“An oldtime companion of mine at this period was John T. Malone, studying for the Catholic priesthood. But beneath the cassock my friend harbored a great love for the Stage, and among his intimate circle had won quite a reputation as a Shakespearean scholar. I remember the morning he came to the Baldwin Theatre and told me the story of his ambition. I engaged him at once, struck by his personality! ’I’ve been waiting many years,’ said he, and now the time has come.’... Later, he supported Booth and Barrett and his name will ever be associated with that splendid gentleman who founded The Players. As the years passed he became a victim of Time’s revenges; nurtured in the blank verse school, his engagements became fewer and fewer until they utterly dwindled away. Often I picture him as an actor of exceedingly great talent, but it had no outlet for its practical use. His is one of the many sad cases in the theatrical world of ’exits’ marked by poverty and loneliness.”
I know not whether Malone ever studied for the priesthood: I know, however, that he was educated for the profession of law, and that in his young manhood he practised law in San Francisco. He was born in 1854, I believe in that city, and he died in New York, January 15, 1906: he richly merited commemoration. He was a good man and a talented, zealous, reverent servant of the Stage. No actor of our time more dearly loved his profession or more devoutly and unselfishly labored in its support, though his career was not attended with any specially brilliant achievements or extraordinary incidents. He was a careful and thoughtful student of Shakespeare, and his acquaintance with the works of the great dramatist was intricate, extensive, and minute. He wrote much upon that subject, and his contributions to contemporary magazines, in the vein of Shakespearean criticism, are of peculiar interest. In his domestic life he was unfortunate and unhappy, but to the last he retained a philosophical spirit and a genial mind. As a comrade, among intellectual men, he was both loved and admired,—because his nature was noble, his heart was kind, his taste was pure, his mind was rich, and his manners were gentle. It was a pleasure to know him, and the remembrance of him lingers sweetly in the recollection of a few old friends.
On August 18 H. J. Byron’s comedy of “The Upper Crust” was played at the Baldwin, in conjunction with the burlesque opera of “Little Amy Robsart,” and that double bill held the stage for a fortnight. During that time Belasco completed an adaptation of the “prize drama” by T. P. Cooke, entitled “True to the Core,”—first acted at the Bowery Theatre, New York, December 17, 1866. It had been seen in San Francisco twelve years earlier, in its original form. I have been able to find only a mutilated programme of the performance of Belasco’s version, August 30, 1880, which gives part of the cast as follows:
| Truegold | James O’Neill. |
| Geoffrey Dangerfield | Frederic de Belleville. |
| Lord High Admiral of England | A. D. Bradley. |
| Marah | Adelaide Stanhope. |
| Mabel Truegold | Lillian Andrews. |
| Queen Elizabeth | Eva West. |
“True to the Core” is an old-fashioned melodrama, of which the hero, Truegold, is an English pilot who passes through many “moving accidents by flood and field,” being seized by treasonous conspirators, placed on board a vessel of the Spanish Armada, which he pilots upon a rock, instead of into Portsmouth Harbor, and who is in danger, subsequently, of losing his head on the block rather than break his word, but who is followed, served, and ultimately saved by a gypsy woman, Marah, whom he has befriended. It was played for one week to audiences of fair size and was succeeded, in order, by William G. Wills’ “Ninon,”—acted September 6, for the first time in America,—“Aladdin Number Two; or, The Wonderful Scamp,” “Forget Me Not,” Bartley Campbell’s “The Galley Slave,” the same author’s “Fairfax,” and “Golden Game,”—all produced under Belasco’s care, and all, unhappily, performed to lessening receipts.
The next incident of note at the Baldwin was the coming of William E. Sheridan, who opened there November 15, playing King Louis the Eleventh, and whose advent brought back a measure of prosperity to the theatre. Belasco, in his “Story,” records this remembrance and estimate of Sheridan:
“We were sadly in need of an attraction at this time, and so, when W. E. Sheridan arrived, from Philadelphia, which city pointed to him with much just pride, we engaged him at a nominal salary, and immediately he soared into popularity, being acclaimed one of the most versatile actors who had ever visited the Coast. Three times his engagement was extended, for the people of San Francisco were loath to let him depart. His Othello was a scholarly performance; ’A New Way to Pay Old Debts’ increased his popularity, as did also ’The Fool’s Revenge,’ ’The Lyons Mail,’ and Shylock. He was essentially a virile actor, forceful and with a magnetic voice that was music in the ear. And I have seen many a Louis the Eleventh, but he was the greatest of them all, not even excepting that wonderful genius, Sir Henry Irving. Success found him greatly astonished, for when he left Philadelphia he was practically unknown to any but his townspeople, and now when his name was heralded abroad, the East listened with a certain curiosity. As we played to crowded houses and the applause floated to his dressing-room, he could scarcely credit this sudden fame which had fallen upon him. More than once Sheridan turned to me and said: ’I’ve found it all out now when it is too late.’”
Belasco’s estimate of Sheridan is interesting and it should be preserved—because it is Belasco’s: the opinion of the foremost stage manager of his time, about any actor, should be of interest. It would, however, be far more instructive and valuable if the reasons for it were also given: but in a long experience I have found few commentators on acting who give reasons for their declared opinions. Why Sheridan should have felt that he had “found it all out when it was too late” passes my understanding,—because, in 1880, he was in the very prime of life, forty years of age; contrary to Belasco’s impression, he was well known throughout our country, and, moreover, he continued to be abundantly successful for more than six years after his initial appearance in San Francisco. He was a sterling actor and richly deserved success. I knew him and liked him much. He took up “King Louis XI.” because of the immense impression created by Irving’s revival of that play at the London Lyceum, March 9, 1878, and he gave an effective and admirable performance in it. Nevertheless, he was not, in my judgment, even for a moment rightly comparable in the part with Irving,—because nowhere in his embodiment of Louis did he reveal even an approximate of the wonderful personality, the indomitable intellect, the inerrant apprehension of subtle traits of complex character, or the faculty of identification, the grim menace, the baleful power, the grisly humor, or the exquisite felicity of expressive art with which Irving displayed his ideal of that human monster of cruelty and guile. Such acting as that of Henry Irving in the scene of King Louis’ confessional, the scene of his paroxysm of maniacal wrath, the scene of his supplication for life, and the scene of his august and awful death, opens the depths of the human heart, lays bare the possible depravity of human nature, depicts a great character in such a way as to illumine the historic page, and conveys a most solemn monition on the conduct of life.
During his first engagement in San Francisco Sheridan acted Rover, in “Wild Oats”; Lesurques and Dubosc, in “The Lyons Mail”; Claude Melnotte, Shylock, Richelieu, Othello, Hamlet, and Sir Giles Overreach, in “A New Way to Pay Old Debts.” Laura Don, making her first appearance in San Francisco, November 24, played Lady Amaranth to his Rover, and Julie to his Lesurques: Lillie Eddington played Pauline, Portia, and other leading female parts with him. He was supported by “the new Baldwin Company,” which had been organized just prior to his coming to San Francisco, and which included Joseph R. Grismer and “Harry” Colton. All the plays were produced under Belasco’s stage management, and his familiarity with them and his indefatigable zeal in rehearsals made his assistance invaluable to Sheridan. That actor filled several subsequent engagements in San Francisco, and his acting so vividly impressed Belasco that he gave public imitations of him in King Louis and in other parts. Sheridan served in the Union Army during the Civil War and attained to the rank of captain. He married the actress Louise Davenport (his first wife, Sarah Hayes, died in 1872), went with her to Australia in 1886, and died there, in Sydney, May 15, 1887. He was the impersonator of Beamish McCoul, in “Arrah-na-Pogue,” when that play was originally performed in America, at Niblo’s Garden, New York, July 12, 1865,—an occasion I have particular reason to remember because that was the first theatrical performance reviewed by me for “The New York Tribune.”
Of Laura Don, with whom Belasco became acquainted at the time of Sheridan’s first San Francisco engagement, he gives this recollection:
“Laura Don was a painter whose landscapes and portraits had won her distinction in the art world. Indeed, she was quite a spoilt child of the Muses, for the gods had dowered her with many gifts. Nature had been kind to her in every way, mentally and physically, for she had a face and figure of great attractiveness; her every movement was serpentine and voluptuous. This was further heightened by an excitable temperament, keyed to the highest pitch, and I never saw anyone who had a more insatiable thirst for fame; so much so, indeed, that her health was on the verge of being undermined. I saw in this woman every possibility of making a wonderful Cleopatra, and when she had joined the Baldwin Theatre I spent many hours after performances training her in the rôle (sic). Then one Sunday afternoon, when we had reached the Death Scene, Laura Don fell in a faint, and I looked down to find drops of blood coming from her mouth. So this was the reason for the hectic flush, for the irresponsible moods and eccentricities! When she came to, we had removed every outward sign of her fatal malady. But Laura Don was not to be deceived. Many times when we had been working together she would exclaim, ’Why is it I am so weak? Why is it I do not gain strength?’ For two days she remained in her room, and then she sent for me and confessed that she had known all along of her consumptive tendencies. ’I shall never play Cleopatra,’ she said; ’you must find someone else to take my place. I suppose we cannot escape the fate imposed upon us. I was born a butterfly and I shall die one. I’ve fought the idea for years, and I have been conquered. So I shall go East and pass the time as well as I may until the end. If you are anywhere near when “it” occurs, send me a few violets in memory of those you have always kept on the rehearsal table.’ Soon after her arrival in the East came her tragic death, so that it was not very long before I had to send the flowers.”
Laura Don’s true name was Anna Laura Fish. She was the first wife of the theatrical agent and manager Thomas B. McDonough. She afterward married a photographer, resident in Troy, New York, whose name I have forgotten. She lived for
DAVID BELASCO AS KING LOUIS THE ELEVENTH
Photograph by Houseworth, San Francisco.
Original loaned by Mrs. David Belasco.
about six years after Belasco met her. On September 6, 1882, at the Standard Theatre, New York, she produced a play called “A Daughter of the Nile,” written by herself, and appeared in it as a star. The principal person in it, a female named Egypt, is supposed to be of Egyptian origin: the subject, however, is American and modern. Miss Don never acted Cleopatra. She died, suddenly, at Greenwich, New York, February 10, 1886.
Sheridan’s engagement at the Baldwin terminated December 28, and the next night the well-known English melodrama of “The World,” by Paul Merritt, Henry Pettitt, and Augustus Harris, was performed there, for the first time in America. (Several years later, after Belasco had become established in New York, he was employed by Charles Frohman to make a revival of this play, which had been introduced to our Stage under his direction, in New Orleans.) On January 10, 1881, a drama called “The Eviction,” depicting some aspects of the landlord and tenant disturbances then rife in Ireland, was brought out and filled one week. On January 17 it was succeeded by a play called “Wedded by Fate,” the joint work of Edward Captain Field and Henry B. McDowell, son of General Irvin McDowell. The younger McDowell, possessed of wealth, proposed, through Belasco, to subsidize a production of their play in order to get it before the public, and Maguire, pressed for money, eagerly assented to that arrangement. Belasco, recalling the incident of bringing forth “Wedded by Fate” and the peculiarities of its principal author, writes thus:
“An instance of the casual devotee of the Theatre was young McDowell, son of the famous Union general. Our first interview was most amusing. I remember how he stutterred: ’I s-s-should l-l-like to b-be an a-a-a-actor,’ he said, with difficulty. He also, in common with many others, believed that he could write a successful play and agreed that if I produced something of his very own he would finance it and would guarantee a certain bonus. His first effort—I forget the name of it—cost him a trifle of a fortune, but inasmuch as it was a local play by a local author people flocked to see it. When I met him years afterwards in New York he was still obsessed by the theatrical bee, from which he never recovered. With Franklin Sargent he opened The Theatre of Arts and Letters and lost a fortune. If I had not been, at the time, under contract to the Lyceum Theatre I should have joined McDowell in that undertaking.”
The period from January to July, 1881, exhibits nothing of particular moment concerning Belasco, though, as usual, he was hard at work throughout it. “Wedded by Fate” gave place to a revival, February 1, of Daly’s version of “Leah the Forsaken,” made to introduce to the Stage a novice, Miss Clara Stuart, who paid for the privilege of appearing and whose money, like that of the extravagant McDowell, was welcome to the distressed Maguire. Beginning on February 9, George Darrell, an actor from Australia,—with whom Belasco had been associated in conjunction with Laura Alberta, at Grey’s Opera House, in 1873,—acted at the Baldwin for several weeks. During McDowell’s season and for several weeks subsequent thereto part of the Baldwin stock company performed in towns of the interior,—Belasco dividing his time between San Francisco, where he assisted Darrell, and the Baldwin company, “on the road.” Darrell opened in “Back from the Grave,” a play dealing with the important, neglected, and often misrepresented subject of spiritualism (that actor was, or, at least, bore the reputation of being, a hypnotist and a student of occult matters). This was followed on the 21st by “Four Fates,” and, on the 25th, by “Transported for Life.” John P. Smith and William A. Mestayer played at the Baldwin for three weeks, beginning April 11, in “The Tourists in a Pullman Palace Car”; Kate Claxton, supported by Charles Stevenson and making her first appearance in San Francisco, presented “The Two Orphans” there for two weeks, opening on May 9; and the company of Jarrett & Rice, in “Fun on the Bristol,” played there from May 30 to June 9, after which date the theatre was closed until July 4. It was then reopened, under the temporary management of J. H. Young, with A. D. Bradley as stage manager, and a few performances of “Emancipation” were given by The Pierreponts. Belasco, however, appears to have been occupied chiefly with his own affairs from April to July.
Even before Belasco had been reinstalled as stage manager at the Baldwin Theatre he had resumed planning another campaign of adventure to gain acceptance and position in New York, and that purpose was ever present in his mind during the year that followed his return from the Eastern venture with the Hernes in “Hearts of Oak.” He had set his heart on a success in the leading theatre of the country, Wallack’s, and he resolutely addressed himself to its achievement. Maguire had come to depend more and more on Belasco, in the labor of keeping the Baldwin Theatre open and solvent, and to him the ambitious dramatist presently turned with his plans for a play to be called “La Belle Russe.” “I felt that I had a play which would suit Wallack’s company,” he said, “and that, if I could get some of his actors to appear in it, Wallack would soon hear of it, and the task of getting a New York hearing would be much simplified. Jeffreys-Lewis
was then in San Francisco, and I stipulated with Maguire that he should engage her for me, and also Osmond Tearle and Gerald Eyre, from Wallack’s; John Jennings, from the Union Square, and Clara Walters, who was then acting in Salt Lake City.” Maguire agreed to do this, the engagements were made, and Belasco earnestly addressed himself to the completion of his play, which was accomplished in six weeks. Meantime Tearle ended his engagement in New York (at Wallack’s Theatre, July 2) and, with other members of the Wallack company, went at once to San Francisco, where rehearsals of the new play were immediately begun.
Belasco’s “La Belle Russe” was originally entitled “Violette.” He chanced to read the phrase “la belle Russe” on a wind-blown fragment of newspaper, was pleased by it, and adopted it as a better title. The play is a fabric of theatrically effective but incredible situations, and it is founded on two other plays, well known to him,—both of them having been acted in San Francisco, under his management,—namely, “Forget Me Not,” by Herman Merivale and Charles Groves, and “The New Magdalen,” by Wilkie Collins: the version produced under Belasco’s direction was a piratical one made by James H. LeRoy. La belle Russe is a beautiful but vicious Englishwoman, named Beatrice Glandore, daughter of a clergyman. She has sunk, by a facile process of social decline, until she has become a decoy for a gambling house, where, pretending to be a Russian, she is known to its frequenters by the sobriquet which gives the play its name. She has a virtuous twin sister, Geraldine, so like her in appearance that they are, practically, indistinguishable. La belle Russe has infatuated a young Englishman, Captain Brand (known at the time by the name of Captain Jules Clopin), with whom she has lived, whom she has robbed, abandoned, and finally shot, believing herself to have killed him. Geraldine, meantime, has married a young Englishman of great expectations, Sir Philip Calthorpe, who is repudiated by his mother and other relatives because of his marriage, whereupon, in financial straits, though represented as loving his wife, Calthorpe deserts her, enlists in the Army, and disappears.
After the lapse of a considerable period, Calthorpe being reported as dead, Lady Elizabeth Calthorpe, his mother, experiences a change of heart, and advertises for information about his widow. Beatrice, la belle Russe, poor and resident in Italy, hears of this inquiry and, believing her twin sister to be dead, determines to present herself in the assumed person of Geraldine, as the widow of Calthorpe, and thus to obtain for herself and her young daughter (of whom Brand is the father) a luxurious home and an enviable social station. In this fraud she partially succeeds, being accepted as Calthorpe’s widow by both Lady Elizabeth and her family lawyer, Monroe Quilton, who evince a confiding acquiescence singularly characteristic of proud old English aristocrats and their astute legal advisers. Almost in the moment of her success, however, Sir Philip having come from Australia, she finds herself installed not as his widow but as his wife,—and also she finds that Sir Philip is accompanied by her former companion, Captain Brand, those wanderers having met in Australian wilds and become close friends. Philip is sure she is his wife and gladly accepts her as such. Brand, on the contrary, promptly identifies the spurious Geraldine as Beatrice, and, privately, demands that she abandon her fraudulent position. This she refuses to do, defying Brand to oust her from the newly acquired affections of Calthorpe and his mother,—and thus, practically, the situation is created wherein Stéphanie de Mohrivart defies Sir Horace Welby, in the play of “Forget Me Not.” Beatrice, having made an unsuccessful attempt to poison Brand, in order to remove all obstacles and maintain her place, is finally defeated and driven to confession and surrender when that inexorable antagonist reveals to her not an avenging Corsican (the dread apparition which overwhelms Stéphanie), but the approaching figure of her twin sister, the true Geraldine and the actual wife of Calthorpe,—who, also, is conveniently resurrected for the family reunion.
Aside from the impossibility of most of these occurrences,—a defect which is measurably lessened by Belasco’s deft treatment of them,—and also from the blemish of intricacy in the substructure of the plot, “La Belle Russe” is an effective play, of the society-melodrama order,—the action of it being free and cumulative, the characters well drawn, and the interest sustained. It contains an interesting exposition of monstrous feminine wickedness, and stimulates thought upon the infatuation that can be caused by seductive physical beauty, and it suggests the singular spectacle of baffled depravity stumbling among its attempted self-justifications,—Beatrice, of course, entering various verbal pleas in extenuation which, accepted, would establish her as a victim of ruthless society instead of her own unbridled tendencies. The play possesses, likewise, the practical advantages of a small cast, implicating only nine persons and requiring for its display only three simple sets of scenery. The San Francisco production of it was abundantly successful, Miss Jeffreys-Lewis, who had previously won high praise by performances of Stéphanie de Mohrivart, and also of the Countess Zicka, in “Diplomacy,” being specially commended, one observer declaring that, though her performances of those parts were good examples of the acting required in the tense dramatic situations of a duel of keen wits, “her Geraldine [Beatrice] Glandore is more varied, more vivid, more intense, and generally powerful. Her mobile face took on every shade of expression that the human face can wear, and perhaps not the least natural was the open, artless, sunny countenance which quickly won Sir Philip’s love.” Tearle as Captain Brand and Gerald Eyre as Calthorpe were almost equally admired, and the play had a prosperous career of two weeks,—which, in San Francisco at that time, was substantial testimony to its popularity. Belasco writes this account of the production:
“San Francisco, like all other cities, was not over-anxious to welcome the product of one of her sons. There was much more drawing power in something of foreign authorship.... Knowing that the critics would welcome anything from France, and knowing how hypercritical some of the writers of the press were becoming of my own efforts, ’La Belle Russe’ was announced as being by a French author. The programme for the opening announced that the drama was from the French. However, Maguire had posters ready to placard the town, were ’La Belle Russe’ a success. This time the name of David Belasco was blazoned forth in the blackest type. And it all worked as I had devised. The play met with instant success, and on the morning after, when the critics had come out in columns of praise for such technique as the French usually showed, on their downward travel to the offices they were faced with the startling announcement that the anonymous author was none other than David Belasco.”
The first presentment of “La Belle Russe” was made at the Baldwin Theatre, to mark “the inauguration of the regular dramatic season” there, on July 18, 1881. During the rehearsals of it Tearle had several times spoken to Belasco, signifying doubt about the “French origin” of the play and, finally, remarking that Belasco showed an astonishing familiarity with every word and detail of the drama. “Well, whatever you may think,” Belasco assured him, “please believe you are mistaken and say nothing about it—just now.” His wishes were observed: one contemporary comment on the day before its production remarks that “of the play little seems to be known. It is said to resemble ’Forget Me Not.’ The actors say it is strong.” The first announcement I have been able to find of the actual authorship is in a newspaper of July 26, 1881, where it is advertised as “The strongest play of modern times, ’La Belle Russe,’ by D. Belasco, author of ’Hearts of Oak.’” After all question of the acceptance of his play was ended and his authorship acknowledged Belasco asked Tearle to inform Lester Wallack about it, “if he thought well enough of the play to feel justified in doing so.” “Oh,” answered Tearle, “I’ve done that long ago; I telegraphed to him after the first performance: it will be just the thing for Rose Coghlan.” Thus Belasco felt he was in a fair way to accomplish his purpose of securing a New York opening. This was the original cast of “La Belle Russe”:
| Captain Dudley Brand | Osmond Tearle. |
| Sir Philip Calthorpe | Gerald Eyre. |
| Monroe Quilton, Esq. | John W. Jennings. |
| Rignold Henderson (Supt. of Police) | E. H. Holden. |
| Roberts | J. McCormack. |
| Barton | Edgar Wilton. |
| Beatrice Glandore (Geraldine) | Jeffreys-Lewis. |
| Lady Elizabeth Calthorpe | Jean Clara Walters. |
| Elise | Edith Livingston. |
| Little Beatrice | Maude Adams. |
“La Belle Russe” received its final performance at the Baldwin Theatre on Saturday evening, July 30. On August 1 “Adolph Challet” was produced there, under Belasco’s direction, and on August 8 a revival of “Diplomacy” was effected, Tearle acting Henry Beauclerc, Gerald Eyre Julian, and Miss Jeffreys-Lewis the Countess Zicka. It had been intended to divide the week between “Diplomacy” and “Camille,” but “to my delight,” Belasco said, “the former was strong enough to fill the whole week and I could give all the time to final preparation of my new play.” That new play was a dramatic epitome of “The Stranglers of Paris” (“Les Étrangleurs de Paris”), by Adolphe Belot, for the production of which much effort had already been made. It was modestly announced by Maguire (who, I surmise, did not thereby greatly distress Belasco) as “The great dramatic event of the nineteenth century,” and it was brought out on August 15. Belasco’s name was not made known as that of the adapter. This play is, in fact, an extravagant and, in some respects, a repulsive sensation melodrama. The story relates some of the experiences of an intellectual pervert named Jagon, a huge hunchback, of remarkable muscular strength, especially in the digits, resident in Paris, and gaining a livelihood for himself and a cherished daughter (whom he keeps in ignorance of her actual relationship to himself) by the gentle art of strangling persons in order to rob them. A specially barbarous murder is committed by Jagon and an accomplice named Lorenz,—an ex-convict who has ingratiated himself with the daughter, Mathilde, and who marries her. Jagon and an innocent man, Blanchard, are arrested, tried for this crime, and sentenced to transportation to New Caledonia. The convict-ship bearing them to that destination is wrecked and they escape together upon a raft and return to Paris. Mathilde, having discovered the criminality of her husband, frees her mind on that subject with such pungency that Lorenz is moved to practise upon her the professional dexterity learned from her revered father and promptly chokes her to death. Jagon arrives at this juncture, attended by police officers, denounces Lorenz to them as his actual accomplice in the crime for which Blanchard has been convicted with him, and then, in the manner of Robert Macaire in somewhat similar circumstances, being determined to escape the guillotine, leaps through a convenient window, thus giving the police an opportunity, which they improve, of shooting him to death. The play is immensely inferior to the story upon parts of which it is based, but it serves its purpose as a “shocker.” The escape of the two convicts on the raft at sea provides an effective scene, not the less so because of its resemblance to a similar scene in the earlier melodrama of “The World”: the expedient, however, was an old one long before “The World” was produced: it is employed with great skill and effect in Reade’s fine novel of “The Simpleton.” Belasco’s mature opinion of this play of his has been recorded in four words which cover the case: “What buncombe it was!” A notably good performance was given in it by Osmond Tearle as Jagon—a part which he expressed himself to the dramatist as delighted to undertake as a relief from acting the repressed “leads” to which he had for some time been restricted. It ran for two weeks. This was the original cast:
| Jagon | Osmond Tearle. | |
| Joseph Blanchard | Gerald Eyre. | |
| Robert de Meillant | Joseph R. Grismer. | |
| Lorenz | Max Freeman. | |
| Captain Jules Guérin | Walter Leman. | |
| Mons. Claude | A. D. Bradley. | |
| Bontout | John W. Jennings. | |
| Papin | Charles Norris. | |
| Dr. Fordien | J. P. Wade. | |
| Mons. Vitel | George McCormack. | |
| Mons. Xavier | E. N. Thayer. | |
| Governor of Prison | George Galloway. | |
| Longstalot | R. G. Marsh. | |
| Grégoire | Logan Paul. | |
| Jacquot | G. L. May. | |
| Cabassa | John Torrence. | |
| Pierre | —Convicts— | G. McCord. |
| Zalabut | J. Higgins. | |
| Lamazon | Charles Robertson. | |
| Zorges | G. Holden. | |
| Jacques | S. Chapman. | |
| Commander of Prison Ship | W. T. Day. | |
| First Lieutenant | E. N. Neuman. | |
| Second Lieutenant | E. Webster. | |
| First Marine | J. Sherwood. | |
| Mathilde | Jeffreys Lewis. | |
| Jeanne Guerin | Ethel Arden. | |
| Sophie Blanchard | Jean Clara Walters. | |
| Zoé Lacassade | Mrs. Elizabeth Saunders. | |
| La Grande Florine | Eva West. |
“The Stranglers” was superbly mounted, it delighted the public for which it was intended, and was played for two weeks, attracting large and enthusiastically demonstrative audiences.
Maguire, because he had produced Belasco’s play of “La Belle Russe” at the Baldwin and had thereby profited, appears to have considered that also he had thereby acquired a property in it. To this claim the necessitous dramatist assented (making, I suppose, a virtue of necessity), giving Maguire a half-interest. Maguire then decreed that they should go to New York together, in order to place the play with Wallack, if that should prove the most expedient arrangement, or to place it with any other manager from whom it might be possible to exact higher payment. Belasco consented to negotiate with other managers and ascertain what terms might be offered, “even though,” he said, “I had determined that none but Wallack should produce it.” On September 25, 1881, they left San Francisco together and came to New York.
According to Belasco’s statement to me, Augustin Daly wanted the play of “La Belle Russe” for Ada Rehan (to whom the central part would have been peculiarly unfitted), while A. M. Palmer wanted it for Miss Jeffreys-Lewis, at the Union Square, and John Stetson wanted it for Marie Prescott. Belasco had interviews with all of them, and with Wallack. His determination that Wallack should produce his play, if he possibly could arrange to have him do so, was intensified by the kindness of Wallack’s manner toward the young author and by the strong impression made upon him by that actor’s pictorial and winning personality. Maguire, meantime, consorted with Stetson, a person naturally congenial to him, and presently became insistent that the play should be intrusted to that manager. “After I had read the play to Stetson in his office (which I did very unwillingly),” Belasco told me, “the two of them threatened me with all sorts of consequences if I did not turn the manuscript over to Stetson, and I really believe they would have taken it from me by force if I had not buttoned it under my coat and bolted out of the office!” This pair of pilgrims had then been for some time in New York, and Maguire, by agreement, had been paying Belasco’s living expenses; now, by way of practical intimation that his will must prevail and the play be relinquished to Stetson, he stopped doing so. This left Belasco in a familiar but not the less painful plight—stranded—and it also incensed him against Maguire.
At this juncture, when unfortunately he was impecunious, indignant, and excited, he received a visit from Maguire’s nephew, Mr. Frank L. Goodwin, with whom he had already negotiated relative to “La Belle Russe,” and whom he now supposed to have come to him as Wallack’s representative. To this person he imprudently made known his quarrel with Maguire, and hastily inquired, “What will you give me for the play?” “Fifteen hundred dollars, cash,” Goodwin answered, and then, observing that he hesitated, “and a return ticket to San Francisco, and $100 more for your expenses.” “How soon can I have the money?” Belasco rejoined. “In half an hour.” “Then I’ll take it”—and he did, selling his play, outright, not, as he supposed, to Wallack, but to Goodwin, for $1,600 cash and a railroad ticket home! He received the money the same afternoon and left that night for San Francisco. When the play was produced at Wallack’s it was announced as “By arrangement with Mr. F. L. Goodwin, the production of a new and powerful drama by David Belasco, Esq.” Wallack paid Goodwin a high price for the play, which, since then, has been successfully acted throughout the English-speaking world, and, later, when told of the facts of the sale, expressed his profound regret and dissatisfaction that Belasco had not dealt directly with him. Fifty times the amount of money that Belasco received for “La Belle Russe” would have been more like a fair payment for it than the sum he actually received. “I did not particularly care what Maguire might do,” Belasco told me, “when he heard about the matter. I felt that I could get along much better without him than he could without me (I always did for Maguire far more than ever I got paid for!), but he cooled off after he got home, and I resumed work, for a little while, at the Baldwin.”
Belasco’s published recollections of the circumstances of Wallack’s removal from the Thirteenth Street house and of the importance to that manager of his presentation of “La Belle Russe” require revision to make them accurate. He says:
“The stage history of ’La Belle Russe’ is interesting. Wallack had opened his theatre with ’Money,’ which had been followed by a play by Pinero. He had met with failure all along the road, and his heart began to question whether he was right in forsaking his old ground on Thirteenth Street and in moving so far up-town. ’La Belle Russe,’ put on hurriedly, as a last forlorn hope, retrieved his fortunes. It called a spade a spade and did not show any reticence, the papers declared, and they flayed it as hard as ever they could. There was one exception, and that was Edward A. Dithmar, of ’The New York Times.’ He said it was a new era among plays, and, although he was not a prophet, he put his finger on the elements that achieved success, and this was long before the day of ’The Second Mrs. Tanqueray.’ Bronson Howard, at the height of his success, declared, in a public lecture, that it was a model of construction, and confessed that he had already seen it seventeen times, each evening discovering some new technical excellence in it. I do not want to appear boastful; the facts of the theatre are no longer personal after they have been made known to the public.”
Bronson Howard was a man of talent, though his plays conclusively show that it was not of a high order and that his command of technical resource in dramatic construction was not remarkable: he may have required seventeen inspections of the drama in order to perceive its many practical merits as an histrionic vehicle: most experienced observers could, and did, discern them at one view. Belasco’s statements with regard to Wallack, above quoted, are not correct. Wallack did not open his Thirtieth Street theatre with “Money”: he opened it, January 4, 1882, with “The School for Scandal”: “Money” was not acted at that theatre till March 23, 1888,—though a play by A. W. Pinero, entitled “The Money Spinner,” was the second acted there, January 21, 1882. Wallack had not “met with failure all along the road.” He closed his theatre at Thirteenth Street with a presentation, under the management of Samuel Colville, of the English melodrama of “The World,” which ran there from April 11 to July 2, 1881, receiving eighty-four performances, and which gained gross receipts to the extent of about $65,000 (at the time, when prices were about half what they are now, an extraordinary profit): he produced another English melodrama, called “Youth,” at his new theatre, February 20, 1882, and this play ran till May 6: “La Belle Russe” was produced by Wallack on May 8, and it ran till the close of the season, June 28. The presentment of it there was a notably handsome one and was distinctly successful. Rose Coghlan was specially excellent in her evincement of agonizing apprehension beneath a forced assumption of calm, and by the denoted prevalence of an indomitable will over mental terror. This was the cast at Wallack’s:
| Captain Dudley Brand | Osmond Tearle. |
| Sir Philip Calthorpe | Gerald Eyre. |
| Monroe Quilton, Esq. | John Gilbert. |
| Roberts | C. E. Edwin. |
| Barton | H. Holliday. |
| Beatrice (Geraldine) | Rose Coghlan. |
| Lady Elizabeth Calthorpe | Mme. Ponisi. |
| Little Beatrice | Mabel Stephenson. |
| Agnes | Celia Edgerton. |
Belasco left New York in the latter part of December, 1881, and he arrived in San Francisco on Christmas Day. “Chispa,” by Clay M. Greene and Slason Thompson, was produced at the Baldwin Theatre on December 26 and it ran there for two weeks,—in the course of which Maguire returned home; the differences between him and Belasco were composed, and the latter was presently reinstalled in his familiar place at the Baldwin. On January 16, 1882, acting Matthias, in “The Bells,” W. E. Sheridan began a season there which lasted for seven weeks, during which he revived “Richelieu,” “Othello,” “Hamlet,” and other plays of the legitimate repertory which he had previously presented in San Francisco (November-December, 1800), and also “King John” and “The Fool’s Revenge.” The last-named tragedy was brought out on March 3, the first performance of it being given for the benefit of Belasco’s old friend and teacher, Mrs. “Nelly” Holbrook.
Sheridan’s season terminated on March 5, and, on the 7th, occurred the first performance of a new play constructed, while that season lasted, by Belasco in collaboration with the excellent and much respected Peter Robertson (1847-1911), long dramatic critic of “The San Francisco Chronicle.” It was called “The Curse of Cain,” and its more active author has written of it as follows: