[Illustration: 9086]
N Saturday came the opening night, and with it my first appearance
before the British public--my “first deboo” as our perruquier called
it. In thinking about it beforehand, I had been very much afraid
lest I should be nervous; but strange to say, I never experienced
stage-fright at any time. I say strange, because, at that period of my
life at all events, I was--as true greatness generally is--of a modest
and retiring disposition. In my very early youth, I believe, I was not
so. I am told that in my frock and pinafore days, I used to stand
upon the table, and recite poetry, to the intense gratification of
my elderly relatives (ah, the old folks knew how to enjoy themselves,
when I was a boy!); and an old nurse of mine always insisted that on
one occasion I collected half a crown in an omnibus by my spirited
rendering of “Baa, baa, black sheep.” I have no recollection of this
performance myself though, and, if it really did take place, where’s
the money? This part of the question has never, to my mind, been
satisfactorily cleared up.
But however self-possessed I may have been at eight, I was anything
but so at eighteen. Even now, I would not act to a drawing-room full
of people for a thousand pounds--supposing the company considered the
effort worth that sum. But before a public audience, I was all right,
and entirely free from that shyness about which, in private life, my
lady friends so bitterly complain. I could not see the people for one
thing--at all events, not those beyond the third row of stalls. The
blaze of light surrounding one on the stage, and the dimness of
the rest of the house, give the audience a shadowy and ghost-like
appearance, and make it impossible to see more than a general mass of
white faces. As I never noticed the “hundreds upon hundreds of
glaring eyes,” they did not trouble me, and I let ‘em glare. The most
withering glance in the world won’t crush a blind man.
If I had been nervous on the first night, I think I should have had a
good excuse for it, knowing, as I did, that a select party of my most
particular friends, including a few medical students and clergymen’s
sons, were somewhere in the theater; having come down, in a body with
the intention of giving me a fair start, as they said. They had insisted on
coming. I had begged them not to trouble themselves on my account, but
they wouldn’t hear of it. They said it would be such a comfort to me
to know that they were there. That was their thoughtful kindness. It
touched me.
I said: “Look here, you know, if you fellows are going to play the
fool, I’ll chuck the whole blessed thing up.”
They said they were not going to play the fool they were coming to see
me. I raised no further objections.
But I checkmated them. I lied to those confiding young men with such
an air of simple truthfulness, that they believed me, though they had
known me for years. Even now, after all this time, I feel a glow of
pride when I think how consummately I deceived them. They knew nothing
of the theaters or actors over the water so I just gave them the
name of our first old man, and told them that that was the name I had
taken. I exaggerated the effect of making-up, and impressed upon them
the idea that I should be so changed that they would never believe it
was I; and I requested them especially to note my assumed voice. I did
not say what character I was going to play, but I let slip a word now
and then implying that my mind was running on gray hairs and long-lost
children, and I bought a stick exactly similar to the one the poor old
gentleman was going to use in the part, and let it lie about.
So far as I was concerned, the plan was a glorious success, but
the effect upon the old man was remarkable. He was too deaf to hear
exactly what was going on, but he gathered enough to be aware that
he was the object of a certain amount of attention, and that he was
evidently giving great satisfaction to a portion of the audience;
which latter circumstance apparently surprised him. The dear fellows
gave him a splendid reception when he first appeared. They applauded
everything he said or did throughout the play, and called for him
after every act. They encored his defiance of the villain, and, when
he came on without his hat in a snow scene, they all pulled out their
pocket handkerchiefs and sobbed aloud. At the end they sent a message
round to tell him to hurry up, as they were waiting for him at the
stage door, an announcement that had the effect of sending him out by
the front way in wonderfully quick time.
On the whole, that first night passed off pretty well. First nights
are trying times at all theaters. The state of excitement behind the
scenes is at fever heat, and the stage manager and the head carpenter
become positively dangerous. In sensation pieces, where the author
plays second fiddle to the scene-shifter, this, of course, is
especially the case.
Now--as all modern playgoers know--there are never any hitches or
delays on first nights. At all events, not at any of the West-end
houses, where everything is always a “triumph of stage management!”
But in my time, hitches on first nights were the rule rather than
the exception, and when a scene was got through without any special
mishap, we felt we were entitled to shake hands with one another. I
remember one first night at a London theater where the sensation was
to be the fall of a house, crushing the villain (_literally_) at the
end of the fourth act. Great expectations were entertained about this
“effect.” It was confidently calculated that the collapse of this
building would bring down the house, and so no doubt it would have
done, if, owing to a mistake in the cues, the curtain had not come
down first. The house fell beautifully, the dummy villain was killed
on the spot, and the heroine saved in the nick of time by the hero
(who, in these plays, is always just round the corner), but the
audience only wondered what all the noise was about, and why no one
had struck an attitude at the end of the act.
But however flat things fell in front, the sensation behind was
undoubted. When the excitement had partially subsided, there was an
energetic inquiry for the man who had let down the curtain, but it
appeared that he had left without stopping even to put on his hat.
This did not transpire at the time, however, and, for half an hour
afterward, the manager was observed to be wandering about with a
crowbar, apparently looking for some one.
The premature rise of curtains is attended with still more ludicrous
results. On one occasion, I call to mind, the “rag” went up
unexpectedly, and discovered the following scene:
The king of the country, sitting by the side of his dying son. He is
drinking beer out of a bottle. His wig and beard lie beside him on the
floor.--The dying son, touching herself up by the aid of a powder-puff
and a hand-glass.--The chief priest of the country (myself) eating a
Bath bun, while a friendly super buttons him up the back.
Another time I recollect was at a very small provincial theater. There
was only one dressing-room in the whole place, and that the ladies had
of course. We men had to dress on the stage itself. You can imagine
the rest--the yell, the confusion; the wild stampede; the stage
looking like the south bank of the Serpentine after 8 P. M.; the rapid
descent of the curtain; the enthusiastic delight of the audience. It
was the greatest success we had during our stay.
I have a strong opinion, however, that this latter catastrophe was
not due so much to accident as to a certain mean villain among the
company, whose name, in consideration of his family, I refrain from
mentioning.