San Francisco dramatic review (1899)

4 November 18th, 1899 l mcsAN piuncisco DRAMATIC RKVIKW j l-v • I [ ( Sixteen Pages ) San Francisco, Nov. i8, 1899 NEW YORK OFFICE 2731 BROA WAY Ten Cents a Copy — $3.00 per Year For Sale at all News Stands DRAMATIC REVIEW PUBLISHING COMPANY, Publishers 22*4 Geary Street Telephone Grant 158 Wm. D. WASSON Editor CHAS. H. FARRELL . . Business Manager C. H. LOMBARD Secretary and Treasurer Entered at the postoffice at San Francisco, Ca!., as second-class matter October 3, 1899. The big success of the New Alhambra Theater has demonstrated the fact that only good business judgment is necessary to remove a hoodoo — one of those frightful superstitions which the theatrical man fears more than ?nything else. Messrs. Ellinghouse and Mott have started in the right way by giving good performances at popular prices. Poor shows oft repeated will put a hoodoo on any theater. ¥ ¥ If we may judge from the following from the New York Journal, Fougere seems to have stirred up things a bit: "We suggest to the police that they arrest a French female called Fougere, who now infests the town, and that they raid a few of the "best theaters" as they would any ordinary disorderly resort. Such crimes against morality as would have landed a Billy McGlory on Blackwell's Island not long ago are now considered too "tame" to attract notice." ♦ * New Theaters are being constructed in many of the principal Eastern cities. The latest news is that Al Hayman and W. J. Davis, lessees of the Columbia Theater, Chicago, have secured a lot on Jackson Boulevard, near Michigan Avenue, as a site for a new million dollar theater. Their lease of the Columbia expires next August and they intend to have the new theater in readiness by that time. No disposition has yet been made of the Columbia. The New York Herald is giving its readers double the worth of their money these days, for it publishes two criticisms on every important first night — one written by Clement Scott and the other by Mr. Gustave Kobbe or someone else assigned to the task by Mr. White, the dramatic editor. So far the Herald's two criticisms have in the main co-incided in their views. In the case of The Children of the Ghetto, however, Mr. Scott pitched into the production much more savagely than did Mr. Kobbe. The question confronting managers is: Which article are they to select as the one representing the Heralds' s verdict. No doubt some of them will be willing to select the one which contains the kindliest sentiments. ¥ * Have you ever wondered why it is that the members of stock companies pull together so much more evenly that the actors and actresses who are engaged in the same roles throughout the entire season? For the simple reason that stock people do not find time to become jealous and envious of each other, and to think up mean things to say to and about the different members in the cast. Traveling companies have much more leisure than stock companies, and trifling little things that a stock actor would be too busy to notice are harbored and gradually magnified by the one-part actor until they assume a magnitude almost impossible to believe. If the members of traveling companies would devote more time to the careful study of their respective roles, they would not have time to think all their companions were enemies and all their friends were fools. This is the beginning of the actor's discontent; the time when he begins to realize what a big success he would have been if— that perpetual if — he had essayed some role different from that which now bedims him. Nat Goodwin is anxious lor the laurels of the serious drama, and promises to eventually educate his critics and the public to the perfect propriety of his own confidence in himself as an emotional mummer. Goodwin's friends declare that his semi-serious roles of recent years are but progressive steps from the comic tumult of The Nominee to the deepest tragedy of Richard III. The late Thomas W. Keene was a vaudevillist and burlesquer before turning his ability to the classic drama, and Louis James is another who made a poor success in vaudeville, but did not fail within the pale immortalized by Shakespeaie. Beware, ye who criticise; the great tragedian of the age approacheth — Nathaniel Goodwin ! * ¥ Prominent among the greatest of New York's lamentably few successes this season is that of Mrs. Fiske and her remarkable play, Becky Sharp, dramatized from Thackeray's Vanity Fair. New York's present theatrical season is specially noteworthy in comparison with that of last year. Play followed play and the number of successes was unprecedented. The remarkable record doubtlessly inspired a more generous enterprise than usual in the preparations for this season — an enterprise also based on the vastly im proved condition of business generally — and the theaters opened earlier, with a more general than tentative activity. But this season's record has been far different from that of last year. Failure has attended almost every one of those pretentious productions favored by dominant influenres in the dramatic world, and, by reason of that favor, enjoying the partial assistance of a certain portion of the metropolitan press. Although Becky Sharp as a production was admitted to be superior to many plays then running, failure was freely — and gratuitously — predicted for Mrs. Fiske by all the influences noted. Only a few discerning critics in New York pronounced unqualifiedly in favor of the play, and yet from the start Mrs. Fiske has drawn the largest and most discriminating audiences of the season, and today interest in her work is more general and flattering than ever. ¥ ¥ Several local correspondents of the Review have recently been clamoring for new plays. It would appear from the following interview with A. J. Spencer, Jacob Litt's representative, that there are plenty of new plays, but their merit is of a decidedly doubtful quality. Here is what Mr. Spencer says: "I believe Mr. Litt is the only manager in New York city who makes it a rule to examine everything that is submitted, but the results thus far have not been encouraging. Of course, good plays are now and then written by new people, and I have no doubt but some of them are unfortunately overlooked in the deluge of mediocrity pouring into every manager's office. But you may rest assured anything meritorious eventually gets a hearing. If writers only knew how eagerly every manager is looking for something available they would have no anxiety about finding a market for their wares provided they have anything worth buying. I have heard it said, by the way, that publishers are much more liberal than managers, and that it is much easier to find a house that will take chances on bringing out a book than a man who will experiment with a play. The comparison is preposterous. The expense of a theatrical production is many times that of printing a book, and while a publisher may have a number of ventures on hand simultaneously a manager must try his experiments one at a time, devoting the whole strength of his establishment to each. Consequently the stigma of failure is vastly greater. The two things are as different as day and night." * ¥ bouquets Pacific Editor, Stockton — About the newest thing in a newspaper way in San Francisco is the Dramatic Review, a finely illustrated journal of sixteen pages. It has a good field, but will not be confined to San Francisco. It is strictly theatrical, and has already made a big hit. William D. Wasson, who was city editor of the Daily Report, when that paper was better known than now, is the editor of the new paper. His associates are Chas. H. Farrell and C. H. Lombard, well-known specialists in advertising. * * * Gaty Pallen, dramatic editor of the St. Louis News Letter — The first number of the San Francisco Dramatic Review has reached my desk. It is ably edited by Wm. D. Wasson, and is full of Western breeziness which makes it very readable to those interested in theatricals. * • * Riverside Enterprise — A new dramatic journal has been launched upon the boards at San Francisco, and it's a beauty. With a scope of country unequalled by that of any journal in the world, it has a wide field for duty. The Dramatic Review aims to make of itself the leading theatrical paper of the West. If it shall succeed in its ambition, it will be but representative of some of the most noted stage folk who have ascended the Thespian ladder in America. It is published by the Review Company, with Wm. D. Wasson at the editorial helm. We congratulate the Review and its editor. cMurphys Jolly Citz Murphy, in advance of By * the Sad Sea Waves, writes the Review from Los Angeles, under date of November 8, as follows: "Be sure and send me copy of Review the first thing Friday sure, as I want to get it at this hotel before I leave for El Paso Sunday afternoon at 2:30. My old friends here have kept me so busy, I haven't had time to think. In the Transvaal, South Africa, people fight and get married, they tell me; in Los Angeles I find they get married and then fight. W7ell, I've discovered the secret of making my plays a success. I'm going to vaccinate them, then they'll be sure to take, and possibly by the addition of a porous plaster they may draw. Pardon the Zangwillesque spirit of this letter. Yours, Fitz Murphy. "Address 'Westminster,' (where they bury dead Englishmen and renegade Irishmen.) A Sincere Compliment 4 4 P\o you know what I consider the most glowing tribute I ever received?" remarked Henry Miller. "The compliment came from a child. There was a crowded house, an intent audience, and humor had for the instant given place to pathos. You might Have heard a pin drop, and I felt the tension of the house was at breaking point. The intense silence was broken by a childish voice — a girl's — who, turning to her parent, asked in a broken voice: 'Mother, is it real?' "