Charles Frohman: Manager and Man Part 36

Frohman's constantly widening activities in London made it necessary for him to have more s.p.a.cious quarters. The story of his offices really tells the story of his work, for they increased in scope as his operations widened. When he leased the Aldwych Theater he set up his headquarters there. With the acquisition of the Globe he needed more room, and this theater became the seat of his managerial operations. In 1913, and with characteristic lavishness, he engaged what is perhaps the finest suite of theatrical offices in London. They were in a marble structure known as Trafalgar House, in Waterloo Place, one of the choicest and most expensive locations in the city.

Here he had a suite of six rooms. Like the man himself, his own personal quarters were very simple. There was a long, high-ceiled room, with a roll-top desk, which was never used, at one end, and a low morris-chair at the other. From this morris-chair and from his rooms at the Savoy Hotel he ruled his English realm.

Charles's love for his stars never lagged, and wherever it was possible for him to surround himself with their pictures he did so. As a result, the visitor to his London rooms found him surrounded by the familiar faces of Maude Adams, Ethel Barrymore, Ann Murdock, Marie Doro, Julia Sanderson, William Gillette, and John Drew. On the roll-top desk, side by side, were the pictures of his two _Peter Pans_, Miss Adams and Pauline Chase.

Charles's last London production, strangely enough, consisted of two plays by his closest friend, Barrie. This double bill was "The New Word," a fireside scene, which was followed by "Rosy Rapture."

By a strange coincidence his first English venture was a failure, and so was his last. Yet the long and brilliant journey between these two dates was a highway that any man might have trod with pride. The English-speaking drama received an impetus and a standard that it never would have had without his unflagging zeal and his generous purse. He left an influence upon the English stage that will last.

What endeared him perhaps more than anything else to England was the smiling serenity with which he met criticism and loss. There may have been times when the English resented his desire for monopoly, but they forgot it in tremendous admiration for his courage and his resource. He revolutionized the economics of the British stage; he invested it with life, energy, action; he established a whole new relation between author and producer. Here, as in America, he was the pioneer and the builder.

XII

BARRIE AND THE ENGLISH FRIENDs.h.i.+PS

The fortunes of Charles Frohman's English productions ebbed and flowed; actors and actresses came and went; to him it was all part of a big and fascinating game. What really counted and became permanent were the man's friends.h.i.+ps, often made in the theatrical world of make-believe, but always cemented in the domain of very sincere reality. In England were some of his dearest personal bonds.

They grew out of the fact that Charles had the rare genius of inspiring loyal friends.h.i.+p. He gave much and he got much. Yet, like Stevenson, it was a case of "a few friends, but these without capitulation."

In England he seemed to be a different human being. The inaccessibility that hedged him about in America vanished. He emerged from his unsocial sh.e.l.l; he gave out interviews; he relaxed and renewed his youth in jaunt and jest. His annual trip abroad, therefore, was like a joyous adventure. It mattered little if he made or lost a fortune each time.

Frohman was happy in London. He liked the soft, gray tones of the somber city. "It's so restful," he always said. Even the "bobbie" delighted him. He would watch the stolid policeman from the curb and say, admiringly: "He is wonderful; he raises his hand and all London stops."

He was greatly interested in the traffic regulations.

Although he had elaborate offices, his real London headquarters were in the Savoy Hotel. Here, in the same suite that he had year after year, and where he was known to all employees from manager to page, he literally sat enthroned, for his favorite fas.h.i.+on was to curl up on a settee with his feet doubled under him. More than one visitor who saw him thus ensconced called him a "beaming Buddha."

From his informal eminence he ruled his world. Around him a.s.sembled the Knights of the Dramatic Round Table. Wherever Frohman sat became the unofficial capitol of a large part of the English-speaking stage. In those Savoy rooms there was made much significant theatrical history. To the little American came Barrie, Pinero, Chambers, Jones, Sutro, Maugham, Morton, with their plays; Alexander, Tree, Maude, Hicks, Barker, Bouchier, with their projects.

Like Charles Lamb, Frohman loved to ramble about London. Often he would stop in the midst of his work, hail a taxi, and go for a drive in the green parks. The Zoological Gardens always delighted him. He frequently stopped to watch the animals. The English countryside always lured him, especially the long green hedges, which held a peculiar fascination. He walked considerably in the country and in town, and he took great delight in peering in shop windows.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _JAMES M. BARRIE_]

In London, as in New York, the theater was his life and inspiration.

Almost without exception he went to a performance of some kind every evening. At most of the London theaters he was always given the royal box whenever possible. He liked the atmosphere of the British playhouse. He always said it was more like a drawing-room than a place of amus.e.m.e.nt.

To Charles, London meant J. M. Barrie, and to be with the man who wrote "Peter Pan" was one of his supreme delights. The devotion between these two men of such widely differing temperaments const.i.tutes one of the really great friends.h.i.+ps of modern times. Character of an unusual kind, on both sides, was essential to such a communion of interest and affection. Both possessed it to a remarkable degree.

No two people could have been more opposite. Frohman was quick, nervous, impulsive, bubbling with optimism; Barrie was the quiet, canny Scot, reserved, repressed, and elusive. Yet they had two great traits in common--shyness and humor. As Barrie says:

"Because we were the two shyest men in the world, we got on so well and understood each other so perfectly."

There was another bond between these two men in the fact that each adored his mother. In Charles's case he was the pride and the joy of the maternal heart; with Barrie the root and inspiration of all his life and work was the revered "Margaret Ogilvy." He is the only man in all the world who ever wrote a life of his mother.

There was still another and more tangible community of interest between these two remarkable men. Each detested the silk hat. Frohman had never worn one since the Haverly Minstrel days, when he had to don the tile for the daily street parade. Barrie, in all his life, has had only one silk hat. It is of the vintage of the early 'seventies. The only occasion when he wears the much-detested headgear is at the first rehearsal of the companies that do his plays. Then he attires himself in morning clothes, goes to the theater, nervously holds the hat in his hand while he is introduced to the actors and actresses. Just as Charles used to hide his silk hat as soon as the minstrel parade was over and put on a cap, so does Barrie send the objectionable headgear home as soon as these formalities are over and welcome his more comfortable bowler as an old friend.

Curiously enough, Frohman and Barrie did not drift together at once.

When the little Scotchman made his first visit to America in 1896 and "discovered" Maude Adams as the inspired person to act _Lady Babbie_, he met the man who was to be his great friend in a casual business way only. The negotiations for "The Little Minister" from England were conducted through an agent.

But when Frohman went abroad the following year the kins.h.i.+p between the men started, and continued with increasing intimacy. The men became great pals. They would wander about London, Barrie smoking a short, black pipe, Frohman swinging his stick. On many of these strolls they walked for hours without saying a word to each other. Each had the great gift of silence--the rare sense of understanding.

Barrie and his pipe are inseparable, as the world knows. There is a legend in London theatrical lore that Frohman wanted to drive to Barrie's flat one night. He was in his usual merry mood, so the instruction he gave was this:

"Drive to the Strand, go down to Adelphi Terrace, and stop at the first smell of pipe smoke."

Frohman never tired of asking Barrie about "Peter Pan." It was a curious commentary on the man's tenacity of interest and purpose that, although he made nearly seven hundred productions in his life, the play of the "Boy Who Would Never Grow Up" tugged most at his heart. Nor did Barrie ever weary of telling him how the play began as a nursery tale for children; how their insistent demand to "tell us more" made it the "longest story in the world"; how, when one pirate had been killed, little Peter (the original of the character, now a soldier in the great war) excitedly said: "One man isn't enough; let's kill a lot of them."

No one will be surprised to know that in connection with "Peter Pan" is one of the most sweetly gracious acts in Frohman's life. The original of _Peter_ was sick in bed at his home when the play was produced in London. The little lad was heartsick because he could not see it. When Frohman came to London Barrie told him about it.

"If the boy can't come to the play, we will take the play to the boy,"

he said.

Frohman sent his company out to the boy's home with as many "props" as could be jammed into the sick-room. While the delighted and excited child sat propped up in bed the wonders of the fairy play were unfolded before him. It is probably the only instance where a play was done before a child in his home.

As most people know, Barrie, at his own expense, erected a statue of _Peter Pan_ in Kensington Gardens as his gift to the children of London who so adored his play. It was done as a surprise, for the statue stood revealed one May Day morning, having been set up during the night.

When he planned this statue Barrie mentioned it casually to Frohman, and said nothing more about it. Frohman never visited the park to see it, but when the model was put on exhibition at the Academy he said to Lestocq one day:

"Where is that _Peter Pan_ model?" When he was told he said: "I want to see it, but do I have to look at anything else in the gallery?" On being a.s.sured that he did not, he said, "All right."

Frohman went to the Academy, bolted straight for the sculpture-room, and stood for a quarter of an hour gazing intently at the graceful figure of _Peter_ playing his pipe. Then he walked out again, without stopping to look at any of the lovely things about him. It was characteristic of Frohman to do just the thing he had in mind to do and nothing else.

Frohman and Barrie seldom wrote to each other. When they did it was a mere scrawl that no other human being in the world could read. The only cablegram that Barrie ever sent Frohman was about "What Every Woman Knows." Hilda Trevelyan played _Maggie Wylie_. Barrie liked her work so much that he cabled Frohman about it on the opening night. When the actress went down to breakfast the next morning to read what the newspapers said about her she found on her plate a cable from Frohman doubling her salary. It was Frohman's answer to Barrie.

Frohman's faith in Barrie was marvelous. It was often said in jest in London that if Barrie had asked Frohman to produce a dramatization of the Telephone Directory he would smile and say with enthusiasm:

"Fine! Who shall we have in the cast?"

One of the great Frohman-Barrie adventures was in Paris. It ill.u.s.trates so completely the relation between these men that it is worth giving in detail.

Frohman was in Paris, and after much telegraphic insistence persuaded his friend to come over on his first visit to the French capital.

Frohman was aglow with antic.i.p.ation. He wanted to give Barrie the time of his life.

"What would a literary man like to do in Paris?" was the question he asked himself.

In his usual generous way he planned the first night, for Barrie was to arrive in the afternoon. He was then living at the Hotel Meurice, in the Rue Royale, so he engaged a magnificent suite for his guest. He ordered a sumptuous dinner at the Cafe de Paris, bought a box at the Theatre Francais, and engaged a smart victoria for the evening.

Barrie was dazed at the splendor of the Meurice suite, but he survived it. When Frohman spoke of the Cafe de Paris dinner he said he would rather dine quietly at the hotel, so the elaborate meal was given up.

"Now what would you like to do this evening?" asked his host.

"Are there any of those country fairs around here, where they have side shows and you can throw b.a.l.l.s at things?" asked Barrie.