Charles Frohman: Manager and Man Part 48

His terse summing up of scenes and facts was never better ill.u.s.trated than when he compressed the instructions of a whole sentimental act into this simple sentence to E. H. Sothern:

"Court--kiss--curtain."

In one detail he differed from all the other great producers of his time. Most managers liked to nurse a play after its production and build it up with new scenes or varied changes. With Frohman it was different.

"I am interested in a production until it has been made, and then I don't care for it any more," he said. This is generally true, although some of his productions he could never see often enough.

Frohman's perception about a play was little short of uncanny. An incident that happened during the rehearsal of the Maude Adams all-star revival of "Romeo and Juliet" will ill.u.s.trate. James K. Hackett was cast for _Mercutio_. He had worked for a month on the Queen Mab speech. He had elaborated and polished it, and thought he had it letter and tone perfect.

Frohman sat down near the front and listened with rapt attention while this fine actor declaimed the speech. When he finished Charles said, in his jerky, epigrammatic way:

"Hackett, that's fine, but just in there somewhere--you know what I mean."

As a matter of fact, Hackett, with all his elaborate preparation, had slipped up on one line, and it was a very essential one. Frohman had never read "Romeo and Juliet" until he cast this production, yet he caught the omission with his extraordinary intuition.

Charles was the most indefatigable of workers. At one time, on arriving in Boston at midnight, he had to stage a new act of "Peter Pan." He worked over it with carpenters, actors, and electricians until three in the morning. Then he made an appointment with the acting manager to take a walk on the Common "in the morning."

The manager took "in the morning" to mean nine o'clock. When he reached the hotel Frohman was just returning from his walk, and handed the man a bunch of cables to send, telegrams to acknowledge, and memoranda of information desired. At ten o'clock Frohman was conducting the rehearsal of a new comedy by Haddon Chambers, which he finished at four. At five he was on a train speeding back to New York, where he probably read ma.n.u.scripts of plays until two in the morning. This was one of the typical "C. F." days.

Occasionally a single detail would fascinate him in a play. "The Waltz Dream" that he did at the Hicks Theater in London in 1908 was typical.

Miss Gertie Millar, who sang the leading part, had an important song.

Frohman did not like the way she sang it, so he worked on it for two weeks until it reached the perfection of expression that he desired. But that song made the play and became the most-talked-of feature in it.

This led him to say:

"I am willing to give as much time to a single song as to the rehearsal of a whole play."

Frohman had a phrase that he often used with his actors and directors.

It was:

"Never get a 'falling curtain.'"

By this he meant a curtain that did not leave interest or emotion subdued or declining. He wanted the full sweep of rage, terror, pity, suspense, or anger alive with the end of the act.

He always said, "A man who sees a play must feel that he is in the presence of an act." It was his way of putting forth the idea that any acted effort, no matter how humble, must have the ring of sincerity and conviction.

Charles had an almost weird instinct for what was right on the stage.

Once at rehearsals he pointed to a heavy candelabrum that stood on a table.

"I want that thing on the mantelpiece," he said.

"You mean the candelabrum?" asked one of his a.s.sistants.

"I don't know what it is, but I know that it belongs on the mantelpiece." And it did.

Many of Frohman's rehearsals were held out of town. He was particularly fond of "pointing up" a production in a strange environment. Then the stage-director would ask the local manager for an absolutely empty theater--"a clear auditorium."

"Peter Pan" was to be "finished off" at Was.h.i.+ngton. The call was issued, the company a.s.sembled--everybody was present except Frohman. "Strange,"

was the thought in all minds, for he was usually so prompt. Ten minutes, fifteen minutes pa.s.sed until the stage-manager left the theater in search of the manager. He was found at the front entrance of the theater, unsuccessfully arguing with a German door-tender who, not knowing him and immensely amused at the idea that he was pretending to be Charles Frohman, refused to admit him until rea.s.sured by the company stage-manager. Later, when the man came to apologize, Frohman's only comment was:

"Oh! I forgot that an hour ago."

Few people knew the Frohman of rehearsals so well as William Seymour, for many years his general stage-director. His illuminating picture of the Little Chief he served so long is as follows:

"At rehearsals Charles Frohman was completely wrapped up in the play and the players. His mind, however, traveled faster than we did. He often stopped me to make a change in a line or in the business which to me was not at all clear. You could not always grasp, at once, just what he was aiming at. But once understood, the idea became illuminative, and extended into the next, or even to succeeding acts of the play. He could detect a weak spot quicker than any one I ever knew, and could remedy or straighten it out just as quickly.

"After the rehearsal of a new play he would think of it probably all the evening and night, and the next morning he had the solutions of the several vague points at his fingers' ends. He was also very positive and firm in what he wanted done, and how he thought it should be done. But what he thought was right, he believed to be right, and he soon made you see it that way.

"I confess to having had many differences of opinion and arguments, sometimes even disagreements, with him. In some instances he came round to my way of thinking, but he often said:

"'I believe you are right--I am sure you are right--but I intend doing it my way.'

"It was his great and wonderful self-confidence, and it was rarely overestimated.

"To his actors in a new play, after a week's 'roughing out' of the lines and business, the announcement that 'C. F. will be here to-morrow' would cause a flutter, some consternation, and to the newer members a great fear. To those who had been with him before he was like a sheet-anchor in a storm. They knew him and trusted and loved him. He was all sympathy, all comfort, all encouragement--if anything, too indulgent and overkind. But he won the confidence and affection of his people at the outset, and I have rarely met a player who would not have done his slightest bidding."

One of Frohman's characteristic hobbies was that he would never allow the leading man or the leading woman of his theater, or anybody in the company, no matter what position he or she held, to presume upon that position and bully the property man, or the a.s.sistant stage-manager, or any person in a menial position in the theater. He was invariably on the side of the smaller people.

Very often he would say, "The smallest member of this organization, be he of the staff or in the company, has as much right to his 'say' in an argument as the biggest member has."

On one occasion a certain actor, who was rather fond of issuing his wishes and instructions in a very loud voice, made his exit through a door up the center of the stage which was very difficult to open and shut. It had not worked well, and this had happened, quite by accident, on several occasions during the run of the play. The actor had spoken rather sharply to the carpenter about it instead of going, as he should have done, to the stage-manager. He always called the carpenter "Charley." The carpenter was a rather dignified person named Charles Heimley.

On the night in question this actor had had the usual trouble with the door. Heimley was not in sight, for he was evidently down in his carpenter-shop under the stage. The actor leaned over the bal.u.s.trade and called out: "Charley! Charley!"

Frohman, who was just walking through the side door on his way to William Faversham's dressing-room, turned to the star and said:

"Who is calling? Does he want me?"

"Oh no, he is calling the carpenter," replied Faversham.

Frohman tapped the noisy actor on the shoulder with his stick, and said, "You mean _Mr. Heimley_, don't you?" He wanted the carpenter's position to be respected.

XVII

HUMOR AND ANECDOTE

The most distinctive quality in Charles Frohman's make-up was his sense of humor. He mixed jest with life, and it enabled him to meet crisis and disaster with unflagging spirit and smiling equanimity. Like Lincoln, he often resorted to anecdote and story to ill.u.s.trate his point. He summed up his whole theory of life one day when he said to Augustus Thomas:

"I am satisfied if the day gives me one good laugh."