was one of the last of the thin and rapidly lessening group of actors
capable of presenting those pieces--wherein, although the substance be
human nature, the manner is that of elaborate and diversified artifice.
When he played Lieutenant Worthington, in _The Poor Gentleman_, he was a
gentleman indeed--refined, delicate, sensitive, simply courageous,
sustained by native integrity, and impressive with a dignity of manner
that reflected the essential nobility of his mind; so that when he
mistook Sir Robert Bramble for a bailiff, and roused that benevolent
baronet's astonishment and rage, he brought forth all the comic humour
of a delightful situation with the greatest ease and nature. He played
Littleton Coke, Sir Harcourt Courtly, old Laroque--in which he gave a
wonderful picture of the working of remorse in the frail and failing
brain of age--and Nicholas Rue, in _Secrets worth Knowing_, a sinister
and thrilling embodiment of avarice and dotage. He played Dr. Bland, the
elegant medical cynic of _Nos Intimes_; De la Tour, the formidable,
jealous husband of Henriette, in _Le Patte de Mouche_; Horace, in _The
Country Squire_; Goldfinch, in which he was airy, sagacious, dashing,
and superb, in _The Road to Ruin_; and Captain Cozzens, the nonchalant
rascal of _The Knights of the Round Table_, which he embodied in a style
of easy magnificence, gay, gallant, courageous, alert, imperturbable,
and immensely comic. He was the original Matthew Leigh in Lester
Wallack's romantic play of _Rosedale_ (1863). He acted Joseph Surface in
the days when Lester Wallack used to play Charles, and he always held
his own in that superior part. He was equally fine in Sir Peter and Sir
Oliver. When the good old play of _The Wife's Secret_ was revived in New
York, in 1864, he gave a dignified and impetuous performance of Sir
Walter Amyott. I remember him in those parts, with equal wonder at his
comprehensive variety of talent and admiration for his always adequate
skill. I saw him as the volatile Ferment, in _The School of Reform_,
and nothing could be more comic than his unwitting abuse of General
Tarragon, in that blustering officer's presence, or his equally
ludicrous scene of cross purposes with Bob Tyke. He was a perfect type,
as Don Manuel Velasco, in _The Compact_, of the gallant, stately Spanish
aristocrat. He excelled competition when, in a company that included
George Holland, W. Holston, A.W. Young, Mark Smith, Frederick C.P.
Robinson, and John Gilbert, he enacted the convict in _Never Too Late to
Mend_. He was equally at home whether as the King in _Don Cæsar de
Bazan_ or as Tom Stylus the literary hack, in _Society_. He passed
easily from the correct and sentimental Sir Thomas Clifford, of _The
Hunchback_, to the frivolous Mr. Willowear, of _To Marry or Not to
Marry_. No one could better express than he did, when playing Wellborn,
both pride of birth and pride of character. One of his most
characteristic works was Hyssop, in _The Rent Day_. His scope and the
rich resources of his experience are denoted in those citations. It is
no common artist who can create and sustain a perfect illusion, and
please an audience equally well, whether in such a part as Gilbert
Featherstone, the villain, in _Lost in London_, or old Baptista, in _The
Taming of the Shrew_. The playgoer who never saw Charles Fisher as
Triplet can scarcely claim that he ever saw the part at all. The quaint
figure, the well-saved but threadbare dress, the forlorn air of poverty
and suffering commingled with a certain jauntiness and pluck, the
profound feeling, the unconscious sweetness and humour, the spirit of
mind, gentility, and refinement struggling through the confirmed
wretchedness of the almost heart-broken hack--who that ever laughed and
wept at sight of him in the garret scene, sitting down, "all joy and
hilarity," to write his comedy, can ever forget those details of a true
and touching embodiment? His fine skill in playing the violin was
touchingly displayed in that part, and gave it an additional tone of
reality. I once saw him acting Mercutio, and very admirable he was in
the guise of that noble, brave, frolicsome, impetuous young gentleman.
The intense vitality, the glancing glee, the intrepid spirit--all were
preserved; and the brilliant text was spoken with faultless fluency. It
is difficult to realise that the same actor who set before us that
perfect image of comic perplexity, the bland and benevolent Dean, in
_Dandy Dick_, could ever have been the bantering companion of Romeo and
truculent adversary of fiery Tybalt. Yet this contrast but faintly
indicates the versatile character of his mind. Fisher was upon the
American stage for thirty-eight years, from August 30, 1852, when he
came forth at Burton's theatre as Ferment. Later he went to Wallack's,
and in 1872 he joined Daly's company, in which he remained till 1890. It
may be conjectured that in some respects he resembled that fine comedian
Thomas Dogget, to whom Sir Godfrey Kneller, the painter, said, "I can
only copy Nature from the originals before me, while you vary them at
pleasure and yet preserve the likeness." Like Dogget he played, in a
vein of rich, hearty, jocose humour, and with great breadth of effect
and excellent colour, the sailor Ben, in _Love for Love_. The
resemblance was in mental characteristics, not physique--for Dogget was
a slight and sprightly man, whereas Fisher could represent majesty as
well as frolic. After he went to Daly's theatre he manifested a
surprising range of faculty. He first appeared there on October 28,
1872, as Mr. Dornton, in _The Road to Ruin_, and on November 19,
following, he acted Falstaff for the first time. He presented there the
other Shakespearean parts of Leonatus, Armado, and Malvolio--the last of
these being a model of fidelity to the poet, and now a classic in
reputation. He also assumed Adam and Jaques. He presented the living
image of Shakespeare himself, in _Yorick_, and his large, broad, stately
style gave weight to Don Manuel, in _She Would and She Wouldn't_; to
that apt type of the refined British aristocrat, Sir Geoffrey Champneys,
in _Our Boys_; and to many a noble father or benevolent uncle of the
adapted French society drama. Just as Dogget was supreme in such parts
as Fondlewife, so was Fisher superb in the uxorious husband whom the
demure child-wife bamboozles, in the comedies of Molière. No man has
ever better depicted than he did a sweet nature shocked by calamity and
bowed down with grief, or, as in Joe Chirrup, in _Elfie_, manliness
chastened by affliction and ennobled by true love: yet his impersonation
of Fagin was only second to that of J.W. Wallack, Jr.; his Moody, in
_The Country Girl_, was almost tragic in its grim and grizzled
wretchedness and snarling wrath; and I have seen him assume to
perfection the gaunt figure and crazy mood of Noah Learoyd, in _The Long
Strike_, and make that personality a terrible embodiment of menace. From
the time he first acted the comic Major Vavasour, in _Henry Dunbar_, no
actor of equal quaintness has trod our stage. He died on June 11, 1891,
and was buried at Woodlawn.
XXVI.
MRS. G.H. GILBERT.
Students of the English stage find in books on that subject abundant
information about the tragedy queens of the early drama, and much
likewise, though naturally somewhat less (because comedy is more
difficult to discuss than tragedy), about the comedy queens. Mrs. Cibber
still discomfits the melting Mrs. Porter by a tenderness even greater
than the best of Belvideras could dispense. Mrs. Bracegirdle and Mrs.
Oldfield still stand confronted on the historic page, and still their
battle continues year after year. All readers know the sleepy voice and
horrid sigh of Mrs. Pritchard in Lady Macbeth's awful scene of haunted
somnambulism; the unexampled and unexcelled grandeur of Mrs. Yates in
Medea; the infinite pathos of Mrs. Dancer (she that became in succession
Mrs. Spranger Barry and Mrs. Crawford) and her memorable scream, as Lady
Randolph, at "Was he alive?"; the comparative discomfiture of both
those ladies by Mrs. Siddons, with her wonderful, wailing cry, as
Isabella, "O, my Biron, my Biron," her overwhelming Lady Macbeth and her
imperial Queen Katharine. The brilliant story of Peg Woffington and the
sad fate of Mrs. Robinson, the triumphant career of Mrs. Abington and
the melancholy collapse of Mrs. Jordan--all those things, and many more,
are duly set down in the chronicles. But the books are comparatively
silent about the Old Women of the stage--an artistic line no less
delightful than useful, of which Mrs. G.H. Gilbert is a sterling and
brilliant representative. Mrs. Jefferson, the great-grandmother of the
comedian Joseph Jefferson, who died of laughter, on the stage (1766-68),
might fitly be mentioned as the dramatic ancestor of such actresses as
Mrs. Gilbert. She was a woman of great loveliness of character and of
great talent for the portrayal of "old women," and likewise of certain
"old men" in comedy. "She had," says Tate Wilkinson, "one of the best
dispositions that ever harboured in a human breast"; and he adds that
"she was one of the most elegant women ever beheld." Mrs. Gilbert has
always suggested that image of grace, goodness, and piquant ability.
Mrs. Vernon was the best in this line until Mrs. Gilbert came; and the
period which has seen Mrs. Judah, Mrs. Vincent, Mrs. Germon, Mary Carr,
Mrs. Chippendale, Mrs. Stirling, Mrs. Billington, Mrs. Drew, Mrs.
Phillips, and Madam Ponisi, has seen no superior to Mrs. Gilbert in her
special walk. She was in youth a beautiful dancer, and all her motions
have spontaneous ease and grace. She can assume the fine lady, without
for an instant suggesting the parvenu. She is equally good, whether as
the formal and severe matron of starched domestic life, or the genial
dame of the pantry. She could play Temperance in _The Country Squire_,
and equally she could play Mrs. Jellaby. All varieties of the
eccentricity of elderly women, whether serious or comic, are easily
within her grasp. Betsy Trotwood, embodied by her, becomes a living
reality; while on the other hand she suffused with a sinister horror her
stealthy, gliding, uncanny personation of the dumb, half-insane Hester
Dethridge. That was the first great success that Mrs. Gilbert gained,
under Augustin Daly's management. She has been associated with Daly's
company since his opening night as a manager, August 16, 1869, when, at
the Fifth Avenue theatre, then in Twenty-fourth Street, she took part in
Robertson's comedy of _Play_. The first time I ever saw her she was
acting the Marquise de St. Maur, in _Caste_, on the night of its first
production in America, August 5, 1867, at the Broadway theatre, the
house near the southwest corner of Broadway and Broome Street, that had
been Wallack's but now was managed by Barney Williams. The assumption of
that character, perfect in every particular, was instinct with pure
aristocracy; but while brilliant with serious ability it gave not the
least hint of those rich resources of humour that since have diffused so
much innocent pleasure. Most of her successes have been gained as the
formidable lady who typifies in comedy the domestic proprieties and the
Nemesis of respectability. It was her refined and severely correct
demeanour that gave soul and wings to the wild fun of _A Night Off_.
From Miss Garth to Mrs. Laburnum is a far stretch of imitative talent
for the interpretation of the woman nature that everybody, from
Shakespeare down, has found it so difficult to treat. This actress has
never failed to impress the spectator by her clear-cut, brilliant
identification with every type of character that she has assumed; and,
back of this, she has denoted a kind heart and a sweet and gentle yet
never insipid temperament--the condition of goodness, sympathy,
graciousness, and cheer that is the flower of a fine nature and a good
life. Scenes in which Mrs. Gilbert and Charles Fisher or James Lewis
have participated, as old married people, on Daly's stage, will long be
remembered for their intrinsic beauty--suggestive of the touching lines:
"And when with envy Time, transported,
Shall think to rob us of our joys,
You'll in your girls again be courted,
And I'll go wooing with my boys."
XXVII.
JAMES LEWIS.
A prominent representative type of character is "the humorous man," and
that is Shakespeare's phrase to describe him. Wit is a faculty; humour
an attribute. Joseph Addison, Laurence Sterne, Washington
Irving--whatever else they might have been they were humourists. Sir
Roger de Coverley, Tristram Shandy, Uncle Toby, Diedrich Knickerbocker,
Ichabod Crane--these and other creations of their genius stand forth
upon their pages to exemplify that aspect of their minds. But the
humourist of the pen may, personally, be no humourist at all. Addison's
character was austere. Irving, though sometimes gently playful, was
essentially grave and decorous.
Comical quality in the humorous man whom nature destines for the stage
must be personal. His coming brings with it a sense of comfort. His
presence warms the heart and cheers the mind. The sound of his voice,
"speaking oft," before he emerges upon the scene, will set the theatre
in a roar. This was notably true of Burton and of William Warren. The
glance, motion, carriage, manner, and the pause and stillness of such a
man, instil merriment. Cibber says that Robert Nokes had a palpable
simplicity of nature which was often as unaccountably diverting in his
common speech as on the stage, John E. Owens, describing the conduct of
a big bee in an empty molasses barrel, once threw a circle of his
hearers, of whom I was one, almost into convulsions of laughter. Artemas
Ward made people laugh the moment they beheld him, by his wooden
composure and indescribable sapience of demeanour. The lamented Daniel
E. Setchell, a comedian who would have been as famous as he was funny
had he but lived longer, presented a delightful example of spontaneous
humour. It is ludicrous to recall the simple gravity, not demure but
perfectly solemn, with which, on the deck of a Hudson River steamboat,
as we were passing West Point, he indicated to me the Kosciuszko
monument, saying briefly, "That's the place where Freedom shrieked." It
was the quality of his temperament that made his playfulness delicious.
Setchell was the mental descendant of Burton, as Burton was of Reeve and
as Reeve was of Liston. Actors illustrate a kind of heredity. Each
species is distinct and discernible. Lester Wallack maintained the
lineage of Charles Kemble, William Lewis, Elliston, and Mountfort--a
line in which John Drew has gained auspicious distinction. John
Gilbert's artistic ancestry could be traced back through Farren and
Munden to King and Quin, and perhaps still further, to Lowin and Kempe.
The comedian intrinsically comical, while in his characteristic quality
eccentric and dry, has been exemplified by Fawcett, Blisset, Finn, and
Barnes, and is conspicuously presented by James Lewis. No one ever saw
him without laughter--and it is kindly laughter, with a warm heart
behind it. The moment he comes upon the stage an eager gladness diffuses
itself throughout the house. His refined quaintness and unconscious
drollery capture all hearts. His whimsical individuality never varies;
yet every character of the many that he has portrayed stands clearly
forth among its companions, a distinct, unique embodiment. The graceful
urbanity, the elaborate yet natural manner, the brisk vitality, the
humorous sapience of Sir Patrick Lundy--how completely and admirably he
expressed them! How distinct that fine old figure is in the remembrance
of all who saw it! But he has never played a part that he did not make
equally distinct. A painter might fill a gallery with odd,
characteristic creations by merely copying his compositions of
"make-up." The amiable professor in _A Night Off_, the senile Gunnion in
_The Squire_, Lissardo in _The Wonder_, Grumio in _The Shrew_--those and
many more he has made his own; while in the actor's province of making
comic characters really comical to others there is no artist who better
fulfils the sagacious, comprehensive injunction of Munden (imparted to a
youthful actor who spoke of being "natural" in order to amuse), "Nature
be d----d! Make the people laugh!" That, aside from all subtleties, is
not a bad test of the comic faculty, and that test has been met and
borne by the acting of James Lewis.
XXVIII.
A LEAF FROM MY JOURNAL.
[November 23, 1867.]
Thirty years hereafter many who are now active and honoured in dramatic
life will be at rest--their work concluded, their achievements a fading
tradition. But they will not be wholly forgotten. The same talisman of
memory that has preserved to our time the names and the deeds of the
actors of old will preserve to future times the names and the deeds that
are distinguished now in the mimic world of the stage. Legend, speaking
in the voice of the veteran devotee of the drama, will say, for example,
that of all the actors of this period there was no light comedian
comparable with Lester Wallack; that he could thoroughly identify
himself with character,--though it did not always please him to do so;
that his acting was so imaginative and so earnest as to make reality of
the most gossamer fiction; and that his vivacity--the essential element
and the crown of comedy-acting--was like the dew on the opening rose.
And therewithal the veteran may quaff his glass to the memory of another
member of the Wallack family, and speak of James Wallack as Cassius, and
Fagin, and the Man-in-the-Iron-Mask, and the King of the Commons, and
may say, with truth, that a more winning embodiment of bluff manliness
and humour was never known to our stage than the versatile actor who
made himself foremost in those characters. It will be impossible to
remember him without recalling his intimate professional associate,
Edwin L. Davenport. He was the only Brutus of his time, our old friend
will say, and in his prime the best Macbeth on the American stage; and
he could play almost any part in the drama, from the loftiest tragedy to
mere trash; and he was an admirable artist in all that he did. There
will be plenty of evidence to fortify that statement; and if the veteran
shall also say that Wallack's company contained, at the same time, the
best "old men" in the profession, no dissentient voice, surely, will
challenge the names of George Holland, John Gilbert, James H. Stoddart,
and Mark Smith. Cibber could play Lord Foppington at seventy-three; but
George Holland played Tony Lumpkin at seventy-seven. A young part,--but
the old man was as joyous as a boy and filled it with a boisterous,
mischievous humour at once delightful and indescribable. You saw him to
the best advantage, though, in Mr. Sulky, Humphrey Dobbin, and kindred
parts, wherein the fineness of his temperament was veiled under a
crabbed exterior and some scope was allowed for his superb skill in
painting character. So the discourse will run; and, when it touches upon
John Gilbert, what else than this will be its burden?--that he was
perfection as the old fop; that his Lord Ogleby had no peer; that he was
the oddest conceivable compound of dry humour, quaint manners,
frolicsome love of mischief, honest, hearty mirth, manly dignity, and
tender pathos. To Mark Smith it will render a kindred tribute. Squire
Broadlands, Old Rapid, Sir Oliver Surface--they cannot be forgotten.
Extraordinary truthfulness to nature, extraordinary precision of method,
large humanity, strong intellect, and refined and delicate humour that
always charmed and never offended--those were the qualities that
enrolled him among the best actors of his time. And it will not be
strange if Old Mortality passes then into the warmest mood of eulogium,
as he strives to recall the admirable, the incomparable "old woman" Mrs.
Vernon. She was a worthy mate of those worthies, he will exclaim. She
could be the sweet and loving mother, gentle and affectionate; the
stately lady, representative of rank and proud of it and true to it; and
the most eccentric of ludicrous old fools. She was the ideal Mrs.
Malaprop, and she surpassed all competitors in the character of Mrs.
Hardcastle. Mary Gannon was her stage-companion and her foil, he will
add--the merriest, most mischievous, most bewitching player of her time,
in her peculiar line of art. As Hester, in _To Marry or Not to Marry_,
and as Sophia, in _The Road to Ruin_, she was the incarnation of girlish
grace and delicious ingenuousness, and also of crisp, well-flavoured
mirth. No taint of tameness marred her acting in those kindred
characters, and no air of effort made it artificial. Nor was Fanny
Morant less remarkable for the glitter of comedy and for an almost
matchless precision of method. So will our friend of the future prose
on, in a vein that will be tedious enough to matter-of-fact people; but
not tedious to gentle spirits who love the stage, and sympathise with
its votaries, and keep alive its traditions--knowing that this mimic
world is as real and earnest as the strife that roars and surges around
it; that there as everywhere else humanity plays out its drama, whereof
the moral is always the same--that whether on the stage or in the mart,
on the monarch's throne or in the peasant's cot,
"We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep."
THE END.
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