“No!” he said, “advertising! The ad. makes the world go round. Why do
our plays fall flat? Not enough advertising. Of them and in them. Take
literature. See 'Bilton's New Monthly Magazine.' Sixty pages reading;
two hundred and forty pages advertising; one million circulation;
everybody likes it. Take the Bible--no ads.; nobody reads it. Take art;
what's famous? 'Gold Dust Triplets;' 'Good evening, have you used
Pear's?' Who prospers? The ad. illustrator. The ad. is the biggest thing
on earth. It sways nations. It wins hearts. It rules destiny. People cry
for ads.”
“That is true enough,” I remarked.
“Why,” asked Perkins, “do men make magazines? To sell ad. space in them!
Why build barns and fences? To sell ad. space! Why run street-cars? To
sell ad. space! But the drama is neglected. The poor, lonely drama is
neglected. In ten years there will be no more drama. The stage will pass
away.”
Perkins uncoiled his legs and stood upright before me.
“The theatre would have died before now,” he said, “but for the little
ad. life it has. What has kept it alive? A few ads.! See how gladly the
audience reads the ads. in the programmes when the actors give them a
little time. See how they devour the ad. drop-curtain! Who first
saw that the ad. must save the stage? Who will revive the down trod
theatrical art?”
“Perkins!” I cried. “Perkins will. I don't know what you mean to do, but
you will revive the drama. I can see it in your eyes. Go ahead. Do it. I
am willing.”
I thought he would tell me what he meant to do, but he did not. I had to
ask him. He lifted the manuscript of the opera from the table.
“Sell space!” he exclaimed. “Perkins the Originator will sell space in
the greatest four-hour play in the world. What's a barn? So many square
feet of ad. space. What's a magazine? So many pages of ad. space. What's
a play? So many minutes of ad. space. Price, one hundred dollars a
minute. Special situations in the plot extra.”
I did not know just what he meant, but I soon learned. The next day
Perkins started out with the manuscript of the “Princess of Pilliwink.”
And when he returned in the evening he was radiant with triumph. Every
minute of available space had been sold, and he had been obliged to add
a prologue to accommodate all the ads.
The “Princess of Pilliwink” had some modern interest when Perkins was
through with it. It did not take up time with things no one cared a cent
about. It went right to the spot.
There was a Winton Auto on the stage when the curtain rose, and from
then until the happy couple boarded the Green Line Flyer in the last
scene the interest was intense. There was a shipwreck, where all hands
were saved by floating ashore on Ivory Soap,--it floats,--and you should
have heard the applause when the hero laughed in the villain's face and
said, “Kill me, then. I have no fear. I am insured in the Prudential
Insurance Company. It has the strength of Port Arthur.”
We substituted a groanograph--the kind that hears its master's
voice--for the hand-organ that was in the original play, and every
speech and song brought to mind some article that was worthy of
patronage.
The first-night audience went wild with delight. You should have heard
them cheer when our ushers passed around post-cards and pencils between
the acts, in order that they might write for catalogues and samples to
our advertisers. Across the bottom of each card was printed, “I heard
your advertisement in the 'Princess of Pilliwink.'”
Run? That play ran like a startled deer I It drew such crowded houses
that we had to post signs at the door announcing that we would only
sell tickets to thin men and women; and then we had an especially narrow
opera chair constructed, so that we were able to seat ten more people on
each row.
The play had plenty of variety, too. Perkins had thought of that. He
sold the time by the month; and, when an ad. expired, he only sold the
space to a new advertiser. Thus one month there was a lullaby about
Ostermoor mattresses,--the kind that advertises moth-eaten horses to
show what it isn't made of,--and it ran:--
“Bye, oh! my little fairy.
On the mattress sanitary
Sent on thirty days' free trial
Softly sleep and sweetly smile.
“Bye, oh! bye! my little baby,
Though your poor dad busted may be.
Thirty days have not passed yet,
So sleep well, my little pet.”
And when Perkins sold this time space the next month to the makers of
the Fireproof Aluminum Coffin, we cut out the lullaby, and inserted the
following cheerful ditty, which always brought tears to the eyes of the
audience:--
“Screw the lid on tightly, father,
Darling ma has far to go;
She must take the elevator
Up above or down below.
“Screw the lid on tightly, father,
Darling ma goes far to-night;
To the banks of rolling Jordan,
Or to realms of anthracite.
“Screw the lid on tightly, father,
Leave no chinks for heated air,
For if ma is going one place,
There's no fire insurance there.”
You can see by this how different the play could be made from month to
month. Always full of sparkling wit and clean, wholesome humor--as fresh
as Uneeda Biscuit, and as bright as a Loftis-on-credit diamond. Take
the scene where the Princess of Pilliwink sailed away to Zululand as an
example of the variety we were able to introduce. The first month she
sailed away on a cake of Ivory Soap--it floats; the next month she
sailed on an Ostermoor Felt Mattress--it floats; and then for a month
she voyaged on the floating Wool Soap; and she travelled in steam
motor-boats and electric motor-boats; by Cook's tours, and across
the ice by automobile, by kite, and on the handle of a Bissell Carpet
Sweeper, like an up-to-date witch. She used every known mode of
locomotion, from skates to kites.
She was a grand actress. Her name was Bedelia O'Dale; and, whatever she
was doing on the stage, she was charming. Whether she was taking a vapor
bath in a $4.98 cabinet or polishing her front teeth with Sozodont, she
was delightful. She had all the marks of a real lady, and gave tone
to the whole opera. In fact, all the cast was good. Perkins spared no
expense. He got the best artists he could find, regardless of the cost;
and it paid. But we nearly lost them all. You remember when we put the
play on first, in 1897,--the good old days when oatmeal and rolled wheat
were still the only breakfast foods. We had a breakfast scene, where the
whole troup ate oatmeal, and pretended they liked it. That scene went
well enough until we began to get new ads. for it. The troup never
complained, no matter how often he shifted them from oatmeal to rolled
wheat and back again. They always came on the stage happy and smiling,
and stuffed themselves with Pettijohns and Mothers' Oats, and carolled
merrily.
But about the time the twentieth century dawned, the new patent
breakfast foods began to boom; and we got after them hotfoot. First
he got a contract from Grape-nuts, and the cast and chorus had to eat
Grape-nuts and warble how good it was.
Perkins was working up the Pink Pellets then, and he turned the Princess
of Pilliwink job over to me.
If Perkins had been getting the ads., all would still have been well;
but new breakfast foods cropped up faster than one a month, and I
couldn't bear to see them wait their turn for the breakfast scene. There
were Malta-Vita and Force and Try-a-Bita and Cero-Fruto and Kapl-Flakes
and Wheat-Meat, and a lot more; and I signed them all. It was
thoughtless of me. I admit that now, but I was a little careless in
those days. When our reviser revised the play to get all those breakfast
foods in, he shook his head. He said the audience might like it, but he
had his doubts about the cast. He said he did not believe any cast on
earth could eat thirteen consecutive breakfast foods, and smile the
smile that won't. He said it was easy enough for him to write thirteen
distinct lyrics about breakfast foods, but that to him it seemed that by
the time the chorus had downed breakfast food number twelve, it would be
so full of oats, peas, beans, and barley that it couldn't gurgle.
I am sorry to say he was right. We had a pretty tough-stomached troup;
and they might have been able to handle the thirteen breakfast
foods, especially as most of the foods were already from one-half
to three-quarters digested as they were sold, but we had a few other
lunchibles in the play already.
[Illustration: 158]
That year the ads. were running principally to automobiles,
correspondence schools, and food stuffs; and we had to take in the food
stuffs or not sell our space.
As I look back upon it, I cannot blame the cast, although I was angry
enough at the time. When a high-bred actress has eaten two kinds of
soup, a sugar-cured ham, self-rising flour, air-tight soda crackers,
three infant foods, two patent jellies, fifty-seven varieties of
pickles, clam chowder, devilled lobster, a salad dressing, and some beef
extract, she is not apt to hanker for thirteen varieties of breakfast
food. She is more likely to look upon them with cold disdain. Ho matter
how good a breakfast food may be by itself and in the morning, it is
somewhat unlovely at ten at night after devilled lobster and fifty-seven
varieties of pickles. At the sight of it the star, instead of gaily
carolling,--
“Joy! joy! isn't it nice
To eat Cook's Flaked Rice,”
is apt to gag. After about six breakfast foods, her epiglottis and
thorax will shut up shop and begin to turn wrong side out with a sickly
gurgle. The whole company struck. They very sensibly remarked that if
the troup had to keep up that sort of thing and eat every new breakfast
food that came out, the things needed were not men and women, but a herd
of cows. They gave me notice that they one and all intended to leave at
the end of the week, and that they positively refused to eat anything
whatever on the stage.
I went to Perkins and told him the game was up--that it was good while
it lasted, but that it was all over now. I said that the best thing
we could do was to sell our lease on the theatre and cancel our ad.
contracts.
But not for a moment did my illustrious partner hesitate. The moment I
had finished, he slapped me on the shoulder and smiled.
“Great!” he cried, “why not thought of sooner?”
And, in truth, the solution of our difficulty was a master triumph of
a master mind. It was simplicity itself. It made our theatre so popular
that there were riots every night, so eager were the crowds to get in.
People long to meet celebrities. If they meet an actor, they are happy
for days after. And after the theatre people crave something to eat.
Perkins merely combined the two. We cut out the eating during the play,
and after every performance our actors held a reception on the stage;
and the entire audience was invited to step up and be introduced to
Bedelia O'Dale and the others, and partake of free refreshments, in the
form of sugar-cured ham, beef extract, fifty-seven varieties of pickles,
and thirteen kinds of breakfast foods, and other choice viands.