Jefferson, and men of that school, lament the decadence of the "stock"
company system. But, in the dramatic as in the real world, we must
take things as we find them, and the fact is that there is very
little chance for a young lady who would be an actress to get a
thorough knowledge of her art--that is, thorough as it is understood
by those in the front rank of the profession, who have reached their
position by following the old methods.
On the other hand, the stage never offered so many opportunities for
bright young women with dramatic talent to make a living as it does at
the present time. Every city, both large and small, can boast of its
theatre or opera-house, and in many of the large towns throughout the
country there are town-halls arranged with a view to accommodate some
of the minor theatrical combinations.
The young lady who would succeed in making a fair living on the stage
must, first of all, be attractive. The stage appeals as much to the
eye as it does to the ear, and there is scarcely an instance of an
ugly actress being successful, or, indeed, even having the opportunity
of exhibiting herself on the stage.
It seems to be the general opinion among actors and theatrical
managers that the instruction received from professors of elocution is
of little or no account. As to the experience gained from performing
in amateur companies, there is a difference of opinion. The dramatic
agent whose views have just been given speaks, it will be seen, very
strongly against the amateur actor. Others, however, whose opinions
are entitled to great weight, say that experience gained in amateur
organizations is always valuable. The manager of one of the principal
theatres in New York--a theatre, too, that has had an unusually large
number of travelling companies on the road--told the writer that he
had employed a large number of amateur actors, and that some of the
greatest pecuniary successes had been made by actors and actresses
who had come to him from some amateur theatrical company. Of course,
the new-comers were not successful at first. They had to serve an
apprenticeship on the regular stage; but he meant to say that their
previous experience, amateur though it was, had been a benefit to
them, and that they had got along quicker than they would if they had
been without it.
"Utility business" is the kind of work a young woman going upon the
stage must first expect to do; or, to speak more accurately, according
to the technique of the profession, she will first be allowed to make
an "announcement." She will come on the stage and say, "My lady, a
letter," or make some other simple speech to the extent of one or two
lines. If she does this well, she will be given parts where there is
more to say, until, finally, she has reached thirty lines, at which
point she is capable of being entrusted with a "responsible" part. The
salary of this class of actresses ranges from $15 to $30 per week.
If she does not start in this line of business, she may be a "ballet
lady,"--not a dancer, but one of the group of ladies that make up the
ballroom or party scenes. In this case, she will start on a salary of
from $5 to $7 per week. If she is very pretty, she will get $7; if she
is an "ancient,"--that is, rather old and decidedly plain,--she will
get only $5. The ability to sing commands an extra dollar per week.
The manager of the theatre alluded to above said, that in one of their
companies they employed a young lady without previous theatrical
experience. She was, however, very quick to learn, and commencing on a
salary of $20 a week, she quickly made herself valuable. After a while
a part was given her in which she made "a hit," and her salary has
been increased until now it is $70 a week when she is travelling, and
$55 a week when she plays in New York City, the extra $15 given to her
when she is away being for hotel expenses.
There has been so much said and written on the morals of the stage
that it will not be necessary here to warn the young dramatic aspirant
that this is a branch of the subject which she should well consider.
That there are actresses who are good women, fulfilling nobly all
the duties of wives, mothers, and sisters, nobody pretends to deny.
But that the stage offers very strong and dangerous temptations to
young and pretty women is a fact which every one who knows any thing
about the subject will admit. These temptations are not in the
theatre itself. The profession of acting is conducted on purely
business principles. Life behind the scenes is dull, uninteresting,
matter-of-fact. The actors and the actresses are full of their work,
and the whole place is decidedly unromantic. But there are great
temptations from without the theatre, into the details of which it is
not necessary to enter. It is not necessary that she should yield to
these temptations, nor are they, probably, all things considered, any
greater or stronger than the pretty shop-girl has to meet. But if she
values her character she will, when she enters this profession, make
up her mind to devote herself thoroughly to work, and she will be
particularly careful about the acquaintances she forms with the
opposite sex, and above all avoid that large and growing class of
silly men, both young and old, who love to boast that they number an
"actress" among their female acquaintances.
In the _North American Review_ for December, 1882, there was published
a symposium on the subject of success on the stage. There are so many
young ladies whose ambition lies in the direction of the drama, and
the contribution referred to contained such wholesome advice, that I
am tempted to quote from it at considerable length. There were six
contributors: John McCullough, Joseph Jefferson, Lawrence Barrett,
William Warren, Miss Maggie Mitchell, and Madame Helena Modjeska. The
views of the lady contributors will be found of especial interest to
the readers of this book.
The article was addressed more particularly to those whose ambition it
is to reach the highest rank in the profession, but the extracts
contain many useful hints for those who are simply looking forward to
a respectable, well-paying "utility" position on the stage.
Miss Mitchell says:--
"To succeed on the stage, the candidate must have a fairly
prepossessing appearance, a mind capable of receiving picturesque
impressions easily and deeply, a strong, artistic sense of form and
color, the faculty of divesting herself of her own mental as well as
physical identity, a profound sympathy with her art, utter sincerity
in assuming a character, power enough over herself to refrain from
analyzing or dissecting her part, a habit of generalization, and at
the same time a quick eye and ready invention for detail, a resonant
voice, a distinct articulation, natural grace, presence of mind, a
sense of humor so well under control that it will never run riot; the
gift of being able to transform herself, at will, into any type of
character; pride, even conceit, in her work; patience, tenacity of
purpose, industry, good-humor, and docility. She must behave, in her
earlier years, very much as if she were a careful, self-respecting
scholar, taking lessons of people better informed than herself, with
her eyes and ears constantly open and ready to receive impressions.
"She should begin by getting, if possible, into a stock company, even
in the most inferior capacity, keeping within reach of the influence
of her home,--or by joining a reputable combination on the road.
Managers, no matter what may be said to the contrary, are always
eagerly looking for talent in the bud, and if a young girl, with
reasonable pretensions to good looks, who is modest and well-behaved,
and shows the slightest ability with a common-sense readiness to begin
at the bottom of the ladder, should offer herself for an engagement,
the chances are that she would get it with much less difficulty than
she imagined. There are, no doubt, numerous candidates, even for the
smallest positions on the stage, but those who possess even moderate
qualifications are extremely rare. Managers have, at present, to take
the best they can pick from a host of worse than interlopers.
"I do not think that novices reap any practical benefit from private
lessons. The neophyte learns not merely of her professional teacher,
but of her audience; and to be informed by the one without being
influenced by the other is to have very lopsided instruction. The
stage itself is the best, in fact, the only school for actresses.
It is a profession made up of traditions and precedents and
technicalities. Mere oral advice, or training in elocution or gesture,
counts for very little. They are, in fact, too often obstacles which
have to be eventually and with difficulty surmounted. In some
instances I have known 'instruction'--of this sort--to bring about as
prejudicial effects as if the victim had tried to learn the art of
swimming at a dancing academy, and then put the knowledge thus gained
into practice. The modulations of the voice and the language of
illustrative gesture ought to be either taught by example or
insensibly acquired by experience. To learn them by precept and rule
has for a result, usually, that woodenness and jerkiness which one
cannot help noticing in the 'youthful prodigies' of the stage. To be
an actress one has to learn other things than merely how to act, and
that is why nobody ever succeeded in the profession who tried to enter
it at the top. * * *
"The early bent of her studies and reading should be precisely the
same as that of any other woman aspiring to be liberally educated. She
should, if possible, speak French, at all events read it. She should
be familiar with English literature. She should cultivate an
acquaintance, through books and otherwise, with the highest as well as
the lowest forms of human society. Refinement and general information
ought to be the characteristics of every actress. * * *
"It would be bold for me to pretend to descry the chances of success
for the actress of the future. It is a lottery, this profession of
ours, in which even the prizes are, after all, not very considerable.
My own days, spent most of them far from my children and the comforts
and delights of my home, are full of exhausting labor. Rehearsals
and other business occupy me from early morning to the hour of
performance, with brief intervals for rest and food and a little
sleep. In the best hotels my time is so invaded that I can scarcely
live comfortably, much less luxuriously. At the worst, existence
becomes a torment and a burden. I am the eager, yet weary, slave of
my profession, and the best it can do for me--who am fortunate enough
to be included among its successful members--is to barely palliate
the suffering of a forty-weeks' exile from my own house and my family.
"For those of our calling who have to make this weary round, year
after year, with disappointed ambitions and defeated hopes as their
inseparable company, I can feel from the bottom of my heart. Each
season makes the life harder and drearier; each year robs it of one
more prospect, one more chance, one more opportunity to try and catch
the fleeting bubble in another field."
Madame Modjeska writes:
"* * * It would be a great mistake to choose the profession with the
idea that money comes easier and work is less hard in this than in any
other. There is little hope for the advancement of such aspirants.
"There is no greater mistake than to suppose that mere professional
training is the only necessary education. The general cultivation of
the mind, the development of all the intellectual faculties, the
knowledge how to think, are more essential to the actor than mere
professional instruction. In no case should he neglect the other
branches of art; all of them being so nearly akin, he cannot attain to
a fine artistic taste if he is entirely unacquainted with music, the
plastic arts, and poetry.
"The best school of acting seems to me to be the stage itself--when
one begins by playing small parts, and slowly, step by step, reaches
the more important ones. There is a probability that if you play well
a minor character, you will play greater ones well by and by; while if
you begin with the latter, you may prove deficient in them, and
afterward be both unwilling and unable to play small parts. It was my
ill-fortune to be put, soon after my entrance on the stage, in the
position of a star in a travelling company. I think it was the
greatest danger I encountered in my career, and the consequence was
that when I afterward entered a regular stock company, I had not only
a great deal to learn, but much more to unlearn.
"The training by acting, in order to be useful, requires a certain
combination of circumstances. It is good in the stock companies of
Europe, because with them the play-bill is constantly changed, and
the young actor is required to appear in a great variety of characters
during a short period. But it may prove the reverse of good in a
theatre where the beginner may be compelled for a year or so to play
one insignificant part. Such a course would be likely to kill in him
all the love of his art, render him a mechanical automaton, and teach
him but very little.
"Private instruction can be given either by professors of elocution or
by experienced actors. I know nothing of the first, as there are no
professors of elocution, to my knowledge, outside of America and of
England, and I never knew one personally. But speaking of private
lessons given by experienced actors, there are certainly a great many
arguments and instances in favor of that mode of instruction. Of
course, a great deal depends upon the choice of the teacher. But,
supposing he is capable, he can devote more time to a private pupil
than he can to one in a public school. Some of the greatest actresses
that ever lived owed, in great part, their success to the instructions
of an experienced actor, of less genius than themselves. Take, for
instance, Rachel and Samson. Strange to say, it happens often that
very good actors make but poor professors, while the best private
teacher I ever met was, like Michonnet, but an indifferent actor
himself. The danger is that the pupil in this kind of instruction may
become a mere imitator of his model. Imitation is the worst mode of
learning, and the worst method in art, as it kills the individual
creative power, and in most cases, the imitators only follow the
peculiar failings of their model.
"There are many objections to dramatic schools, some of which are
very forcible. There is in them, as in private teaching, the danger
of imitation, and of getting into a purely mechanical habit, which
produces conventional, artificial acting. Yet it is not to be denied
that a great number of the best French and German actresses and
actors have been pupils of dramatic schools, and that two of the
schools--those of Paris and Vienna--have justly enjoyed a great
celebrity. Of the schools I have known personally I cannot speak very
favorably. One point must be borne in mind; a dramatic school ought to
have an independent financial basis, and not rely for its support on
the number of its pupils, because in such a case the managers might
be induced to receive candidates not in the least qualified for the
dramatic profession.
"Of the three elements that, in my opinion, go to make up a good
dramatic artist, the first one, technique, must be acquired by
professional training; the second and higher one, which is art itself,
originates in a natural genius, but can and ought to be improved by
the general cultivation of the mind. But there is yet something beyond
these two: it is inspiration. This cannot be acquired or improved, but
it can be lost by neglect. Inspiration, which Jefferson calls his
demon, and which I would call my angel, does not depend upon us.
Happy the moments when it responds to our appeal. It is only at such
moments that an artist can feel satisfaction in his work--pride in his
creation; and this feeling is the only real and true success which
ought to be the object of his ambition."
* * * * *
There is but very little chance for women to succeed as lecturers at
the present time. Some few years ago the country seemed to be overrun
with orators, both male and female. Probably the woman-suffrage
excitement had a great deal to do with this; at all events, there is
not much demand now for female eloquence. Twelve years ago a number of
distinguished women were before the public. Anna Dickinson spoke on
politics; since then she entered the dramatic profession. Susan B.
Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, spoke about woman-suffrage, a subject
which seems for the time to have died out. Olive Logan talked on
social topics; now she is in Europe. Mrs. Livermore is the only
female orator of that time who is now before the public, and she is
as successful now as she was then.
* * * * *
As public readers, women who have a talent in that direction have an
excellent chance at the present time. "Readings" are getting to be a
very popular form of entertainment. The theatres are offering such
poor and trashy attractions that many educated people who want to be
amused, are forced to seek diversion in this way. The general spread
of culture is also, probably, creating a taste in this direction.
The lady who would succeed as a public reader must, like the actress,
be good-looking. The most successful lady readers now before the
public are physically attractive. Some of them are large, fine-looking
women, while others are petite; but no matter what the particular
style of beauty may be, they are all pleasing in their personal
appearance.
The woman who wants to make public reading a profession will do all
she can to get her name and profession before the public. At first
she will give free readings before church societies. In this way she
will gradually become known, and, after a while, she will be able
to appear before some lyceum in the small outlying towns. If she
is favorably received she will be invited to come again, and so,
gradually, her name and fame will become known, and if she has the
necessary talent she will eventually command very good pay.
At first she will give free readings. Her readings for pay will, in
the beginning, bring her from $10 to $25 a reading. After that the
compensation will increase, according to her reputation as a reader.
The very best female readers, or "elocutionists," as they prefer to
term themselves, receive as much as $500 for one entertainment.
The social position which a lady occupies will have much to do with
her success. If she has a large circle of influential friends in good
social standing, provided, of course, she is talented, she will find
the road to success much easier than it otherwise would be.
BOOK-AGENTS.
Canvassing for books is a business in which some men have been known
to make $10,000 a year, and a large number of other men have earned
$2,000 and $3,000 in the same length of time. This is an occupation
which, under certain conditions, is admitted to be just as suitable
for a woman as a man.
The newspapers have poked a great deal of fun at book-agents, and
their ridicule has, doubtless, deterred many a person from following
the occupation. A young man, a book-agent, once wrote for advice to
the editor of a New York paper. He said that he had followed the
calling for some time, and that he made, the year round, from $50 to
$60 a week. He liked the work of travelling from place to place, but
he had doubts as to whether his calling was a respectable one. Would
it not be better for him to get some other employment? The editor
promptly informed him that the work he was doing was not only
respectable but exceedingly useful; that many persons were glad to
see him present to their notice the new and useful books he was
endeavoring to sell; that his earnings were exceptionally large, and
that it would be a long time before he could hope to earn as much in
any other business. By all means he should remain a book-agent.
It is said by the publishers of books that women make excellent
book-agents; they cannot hope to make as much money as the very best
male agents, but if they have the necessary qualifications they can do
very well. The prerequisites required can be summed up under four
heads:
First of all, a woman must have pretty good health; if she has not,
she will not be able to go through the necessary amount of physical
exercise involved in the work. But it is not necessary that she shall
be perfectly sound in body. Many a woman enters the business because
she has a delicate constitution, and because she believes that the
exercise she will be obliged to take will do her good. And if her
ailments are not too serious, she is seldom disappointed in this
respect.
Second, she must have a great deal of what business men call "push,"
and what some people might term impudence. She cannot afford to be
nervous about going into stores, offices, and houses, and offering
what she has for sale. Nor will it go well with her if she is
bad-natured, and shows temper when she is not greeted cordially by the
master or mistress of the house. She must have smiles and pleasant
words for those who do not buy as well as for those who do.
Third, she must be a good judge of human nature, and on this one
commandment, probably, hangs all the law and the prophets of
book-canvassing. For, if she has been a student of mankind she will
use great judgment in her vocation. She will call at the proper time,
at the proper place, upon the kind of people who will most likely want
to see her, or rather the book she has to offer. She will, by her
demeanor, win the respect of the men, the admiration of the women, and
the love of the children. It seems like saying a great deal too much,
but it is a fact, that there are some lady book-agents whose calls are
remembered as angels' visits, so agreeable were they in their manners,
so charming in conversation. It must be admitted, however, that there
are not many such women roaming up and down through the country.
Last of all, she must have great perseverance, and work continuously.
Women get very easily discouraged, no matter what occupation they
pursue, if they do not very quickly see some substantial return for
their work. The idea that "hope springs eternal in the human breast,"
was certainly never meant to apply to women; nor, maybe, was it meant
to, seeing that it occurs in the "Essay on Man." The female book-agent
is very much depressed if she does not make good earnings at the
start. Her depression so affects her spirits that she cannot be as
industrious as she otherwise would, and so she does more and more
poorly until, finally, she gives up the business. Men agents do not,
as a rule, become discouraged so easy. They know that provided they
have got a good book, published by a good house, it is only a question
of time when they will be making good earnings. Women should go to
work in the same spirit.
If poor success is apt to discourage a woman (and, in what I say now I
am only the mouthpiece of several publishers I have seen), a run of
very good luck is liable to demoralize her. It is said that some lady
agents, after making a considerable sum of money in a short space of
time, will at once stop work, and, retiring to their homes, will not
think of following the employment until their means are exhausted.
Of course that is foolish. While they are spending their time in
idleness some new-comer has been assigned to the field they found so
profitable. When they return to work it is with a listless spirit,
and it will be quite a while before they can summon up that old-time
energy, which comes, in any vocation, from long and continuous
performance.