Terriss, casting down his eyes.
"Now no hanky-panky tricks, Terriss."
"Tricks, Guv'nor! I think you'll regret having said that when you hear
that my poor mother passed away early this morning."
And Terriss wept.
Henry promptly gave him the day off. A few weeks later, when Terriss and
I were looking through the curtain at the audience just before the play
began, he said to me gaily:
"See that dear old woman sitting in the fourth row of stalls--that's my
dear old mother."
The wretch had quite forgotten that he had killed her!
He was the only person who ever ventured to "cheek" Henry, yet he never
gave offense, not even when he wrote a letter of this kind:
"My dear Guv.,--
"I hope you are enjoying yourself, and in the best of health. I very
much want to play 'Othello' with you next year (don't laugh). Shall I
study it up, and will you do it with me on tour if possible? Say _yes_,
and lighten the drooping heart of yours sincerely,
"WILL TERRISS."
I have never seen any one at all like Terriss, and my father said the
same. The only actor of my father's day, he used to tell me, who had a
touch of the same insouciance and lawlessness was Leigh Murray, a famous
_jeune premier_.
One night he came into the theater soaked from head to foot.
"Is it raining, Terriss?" said some one who noticed that he was wet.
"Looks like it, doesn't it?" said Terriss carelessly.
Later it came out that he had jumped off a penny steamboat into the
Thames and saved a little girl's life. It was pretty brave, I think.
Mr. Pinero, who was no longer a member of the Lyceum company when "Much
Ado" was produced, wrote to Henry after the first night that it was "as
perfect a representation of a Shakespearean play as I conceive to be
possible. I think," he added, "that the work at your theater does so
much to create new playgoers--which is what we want, far more I fancy
than we want new theaters and perhaps new plays."
A playgoer whose knowledge of the English stage extended over a period
of fifty-five years, wrote another nice letter about "Much Ado" which
was passed on to me because it had some ridiculously nice things about
me in it.
SAVILE CLUB,
_January 13, 1883._
"My dear Henry,--
"I were an imbecile ingrate if I did not hasten to give you my warmest
thanks for the splendid entertainment of last night. Such a performance
is not a grand entertainment merely, or a glorious pastime, although it
was all that. It was, too, an artistic display of the highest character,
elevating in the vast audience their art instinct--as well as purifying
any developed art in the possession of individuals.
"I saw the Kean revivals of 1855-57, and I suppose 'The Winter's Tale'
was the best of the lot. But it did not approach last night....
"I was impressed more strongly than ever with the fact that the plays of
Shakespeare were meant to be _acted_. The man who thinks that he can
know Shakespeare by reading him is a shallow ass. The best critic and
scholar would have been carried out of himself last night into the
poet's heart, his mind-spirit.... The Terry was glorious.... The scenes
in which she appeared--and she was in eight out of the sixteen--reminded
me of nothing but the blessed sun that not only beautifies but creates.
But she never acts so well as when I am there to see! That is a real
lover's sentiment, and all lovers are vain men.
"Terriss has 'come on' wonderfully, and his Don Pedro is princely and
manful.
"I have thus set down, my dear Irving, one or two things merely to show
that my gratitude to you is not that of a blind gratified idiot, but of
one whose intimate personal knowledge of the English stage entitles him
to say what he owes to you."
"I am
"Affectionately yours,
"A.J. DUFFIELD."
In 1891, when we revived "Much Ado," Henry's Benedick was far more
brilliant than it was at first. In my diary, January 5, 1891, I wrote:
"Revival of 'Much Ado about Nothing.' Went most brilliantly. Henry
has vastly improved upon his _old_ rendering of Benedick. Acts
larger now--not so 'finicking.' His model (of manner) is the Duke
of Sutherland. VERY good. I did some parts better, I think--made
Beatrice a nobler woman. Yet I failed to please myself in the
Cathedral Scene."
_Two days later._--"Played the Church Scene all right at last. More
of a _blaze_. The little scene in the garden, too, I did better (in
the last act). Beatrice has _confessed_ her love, and is now
_softer_. Her voice should be beautiful now, breaking out into
playful defiance now and again, as of old. The last scene, too, I
made much more merry, happy, _soft_."
_January 8._--"I must make Beatrice more _flashing_ at first, and
_softer_ afterwards. This will be an improvement upon my old
reading of the part. She must be always _merry_ and by turns
scornful, tormenting, vexed, self-communing, absent, melting,
teasing, brilliant, indignant, _sad-merry_, thoughtful, withering,
gentle, humorous, and gay, Gay, _Gay_! Protecting (to Hero),
motherly, very intellectual--a gallant creature and complete in
mind and feature."
After a run of two hundred and fifty nights, "Much Ado," although it was
still drawing fine houses, was withdrawn as we were going to America in
the autumn (of 1883) and Henry wanted to rehearse the plays that we were
to do in the States by reviving them in London at the close of the
summer season. It was during these revivals that I played Janette in "The
Lyons Mail"--not a big part, and not well suited to me, but I played it
well enough to support my theory that whatever I have _not_ been, I
_have_ been a useful actress.
I always associate "The Lyons Mail" with old Mead, whose performance of
the father, Jerome Lesurques, was one of the most impressive things
that this fine actor ever did with us. (Before Henry was ever heard of,
Mead had played Hamlet at Drury Lane!) Indeed when he "broke up," Henry
put aside "The Lyons Mail" for many years because he dreaded playing
Lesurques' scene with his father without Mead.
In the days just before the break-up, which came about because Mead was
old, and--I hope there is no harm in saying of him what can be said of
many men who have done finely in the world--too fond of "the wine when
it is red," Henry use to suffer great anxiety in the scene, because he
never knew what Mead was going to do or say next. When Jerome Lesurques
is forced to suspect his son of crime, he has a line:
"Am I mad, or dreaming? Would I were."
Mead one night gave a less poetic reading:
"Am I mad or _drunk_? Would I were!"
It will be remembered by those who saw the play that Lesurques, an
innocent man, will not commit the Roman suicide of honor at his father's
bidding, and refuses to take up his pistol from the table. "What! you
refuse to die by your own hands, do you?" says the elder Lesurques.
"Then die like a dog by mine!" (producing a pistol from his pocket).
One night, after having delivered the line with his usual force and
impressiveness, Mead, after prolonged fumbling in his coat-tail pockets,
added another:
"D---, b----! God bless my soul! Where's the pistol? I haven't got the
pistol!"
The last scene in the eventful history of "Meadisms" in "'The Lyons
Mail" was when Mead came on to the stage in his own top-hat, went over
to the sofa, and lay down, apparently for a nap! Not a word could Henry
get from him, and Henry had to play the scene by himself. He did it in
this way:
"You say, father, that I," etc. "I answer you that it is false!"
Mead had a remarkable _foot_. Norman Forbes called it an _architectural_
foot. Bunions and gout combined to give it a gargoyled effect! One
night, I forget whether it was in this play or another, Henry, pawing
the ground with his foot before an "exit"--one of the mannerisms which
his imitators delighted to burlesque--came down on poor old Mead's foot,
bunion gargoyles and all! Hardly had Mead stopped cursing under his
breath than on came Tyars, and brought down _his_ weight heavily on the
same foot. Directly Tyars came off the stage he looked for Mead in the
wings and offered an apology.
"I beg your pardon--I'm really awfully sorry, Mead."
"Sorry! sorry!" the old man snorted. "It's a d----d conspiracy!"
It was the dignity and gravity of Mead which made everything he said so
funny. I am afraid that those who never knew him will wonder where the
joke comes in.
I forget what year he left us for good, but in a letter of Henry's dated
September, 1888, written during a provincial tour of "Faust," when I was
ill and my sister Marion played Margaret instead of me, I find this
allusion to him:
"Wenman does the Kitchen Witch now (I altered it this morning) and Mead
the old one--the climber. Poor old chap, he'll not climb much longer!"
This was one of the least successful of Henry's Shakespearean
productions. Terriss looked all wrong as Orsino; many other people were
miscast. Henry said to me a few years later when he thought of doing
"The Tempest," "I can't do it without three great comedians. I ought
never to have attempted 'Twelfth Night' without them."
I don't think that I played Viola nearly as well as my sister Kate. Her
"I am the man" was very delicate and charming. I overdid that. My
daughter says: "Well, you were far better than any Viola that I have
seen since, but you were too simple to make a great hit in it. I think
that if you had played Rosalind the public would have thought you too
simple in that. Somehow people expect these parts to be acted in a
'principal boy' fashion, with sparkle and animation."
We had the curious experience of being "booed" on the first night. It
was not a comedy audience, and I think the rollickings of Toby Belch and
his fellows were thought "low." Then people were put out by Henry's
attempt to reserve the pit. He thought that the public wanted it. When
he found that it was against their wishes he immediately gave in. His
pride was the service of the public.
His speech after the hostile reception of "Twelfth Night" was the only
mistake that I ever knew him make. He was furious, and showed it.
Instead of accepting the verdict, he trounced the first-night audience
for giving it. He simply could not understand it!
My old friend Rose Leclercq, who was in Charles Kean's company at the
Princess's when I made my first appearance upon the stage, joined the
Lyceum company to play Olivia. Strangely enough she had lost the touch
for the kind of part. She, who had made one of her early successes as
the spirit of Astarte in "Manfred," was known to a later generation of
playgoers as the aristocratic dowager of stately presence and incisive
repartee. Her son, Fuller Mellish, was also in the cast as Curio, and
when we played "Twelfth Night" in America was promoted to the part of
Sebastian, my double. In London my brother Fred played it. Directly he
walked on to the stage, looking as like me as possible, yet a _man_ all
over, he was a success. I don't think that I have ever seen anything so
unmistakable and instantaneous.
In America "Twelfth Night" was liked far better than in London, but I
never liked it. I thought our production dull, lumpy and heavy. Henry's
Malvolio was fine and dignified, but not good for the play, and I never
could help associating my Viola with physical pain. On the first night I
had a bad thumb--I thought it was a whitlow--and had to carry my arm in
a sling. It grew worse every night, and I felt so sick and faint from
pain that I played most of my scenes sitting in a chair. One night Dr.
Stoker, Bram Stoker's brother, came round between the scenes, and, after
looking at my thumb, said:
"Oh, that'll be all right. I'll cut it for you."
He lanced it then and there, and I went on with my part for _that_
night. George Stoker, who was just going off to Ireland, could not see
the job through, but the next day I was in for the worst illness I ever
had in my life. It was blood-poisoning, and the doctors were in doubt
for a little as to whether they would not have to amputate my arm. They
said that if George Stoker had not lanced the thumb that minute, I
_should_ have lost my arm.
A disagreeable incident in connection with my illness was that a member
of my profession made it the occasion of an unkind allusion (in a speech
at the Social Science Congress) to "actresses who feign illness and have
straw laid down before their houses, while behind the drawn blinds they
are having riotous supper-parties, dancing the can-can and drinking
champagne." Upon being asked for "name," the speaker would neither
assert nor deny that it was Ellen Terry (whose poor arm at the time was
as big as her waist, and _that_ has never been very small!) that she
meant.
I think we first heard of the affair on our second voyage to America,
during which I was still so ill that they thought I might never see
Quebec, and Henry wrote a letter to the press--a "scorcher." He showed
it to me on the boat. When I had read it, I tore it up and threw the
bits into the sea.
"It hasn't injured me in any way," I said. "Any answer would be
undignified."
Henry did what I wished in the matter, but, unlike me, whose heart I am
afraid is of wax--no impression lasts long--he never forgot it, and
never forgave. If the speech-maker chanced to come into a room where he
was--he walked out. He showed the same spirit in the last days of his
life, long after our partnership had come to an end. A literary club,
not a hundred yards from Hyde Park Corner, "blackballed"' me (although I
was qualified for election under the rules) for reasons with which I was
never favored. The committee, a few months later, wished Henry Irving to
be the guest of honor at one of the club dinners. The honor was
declined.
The first night of "Olivia" at the Lyceum was about the only
_comfortable_ first night that I have ever had! I was familiar with the
part, and two of the cast, Terriss and Norman Forbes, were the same as
at the Court, which made me feel all the more at home. Henry left a
great deal of the stage-management to us, for he knew that he could not
improve on Mr. Hare's production. Only he insisted on altering the last
act, and made a bad matter worse. The division into two scenes wasted
time, and nothing was gained by it. _Never_ obstinate, Henry saw his
mistake and restored the original end after a time. It was weak and
unsatisfactory but not pretentious and bad like the last act he
presented at the first performance.
We took the play too slowly at the Lyceum. That was often a fault there.
Because Henry was slow, the others took their time from him, and the
result was bad.
The lovely scene of the vicarage parlor, in which we used a harpsichord
and were accused of pedantry for our pains, did not look so well at the
Lyceum as at the Court. The stage was too big for it.
The critics said that I played Olivia better at the Lyceum, but I did
not feel this myself.
At first Henry did not rehearse the Vicar at all well. One day when he
was stamping his foot very much, as if he was Matthias in "The Bells,"
my little Edy, who was a terrible child _and_ a wonderful critic, said:
"Don't go on like that, Henry. Why don't you talk as you do to me and
Teddy? At home you _are_ the Vicar."
The child's frankness did not offend Henry, because it was illuminating.
A blind man had changed his Shylock; a little child changed his Vicar.
When the first night came he gave a simple, lovable performance. Many
people now understood and liked him as they had never done before. One
of the things I most admired in it was his sense of the period.
In this, as in other plays, he used to make his entrance in the _skin_
of the part. No need for him to rattle a ladder at the side to get up
excitement and illusion as Macready is said to have done. He walked on,
and was the simple-minded old clergyman, just as he had walked on a
prince in "Hamlet," a king in "Charles I.," and a saint in "Becket."
A very handsome woman, descended from Mrs. Siddons and looking exactly
like her, played the gipsy in "Olivia." The likeness was of no use,
because the possessor of it had no talent. What a pity!
"Olivia" has always been a family play. Edy and Ted walked on the stage
for the first time in the Court "Olivia." In later years Ted played
Moses and Edy made her first appearance in a speaking part as Polly
Flamborough, and has since played both Sophia and the Gipsy. My brother
Charlie's little girl Beatrice made her first appearance as Bill, my
sister Floss played Olivia on a provincial tour, and my sister Marion
played it at the Lyceum when I was ill.
I saw Floss play it, and took from her a lovely and sincere bit of
"business." In the third act, where the Vicar has found his erring
daughter and has come to take her away from the inn, I had always
hesitated at my entrance as if I were not quite sure what reception my
father would give me after what had happened. Floss in the same
situation came running in and went straight to her father, quite sure
of his love if not of his forgiveness.
I did _not_ take some business which Marion did on Terriss's suggestion.
Where Thornhill tells Olivia that she is not his wife, I used to thrust
him away with both hands as I said--"Devil!"
"It's very good, Nell, very fine," said Terriss to me, "but believe me,
you miss a great effect there. You play it grandly, of course, but at
that moment you miss it. As you say 'Devil!' you ought to strike me full
in the face."
"Oh, don't be silly, Terriss," I said, "she's not a pugilist."
Of course I saw, apart from what was dramatically fit, what would
happen.
However Marion, very young, very earnest, very dutiful, anxious to
please Terriss, listened eagerly to the suggestion during an understudy
rehearsal.
"No one could play this part better than your sister Nell," said Terriss
to the attentive Marion, "but as I always tell her, she does miss one
great effect. When Olivia says 'Devil!' she ought to hit me bang in the
face."
"Thank you for telling me," said Marion gratefully.
"It will be much more effective," said Terriss.
It was. When the night came for Marion to play the part, she struck out,
and Terriss had to play the rest of the scene with a handkerchief held
to his bleeding nose!
I think it was as Olivia that Eleonora Duse first saw me act. She had
thought of playing the part herself some time, but she said: "_Never_
now!" No letter about my acting ever gave me the same pleasure as this
from her:
"Madame,--Avec Olivia vous m'avez donnŽ bonheur et peine. _Bonheur_ part
votre art qui est noble et sincre ... _peine_ car je sens la tristesse
au coeur quand je vois une belle et gŽnŽreuse nature de femme, donner
son ‰me ˆ l'art--comme vous le faites--quand c'est la vie mme, _votre_
coeur mme qui parle tendrement, douleureusement, noblement _sous_ votre
jeu. Je ne puis me dŽbarrasser d'une certaine tristesse quand je vois
des artistes si nobles et hauts tels que vous et Irving.... Si vous tes
si forts de soumettre (avec un travail continu) la vie ˆ l'art, il faut
done vous admirer comme des forces de la nature mme qui auraient
pourtant le droit de vivre pour elles-mmes et non pour la foule. Je
n'ose pas vous dŽranger, Madame, et d'ailleurs j'ai tant ˆ faire aussi
qu'il m'est impossible de vous dire de vive voix tout le grand plaisir
que vous m'avez donnŽ, mais puisque j'ai senti votre coeur, veuillez,
chre Madame, croire au mien qui ne demande pas mieux dans cet instant
que de vous admirer et de vous le dire tant bien que mal d'une manire
quelconque. Bien ˆ vous.
"E. DUSE."
When I wrote to Madame Duse the other day to ask her permission to
publish this much-prized letter, she answered:
BUENOS AYRES,
_Septembre 11, 1907._
"Chre Ellen Terry,--
"Au milieu du travail en AmŽrique, je reois votre lettre envoyŽe ˆ
Florence.
"Vous me demandez de publier mon ancienne lettre amicale. Oui, chre
Ellen Terry; ce que j'ai donnŽ vous appartient; ce que j'ai dit, je le
peux encore, et je vous aime et admire comme toujours....
"J'espre que vous accepterez cette ancienne lettre que j'ai rendue plus
claire et un peu mieux Žcrite. Vous en serez contente avec moi car,
ainsi faisant, j'ai eu le moyen de vous dire que je vous aime et de vous
le dire deux fois.
"A vous de coeur,
"E. DUSE."
Dear, noble Eleanora Duse, great woman, great artist--I can never
appreciate you in words, but I store the delight that you have given me
by your work, and the personal kindness that you have shown me, in the
treasure-house of my heart!
When I celebrated my stage jubilee you traveled all the way from Italy
to support me on the stage at Drury Lane. When you stood near me,
looking so beautiful with wings in your hair, the wings of glory they
seemed to me, I could not thank you, but we kissed each other and you
understood!
"Clap-trap" was the verdict passed by many on the Lyceum "Faust," yet
Margaret was the part I liked better than any other--outside
Shakespeare. I played it beautifully sometimes. The language was often
very commonplace--not nearly as poetic or dramatic as that of "Charles
I."--but the character was all right--simple, touching, sublime.
The Garden Scene I know was unsatisfactory. It was a bad, weak
love-scene, but George Alexander as Faust played it admirably. Indeed he
always acted like an angel with me; he was so malleable, ready to do
anything. He was launched into the part at very short notice, after H.B.
Conway's failure on the first night. Poor Conway! It was Coghlan as
Shylock all over again.
Henry called a rehearsal the next day--on Sunday, I think. The company
stood about in groups on the stage while Henry walked up and down,
speechless, but humming a tune occasionally, always a portentous sign
with him. The scene set was the Brocken Scene, and Conway stood at the
top of the slope as far away from Henry as he could get! He looked
abject. His handsome face was very red, his eyes full of tears. He was
terrified at the thought of what was going to happen. The actor was
summoned to the office, and presently Loveday came out and said that Mr.
George Alexander would play Faust the following night. Alec had been
wonderful as Valentine the night before, and as Faust he more than
justified Henry's belief in him. After that he never looked back. He had
come to the Lyceum for the first time in 1882, an unknown quantity from
a stock company in Glasgow, to play Caleb Decie in "The Two Roses." He
then left us for a time, returned for "Faust," and remained in the
Lyceum company for some years playing all Terriss's parts.
Alexander had the romantic quality which was lacking in Terriss, but
there was a kind of shy modesty about him which handicapped him when he
played Squire Thornhill in "Olivia." "Be more dashing, Alec!" I used to
say to him. "Well, I do my best," he said. "At the hotels I chuck all
the barmaids under the chin, and pretend I'm a dog of a fellow for the
sake of this part!" Conscientious, dear, delightful Alec! No one ever
deserved success more than he did and used it better when it came, as
the history of the St. James's Theater under his management proves. He
had the good luck to marry a wife who was clever as well as charming,
and could help him.
The original cast of "Faust" was never improved upon. What Martha was
ever so good as Mrs. Stirling? The dear old lady's sight had failed
since "Romeo and Juliet," but she was very clever at concealing it. When
she let Mephistopheles in at the door, she used to drop her work on the
floor so that she could find her way back to her chair. I never knew why
she dropped it--she used to do it so naturally with a start when
Mephistopheles knocked at the door--until one night when it was in my
way and I picked it up, to the confusion of poor Mrs. Stirling, who
nearly walked into the orchestra.
"Faust" was abused a good deal as a pantomime, a distorted caricature of
Goethe, and a thoroughly inartistic production. But it proved the
greatest of all Henry's financial successes. The Germans who came to see
it, oddly enough, did not scorn it nearly as much as the English who
were sensitive on behalf of the Germans, and the Goethe Society wrote a
tribute to Henry Irving after his death, acknowledging his services to
Goethe!
It is a curious paradox in the theater that the play for which every one
has a good word is often the play which no one is going to see, while
the play which is apparently disliked and run down is crowded every
night.