apparatus upon which a dozen aerial performers exhibit at the same
time. In the first ring there is a bareback act, in the second a
juggling family upon an intermediate stage, and in the third ring a
herd of trained elephants. Over the surrounding race-track twenty
clowns play tag, setting small sections of the amphitheater into roars
of laughter as they pass.
All this is typical with us of the “greatest show on earth.”
Parisians delight in the circus as much as we do, but they are content
in seeing one thing at a time and enjoying it.
Here the _cirques_ are as cozy as theaters and one small ring suffices.
The Nouveau Cirque, whose façade on the rue St. Honoré resembles that
of a music-hall, is the most comfortable of all the Parisian circuses,
and, like the Cirque d’Hiver and the Cirque Médrano, is open the year
round. The patronage of the last two is more bourgeois than that of the
first one, for both are situated in thickly populated quarters.
The Médrano, on the boulevard Rochechouart in Montmartre, and the
Cirque d’Hiver, on the boulevard du Temple, are patronized for the most
part by the people of the rue du Temple and around la Place de la
Bastille.
All Paris pours to Longchamp the day of the Grand Prix. Seen from the
grandstand, the track stretches away in a velvety green ribbon. Every
square foot of the remainder of the vast enclosure is packed with
people. Part of this human sea, that which fills the grandstands and
broad promenade, is gay in the smartest of toilettes, silk parasols,
and shining top hats. The rest is made up of all sorts and conditions.
Indoor displays of horsemanship, where the incentive of betting is
lacking, have not been a success in Paris—at least when conducted upon
a large scale. The old Hippodrome, founded for track exhibitions, has
passed out of existence. It was too big to be popular, and the new
Hippo-Palace, a splendid structure forming a spacious angle with the
rue Calvalotti and the rue Caulincourt, after a short life proved an
absolute failure. Its exterior was vast and exceedingly attractive in
color. The whole was done in a scheme of gold and turquoise blue
velvet, with a huge stage for ballets at the end of the three-ringed
amphitheater. The performance was excellent, and for a while it looked
as if the Hippo-Palace might be a success. But the same criticism
caused its downfall. There were too many things to watch at once from
seats too far removed from the performers.
[Illustration: THE CROWD AT LONGCHAMP]
Parisians enjoy the intimacy of a small circus.
Between the acts the pretty stables behind the scenes are crowded with
people who enjoy looking at the horses in their neatly kept
stalls—indeed, many of these remain in the stables after the bell
announces the continuance of the performance, in order to view at
leisure the byplay of the performers before they go into the ring.
A pretty bareback rider comes tripping down the stairs from her
dressing-room. Her horse is brought out for her from its stall, and,
while an elderly gentleman with a ribbon in his buttonhole stands
chatting with her for a moment, her groom gives a final cinch to the
mare’s white kid girdle and rosins its broad back.
Applause announces the end of an act, and a trained bear, held in check
by his keeper, shuffles past you.
It is mademoiselle’s turn now, and the old gentleman with the
decoration lifts his opera hat as mademoiselle leaves him and runs into
the ring.
From the circular _promenoir_ behind the second tier of boxes you catch
glimpses of women in _chic_ toilets who nightly frequent the circuses.
Immortal are the names of the famous of French clowns—Boum-Boum,
Auguste and Chocolat. For years they have made Paris roar with
laughter, and the little French children kick their bare legs in glee.
Chocolat and Auguste, who appear together, are far more than ordinary
clowns. They are past masters in the art of nonsense. Every effect is
carefully planned and studied. Their performance is pantomime of the
first order. To keep the amused attention of an audience for half an
hour by a representation of Hamlet played with no costumes and no
scenery, and for the most part executed wholly in pantomime, requires
rare skill and subtle humor, and that rarest of qualities in comic men,
the time to know when to stop.
There is something especially attractive in the coziness of these
one-ring circuses of Paris. The buildings themselves are circular, like
those built for permanent panoramas. From the ring, with its red velvet
border, begin rows of orchestra seats, reaching to the balcony of
pretty boxes, behind which is a circular promenade.
[Illustration: MADEMOISELLE LA BOUFFONNE]
The stables themselves are models of well-ordered cleanliness, and each
stall that contains some beauty of the ring shines in polished brass.
The stall posts are bound with fresh sheaths of straw tied with gaily
colored ribbons.
An attractive feature of the Nouveau Cirque is the aquatic performance
which concludes the show. The big ring mattress is suspended between
two giant wheels and rolled away; the floor of the ring sinks slowly,
and water rushes in until a safe diving depth is attained. Calcium
lights are turned upon this improvised lake, and an aquatic burlesque
follows. This naturally concludes the program, for every one taking
part tumbles in as often as possible and retires dripping to his
dressing-room. One of these farce comedies ends in a wedding party
where the bride and groom are ferried across in the little boat. The
clown who acts as ferryman is invariably upset, and the wedding party
have to kick out and swim for shore, on which they climb or are hauled
minus most of their clothes.
The Thursday matinées are filled with happy French children. What a
never-to-be-forgotten ecstasy it must be to Jacqueline, François and
little Antoinette to be taken between the acts to the café of the
Cirque Médrano and be served with a huge _cérise à l’eau_ by the clown
himself. How delightful to hear his special jokes as he pours out for
them their _cérise_ and nearly spills a whole trayful of cakes over
their heads as he serves it!
[Illustration: STREET CLOWNS]
I spent the afternoon yesterday with a famous old clown at the Médrano.
At intervals during our chat my friend would leave me to run back into
the ring and play the fool. Yet he was a grave and a sad old man. His
heavily chalked face with its traditional black lines between his eyes
and his painted cheeks seemed strangely incongruous as he talked
seriously of his life.
Behind his mask of chalk his old eyes burned with a brave light in them
still, for his life had been one of trying struggle. He spoke of the
death of his only daughter, of the hardships of many touring adventures
in many lands.
“I went with my family to Constantinople to start a circus there, and
it took me five years to earn enough money to return, for we not only
lost all we had, but were forced into debt.
“We managed to get free at last and returned to Paris. Here we worked
hard, all of us, and at last we opened again a circus of our own. My
son-in-law was the trapeze performer, and my boy was a clown like
myself. We had with us a family of old friends, the Lorettis—you may
remember them? The opening night of that show brought with it the old
sensation of ruin staring us in the face. We opened the doors that
evening just thirty-five thousand francs in debt. Gradually by hard
work we managed to pull out of it, and,” he added, “to-day, thank God!
I am free from worry and anxiety. I know that I can make but a living
at the best. I get my money here; it is not much, but I get it
regularly, and here I shall stay. I am sixty years old and have been a
clown nearly forty years of my life.”
[Illustration:
Photo by F. Berkeley Smith
A COUNTRY CIRCUS]
He excused himself for a moment and ran out into the ring, turned a
flipflap, and ran tripping over things in a fruitless endeavor to
assist the lady in pink tulle on her cantering white horse. A pantomime
followed in which a second clown, his son, having killed him in a comic
duel, doubled his father up, packed him neatly in a barrel, and
wheelbarrowed him out of the ring.
“You see,” continued the father seriously as he rejoined me, having
divested himself of the barrel and run the wheelbarrow out of the way
of an advancing herd of elephants, “it is different with your big
American shows. An artist there never gets credit for his work. With so
many acts going at once it is impossible for him to be fairly seen. He
can play only to a small section of the house, and, if he is doing high
trap work like my son-in-law, he no sooner gets a neat trick worked up
than the bell rings and down the rope he has to come.
“Well, sir, I must wash up and be getting along; we have dinner at home
at six and I have a little special marketing to do for we have some old
friends coming.”
[Illustration]
Chapter Eight
GREASE PAINT AND POWDER PUFFS
The stage of the Folies Bergère during a spectacular _revue_ is a busy
place. Sunday evening is always a crowded night at Parisian theaters
and a hard one upon players, since all the theaters on that day give
matinées as well.
There are few persons in an audience who realize the amount of hard
work required of every one behind the scenes in the staging and playing
of a spectacular _revue_.
It was nine o’clock Sunday evening and the _revue_ at the Folies
Bergère was about to begin, as my friend, a successful writer of many
Parisian _revues_, Monsieur René Louis, led me through the crowded
_promenoir_ of this thoroughly Parisian music-hall and through a small
iron door into another world. I say another world, for it was peopled
with fairies—_coryphées_ in pink tights whose eyes were stenciled and
lined with blue until they appeared as almond-shaped as an odalisque’s.
The stage was crowded with scene-shifters in black caps and long white
linen dusters, with ladies protected from stray drafts by warm woolen
dressing gowns, with hair-dressers in their shirt-sleeves, with firemen
in shining brass helmets, with ballet girls in white tulle and
fleshings, and pink satin slippers with padded toes.
We came upon all this suddenly, for, as we entered the iron door
leading to the _coulisses_, we found ourselves in a small _entresol_
and in the midst of a dozen _coryphées_ who were giving a final touch
to their make-up before an extra mirror.
The air was heavy with the odor of scores of different cheap perfumes.
Down a narrow winding stairway leading from the dressing-rooms above,
poured a stream of other _coryphées_, principals, ballet girls and
_figurantes_, a moving kaleidoscopic procession of pink tights,
glittering tinsel and bizarre head-dresses.
Groups of chorus girls gossiped in safe corners out of the way of
hurrying scene-shifters.
“_Attention! s’il vous plait_,” shouted two of the latter as they
dodged past with a section of a Venetian palace, while two others
followed with half of the Bridge of Sighs and eight feet of canvas
water.
[Illustration:
Drawing by Pezilla
AT THE FOLIES-BERGÈRE]
“_Dis donc, ma chérie_,” said a petite brunette costumed as a gray
pigeon to another pigeon whose dresser was attaching to her shoulders a
pair of white wings, “did you find the tailor whose address I gave you
yesterday? A hundred francs for a dress like my little brown one, and
_tu sais trés, trés chic_. Tell Amélie I am coming to see her to-morrow
_à trois heures, n’est-ce pas_?” and the gray pigeon hurried away to
her place in the wings.
High up above the busy stage hung the great drops suspended from a
network of ropes. Hoisted by the side of an Italian lake hung the back
flat of the palace of diamonds, and next to it a dark wood through
which at ten thirty-five, by the stage manager’s watch, fluttered
nightly a ballet of bats.
My friend led the way through a back corridor to the director’s office.
I found the director a serious man of affairs, who looked more like a
scientist than a man of the theater. His greeting was most cordial,
even hospitable, for, as he left me to attend to the performance, he
added, with charming courtesy: “_Monsieur, vous êtes ici chez vous_; go
where you will or, better still, let me present you to our stage
manager. It is he who is really captain of the ship in the storm, for
we have some rapid dark changes to make during the _revue_, when you
will be safer in a corner.”
From the wings behind the blaze of the footlights, the crowded house
lay like a flower-garden in the dusk. Here a patch of red flamed
brighter than the rest from some theater hat; there the white of a
shirt-front gleamed.
The prompter sat huddled under his wooden hood with his prompt-book in
readiness for the raising of the curtain.
Behind him, the leader of the orchestra wiped his eyeglasses, looked at
his watch, passed a word by the second violin to the oboe concerning a
late correction, and, tapping his baton, began the overture.
Bang! Bang! Bang! pounded thrice the stage manager with measured
precision, and, with a final glance at the people on the stage, gave
the signal to the head electrician who turned a switch. Up went the
curtain.
The night’s work had begun.
For the three hours that ensued during the _revue_, ballets succeeded
ballets. There were burlesques upon current topics and singing
choruses. All through this the stage management was perfect.
[Illustration: CHORUS GOSSIP]
When you consider the lack of room it was all the more remarkable.
“You see,” said the stage manager, during one of his free minutes, “we
are terribly cramped for room here upon this old stage. Our biggest
flats we set with this panorama arrangement”—and he pointed to two
giant rollers, one on either side of the stage. Then, leading the way
beneath the stage, he showed me the two great wheels and the dynamo
that moved them.
“Look out!” said he, as we returned to the stage, “that is the finale
of the _commère’s_ song and we are going to make a quick change. Stand
there!” he said, and instinctively I jumped for the spot he indicated.
At the same instant the two electricians pulled a combination of
switches and everything went black.
Scene-shifters hurried through the gloom with awkward sections of
scenery, all of which had to be taken back through a doorway and
replaced in order where they had come from. Others hurried on the stage
with properties and sections for the new set.
The stage was, fortunately, warm, otherwise many of the _petites
Parisiennes_ who were descending the winding stairs would have suffered
from even the slightest current of air, for most of their clothes had
been left in the dressing-rooms above.
I saw among this “big family,” that are together during a long season,
the best of _camaraderie_ and unusual deference and courtesy by every
man toward the women.
During the second act I found that exceedingly _chic_ and attractive
_comédienne_, Mademoiselle Léa Dorville, in her loge.
Every available corner of her small room did good service. Rows of pink
and Nile green silk petticoats, _frous-frous_ and things hung from
hooks under cretonned shelves.
Other hooks held mademoiselle’s stage hats, some of them as big as
circus hoops. Her duchesse table was a veritable museum of little
necessaries: hare’s-feet and powder puffs, mirrors, sticks of grease
paint, a pot of cold cream with a silver top, a box of _poudre de riz_,
rouge for her lips, for her nails, for the tips of her ears. It was all
artificial, but it was nevertheless one real side of life. Serious
gaiety if you will, since to survive the daily routine of the stage is
hard work.
Being Sunday, that day they had already gone through a matinée. There
is but little time to rest between the matinée and the evening
performance, and in Paris the theaters are not out until midnight.
All this activity behind the scenes of the Folies Bergère seemed in
strong contrast to the idle leisure of the audience in front, who
during the _entr’actes_ strolled among the _demi-mondaines_ in the
_promenoir_ or lounged comfortably in arm-chairs pulled up to the café
tables of the alcoves, and with a cooling drink listened to the band of
Neapolitans.
The curtain fell upon an apotheosis representing the palace of gems;
upon La Belle Otéro clothed in solitaires; upon the _commère_ and the
_compère_ bowing to an appreciative audience; and finally upon a
stageful of _figurantes_ and _coryphées_ who, as the final curtain
fell, made a rush for their dressing-rooms. Half an hour later they all
said _bonsoir_ to the doorkeeper and scattered among the highways and
byways of the city. Some who passed out wore sables; others, who half
an hour before stood flashing in gems, went away in modest clothes of
their own making. Some departed to meet their sweethearts, others to
their families or their children; some to supper at the Café de Paris,
to Pousset’s and to the Café Riche, others to little snuggeries where
the cheapest dish was the most popular, and where the _vieux monsieur_
with the purse of gold never came.
[Illustration:
Photo by Reutlinger, Paris
LA BELLE OTÉRO]
I found the stage of another big music-hall, the Olympia, differing
widely from the cramped and picturesque old stage of the Folies
Bergère. Here there was plenty of room and sufficient stage height for
scenic spectacles. Back of all this, wide corridors led to the offices
of administration and comfortable dressing-rooms. Here again I found a
safe corner behind the proscenium, out of the way of changing scenery
and the toes of the agile mademoiselles of the ballet.
One seldom sees a more beautiful woman than the present _commère_ of
the Olympia _revue_, Germaine Gallois. She is tall, lithe and queenly,
with clear-cut features and a wealth of golden hair. With Lucien Noël
and the statuesque Graziella the _revue_ is not lacking in talent. From
the shadows of the wings framed by the side of the proscenium in deep
shadow against the flood of orange calcium light, the glitter of the
scene upon the stage seemed even more brilliant than when viewed from
the house.
[Illustration: EMILIENNE D’ALONÇON AS A COMMÈRE]
Three fourths of the performers in Parisian vaudeville are Americans,
English or Austrians. These naturally can not be employed in the
_revue_ following the vaudeville, for they do not speak French.
It is the custom to print in English the billposters announcing these
artists. It seems more of a novelty to Parisians if the lady on the
high wire appears on the bills as “Miss Dorita Gayford, Queen of the
High Wire.” In London you will see this lady who is on such good terms
with the attraction of gravitation, billed as “Mademoiselle Céleste
Pirrizetti, Reine du Fil de Fer.” It is more interesting, just as a
“Chateaubriand aux pommes soufflées” is more attractive upon a bill of
fare than plain “steak and fried potatoes.”
To us Americans who are accustomed to our modern theaters fitted with
every appliance for safety and comfort, the old-fashioned playhouses of
Paris, seasoned by time and tradition, seem quite primitive in
construction. Many of them have remained for nearly a century
materially unchanged. The narrow semi-circular corridors leading to the
orchestra through little velveted doors have low ceilings.
That the most sought after seats are those in the first balcony is due
to the fact that in many of the theaters the first rows in the
orchestra are sunk so low below an unusually high stage that it is
impossible to see more than the upper half of the performers. Then,
too, the hood of the prompter’s box is invariably placed in the middle
of the stage. Add to this a lady in front with a theater hat of such
dimensions that it would serve much better as a sunshade, and the
spectator near the front row has left to his vision a little triangular
space bounded on the base by the footlights, on one side by the
prompt-box, and on the other by a bobbing ostrich plume. Across this
aperture, provided the ostrich feather keeps still, you may, by good
luck, from time to time see the villain pursue the heroine.
The French playhouse is a slave to traditional custom. The stone
stairways worn by the feet of generations of audiences have sunk badly
out of plumb. There are comfortable old foyers and _fumoirs_ to which
the audience pour during the _entr’actes_, but the approach to these is
painfully slow through narrow corridors and up winding flights of
stairs.
The boxes lined along beneath the first balcony and circling the
orchestra are narrow, and insufferably warm in summer. Besides the open
loges there are boxes screened by grilles of gilt lattice, where madame
and another madame’s monsieur may secrete themselves, discreet even in
their indiscretions—but why gossip of the happiness of others?—there
is enough misery in the world as it is.
Those gray-haired old ladies, the _ouvreuses_, are traditional, too;
they hang the coats and wraps along the wall of the narrow corridor
into which the audience goes out, with the result that at the end of
the performance the corridor is jammed with people in search of their
belongings.
There is no orchestra except in those theaters in which the performance
as in opéra bouffes and musical comedies requires one. During the
_entr’actes_ Frenchmen stand in their orchestra places and carefully
look over the audience who have remained in their seats, with their
opera-glasses, until the stage manager pounds his staff solemnly for
the rising of the curtain. It is the custom, too, to use hideous drop
curtains between the acts covered with advertisements of perfumery,
automobiles, and of winter and summer resorts.
But if there are many little discomforts within Parisians theaters, the
interiors themselves are rich in works of art. The foyers contain
superb busts and rare pictures. There are ceilings, mellowed in color
by time, which were painted by the best masters. If many of these
auditoriums are uncomfortable, they possess a charm and a dignity which
age alone can give.
Take for example the old Palais Royal. This famous old playhouse has a
cozy old-fashioned auditorium and a foyer with a quaint gallery, and a
rich frieze which illustrates the history of the theater since the day
when Mademoiselle de Montansier in 1789 bought the Beaujolais, a little
playhouse constructed as a _théâtre des marionnettes_. From that year
the old theater existed under many names, until in 1848 it adopted the
title of the “Théâtre du Palais Royal,” a name which it still retains.
One feels within it that but for the modern costumes of the audience he
might be living in the time of the First Empire. The windows of the
foyer look out upon the dimly lighted courtyard of the palace of
Richelieu.
Like the ruddy back of some old violin, the interior of the Théâtre du
Palais Royal has become rich and polished by the hands of time. It has
become a Parisian institution, beloved by men and women of culture
because of its associations.
If you ask a Parisian at which theaters you can see the best plays, he
will invariably answer: The Théâtre Antoine and the Théâtre Français.
He adds the latter as a matter of habit, for the French have been
brought up for generations to regard the immortal house of the great
Molière as the best stage.
It is there he received his first impression of the theater when in his
childhood as a reward of merit he was taken to the Français to see
classical plays. He was told it was the best theater, and this
impression has remained with him since infancy. For French children are
taken as a matter of education to the Français and the Odéon.