Am engaged at Astley’s. The curious history of the theatre. Sanger’s
odd expedient against fire. I am a soldier for one night in “Fair
Rosamond.” Recreation at the “Bower Saloon.” I play the part of
a monk. The monks’ revenge on an obnoxious actor. A fight with
“Richard III.” Am pitched into the orchestra. I join Adams’ Circus in
Yorkshire. I make Marwood, the hangman, laugh. Am an unsatisfactory
witness in a police court case.
Sometime during 1873 I came to London and obtained an engagement at
Astley’s. Astley’s was not the old circus of Ducrow and other “Ring”
celebrities, but the transformed building, at least so far as the
outside walls were concerned, of Mr. Dion Boucicault, who in 1863
rebuilt it with very highflown notions. He proposed to call the new
theatre the “Westminster” and to devote it to the “legitimate” drama.
The project came to grief hopelessly. The public refused to recognise
the “Westminster,” which wasn’t in Westminster but in Lambeth. Astley’s
it always had been and Astley’s it was to remain to the end of its
days. The “legitimate” fled--to use the words of old Ducrow on one
occasion--the “cackle” was “cut,” and horses came into their own once
more. But they did not reign supreme, for that eccentric showman
E. T. Smith, who was always out for something “original,” tried the
experiment in 1865 of combining a circus with opera! It was of course
an utter failure.
Then Sanger’s had their home there for a time, and during 1872 Lord
George Sanger (who by the way laid the foundation of his fortune in
a penny show with “Maria Martin”) took the place on a lease from Mr.
Batty and transmogrified the interior, opening with a pantomime at
Christmas 1872. Mr. Boucicault’s experiment had completely spoilt the
theatre for circus purposes and Lord George Sanger restored the ring,
re-arranged and re-decorated the auditorium, and “Astley’s” was almost
itself again, but with a difference. There was now a stage as well as a
ring.
Sanger’s did not forget to set forth the glories of the new home with
the old name. “No; Astley’s not gone to dust and ashes”--ran one
advertisement affectionately. “We have come to the rescue--we have
spent a fortune to restore the dear old place”--and this was no more
than the sober truth. A singular contrivance to satisfy the public
that Astley’s would not be burnt down was the novel idea of turning
the gas pipes into water pipes should there be any necessity for the
transformation! “In case of emergency,” ran the announcement, “any
person by turning a lever will be able to convert the whole of the
gas jets into water outlets.” Lord George, however, did not reckon
with his elephants. One of the huge beasts broke loose the day before
the opening of the theatre, smashed a water main which supplied the
gas-water pipes, and ruined the act
* * * * *
Missing text in the printed source.
* * * * *
drop! The fashion of the day in circus titles--“William the Conqueror
and the pretty white horse with the golden hoof”--was fairly well
indicated by the title of the piece which formed the principal
attraction.
But before a year was out Lord George Sanger discovered that his own
name was quite as good for the public as was Astley’s, and certainly
more gratifying to himself. In the late autumn of 1873 he announced
with a great flourish of trumpets the production of Mr. Akhurst’s
spectacular play, “Fair Rosamond, or the Days of the Plantagenets.”
Stories of the feudal times had apparently caught on with the public.
Lord George Sanger was not one to hide his light under a bushel and he
gave evidence of this in the following advertisement: “Sanger’s Grand
National Amphitheatre. Late Astley’s. The proprietors do publicly
challenge the entire profession to equal the exciting and effective
scene of the Battle of Bridgenorth. Fifty trained horses in the great
fight.”
As for the spectacle itself, to go over the list fairly takes one’s
breath away. Here it is:
“The Landing of King Henry at Portsmouth, the Grand Procession at
Winchester, Coronation in Westminster Abbey, the Great Battle of
Bridgenorth, the Great Scene Morning after the Battle, the Bower
at Woodstock, the Cloisters of Canterbury Cathedral, Interior of
Canterbury Cathedral, Assassination of A’Beckett--with four other grand
tableaux.”
The names read beautifully and it seems almost a shame to spoil the
effect by relating, as I shall shortly have to do, an inglorious
episode in which I took part.
The play was produced on November 1st, 1873, and preceded the Christmas
pantomime. It was at Astley’s in this very “Fair Rosamond” that, not
discouraged by my failure at Royston’s mumming booth, I made my second
attempt to become a great actor. The play came on after the circus
business, in which I had a share, was over. For arena purposes half
the stage, which was adaptable, was removed, and restored when the
drama came on. I had to play the part of a soldier, together with three
others. We all wore beautiful armour. The words we had to say did not
want much study. They comprised two only, “To Canterbury,” in reply
to our Captain’s question, “Where goest thou?” uttered with all the
haughtiness demanded by melodrama.
I was only a little chap at this time and my suit of armour had been
made for a man quite six feet high. I’m not sure that I looked a very
noble warrior; at all events the audience didn’t think so, and the
gallery and the pit yelled at me. Again, I was a failure at serious
acting and my second essay lasted one night only. Somehow I had the
knack of always doing something wrong, and I fancy I often involved
my three companions into scrapes, and unfortunately one of the actors
named Lee made matters worse by telling tales of our misdoings to
the stage manager. Lee was really a fine actor and I daresay our
blunderings were a real source of annoyance to him.
Practically, so far as acting was concerned, we were given the sack,
but this didn’t quell the dramatic ardour which possessed us, and we
found solace, after our circus business was over, in visits to the
“Bower” in Stangate, not far from Astley’s.
The “Bower”--its full name was the “Bower Saloon,” but no one ever
thought of calling it so--was then falling into decay, but it was still
struggling to maintain its reputation as the only rival to the “Vic” as
a home of gory melodramas. Whatever the “Bower” may have looked like
in its best days, it had now become grimy and shabby, and the audience
was of the rowdiest. It probably would not hold many more than some 500
people. “Sweeney Todd” and “bluggy” plays of a like lurid character
formed the staple bill of fare, and we were able to revel in gore
comfortably seated in the royal box, for which we paid twopence a piece.
If I’d known as much about the “Bower” at that time as I’ve learned
since I should probably have looked upon it with more interest and
respect. It was in Stangate--a somewhat slummy street, swept away, I
think, for the approaches of St. Thomas Hospital, and in Stangate close
to the “Bower” once lived the father of the great Grimaldi. Mr. H. G.
Hibbert in his “A Playgoer’s Memories” reminds us that that erratic
genius, Robson, commenced his career at the “Bower,” and further points
out a curious if remote connection between the “Bower” and the “Belle
of New York.” Musgrove, who produced this American musical play in
London and made a fortune out of it, married a relative of the once
popular Irish comedian George Hodson, one of whose daughters was
Miss Henrietta Hodson, who became the wife of Mr. Labouchere. George
Hodson was at one time the manager of the “Bower” and thus supplied the
chain which linked this sordid place of amusement with the bright and
brilliant “Belle.”
Our studies of the drama as it was presented at the “Bower” were
eventually discovered, and the Astley manager expressed his
displeasure--why, I couldn’t understand, unless he thought the
spectacle of murders (it was the murders which we really went to see)
were corrupting our taste. Anyway he stalked into the “Bower” one
night, and spotting us, enquired sternly what we were doing there.
Our excuse that as we were not wanted on the Astley stage we had come
to pick up what we could of acting at the “Bower” was not considered
satisfactory, and we were bundled back to Astley’s and given another
chance as monks.
Now Mr. Lee played “Fair Rosamond’s” father, and he had a fine tragic
scene of which he made the most, especially in his death scene, where
he was supposed to be shot through the heart by an arrow on the
battlefield. Having a number of trained horses on the establishment it
was not to be supposed a chance of producing a realistic effect would
be lost sight of, so a whole batch of “gees” were brought on the stage
and represented the dead and dying.
Our duty as monks was to pick up the body of Rosamond’s father, place
it on a bier and carry the latter round the battlefield among the
defunct quadrupeds. We were longing to get our own back on Lee, and
one night as we were doing the usual mournful promenade to slow music
one of the horses started kicking. Mr. Lee suspected the monks were at
the bottom of the “certain liveliness,” and I’m afraid he wasn’t far
wrong.
But this was only the preliminary to our plot. Before the next
performance one of the handles attached to the bier was half sawn
through, and it only wanted a little jerk to bring about a catastrophe.
Sure enough that catastrophe arrived. Down fell the body; the audience
yelled with delight and shouted for him to die again, much to Mr. Lee’s
disgust, because he knew full well that it was not his fine acting
they wanted to see, but merely the collapse of the corpse. Another row
with the stage manager followed, with the result that the monks were
unfrocked and not allowed again to figure in “Fair Rosamond.”
I was then tried as a Lancashire soldier in Richard III. I had to
fight the King, who of course was mounted on “White Surrey.” The horse
that played the part was a very vicious brute, and when I saw him put
his ears back and show his teeth I made sure he was going for me. I
retreated, and backing a little too much, fell over the footlights
on to a fiddler. That did it. I was fished out of the orchestra a
very discomfited warrior, and this was the end of my acting career at
Astley’s.
My connection with Astley’s abruptly terminating (I never appeared
there again) I joined Adams’ Circus, well-known in those days in the
various towns of Yorkshire. Off and on I was a member of Adams’
Company for a considerable time, and strictly speaking, the episodes I
am about to relate did not take place until some years after my first
engagement, but as I shall not have occasion to refer to Adams again, I
insert them here.
We were at Leeds, the circus being stationed in Cudbright Street.
Charles Peace had just been condemned, and Armley gaol, to which he had
been consigned after his trial, being just outside Leeds, nothing else
but the murderer and his extraordinary career was being talked about.
On this particular night Mr. Adams and I, after the performance, looked
in at one of the hotels, and while we were there a gentleman sitting
close by recognised Mr. Adams, and said he:
“I saw your show to-night and I knew you again. You were riding that
beautiful Arab.”
Mr. Adams said that was so, and the stranger went on:
“Who was that funny cuss who had some fits and performed on the high
stilts?”
Mr. Adams, pointing to me, said that I was the individual.
“I’m very pleased,” was the rejoinder; “You made me laugh.”
He handed me his card, which I didn’t bother about, as cards were
often forced upon me, but thrust it into my pocket. That night I stuck
it with others on the mantelpiece in my room and went to bed. In the
morning I looked at the card, and something like a shudder went over me
when my eyes fell on the inscription “Marwood, Executioner.” That very
morning he executed Peace. It may sound absurd, but I could not eat
any breakfast, nor could I get the man out of my mind for weeks, for I
had shaken hands with him!
By way of contrast to this gruesome memory I recall an odd incident
which happened when Adams’ Circus was at Bradford. The circus stood on
the ground where is now the Midland Station, and I lived up the hill
and every night had to pass the “Ring of Bells,” where open house was
kept, and where I was a welcome visitor. One night I looked in while a
fearful row was going on between the landlord and a customer, a tailor.
The row was terminated in summary fashion by the landlord kicking the
tailor out of the house. The tailor retaliated by obtaining a summons
for assault, and I found myself subpœnaed as a witness.
While we were waiting for the case to come off, and the time hanging
heavy on our hands, plaintiff, defendant and witness went to the
nearest hostelry. I became an object of special interest to both sides,
and they stood treat very liberally. The result was that when we got
back to the court and the case was called I was feeling unusually fit.
What happened was something like this. After the parties told their
stories, which of course represented the affair in totally different
lights, I was told to stand in front of the magistrate, which I did.
“What have you got to say about this case?” asked his worship.
“Nothing,” said I.
“Well, what are you doing here then?”
“I don’t know,” was all I could think of saying.
Case dismissed!
But the witness hadn’t finished distinguishing himself. As I was
leaving the court I was passing a form on which two or three
policemen were sitting. I needn’t say that I fell over this form and
that the policemen fell with me. But nothing came of it--they knew who
I was.
By the way, it may be of interest at the present time to note that
those were days of amazing prosperity among the coal miners. Champagne
was such a common drink that at Barnsley it was known as “colliers’
pop.” It was at Barnsley that I was invited to go down a coal mine.
With my usual want of thought it never occurred to me that about the
last costume one would select for such a visit was a light summer suit
and hat to match. I needn’t say that when I reappeared after my ramble
down among the coals I looked fit to go to a funeral.
[Illustration: The best friend I ever had in the Theatrical Profession]