CHAPTER IX.

1881.

‘OTHELLO’ AND ‘THE TWO ROSES’ REVIVED.

At this time there came to London an American actor whose reputation in his own country was very high, and for whom it was claimed that, as a legitimate performer, he was superior to all rivals. This was Mr. Edwin Booth. He was welcomed with cordiality and much curiosity, and by none was he received with such hearty goodwill as by the manager of the Lyceum. Unluckily, he had made his arrangements injudiciously, having agreed to appear under a management which was quite unsuited to the proper exhibition of his gifts. The Princess’s Theatre was a house devoted to melodrama of the commoner type, and was directed by commercial rather than by æsthetic principles. This mistake proved fatal. The manager, finding that there was no likelihood of success, was not inclined to waste his resources, and, no doubt to the anguish of the actor, brought out the pieces in a meagre fashion that was consistent with the traditions of Oxford Street, but fatal to the American’s chances.

In this disastrous state of things the manager of the Lyceum came to the rescue of his _confrère_ with a suggestion as delicately conceived as it was generous. He offered him his theatre, with its splendid resources and traditions, his company, and—himself. He proposed that a Shakespearian play should be produced on the customary scale of magnificence, and that he and Booth should fill the leading characters. This handsome offer was, of course, accepted with gratitude, and ‘Othello’ was selected as the play.

The arrangements for this “Booth season,” as it might be termed, were of an unusual and certainly laborious kind. The manager, however, was never disposed to spare himself. The programme began on May 2, 1881, when Booth was to appear as Othello, performing on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, the manager playing Iago. On the other nights of the week, ‘The Cup,’ with the lively ‘Belle’s Stratagem,’ was to be performed. In the following week there was the same arrangement, except that Irving took the part of Othello.[27]

The night of May 2 was an exciting one, even in the list of exciting Lyceum nights. The Americans were, of course, there in great force. Irving—Booth—Ellen Terry: this surely formed, in theatrical phrase, a galaxy of talent, and the cynosure of a crowded, brilliant audience. It was, indeed, a charming performance—intellectual, highly-coloured, and treated in the romantic fashion which the age seems to demand. The old days of lusty-throated, welkin-splitting declamation, emphasized with strides and lunges, are done with.

Of Irving’s Iago it would be difficult to say too much. There have been always the two extremes: one portraying the Ancient as a malignant, scowling, crafty villain, doing much work with his eyes; the other as a kind of dapper, sarcastic, sneering personage, much after the model of Mephistopheles, this tone being emphasized by an airy, fashionable dress, as though he were some cynical Venetian “about town.” In Irving was seen the man of power and capability. There was breadth of treatment—the character was coherent throughout. The keynote to the perplexing character was found in his _humour_. In “I hate the Moor!”—one of those secret, jealous, morbid broodings which belong to human nature—an admirably delivered soliloquy, he strives to find some reasonable excuse for this suggestion; ‘He has done my office’ is merely accepted as a suitable pretext. The mode in which this was, as it were, chased through the turnings of his soul; the anxious tone of search, “I know not if ’t be true”; the covering up his face, and the motion by which he let his hands glide, revealing an elated expression at having found what would “serve,” was a perfect exhibition of the processes of thought. All this was set off by a dress of singular appropriateness and richness: a crimson and gold jerkin, with a mantle of dull or faded green, sometimes alternated with a short cloak and a red mantle worn on one arm.

In Booth’s Othello there appeared to be a lack of vigour, and the elocutionist was too present. There was a system of “points.” Some critics were rude enough to say that “his make-up suggested at times an Indian juggler, while about the head he seemed a low-cast Bengali.” He was never the “noble Moor.” “He had a tendency at times to gobble like a turkey.” This was rather hard measure. But in the scene with Iago, and, above all, in the scenes with Desdemona, the frantic bursts of jealousy, the command of varied tones, the by-play, the fierce ordering of Emilia and his wife—all this was of a high class, and stirred us. Miss Terry’s Desdemona was pathetic, and her piteous pleadings and remonstrances went straight to the heart.

On the next performance the parts were interchanged. A figure arrayed in a flowing amber robe over a purple brocaded gaberdine; a small, snow-white turban; a face dark, yet not “black”—such was Irving’s conception of Othello, which indeed answered to our ideal of the Moor. His tall figure gave him advantage. His reading of the part, again, was of the romantic, passionate kind, and he leant more on the tender side of the character than on the ferocious or barbaric. In the scene of Desdemona’s death or murder, there was now another and more effective arrangement: the bed was placed in the centre of the stage, and the whole became more important and conspicuous. When it was at the side, as in the Booth arrangement, it was difficult to believe in the continued presence of the lady after her death, and there was an awkwardness in the efforts to keep in sight of the audience during the struggle. There is not space to give details of the points which distinguished this conception—it is virtually a new character; but it will always be played by Irving under a disadvantage, as the play of his expressive face—the meaning, “travelling” eyes—is greatly veiled by the enforced swarthiness and Æthiop tint.

Booth’s Iago had been seen before, and was much praised. It was on the old “Mephistopheles” lines. The dress, indeed, strangely meagre and old-fashioned, scarcely harmonized with the rich costumes about him.

The whole of this transaction, as I have said, did honour to the English actor. Nothing more cordially hospitable could have been imagined. At the time there was a “Booth party,” who gave out that their favourite had not had fair play at the Princess’s, and that on a properly-appointed stage his superiority to all rivals would be apparent. These and other utterances were scattered about freely. Irving might have passed them by with indifference. It was certainly not his duty to share his stage with a stranger and a rival. At the same time we may give him credit for a certain delicate _finesse_, and he may have later thought, with a smiling, good-humoured complacency, that, owing to his allowing the experiment, the issue had turned out very differently from what “good-natured people” had hoped. The mortification for the American must have been the greater from the disadvantage of the contrast, which brought out in the most forcible way the want of “distinction,” the stock of old, rather faded, devices with which he came provided, and which he tried on his audience with an antique gravity. Audiences have, unfortunately, but little delicacy. In their plain way they show their appreciation of whom they think “the better man” in a business-like manner; and I remember how they insisted that the encouraging applause which they gave to the new actor should be shared by his host.

It should be mentioned that the prices on this engagement were raised to the opera scale—a guinea in the stalls, half-a-guinea for the dress-circle.

When the actor took his benefit at the close of this laborious season, the theatre presented an opera-house appearance, and was filled to overflowing with a miscellany of brave men and fair women, the latter arrayed in special splendour and giving the whole an air of rich luxury and magnificence befitting the handsomest and best-appointed theatre in the kingdom. Bouquets of unusual brilliancy and dimensions were laid in position, clearly not brought for the enjoyment of the owners. The entertainment consisted of the stock piece of ‘The Bells.’ Mr. Toole performed Mr. Hollingshead’s farce, ‘The Birthplace of Podgers,’ a happy subject, which shows that the “germ” of the æsthete “business” existed twenty years ago. The feature of the night was the well-known scene from ‘The Hunchback,’ in which Modus is so pleasantly drawn into making a declaration. Sheridan Knowles is often ridiculed for his sham Elizabethan situations; yet it may be doubted if any living writer could treat this incident with such freshness or so naturally. It is a piece of good, wearing stuff, and will wear even better. When the scene drew up, the handsome curtains, festooned in rich and abundant folds, revealed a new effect, throwing out, by contrast, the pale greenish-tinted scene, and heightening the light so that the two figures were projected on this mellow background with wonderful brilliancy. Miss Terry’s performance was full of animation and piquancy. Most remarkable, indeed, was the new store of unexpected attitudes and graces revealed at every moment—pretty stoopings, windings, sudden half turns, inviting “rallyings”—so that even a Modus more insensible to her advances must have succumbed. But in truth this wonderful creature “adorns all she touches.” It is clear that there is a Jordan-like vein of comedy in her yet to be worked. Irving’s Modus was full of a quaint earnestness, and his air of helplessness in the hands of such a mistress was well maintained. Modus is generally made to hover on the verge of oafishness, so as to make it surprising that there should be any object in gaining such a being. Irving imparted a suitable air to it, and lifted the character into pure comedy.

At the end came the expected speech, delivered with a pleasant familiarity, and dwelling on past successes and future plans. As in the case of another Premier, announcement was made of “improvement for tenants” in the pit and boxes, who were to have more room—to be “rooted,” if not to the soil, in their places at least. It was a pleasant and remarkable season to look back upon: the enchanting ‘Cup,’ which lingers like a dream, or lotus-eating fancy; the ‘Corsican Brothers,’ so sumptuously mounted; the splendid ‘Othello,’ the meeting of the American and the English actor on the same stage, and their strangely opposed readings of the same characters.

The performance of ‘The Belle’s Stratagem,’ which supplemented the attraction of ‘Othello,’ was interesting, as it introduced once more to active life that excellent and sound old actor, Henry Howe, who is now perhaps the only link with the generation of the great actors. It was a graceful and thoughtful act of Irving’s to seek out the veteran and attach him to his company. During the decade of years that have since elapsed, he has always treated him with a kindly and courteous consideration. Everyone who knows Mr. Howe—and everyone who does is glad to be counted among his friends—can testify to his kindly and loveable qualities. He has not the least particle of that testy discontent which too often distinguishes the veteran actor, who extols the past and is discontented with the present, because it is discontented with him, or thinks that he lags superfluous on the stage. As we have talked with him of a summer’s afternoon, in his little retreat at Isleworth, the image of many a pleasant hour in the old Haymarket days has risen up with his presence. It is always pleasant to encounter his honest face in the Strand, where he lives, as he is hurrying to his work.[28]

In January, 1882, our manager revived a piece in which he had achieved one of his earliest triumphs—‘The Two Roses.’ Miss Terry was at this time busily preparing for what was to be her great effort, in Juliet, and this interruption to her labours was judicious policy on the manager’s part. Much had occurred during the long interval of twelve years since the play had been first performed, but many still recalled with enjoyment Irving’s masterly creation. When he was casting the characters for the piece, he had counted on the original Caleb Decie—Thorne—who held the traditions of the play. Owing to some sudden change—I think to his entering on management—this arrangement had to be given up, and the manager was somewhat perplexed as to who he could find to fill the character. He happened to be in Glasgow at this time, when the local manager said to him, “There is a young fellow here who, I think, would exactly suit you; he is intelligent, hard working, and anxious to get on. His name is Alexander.” Irving accepted the advice, and secured an actor who was of his own school, of well-defined instincts and a certain elegance, and exactly suited to be _jeune premier_ of the Lyceum. It may be conceived with what delight, as he himself has told me, this unexpected opening was received by the then obscure youth; and at a pleasant supper the new engagement was ratified. At this moment the young Glasgow candidate is the prosperous manager of the St. James’s Theatre, a position which a dozen years of conscientious work has placed him in. Far more rough and thorny was the path along which Irving had to toil, during a score of years, before he found himself at the head of a theatre. But in these _fin de siècle_ times, the days and hours have doubled their value.

The piece was well mounted and well played, and there was much interest felt in comparing the new cast with the old. In a pleasant, half-sad meditation, my friend Mr. Clement Scott called up some of the old memories; the tyrant Death, he said, had played sad havoc with the original companies that did so much for this English comedy. “Far away, leagues from home, across the Atlantic sleep both Harry Montague and Amy Fawcitt. We may associate them still with Jack Wyatt and Lottie—who seemed the very boy and girl lovers that such a theme required—so bright and manly and noble, so tender, young, and handsome.” David James, as I have said, had taken the place of the oleaginous Honey, and for those who had not seen the latter, was an admirable representative of the part. The “Roses” were Miss Helen Mathews and Miss Emery.

The manager, in his old part, received universal praise from the entire circle of critics. Some considered it his most perfect creation, and likened it to Got’s ‘Duc Job’ and Regnier’s ‘Annibal.’ It was certainly a most finished and original performance; but it must be confessed that the larger stage and larger house had its effect, and tempted the actor into laying greater emphasis on details of the character. An actor cannot stand still, as it were. Repetition for a hundred nights is one of the vices of the modern stage, and leads to artificiality. Under the old _répertoire_ system, when a piece was given for a few nights, then suspended to be resumed after an interval, the actor came to his part with a certain freshness and feeling of novelty.

At the same time, it should be said that the play itself was accountable for this loss of effect. It was of but an ephemeral sort, and belonged to an old school which had passed away. Other players besides Irving, conscious of this weakness, have felt themselves constrained to supplement it by these broad touchings. The average “play of commerce” is but the inspiration of the moment, and engendered by it—authors, manager, actors, audience all join, as it were, in the composition. Every portion, therefore, reflects the tone of the time. But after a number of years this tone becomes lost or forgotten; the fashions of feeling and emotion, both off as well as on the stage, also pass away.

When closing his season and making the important announcement of the selection of ‘Romeo and Juliet’ for the new one, the manager, as we have seen, had promised some alterations and improvements in the theatre. These were duly carried out, and not only added to the comfort of the audience, but also to the profits of the management. The corridor at the back of the dress-circle was taken in and supplied some sixty or seventy new seats; while below, on the pit floor, place was found for some two hundred additional persons, by including the saloon. Further, the arch of the gallery which impeded the view was raised, padded seats were furnished for the pit, and the manager was willing even to supply “backs,” an unusual luxury, to the seats in the gallery; but the Chamberlain interposed, on the ground that in any panic or hurrying down the steep ascent, these might be found an obstruction. Other alterations were made in the exits and entrances—though these were merely in the nature of makeshifts. But the manager was not content until, many years later, he had purchased the adjoining house and thoroughly remodelled the whole.[29]

The manager, in the interval, took his company on a provincial tour to the leading towns. At Glasgow it was announced to be “the greatest engagement ever witnessed in that city.” As he told his audience on the last night, the receipts for the twelve nights amounted to over £4,000—an average of £334 per night. But the extraordinary “drawing” power of our actor was never exhibited more signally than during the engagement at Edinburgh, at Mr. Howard’s Theatre, which produced results that were really unprecedented. On his last appearance Irving told the audience that “this engagement—and you must not take it for egotism—has been the most remarkable one played for any twelve nights in any theatre, I should think, in Great Britain, certainly out of London, and there are some large theatres in London. I may tell you that there has been taken during the engagement here £4,300, which is certainly the largest sum ever had before in any theatre during the space of time, and I believe it is perfectly unprecedented in any city.” This was a tribute to his attraction. On his departure a gold repeater watch was presented to him.