E-text prepared by Robert Cicconetti, Chuck Greif, and the Project
Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net)
Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
file which includes the original illustrations.
See 26146-h.htm or 26146-h.zip:
(https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/6/1/4/26146/26146-h/26146-h.htm)
or
(https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/6/1/4/26146/26146-h.zip)
CHARLES FROHMAN: MANAGER AND MAN
by
ISAAC F. MARCOSSON and DANIEL FROHMAN
With an Appreciation by James M. Barrie
Illustrated with Portraits
New York and London
Harper & Brothers
M.C.M.X.V.I
Charles Frohman: Manager and Man
Copyright, 1916, by Harper & Brothers
Copyright, 1915, 1916, by
International Magazine Company (Cosmopolitan Magazine)
Printed in the United States of America
Published October, 1916
_To
The Theater
That Charles Frohman
Loved and Served_
_Nought I did in hate but all in honor!_
HAMLET
Contents
CHARLES FROHMAN: AN APPRECIATION
I. A CHILD AMID THE THEATER
II. EARLY HARDSHIPS ON THE ROAD
III. PICTURESQUE DAYS AS MINSTREL MANAGER
IV. IN THE NEW YORK THEATRICAL WHIRLPOOL
V. BOOKING-AGENT AND BROADWAY PRODUCER
VI. "SHENANDOAH" AND THE FIRST STOCK COMPANY
VII. JOHN DREW AND THE EMPIRE THEATER
VIII. MAUDE ADAMS AS STAR
IX. THE BIRTH OF THE SYNDICATE
X. THE RISE OF ETHEL BARRYMORE
XI. THE CONQUEST OF THE LONDON STAGE
XII. BARRIE AND THE ENGLISH FRIENDSHIPS
XIII. A GALAXY OF STARS
XIV. STAR-MAKING AND AUDIENCES
XV. PLAYS AND PLAYERS
XVI. "C. F." AT REHEARSALS
XVII. HUMOR AND ANECDOTE
XVIII. THE MAN FROHMAN
XIX. "WHY FEAR DEATH?"
APPENDIX A--THE LETTERS OF CHARLES
APPENDIX B--COMPLETE CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF THE FROHMAN
PRODUCTIONS
Illustrations
CHARLES FROHMAN--Frontispiece
VIOLA ALLEN
WILLIAM GILLETTE
JOHN DREW
CLYDE FITCH
HENRY ARTHUR JONES
W. LESTOCQ
CHARLES DILLINGHAM
MAUDE ADAMS
MAUDE ADAMS
FRANCIS WILSON
WILLIAM COLLIER
MARGARET ANGLIN
ANNIE RUSSELL
WILLIAM FAVERSHAM
HENRY MILLER
WILLIAM H. CRANE
AUGUSTUS THOMAS
SIR ARTHUR WING PINERO
ETHEL BARRYMORE
JULIA MARLOWE
E. H. SOTHERN
ELSIE FERGUSON
EDNA MAY
BILLIE BURKE
PAULINE CHASE
JAMES M. BARRIE
PAUL POTTER
HADDON CHAMBERS
OTIS SKINNER
MARIE DORO
JULIA SANDERSON
ANN MURDOCK
CHARLES FROHMAN AND DAVID BELASCO
MARIE TEMPEST
MME. NAZIMOVA
CHARLES FROHMAN'S OFFICE IN THE EMPIRE THEATER
CHARLES FROHMAN ON BOARD SHIP
Charles Frohman: an Appreciation
By James M. Barrie
The man who never broke his word. There was a great deal more to him,
but every one in any land who has had dealings with Charles Frohman will
sign that.
I would rather say a word of the qualities that to his friends were his
great adornment than about his colossal enterprises or the energy with
which he heaved them into being; his energy that was like a force of
nature, so that if he had ever "retired" from the work he loved (a thing
incredible) companies might have been formed, in the land so skilful at
turning energy to practical account, for exploiting the vitality of this
Niagara of a man. They could have lit a city with it.
He loved his schemes. They were a succession of many-colored romances to
him, and were issued to the world not without the accompaniment of the
drum, but you would never find him saying anything of himself. He pushed
them in front of him, always taking care that they were big enough to
hide him. When they were able to stand alone he stole out in the dark to
have a look at them, and then if unobserved his bosom swelled. I have
never known any one more modest and no one quite so shy. Many actors
have played for him for years and never spoken to him, have perhaps seen
him dart up a side street because they were approaching. They may not
have known that it was sheer shyness, but it was. I have seen him
ordered out of his own theater by subordinates who did not know him, and
he went cheerfully away. "Good men, these; they know their business,"
was all his comment. Afterward he was shy of going back lest they should
apologize.
At one time he had several theaters here and was renting others, the
while he had I know not how many in America; he was not always sure how
many himself. Latterly the great competition at home left him no time to
look after more than one in London. But only one anywhere seemed a
little absurd to him. He once contemplated having a few theaters in
Paris, but on discovering that French law forbids your having more than
one he gave up the scheme in disgust.
A sense of humor sat with him through every vicissitude like a faithful
consort.
"How is it going?" a French author cabled to him on the first night of a
new play.
"It has gone," he genially cabled back.
Of a Scotch play of my own that he was about to produce in New York, I
asked him what the Scotch would be like.
"You wouldn't know it was Scotch," he replied, "but the American public
will know."
He was very dogged. I had only one quarrel with him, but it lasted all
the sixteen years I knew him. He wanted me to be a playwright and I
wanted to be a novelist. All those years I fought him on that. He always
won, but not because of his doggedness; only because he was so lovable
that one had to do as he wanted. He also threatened, if I stopped, to
reproduce the old plays and print my name in large electric letters over
the entrance of the theater.
* * *
A very distinguished actress under his management wanted to produce a
play of mine of which he had no high opinion. He was in despair, as he
had something much better for her. She was obdurate. He came to me for
help, said nothing could move her unless I could. Would not I tell her
what a bad play it was and how poor her part was and how much better the
other parts were and how absolutely it fell to pieces after the first
act? Of course I did as I was bid, and I argued with the woman for
hours, and finally got her round, the while he sat cross-legged, after
his fashion, on a deep chair and implored me with his eyes to do my
worst. It happened long ago, and I was so obsessed with the desire to
please him that the humor of the situation strikes me only now.
For money he did not care at all; it was to him but pieces of paper with
which he could make practical the enterprises that teemed in his brain.
They were all enterprises of the theater. Having once seen a theater, he
never afterward saw anything else except sites for theaters. This
passion began when he was a poor boy staring wistfully at portals out of
which he was kept by the want of a few pence. I think when he first saw
a theater he clapped his hand to his heart, and certainly he was true
to his first love. Up to the end it was still the same treat to him to
go in; he still thrilled when the band struck up, as if that boy had
hold of his hand.
* * *
In a sense he had no illusions about the theater, knew its tawdriness as
he knew the nails on his stages (he is said to have known every one). He
would watch the performance of a play in some language of which he did
not know a word and at the end tell you not only the whole story, but
what the characters had been saying to one another; indeed, he could
usually tell what was to happen in any act as soon as he saw the
arrangement of the furniture. But this did not make him _blase_--a
strange word, indeed, to apply to one who seemed to be born afresh each
morning. It was not so much that all the world was a stage to him as
that his stage was a world, a world of the "artistic temperament"--that
is to say, a very childish world of which he was occasionally the stern
but usually indulgent father.
His innumerable companies were as children to him; he chided them as
children, soothed them, forgave them, and certainly loved them as
children. He exulted in those who became great names in that world and
gave them beautiful toys to play with; but, great as was their devotion
to him, it is not they who will miss him most, but rather the far
greater number who never "made a hit," but set off like the rest to do
it and fell by the way. He was of so sympathetic a nature, he understood
so well the dismalness to them of being "failures," that he saw them as
children with their knuckles to their eyes, and then he sat back
cross-legged on his chair with his knuckles, as it were, to his eyes,
and life had lost its flavor for him until he invented a scheme for
giving them another chance.
* * *
Authors of to-day sometimes discuss with one another what great writer
of the past they would like most to spend an evening with if the shades
were willing to respond, and I believe (and hope) that the choice most
often falls on Johnson or Charles Lamb. Lamb was fond of the theater,
and I think, of all those connected with it that I have known, Mr.
Frohman is the one with whom he would most have liked to spend an
evening. Not because of Mr. Frohman's ability, though he had the biggest
brain I have met with on the stage, but because of his humor and charity
and gentle chivalry and his most romantic mind. One can conceive him as
often, sitting at ease, far back in his chair, cross-legged,
occasionally ringing for another ice, for he was so partial to sweets
that he could never get them sweet enough, and sometimes he mixed two in
the hope that this would make them sweeter.
I hear him telling stories of the stage as only he could tell them,
rising now and roaming the floor as he shows how the lady of the play
receives the declaration, and perhaps forgetting that you are the author
of the play and telling you the whole story of it with superb gesture
and gleaming eyes. Then back again cross-legged to the chair. What an
essay Elia might have made of that night, none of it about the stories
told, all about the man in the chair, the humorous, gentle, roughly
educated, very fine American gentleman in the chair!
J. M. BARRIE.
LONDON, 1915.
_Charles Frohman_
I
A CHILD AMID THE THEATER
One evening, toward the close of the 'sixties, a plump, rosy-cheeked lad
in his eighth year stood enthralled in the gallery of the old Niblo's
Garden down on lower Broadway in New York. Far below him on the stage
"The Black Crook"--the extravaganza that held all New York--unfolded
itself in fascinating glitter and feminine loveliness. Deaf to his
brother's entreaties to leave, and risking a parental scolding and
worse, the boy remained transfixed until the final curtain. When he
reached home he was not in the least disturbed by the uproar his absence
had caused. Quite the contrary. His face beamed, his eyes shone. All he
could say was:
"I have seen a play. It's wonderful!"
The boy was Charles Frohman, and such was his first actual experience in
the theater--the institution that he was to dominate in later years with
far-flung authority.
* * *
To write of the beginnings of his life is to become almost immediately
the historian of some phase of amusement. He came from a family in whom
the love of mimic art was as innate as the desire for sustenance.
About his parents was the glamour of a romance as tender as any he
disclosed to delighted audiences in the world of make-believe. His
father, Henry Frohman, was both idealist and dreamer. Born on the
pleasant countryside that encircles the town of Darmstadt in Germany, he
grew up amid an appreciation of the best in German literature. He was a
buoyant and imaginative boy who preferred reading plays to poring over
tiresome school-books.
One day he went for a walk in the woods. He passed a young girl of rare
and appealing beauty. Their eyes met; they paused a moment, irresistibly
drawn to each other. Then they went their separate ways. He inquired her
name and found that she was Barbara Strauss and lived not far away. He
sought an introduction, but before it could be brought about he left
home to make his fortune in the New World.
He was eighteen when he stepped down the gang-plank of a steamer in New
York in 1845. He had mastered no trade; he was practically without
friends, so he took to the task which so many of his co-religionists had
found profitable. He invested his modest financial nest-egg in a supply
of dry goods and notions and, shouldering a pack, started up the Hudson
Valley to peddle his wares.
Henry Frohman had a magnetic and fascinating personality. A ready story
was always on his lips; a smile shone constantly on his face. It was
said of him that he could hypnotize the most unresponsive housewife into
buying articles she never needed. Up and down the highways he trudged,
unmindful of wind, rain, or hardship.
New York was his headquarters. There was his home and there he
replenished his stocks. He made friends quickly. With them he often went
to the German theater. On one of these occasions he heard of a family
named Strauss that had just arrived from Germany. They had been
shipwrecked near the Azores, had endured many trials, and had lost
everything but their lives.
"Have they a daughter named Barbara?" asked Frohman.
"Yes," was the reply.
Henry Frohman's heart gave a leap. There came back to his mind the
picture of that day in the German woods.
"Where do they come from?" he continued, eagerly.
On being told that it was Darmstadt, he cried, "I must meet her."
He gave his friend no peace until that end had been brought about. He
found her the same lovely girl who had thrilled him at first sight; he
wooed her with ardor and they were betrothed.
He now yearned for a stable business that would enable him to marry.
Meanwhile his affairs had grown. The peddler's pack expanded to the
proportion of a wagon-load. Then, as always, the great West held a lure
for the youthful. In some indescribable way he got the idea that
Kentucky was the Promised Land of business. Telling his fiancee that he
would send for her as soon as he had settled somewhere, he set out.
But Kentucky did not prove to be the golden country. He was advised to
go to Ohio, and it was while driving across the country with his line of
goods that he came upon Sandusky. The little town on the shores of a
smiling lake appealed to him strongly. It reminded him of the home
country, and he remained there.
He found himself at once in a congenial place. There was a considerable
German population; his ready wit and engaging manner made him welcome
everywhere. The road lost its charm; he turned about for an occupation
that was permanent. Having picked up a knowledge of cigar-making, he
established a small factory which was successful from the start.
This fact assured, his next act was to send to New York for Miss
Strauss, who joined him at once, and they were married. These were the
forebears of Charles Frohman--the exuberant, optimistic, pleasure-loving
father; the serene, gentle-eyed, and spacious-hearted woman who was to
have such a strong influence in the shaping of his character.
The Frohmans settled in a little frame house on Lawrence Street that
stood apart from the dusty road. It did not even have a porch.
Unpretentious as it was, it became a center of artistic life in
Sandusky.
Henry Frohman had always aspired to be an actor. One of the first things
he did after settling in Sandusky was to organize an amateur theatrical
company, composed entirely of people of German birth or descent. The
performances were given in the Turner Hall, in the German tongue, on a
makeshift stage with improvised scenery. Frohman became the directing
force in the production of Schiller's and other classic German plays,
comic as well as tragic.
Nor was he half-hearted in his histrionic work. One night he died so
realistically on the stage that his eldest son, who sat in the audience,
became so terrified that he screamed out in terror, and would not be
pacified until his parent appeared smilingly before the curtain and
assured him that he was still very much alive.
* * *
Frohman's business prospered. He began to build up trade in the
adjoining country. With a load of samples strapped behind his buggy, he
traveled about. He usually took one of his older sons along. While he
drove, the boy often held a prompt-book and the father would rehearse
his parts. Out across those quiet Ohio fields would come the thrilling
words of "The Robbers," "Ingomar," "Love and Intrigue," or any of the
many plays that the amateur company performed in Sandusky.
He even mixed the drama with business. Frequently after selling a bill
of goods he would be requested by a customer, who knew of his ability,
to recite or declaim a speech from one of the well-known German plays.
It was on his return from one of these expeditions that Henry Frohman
was greeted with the tidings that a third son had come to bear his name.
When he entered that little frame house the infantile Charles had made
his first entrance on the stage of life. It was June 17, 1860, a time
fateful in the history of the country, for already the storm-clouds of
the Civil War were brooding. It was pregnant with meaning for the
American theater, too, because this lusty baby was to become its
Napoleon.
Almost before Charles was able to walk his wise and far-seeing mother,
with a pride and responsibility that maintained the best traditions of
the mothers in Israel, began to realize the restrictions and limitations
of the Sandusky life.
"These boys of ours," she said to the husband, "have no future here.
They must be educated in New York. Their careers lie there."
Strong-willed and resolute, she sent the two older sons, one at a time,
on to the great city to be educated and make their way. The eldest,
Daniel, went first, soon followed by Gustave. In 1864, and largely due
to her insistent urging, the remainder of the family, which included the
youthful Charles, packed up their belongings and, with the proceeds of
the sale of the cigar factory, started on their eventful journey to New
York.
They first settled in one of the original tenement houses of New York,
on Rivington Street, subsequently moving to Eighth Street and Avenue D.
Before long they moved over to Third Street, while their fourth
residence was almost within the shadow of some of the best-known city
theaters.
Henry Frohman had, as was later developed in his son Charles, a peculiar
disregard of money values. Generous to a fault, his resources were
constantly at the call of the needy. His first business venture in New
York--a small soap factory on East Broadway--failed. Later he became
part owner of a distillery near Hoboken, which was destroyed by fire.
With the usual Frohman financial heedlessness, he had failed to renew
all his insurance policies, and the result was that he was left with but
a small surplus. Adversity, however, seemed to trickle from him like
water. Serene and smiling, he emerged from his misfortune.
The only business he knew was the cigar business. With the assistance of
a few friends he was able to start a retail cigar-store at what was then
708 Broadway. It was below Eighth Street and, whether by accident or
design, was located in the very heart of the famous theatrical district
which gave the American stage some of its greatest traditions.
To the north, and facing on Union Square, was the Rialto of the day,
hedged in by the old Academy of Music and the Union Square Theater. Down
Broadway, and commencing at Thirteenth Street with Wallack's Theater,
was a succession of more or less historic playhouses. At Eighth Street
was the Old New York Theater; a few doors away was Lina Edwins's; almost
flanking the cigar-store and ranging toward the south were the Olympic,
Niblo's Garden, and the San Francisco Minstrel Hall. Farther down was
the Broadway Theater, while over on the Bowery Tony Pastor held forth.
Thus the little store stood in an atmosphere that thought, breathed, and
talked of the theater. It became the rendezvous of the well-known
theatrical figures of the period. The influence of the playhouses
extended even to the shop next door, which happened to be the original
book-store founded by August Brentano. It was the only clearing-house in
New York for foreign theatrical papers, and to it came Augustin Daly,
William Winter, Nym Crinkle, and all the other important managers and
critics to get the news of the foreign stage.
It was amid an environment touching the theater at every point that
Charles Frohman's boyhood was spent. He was an impulsive, erratic,
restless child. His mother had great difficulty in keeping him at
school. His whole instinct was for action.
Gustave, who had dabbled in the theatrical business almost before he was
in his teens, naturally became his mentor. To Charles, Gustave was
invested with a rare fascination because he had begun to sell books of
the opera in the old Academy of Music on Fourteenth Street, the
forerunner of the gilded Metropolitan Opera House. Every night the
chubby Charles saw him forge forth with a mysterious bundle, and return
with money jingling in his pocket. One night, just before Gustave
started out, the lad said to him:
"Gus, how can I make money like you?"
"I'll show you some night if you can slip away from mother," was the
brother's reply.
Unrest immediately filled the heart of Charles. Gustave had no peace
until he made good his promise. A week later he stole away after supper
with his little brother. They walked to the Academy, where the old
Italian opera, "The Masked Ball," was being sung. With wondering eyes
and beating heart Charles saw Gustave hawk his books in the lobby, and
actually sell a few. From the inside came the strains of music, and
through the door a glimpse of a fashionable audience. But it was a
forbidden land that he could not enter.
Fearful of the maternal scolding that he knew was in store, Gustave
hurried his brother home, even indulging in the unwonted luxury of
riding on the street-car, where he found a five-dollar bill. The mother
was up and awake, and immediately began to upbraid him for taking out
his baby brother at night, whereupon Gustave quieted the outburst by
permitting Charles to hand over the five-dollar bill as a peace
offering.
From that hour life had a new meaning for Charles Frohman. He had seen
his brother earn money in the theater; he wanted to go and do likewise.
The opportunity was denied, and he chafed under the restraint.
In the afternoon, when he was through with the school that he hated, the
boy went down to his father's store and took his turn behind the
counter. Irksome as was this work, it was not without a thrilling
compensation, because into the shop came many of the theatrical
personages of the time to buy their cigars. They included Tony Pastor,
whose name was then a household word, McKee Rankin, J. K. Mortimer, a
popular Augustin Daly leading man, and the comedians and character
actors of the near-by theaters.
Here the magnetic personality of the boy asserted itself. His ready
smile and his quick tongue made him a favorite with the customers. More
than one actor, on entering the shop, asked the question: "Where is
Charley? I want him to wait on me."
In those days much of the theatrical advertising was done by posters
displayed in shop-windows. To get these posters in the most conspicuous
places passes were given to the shopkeepers, a custom which still holds.
The Frohman store had a large window, and it was constantly plastered
with play-bills, which meant that the family was abundantly supplied
with free admission to most of the theaters in the district. The whole
family shared in this dispensation, none more so than Henry Frohman
himself, who could now gratify his desire for contact with the theater
and its people to an almost unlimited extent. His greatest delight was
to distribute these passes among his boys. They were offered as rewards
for good conduct. Charles frequently accompanied his father to matinees
at Tony Pastor's and the other theaters. Pastor and the elder Frohman
were great pals. They called each other by their first names, and the
famous old music-hall proprietor was a frequent visitor at the shop.
But Charles became quite discriminating. Every Saturday night he went
down to the old Theatre Comique, where Harrigan and Hart were serving
their apprenticeship for the career which made them the most famous
Irish team of their time. The next morning at breakfast he kept the
family roaring with laughter with his imitations of what he had seen and
heard. Curiously enough, Tony Hart later became the first star to be
presented by Charles Frohman.
All the while the boy's burning desire was to earn money in the theater.
He nagged at Gustave to give him a chance. One day Gustave saw some
handsome souvenir books of "The Black Crook," which was then having its
sensational run at Niblo's Garden. He found that he could buy them for
thirty-three cents by the half-dozen, so he made a small investment,
hoping to sell them for fifty cents in the lobby of the theater. That
evening he showed his new purchases to Charles.
Immediately the boy's eyes sparkled. "Let me see if I can sell one of
them!"
"All right," replied Gustave; "I will take you down to Niblo's to-night
and give you a chance."
The boy could scarcely eat his supper, so eager was he to be off.
Promptly at seven o'clock the two lads (Charles was only eight) took
their stand in the lobby, but despite their eager cries each was able to
sell only a single copy. Gustave consoled himself with the fact that the
price was too high, while Charles, with an optimism that never forsook
him, answered, "Well, we have each sold one, anyhow, and that is
something."
Charles's profit on this venture was precisely seventeen cents, which
may be regarded as the first money he ever earned out of the theater.
But this night promised a sensation even greater. As the crowd in the
lobby thinned, the strains of the overture crashed out. Through the open
door the little boy saw the curtain rise on a scene that to him
represented the glitter and the glory of fairyland. Beautiful ladies
danced and sang and the light flashed on brilliant costumes. With their
unsold books in their hands, the two boys gazed wistfully inside.
Charles, always the aggressor, fixed the doorkeeper with one of his
winning smiles, and the doorkeeper succumbed. "You boys can slip in," he
said, "but you've got to go up in the balcony." Up they rushed, and
there Charles stood delighted, his eyes sparkling and his whole face
transfigured.
During the middle of the second act Gustave tugged at his sleeve,
saying: "We'll have to go now. You follow me down."
With this he disappeared and hurried home. When he arrived he found the
home in an uproar because Charles had not come back. Gustave ran to the
theater, but the play was over, the crowd had dispersed, and the
building was deserted. With beating heart and fearful of disaster to his
charge, he rushed back to see Charles, all animation and excitement, in
the midst of the family group, regaling them with the story of his first
play. He had remained to the end.
That thrilling night at "The Black Crook," his daily contact with the
actors who came into the store, his frequent visits to the adjoining
playhouses, fed the fire of his theatrical interest. The theater got
into his very blood.
A great event was impending. Almost within stone's-throw of the little
cigar-store where he sold stogies to Tony Pastor was the Old New York
Theater, which, after the fashion of that time, had undergone the
evolution of many names, beginning with the Athenaeum, and continuing
until it had come under the control of the three famous Worrell
sisters, who tacked their name to it. Shortly after the New Year of 1869
they produced the extravaganza "The Field of the Cloth of Gold," in
which two of them, Sophie and Jane, together with Pauline Markham, one
of the classic beauties of the time, appeared. Charles had witnessed
part of this extravaganza one afternoon. It kindled his memories of "The
Black Crook," for it was full of sparkle and color. Charles and Gustave
had made the acquaintance of Owen, the doorkeeper. One afternoon they
walked over to the theater and stood in the lobby listening to a
rehearsal.
Owen, who knew the boys' intense love of the theater, spoke up, saying:
"We need an extra page to-night. How would you like to go on?"
Both youngsters stood expectant. They loved each other dearly, yet here
was one moment where self-interest must prevail. Charles fixed the
doorkeeper with his hypnotic smile, and he was chosen. Almost without
hearing the injunction to report at seven o'clock, Charles ran back to
the store, well-nigh breathless with expectancy over the coming event.
With that family feeling which has marked the Frohmans throughout their
whole life, Gustave hurried down-town to notify their eldest brother to
be on hand for the grand occasion.
Charles ate no supper, and was at the stage-door long before seven.
Rigged up in a faded costume, he carried a banner during the
performance. His two elder brothers sat in the gallery. All they saw in
the entire brilliant spectacle was the little Charles and his faded
flag.
Charles got twenty-five cents for his evening's work, and brought it
home bubbling with pride. To his great consternation he received a
rebuke from his mother and the strong injunction never to appear on the
stage again.
This was Charles Frohman's first and only appearance on any stage. In
the years to come, although he controlled and directed hundreds of
productions, gave employment to thousands of actors in this country,
England, and France, and ruled the destinies of scores of theaters, he
never appeared in a single performance. Nor had he a desire to appear.
* * *
It will be recalled that in one way or another a great many passes for
the theater found their way into the hands of the elder Frohman, who, in
his great generosity of heart, frequently took many of the neighboring
children along. He was the type of man who loves to bestow pleasure. But
this made no difference with Charles. He was usually able to wring an
extra pass from the bill-poster or some of the actors who frequented the
store. Hence came about his first contract, and in this fashion: At that
time Gustave Frohman was a famous cyclist. He was the first man to keep
a wheel stationary, and he won prizes for doing so. He had purchased his
bicycle with savings out of the theatrical earnings, and his bicycle and
his riding became a source of great envy to Charles, who asked him one
night if he would teach him how to ride.
"Yes," replied Gustave, "I'll teach you if you will make a contract with
me to provide five dollars' worth of passes in return."
"Good!" said Charles, and the deal was closed.
Gustave kept his word, and down in Washington Place, in front of the
residence of old Commodore Vanderbilt, Charles learned to ride. He kept
his part of the contract, too, and delivered five dollars' worth of
passes ahead of schedule time.
One of Gustave's cycling companions was the son of George Vandenhoff,
the famous reader. Through him he met the father, who engaged him to
post his placards for his series of lectures on Dickens. Charles
accompanied Gustave on these expeditions, and got his first contact with
theatrical advertising. Frequently he held the ladder while Gustave
climbed up to hang a placard. Charles often employed his arts to induce
an obdurate shopkeeper to permit a placard in his window. These cards
were not as attractive as those of the regular theaters and it took much
persuasion to secure their display. Charles sometimes sat in the
box-office of Association Hall, where the Vandenhoff lectures were given
and where Gustave sold tickets. It was here that Charles got his
introduction to the finance of the theater.
These days in the early 'seventies were picturesque and carefree for
Charles. The boy was growing up in an atmosphere that, unconsciously,
was shaping his whole future life. In the afternoon he continued his
service behind the counter, hearing the actors tell stories of their
triumphs and hardships. Often he slipped next door to Brentano's, where
he was a welcome visitor and where he pored over the illustrations in
the theatrical journals.
Life at the store was not without incident. Among those who came in to
buy cigars were the Guy brothers, famous minstrels of their time. They
were particular chums of Gustave, and they likewise became great
admirers of the little Charles. At the boys' request they would step
into the little reception-room behind the store and practise their
latest steps to a small but appreciative audience. This was Charles
Frohman's first contact with minstrelsy, in which he was to have such
an active part later on.
Strangely enough, music and moving color always fascinated Charles
Frohman. At that time, for it was scarcely more than a decade after the
Civil War, there were many parades in New York, and all of them passed
the little Broadway cigar-store. To get a better view, Charles
frequently climbed up on the roof and there beheld the marching hosts
with all their tumult and blare. Here it was, as he often later
admitted, that he got his first impressions of street-display and
brass-band effects that he used to such good advantage.
A picturesque friendship of those early days was with the clock-painter
Washburn, perhaps the foremost worker of that kind in this country. He
painted the faces of all the clocks that hung in front of the jewelers'
shops in the big city. He always painted the time at 8.17-1/2 o'clock,
and it became the precedent which most clock-painters have followed ever
since.
Charles watched Washburn at work. One reason for his interest was that
it dealt with gilt. The old painter took such a fancy to the lad that he
wanted him to become his apprentice and succeed him as the first
clock-face painter of his time. But this work seemed too slow for the
future magnate.
* * *
Now came the first business contact of a Frohman with the theater, and
here one encounters an example of that team-work among the Frohman
brothers by which one of them invariably assisted another whenever
opportunity arose. Frequently they created this opportunity themselves.
To Gustave came the distinction of being the first in the business, and
also the privilege of bringing into it both of his brothers. Having
hovered so faithfully and persistently about the edges of theatricals,
Gustave now landed inside.
It was at the time of the high-tide of minstrelsy in this country--1870
to 1880. Dozens of minstrel companies, ranging from bands of real
negroes recruited in the South to aggregations of white men who blacked
their faces, traveled about the country. The minstrel was the direct
product of the slave-time singer and entertainer. His fame was
recognized the world over. The best audiences at home, and royalty
abroad, paid tribute to his talents. Out of the minstrel ranks of those
days emerged some of the best known of our modern stars--men like
Francis Wilson, Nat Goodwin, Henry E. Dixey, Montgomery and Stone,
William H. Crane, and scores of others.
One of the most famous organizations of the time was Charles Callender's
Original Georgia Minstrels, hailing from Macon, Georgia, composed
entirely of negroes and headed by the famous Billy Kersands. Ahead of
this show was a mulatto advance-agent, Charles Hicks. He did very well
in the North, but when he got down South he faced the inevitable
prejudice against doing business with a negro. Callender needed some one
to succeed him. A man whom Gustave Frohman had once befriended, knowing
of his intense desire to enter the profession, recommended him for the
position, and he got it.
All was excitement in the Frohman family. At last the fortunes of one
member were definitely committed to the theater, and although it was a
negro minstrel show, it meant a definite connection with public
entertainment.
No one, not even Gustave himself, felt the enthusiasm so keenly as did
little Charles, then twelve years old. He buzzed about the fortunate
brother.
"Do you think you can get me a job as programmer with your show?" he
asked.
"No," answered the new advance-agent. "Don't start in the business until
you can be an agent or manager."
On August 2, 1872, Gustave Frohman started to Buffalo to go ahead of the
Callender Minstrels. Charles followed his brother's career with eager
interest, and he longed for the time when he would have some connection
with the business that held such thrall for him.
Life now lagged more than ever for Charles. He chafed at the service in
the store; he detested school; his one great desire was to earn money
and share in the support of the family. His father urged him to prepare
for the law.
"No," he said, "I won't be a lawyer. I want to deal with lots of
people."
Charles frequently referred to Tony Pastor. "He's a big man," he would
often say. "I would like to do what he is doing."
A seething but unformed aspiration seemed to stir his youthful breast.
Once he heard his eldest brother recite some stanzas of Alexander Pope,
in which the following line occurs:
_The whole, the boundless continent is ours._
This line impressed the lad immensely. It became his favorite motto; he
wrote it in his sister's autograph-album; he spouted it on every
occasion; it is still to be found in his first scrap-book framed in
round, boyish hand.
Now the singular thing about this sentiment is that he never quoted it
correctly. It was a life-long failing. His version--and it was strangely
prophetic of his coming career--was:
_The whole--the boundless earth--is mine._
Meanwhile, Daniel Frohman had gone from _The Tribune_ to work in the
office of _The New York Graphic_, down in Park Place near Church Street.
_The Graphic_ was the aristocrat of newspapers--the first illustrated
daily ever published anywhere. With the usual family team-work, Daniel
got Charles a position with him in 1874. He was put in the circulation
department at a salary of ten dollars a week, his first regular wage. It
was a position with which personality had much to do, for one of the
boy's chief tasks was to select a high type of newsboy equipped to sell
a five-cent daily. His genial manner won the boys to him and they became
his loyal co-workers.
With amazing facility he mastered his task. Among other things, he had
to count newspapers. It was before the day of the machine enumerator,
and the work had to be done by hand. Charles developed such
extraordinary swiftness that patrons in the office often stopped to
watch him. In throwing papers over the counter it was necessary to be
accurate and positive, and here came the first manifestation of his
dogged determination. He never lost his cunning in counting papers, and
sometimes, when he was rich and famous, he would take a bundle of
newspapers, to help a newsboy in the street, and run through them with
all his old skill and speed.
* * *
Though his fingers were in the newspapers, his heart yearned for the
theater. This ambition was heightened by the fact that his brother
Daniel, having heeded the lure of Gustave, joined the Callender
Minstrels as advance-agent, while Gustave remained back with the show.
Slowly but surely the theater was annexing the Frohman boys. In the
summer of 1874 Charles was drawn into its charmed circle, and in a
picturesque fashion.
It was the custom for minstrel companies and other theatrical
combinations to rent theaters outright during the dull summer months.
The playhouses were glad to get the rental, and the organizations could
remain intact during what would otherwise be a period of disorganization
and loss. Gustave, therefore, took Hooley's Theater in Brooklyn for
summer minstrel headquarters, and on a memorable morning in July Charles
was electrified to receive the following letter from him:
_You can begin your theatrical career in the box-office of Hooley's
Theater in Brooklyn. Take a ferry and look at the theater. Hooley
is going to rent it to us for the summer. Your work will begin as
ticket-seller. You will have to sell 25, 50, and 75 cent tickets,
and they will all be hard tickets, that is, no reserved seats. Get
some pasteboard slips or a pack of cards and practise handling
them. Your success will lie in the swiftness with which you can
hand them out. With these rehearsals you will be able to do your
work well and look like a professional._
Charles immediately bought a pack of the thickest playing-cards he could
find and began to practise with them. Soon he became an expert shuffler.
Often he used his father's cigar counter for a make-believe box-office
sill, and across it he handed out the pasteboards to imaginary patrons.
A dozen times he went over to Brooklyn and gazed with eager expectancy
at the old theater, destined, by reason of his association with it, to
be a historic landmark in the annals of American amusement.
He wrote Gustave almost immediately:
_I will be ready when the time comes._
That great moment arrived the first Monday in August, 1874. Charles
could scarcely contain his impatience. So well had the publicity work
for the performance been done by the new advance-agent that when the boy
(he was just fourteen) raised the window of the box-office at seven
o'clock there was a long line waiting to buy tickets. The final word of
injunction from Gustave was:
"Remember, Charley, you must be careful, because you will be personally
responsible for any shortage in cash when you balance up."
The house was sold out. When Gustave asked him, after the count-up, if
he was short, the eager-faced lad replied:
"I am not short--I am fifty cents over!"
"Then you can keep that as a reward for your good work," said Gustave.
Callender was on hand the opening night. He watched the boy in the
box-office with, an amused and lively interest. When Charles had
finished selling tickets, Callender stepped up to him with a smile on
his face and said:
"Young fellow, I like your looks and your ways. You and I will be doing
business some day."
During this engagement, and with the customary spirit of family
co-operation, Gustave said to Charles:
"You can give your sister Rachel all the pennies that come in at the
Wednesday matinee." At this engagement very little was expected in the
way of receipts at a midweek matinee.
But Gustave did not reckon with Charles. With an almost uncanny sense of
exploitation which afterward enabled him to attract millions of
theater-goers, the boy kept the brass-band playing outside the theater
half an hour longer than usual. This drew many children just home from
school, and they paid their way in pennies. The receipts, therefore,
were unexpectedly large. When sister Rachel came over that day her
beaming brother filled her bag with coppers.
The summer of 1874 was a strenuous one for Charles Frohman. By day he
worked in _The Graphic_ office, only getting off for the matinees; at
night he was in the box-office at Hooley's in Brooklyn, his smiling face
beaming like a moon through the window. He was in his element at last
and supremely happy. When the season ended the Callender Minstrels
resumed their tour on the road and Charles went back to the routine of
_The Graphic_ undisturbed by the thrill of the theater.
He was developing rapidly. Daily he became more efficient. The following
year he was put in charge of a branch office established by _The
Graphic_ in Philadelphia. Now came his second business contact with the
theater. Callender's Minstrels played an engagement at Wood's Museum,
and Daniel came on ahead to bill the show. Charles immediately offered
his services. His advice about the location of favorite "stands" was of
great service in getting posters displayed to the best advantage. It
was the initial expression of what later amounted to a positive genius
in the art of well-directed bill-board posting.
While prowling around Philadelphia in search of amusement novelty--a
desire that remained with him all his life--Charles encountered a unique
form of public entertainment which had considerable vogue. It was
Pepper's "Ghost Show," and was being shown in a small hall in Chestnut
Street.
The "Ghost Show" was an illusion. The actors seemed to be on the stage.
In reality, they were under the stage, and their reflection was sent up
by refracting mirrors. This enabled them (in the sight of the audience)
to appear and disappear in the most extraordinary fashion. People
apparently walked through one another, had their heads cut off, were
shown with daggers plunged in their breasts. The whole effect was weird
and thrilling.
This show impressed Charles greatly, as the unusual invariably did. It
gave him an idea. When Charles Callender joined his minstrel show at
Philadelphia, young Frohman went to him with this proposition:
"I believe," he said with great earnestness, "that there is money in the
'Ghost Show.' The trouble with it now is that it is not being properly
advertised. If you will let me have a hundred dollars, I will take
charge of it and I think we can make some money out of it. It won't
interfere with my work with _The Graphic_."
Charles, who seldom left anything to chance, had already made an
arrangement with the manager of the show to become his advertising
agent.
Callender, who liked the boy immensely, readily consented and gave him
the required money, thus embarking Charles on his first venture with
any sort of capital.
Unfortunately, the show failed. Charles maintained that the
Philadelphians lacked imagination, but with his usual optimism he was
certain that it would succeed on the road. When he approached Callender
again and offered to take it out on the road the minstrel magnate
slapped him on the shoulder and said:
"All right, my boy. If you say so, I believe you. You can take the show
out and I'll back you."
Charles counseled with Gustave, who continued as his theatrical monitor.
Eagerly he said:
"I've got a great chance. Callender is going to back me on the road with
the 'Ghost Show.'"
"No," said Gustave, firmly, "your time has not come. Wait, as I told you
before, until you can go out ahead of a show as agent."
Bitter as was the ordeal, Charles took his brother's advice, and the
"Ghost Show" was abandoned to its fate.
II
EARLY HARDSHIPS ON THE ROAD
The Christmas of 1876 was not a particularly merry one for Charles
Frohman. The ardent boy, whose brief experience in Hooley's box-office
had fastened the germ of the theater in his system, chafed at the
restraint that kept him at a routine task. But his deliverance was at
hand.
Shortly before the close of the old year Gustave quit the Callender
Minstrels. With a capital of fifty-seven dollars he remained in Chicago,
waiting for something to turn up. One day as he sat in the lobby of the
old Sherman House he was accosted by J. H. Wallick, an actor-manager who
had just landed in town with a theatrical combination headed by John
Dillon, a well-known Western comedian of the time. They were stranded
and looking for a backer.
"Will you take charge of the company?" asked Wallick.
"I've only got fifty-seven dollars," said Gustave, "but I'll take a
chance."
Between them they raised a little capital and started on a tour of the
Middle West that was destined to play a significant part in shaping the
career of Charles. In the company besides John Dillon were his wife,
Louise Dillon (afterward the ingenue of Daniel Frohman's Lyceum
Company); George W. Stoddart, brother of J. H. Stoddart of A. M.
Palmer's Company, his wife and his daughter, Polly Stoddart, who married
Neil Burgess; John F. Germon; Mrs. E. M. Post, and Wesley Sisson. Their
repertory consisted of two well-worn but always amusing plays, "Our
Boys" and "Married Life."
Gustave was to remain with the company until they reached Clinton, Iowa.
After that he was to go ahead while Wallick was to remain with the
company. When Gustave was about to leave, the company protested. He had
won their confidence, and they threatened to strike. What to do with
Wallick was the problem.
"Why not make him stage-manager?" suggested Dillon.
"All right," said Gustave, "but who is to go ahead of the show?"
The company was gathered on the stage of the Davis Opera House. Gustave
scratched his head. Then he turned quickly on the group of stage folk
and said:
"I've got some one for you. I'll wire my brother Charles to come on and
be advance-agent."
Thus it came about that from a little Iowa town there flashed back to
New York on a memorable morning in January, 1877, the following telegram
from Gustave to Charles Frohman:
_Your time has come at last. Am wiring money for ticket to St.
Paul, where you begin as agent for John Dillon. Will meet you 2
A.M. at Winona, where you change cars and where I will instruct._