Behind the Footlights

—A French Claque—Three Ominous Raps—Strike of the Orchestra—Parisian Theatre Customs—Programmes—Late Comers—The Matinée Hat—Advertisement dro

cares to erect his own m

for notoriety, who can tell? Was it not one of our dukes who built a charming crematorium for the benefit of the public, and beside it one for himself, the latter to be given over to general use after he h

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ris she has placed her tomb. It is a solid stone structure, like a large sarcophagus, but it is supported on four arches, so tha

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the world has ever known. What is lacking in the length

Morts, 1902, and innumerable people paid homage to i

y, there are moments when she seeks solitude as

r as theatrical matters are concerned she lives in another sphere. That is part of her holiday. It is not a holiday of rest, for she never rests; i

ayette, New

H BERNHARDT

distance, and her aim is generally deadly. Another favourite entertainment is to shrimp. She takes off her shoes and stockings and for a couple of hours will stand in the water shrimping, for her “resting” is as energetic as everything el

mires works of art—works of art are about her, for she has achieved her own posit

with her son. This game is a kind of draughts, and often during their two months’ holiday-making she and her only child Maurice will amuse themselves in this way for two or three hours in the afternoon; generally she wins, much to her joy. She simply lov

r is life. He has married a clever woman, a descendant of a Royal house, and has a boy and two girls adored by their grandmother almost as much as their f

lways looks cool in the white she invariably wears. She wants an active life, and if her brain is not working her body must be, so she play

e reading a novel being her only time of repose during her summer holiday. She walks when she has nothing else to do, and rambles for miles around her s

and “guess” games are all the fashion, games which she cleverly arranges to suit the children. No evening dresses are allowed, nor décolleté frocks; except for flowers and well-cooked food, Madame l

ng, to which she attributes much of her good health. Fishermen throw nets for the evening’s catch, but “Sarah” is most energetic in hauling them in, and gets wildly excited at a good haul. Her unfailing energy is thrown even into the fishing, and she will stay out till the s

ofession. After[Pg 156] a rest, however, she fortunately changed her mind, or the stage would have lost one of the greatest actresses the world has known. Perhaps the apotheosis of her lif

ork of poets. I have struggled as no other human being has struggled.... I have ardently longed to climb the topmost pinnacle of my art. I have not yet reached it. By far the smaller part of my life remains for me to live;

e who think they have seized it must court failure from that moment

prefers milk to anything. Perhaps this is the reason of her perpetual youth. She loves her holiday, she loves the simple life of the country,[Pg 157] the repose

of draughts. She always wears white, even in the theatre, and looks as smart as though at a party instead of on business bent. Dresses are brought her for inspection, she alters, changes, admires, or deplores as fancy takes her; she arranges the lighting, decides a little more blue or a little less green will give the tone required; but then she has that inner knowledge of harmony and the true painter spirit. She is never out of tune. At six high-tea is served in her dressing-room, for she rarely leaves the theatre. The meal consists mostly of fish—lobster, crab, cray-fish, shrimps, scallops cooked or raw—with a little tea a

behind a French claque. That claque was terrible, but the actress was so wonderful I

laque, nothing more or less than a paid body of men whose duty it was to ap

he received ￡12 a month, or ￡3 a week, for “clapping” when required. He was a person of great importance. Though disliked by the public, he was petted and feasted by actors and actresses, for

relief in the absence of the original claque, and gradually one theatre after another began to dispense with a nuisance it had endured for long. History says that during the early days of the claque there was an equally obnoxious institution, a sort of organised opposition known as siffleurs. It was then as fashionable to whistle a p

s to say, in May, 1899. We were so anxious to see her first performance, however, that we decided to stay an extra day. So far all was well, but not a single ticket could be obtained. Here was disappo

ic[Pg 160] at beholding our distress, and finall

t you will see and hear

finding ourselves beside Jupiter and Mars, Venus or

er in the centre of the front row. The middle one had a marked book—fancy Shakespeare’s Hamlet marked for

e those men made at Hamlet was deafening. The excitement of the leader lest the play should not go off well on a first night was terrible—and if their hands were not sore, and their arms did not ache, it was a wonder indeed. They were so app

racks, the heat equal to Dante’s Inferno, and no sweet music[Pg 161] soothes the savage breast, o

orchestras at the theatres. A few years previously there could not have been a strike, for the sufficient reason there were no orchestras; but gradually our plan of having music during

sixteen hundred members. During the strike I chanced to be present at a theatre where there was generally an orchestra—that night one small cottage piano played by a lady usurped its place. She manage

g 162] and that is because they are allowed to “deputise”; when there is a grand concert at the St. James’s Hall or elsewhere, provided they find some one to take their place in their own orchestra, they may go and play. Consequently, when there is a big concert s

tra, sir, and have b

new your face; but I am accustomed

stra is hidden under the stage, a

and pester for wraps. It is difficult to know which is the worse evil, to cling to one’s belongings in the small space allotted each member of the audience, or to let one of those women take them away. In the latter case before the last act she returns with a great deal of[Pg 163] fuss, hands over the articles, and demands her sous. If the piece be only in three acts, one pays for being free of a garment for two of them and is annoyed by its presence during the t

ion, therefore, does not mean that the management are out of pocket. Why, then, do they not present them gratis? As things are it is most aggravating. Suppose two ladies arrive; as they are shown to their seats, holding their skirts, opera-bags and fans in their h

openly declare they never go to a theatre because they have not got room for their knees. This is certainly much worse in Parisian theatres, where the se

, “Ladies who cannot, or are unwilling to, remove their hats while occupying seats in this theatre, are requested to leave at once; their money will be returned at the box office.” A gentlewoman never wears a picture hat at the play; if she arrives in o

curtain descends literally covered with pictures and puffs of pills, automobiles, corset

or Dame aux Caméllias, deprived of her train appeared quite tiny. She had the neatest legs, encased in black silk stockings, the prettiest feet with barely any heel to give her height, while her flaxen wig which hung upon her shoulders, made her look a youth, in the sixteenth century clothes she elected to wear. At first I felt woefully disappointed;

. Immediately below the Royal pair sat Ophelia, and at her feet, upon a white polar-bear-skin rug, reclined Sarah Bernhardt, with her elbow upon Ophelia’s knee and her hand upon some yellow cushions. As the play went on she looked up to catch a glimpse of the King, but he was too high above her, the wall of the platform hid him from view. Very

on her uncle’s face she gave a shriek of triumph, a perfectly fiendish shriek of joy, once heard never to be forgotten, and springing down from her post, rushed to the torch footlights, and seizing one in her hand stood in the middle of the stage, her back to the audienc

traight out before her, a book lying idle upon her lap, and murmured, mots, mots, or again, when she came in through the a

dame Bernhardt wrote

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is quand il y a du monde il parle;

’il est irrésolu et faible, mais parcequ’il est tenace et logique; il veut le tuer dans le péché, non dans le repentir, car il veut qu’il aille en enfer, et pas au ciel. On veut absolument voir, dans Hamlet, une ame de femme, hésitante, imponderée; moi, j’y vois l’ame d’un homme, résolue m

le plus criminel; mais il ne le tue que lorsqu’il est absolument s?r. Lorsqu’on l’envoie en Angleterre, à la première occasion qu’il rencontre il bondit tout seul sur un bateau ennemi

i Dieu n’avait pas défendu le suicide, il se tuerait par dé

son génie colossal, appartient à l’Univers! et qu’un cerveau Fran?

BERNH

le 16 Ju

here was nothing of the halting, hesitating woman abou

ng out her dagger, prepared to kill him. She said nothing, but her play was marvellous, her expression of hatred and loathing, her

ssing whether Hamlet ought to be fat or thin, struck one another in the face and finally ar

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n as Yorick’s skull, which is in the possession

Georg Brandes, of Copenhagen, Mr. Sydney Lee, of London, and he probably

from its appearance—a low, rambling old house with wide balconies, creeper-grown with roses, and honey-suckle hugging the porch. The dear old home was built more than a century ag

ghtful; no more polished gentleman ever walked this earth than Horace Howard Furness, the great American writer. His father was an intimate friend of Ralph Waldo

rare volumes. Some original MSS. of Charles Lamb, beautifully written and signed Elia, are there; a delightful sketch of Mary Anderson by Forbes Robertson; Lady Martin’s (Helen Faucit) own acting editions of the parts she played marked by herself; and in a special glass case lie a pair of grey gauntlet gloves, richly embroidered in silver, which were worn by Shakespea

mily went off to Philadelphia to see the dramatisation of one of Dr. Weir Mitc

rgy of Bj?rnsen. Here was repose and strength. Not an originator, perhaps, but a learned disciple. How he loved Shakespeare, with what reverence he

with such a mind. His work is the thing, for the man as a man I care nothing.” This

nner-table appointments were his choice. The soup-plates were of the rarest Oriental porce

for something that could not break—solid and plain, like myself, eh?” he chuckled. The

e was nearly forty years old when he gave up law and devoted himself to writing;

; but still an Englishwoman cannot help hoping that when he has done with them,

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