The ballet seems at last to have found a home in New York, and to have
become one of the permanent institutions of the great city,--witness the
triumphs of the Black Crook, of Humpty Dumpty, and the spectacular plays
of the Grand Opera House. It must be confessed that it is well done
here. The Black Crook carries off the palm. Its ballets are the best
arranged and the best executed, and its dancers are as good looking and
attractive as ballet girls ever are.
There are several hundred girls and women in New York who earn their
living by dancing in the ballets of the various theatres. The Black
Crook alone employs about one hundred. Those who have seen these damsels
in their glory, in the full glare of the foot and calcium lights, amidst
the most gorgeous surroundings, and under the influence of delicious
music, may have come to the conclusion that such a life must be very
pleasant. They little know the experience of a ballet girl. "It's a
hard life," said one of them, not long since, "and very little fun in it,
if you're decent."
The ballet girl always appears on the bills as a miss, but some of them
are married, and have to support helpless or worthless husbands. They
are of all nationalities. The Premieres are generally French or
Italian--at least on the bills. These are usually excellent dancers, and
are fond of their art. They are well paid, and as a rule save their
money. Mdlle. Bonafanti received $150 per week from the managers of
Niblo's Theatre. Mdlle. Morlacchi also receives large sums. She is a
sensible woman, and has invested her earnings in a pretty home in New
England, where she spends her summers.
[Picture: THE BALLET.]
Not more than one or two in the same establishment receive such high pay,
however. The salaries, as a rule, are small. The Secondas at Niblo's,
the home of the Black Crook, receive from $50 to $100 per week. There
are twelve coryphees who earn from $25 to $30 per week. Then follow the
first, second, and third lines of the ballet, with wages ranging from $5
to $30 per week. The girls who march in the processions of female
soldiers receive about $8 per week. The costumes, armor, etc., are
furnished by the theatre, but there are many articles of dress which the
girls are obliged to furnish at their own expense.
The ballet girl rises about eight o'clock in the morning, and is off to
rehearsal by nine. A duller, more dreary sight than a rehearsal of a
ballet by daylight, and in plain dress, cannot be imagined. The theatre
is dark and gloomy, the stage not much lighter, and everything is in
confusion. There is a smell of escaping gas in all parts of the
building. Scattered about the stage are a number of girls and women in
half skirts, with fleshings on their legs, and some of them with woollen
hose drawn over the fleshings to keep them warm. They are terribly jaded
and hollow eyed, and they seem incapable of being interested in anything.
A very different set from the smiling, graceful houris of the evening
before. At a given signal the music begins, and the girls commence a
series of capers which seem utterly ridiculous. It is downright hard
work for the girls, however; and those who are not engaged in leaping, or
pirouetting, or wriggling, are leaning against the scenery and panting
with fatigue. The leader of the ballet storms and swears at them, and is
made frantic by every little mistake. The rehearsal occupies several
hours. If there is a matinee that day, it is kept up until it is time
for the girls to dress for that performance. Between the close of the
matinee, and the opening of the evening performance, there is not much
time for the tired girls to rest.
Upon assembling for the evening performance, the girls are dressed by a
practical costumer, whose business it is to see that each one wears her
costume properly. This arranged, they pass down to the painter's room,
where their cheeks, ears, and nostrils are "touched up" by an artist.
Their hair is dressed by another artist, and every defect of face and
figure is overcome as far as is possible. Thus adorned, the dull and
jaded girl of the morning becomes, under the magical influence of the
footlights, a dazzling sprite, and the object of the admiration of the
half-grown boys and brainless men who crowd the front rows of orchestra
seats.
The performance is not over until near midnight. Then the dancer must
change her dress, fold her stage dress carefully away, make up her
bundle, and set out for home. The principal dancers, such as Bonafanti,
and Morlacchi, of course, have an easier time than the ordinary ballet
girls, but all work hard.
It is commonly supposed that the ballet-dancer is of necessity an impure
woman. Too many of them are; but, as a class, they are much abused.
They work hard, and do not have much leisure time, and deserve more
sympathy than reproach. Men, especially, think that, because they appear
on the stage in a state of semi-nudity, they are immodest and of easy
virtue; and in New York there is a class of men, of nominal
respectability, who appear to regard ballet-dancers as their legitimate
prey. They exert all their arts to lead these poor girls astray, and are
too often successful. There is not a ballet-dancer in the city but can
tell many a tale of persecutions of this kind; and if ever the devil
employed a legion of emissaries to do his work, they must be the
grinning, leering men who occupy the front seats in the theatres during
the ballet performances, and who spend their leisure time in seeking to
compass the ballet-girl's ruin.
The ballet-girl, says Olive Logan, "is a dancer, and loves dancing as an
art. That pose into which she now throws herself with such abandon, is
not a vile pandering to the tastes of those giggling men in the orchestra
stalls, but is an effort, which, to her idea, is as loving a tribute to a
beloved art as a painter's dearest pencil touch is to him. I have seen
these women burst into tears on leaving the stage, because they had
observed men laughing among themselves, rolling their eyes about, and
evidently making unworthy comments on the pretty creatures before them,
whose whole heart was for the hour lovingly given over to Terpsichore.
'It is _they_ who are bad,' said Mdlle. B--- to me, the other night; 'it
is not we.'"
The majority of the ballet-dancers dwell with their parents, but many of
those in the upper ranks of the profession like the freedom of Bleecker
street, and reside in that thoroughfare. Thompson street also contains
several boarding-houses patronized by dancers and burlesque actresses. A
writer in the New York _World_ gives the following clever sketch of the
more prosperous ballet-girl at home:
"It was strictly a theatrical boarding-house, and all the young ladies
were dancers. 'It would never do to have anybody else here. Mrs.
Sullivan is Miss Jones's dresser at the "Adelphi," and she has kept house
here some years. Her husband was an actor, and he went to California and
never came back. She's a dear good woman, and treats us like her
daughters.'
"'How many of you board here?'
"'Thirteen. All of them are high-priced dancers--no ballet and utility
girls here. No, _sir_! We pay $10 to $15 a week for board. She treats
us like her own family.'
"Miss Bell then suggested a tour of the house, offering to be the guide
of such an exploration. Tripping down stairs with the elastic hop of a
bird, she knocked at the door of the lower front chamber, and immediately
ushered her companion into the room. It was large and elegant, and in
exquisite order. One really beautiful girl was driving a sewing-machine
before a window with the industry of a seamstress. Another was engaged
in trimming a tiny pair of satin boots with beads of every color. She
was short, small, and swarthy, her chief beauty being a languishing pair
of black eyes. A third lay at full length on a small bed in an alcove,
reading _Harper's Bazaar_ with the avidity of a milliner, or a lady of
fashion. She was exceedingly pretty and ladylike. Two of them wore the
inevitable white wrapper, while the third was fully dressed in a simple
gray walking-suit. The lovely creature at the sewing-machine was Miss
Ethel Lynn of the 'Lyceum;' the swarthy girl was Miss Lottie Taylor of
the 'Gaiety,' and the third was another Miss Lynn, pseudo-sister of
Ethel, with whom she 'worked,' but in reality a no-relation named Ellis.
The three girls smiled prettily enough on learning their visitor's
object, and the recumbent beauty regretted that it was impossible, under
the circumstances, to publish a picture of the scene.
"The next room was occupied by 'a very great swell,' the premiere
danseuse of the 'Lyceum'. It contained a superb piano littered with
stage properties, dresses, and general odds and ends. The furniture was
of splendid quality, and large tinted photographs of prominent French
'professionals,' including an unusually prepossessing likeness of
Schneider, decked the walls. Satin tights, exquisitely pink, hung out of
a half-open trunk. The danseuse was seated at a small table, her own
profuse golden hair coiled after an indolent fashion, while her diamonded
fingers were hard at work saturating some superb yellow tresses in a
saucerful of colorless fluid, a bleaching agent for continuing the lustre
of blond hair. A clamorous parrot trolled a bar or two of _'Un Mari
Sage'_ overhead, and a shaggy poodle lay couched in leonine fashion at
her feet, munching a handsome though fractured fan. A well-directed kick
of her dainty little slippered foot sent the sacrilegious animal flying
on the entrance of the two invaders. This was Mademoiselle Helene
Devereux, a young lady who twirled her toes for a salary scarcely less
than that of the President of the United States. French by birth, she
spoke English with a pure accent. She seemed much amused at the errand
of her masculine visitor.
"You want to see a _premiere_ at home? Look at me now, dyeing my own
hair. And see that dress there. I made it every bit myself. I get up
every morning at 8. Some of the other lazy things in the house never
think of breakfast till 10. But I turn out at 8; eat some breakfast; do
all my mending; sort out my washing; go to rehearsal; practise new
dances; come home to lunch; drive out to the Park; eat my dinner; go to
the theatre; eat my supper, and go straight to bed. Can anybody live
more properly? I don't think it possible. Mrs. Sullivan says I'm a
model. I don't give her the least bit of trouble, and she wouldn't part
with me for anything. You ought to have been here just now, and seen
little Vulfi of the "Melodeon." She makes $100 a night, and yet she
doesn't dress any more stylishly than Mrs. Sullivan; and she never bought
a jewel in her life. She supports a mother, and sends a brother to
college in Florence. You people think we are fast. That's all nonsense.
It is only the little dancers, _la canaille_, who can afford to be
dissipated. I can't, I know that. I'm too tired after the theatre to
think of going out on a spree, as they call it. Besides, it doesn't do
for a dancer to be too cheap. It hurts her business.'
"'Devereux's nice, isn't she?' said Miss Bell. 'She's very good, and
she's plucky. A fellow once followed her home from rehearsal, chirping
to her all the way. She said nothing, but went right on into the livery
stable next door. The fellow went in after her, and she snatched a
carriage whip out of the office, and, oh my! didn't she thrash him?
Nobody interfered, and she whipped him till her arm ached. Ever since
then she's been receiving dreadful letters, and so has Mrs. Sullivan.
She can't find out who sends them, and she's never seen the fellow
again.'"