he thought might add, even in the minutest degree, to
the effect of the part in which he had to appear."
But for a long time the critics were painfully and, as I think,
perversely against him. They either did not understand or waywardly
resented the crack of the new whip. In 1865, at the Prince of Wales'
Theatre, Birmingham, I saw him play Laertes to the Hamlet of Fechter. It
was an original Laertes, and not modelled on the perfunctory reading of
the part generally adopted by the ordinary provincial stock-actor of
those days. To me, and I am sure to the large majority of the audience,
it was a very interesting and entirely satisfying performance, but it
was recorded by a local critic as "as bad as could be."
This is only one example of many little stabs that must have wounded him
at the time. But I noticed that he never altered his methods, and in due
season he convinced his would-be censors that he knew more than they
did. From the time when he played Rawdon Scudamore at the St. James'
Theatre, to the day when he made his first great triumph as Mathias at
the Lyceum, it was my good fortune to see him in nearly all his London
impersonations--as Harry Dornton in "The Road to Ruin," as Bob Gassitt
in H. J. Byron's "Dearer than Life" (in which at the Queen's Theatre he
shared honours with J. L. Toole and Lionel Brough), as Compton Kerr in
Dion Boucicault's much discussed "Formosa" at Drury Lane, as Mr.
Chevenix in H. J. Byron's "Uncle Dick's Darling" at the Gaiety, and in
many other parts (one and all played with the touch of a master); until
at the Vaudeville Theatre, as Digby Grant in James Albery's "Two Roses,"
he put the seal to his reputation. How some of us, who had faithfully
followed him about from theatre to theatre, carefully watching and
delighting in his growing reputation, rejoiced when we knew that he had
conquered his opponents and become a king of the stage. How excited we
were when in "The Bells" at the Lyceum he made the world ring with his
praises.
It was when he was playing the part of Redburn in H. J. Byron's
"Lancashire Lass" at the Queen's Theatre that he excited the admiration
of Charles Dickens. Some years later the eldest son of the great
novelist said in the course of a speech that his father had spoken with
enthusiasm of "a young fellow in the play who sits at the table and is
bullied by Sam Emery; his name is Henry Irving, and if that young man
does not one day come out as a great actor, I know nothing of art."
Charles Dickens might have seen Henry Irving's graphic impersonation of
Bill Sikes in a poor stage version of "Oliver Twist," in which Toole
used to revel in the character of "The Artful Dodger," but he did not
live to appreciate his life-like impersonation of Jingle. Sensitive as
the author always was with regard to the interpretation of his creations
in the theatre, that inimitable and realistic stage-portrait would
surely have satisfied him.
Never, it may safely be said, has any actor been more popular than Henry
Irving, not only with the public but with members of his own profession.
That he deserves his popularity no one who has studied his remarkable
career will deny; that he has won it "facing fearful odds" his most
intimate friends and ardent admirers must candidly admit. Even to-day,
when his fame is so firmly established, that he could, if it troubled
him at all, laugh at adverse and hostile criticism, we find any number
of self-constituted and ridiculously complacent censors ready to tell us
that he won his spurs by a fluke, and that he cannot be regarded as a
great actor. Men existed who said the same of Betterton, Garrick, and
Kean. But how absurd it is to hear such opinions when we know that,
thanks to him, the Lyceum Theatre has for years and years been the
cherished resort of all that is intellectual in modern life.
When he first began to make his successes, and had the jealousy that he
has long since vanquished to fight, his so-called "mannerisms" (and is
it not a truism that there never was an actor, or, for the matter of
that, author, yet without some mannerism or speciality that made him a
man of mark and so attracted the public to his piping?) were mercilessly
caricatured and lampooned, and a weaker man might well have been crushed
under the heaps of ill-natured ridicule that were, mud-like, hurled at
him. But an indomitable worker as well as a brave and generous man he
rose superior to it all, and in a few busy, and no doubt very anxious,
years the difficult sum was done in order that it might be incontestably
proved, and to the satisfaction and advantage of all except the
croakers, who even less than any one else understand their own
croakings, our great English actor of to-day holds his throne.
"What a blessed thing it is," said wise Oliver Wendell Holmes, "that
Nature, when she invented, manufactured, and patented her authors" (and
original actors take rank amongst the best of authors), "contrived to
make critics out of the chips that were left."
No actor more conclusively proves the rightly held theory that the
perfection of dramatic art can only be achieved by early apprenticeship
and many years devoted to earnest study and incessant hard work than
Henry Irving. In a period of three and a half years he had played no
fewer than four hundred and twenty-eight parts before his claim to be
regarded as one of the most promising actors of his day was even
considered. Well might the actor ponder over Chaucer's beautiful lines--
"The lyfe so short,
The crafte so long to lerne,
The essay so hard,
So sharpe the conquering."
If he cared to make one, Henry Irving's reply to his detractors might
well be that he has stood the inexorable test of time. Since he first
wore his laurels a new and very critical generation has sprung up--a
generation that has little or no respect for tradition, that has
abundant choice of entertainment, and only cares to pay for what it
chooses to see.
Face to face with this somewhat intractable tribe, Henry Irving has for
more than a quarter of a century held his own, and America has united
with England in hailing him as the living master of dramatic art in its
purest and highest form. From the first he was wise enough to know that
even the best and greatest of men, to say nothing of the greatest and
best of actors, cannot afford to stand alone. As a matter of consequence
he surrounds himself with a company composed of the best dramatic talent
of the day, and his productions are mounted with a general and generous
richness, and a minute attention to detail never, until his time,
attempted on the stage.
Then take the quality of the plays produced at the Lyceum, as compared
with those morbid and unsavoury ones that during recent years we have
seen in too many leading playhouses. Somebody wondered the other day why
Adam had never been made the hero of a play, and a cynic suggested that
it is because it is not possible to mix up his name with that of some
married woman. If Adam is to have his stage chance it must be under the
unsullied banner of Henry Irving.
Great as a leader of men as he has proved himself to be, modesty and
unselfishness are prominent among his characteristics. Although Queen
Victoria, in recognition of his personal worth and public services,
created him a Knight (let it be remembered this was the first time that
such a distinction had been conferred upon an actor), he still loves to
be called plain Henry Irving. Proud as he was--and is--of the honour
that, through him, has been bestowed upon his profession, on the day
when he was privileged to call himself "Sir Henry" in the play-bills, he
merely put his pen through the prefix "Mr.," so that he might remain to
the public, as well as to his friends, "Henry Irving." When Ellen Terry
was asked, "Have you got used to Sir Henry's title?" she prettily
replied, "Oh yes! He has been a Prince in my eyes for many years;" and
in doing so she unconsciously spoke for all his associates. Well, in
1878, Irving, having completed his brilliant engagements with the
renowned Bateman family, found himself not only the chief actor and
attraction, but manager of the Lyceum Theatre.
"His first effort," says Percy Fitzgerald, "was to gather round him an
efficient and attractive company. It became presently known that Ellen
Terry was to be his partner and supporter on the stage, and it was
instantly, and almost electrically, felt that triumph had been already
secured. People could see in advance, in their mind's eye, the gifted
pair performing together in a series of romantic plays; they could hear
the voices blending, and feel the glow of dramatic enjoyment. This
important step was heartily acclaimed. No manager ever started on his
course cheered by such tokens of goodwill and encouragement, though much
of this was owing to a natural and selfish anticipation of coming
enjoyment."
To-day we know how that dream of enjoyment has been realised, and how,
under the reign of Henry Irving and Ellen Terry at the Lyceum, we have
found, in the words of the poet Campbell--
"The spell o'er hearts
Which only acting lends,
The youngest of the Sister Arts
Where all their beauty blends.
For ill can Poetry express
Full many a tone of thought sublime,
And Painting, mute and motionless,
Steals but a glance of time.
But by the mighty Actor brought
Illusion's perfect triumphs come,
Verse ceases to be airy thought
And Sculpture to be dumb."