Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-09-29
LONDON MUSIC HALLS.
Magnificent Structures and Topical
Songs to Catch the Public.
A NIGHT WITH KING M'DERM0TT.
Footlight Favorites Who Feel the Pulse Of
the People.
A PEERS BRIDE ON THE STAGE
A NIGHT WITH KING M'DERMOTT.
A PEERS BRIDE ON THE STAGE
WRITTEN FOR THE DIsPATcH.l

WRITTEN FOR THE DIsPATCH.1
The entrance to most of the theaters in
London is as inconspicuous at night as a
lighted shop front, the managers seemingly
thinking that it pays better 10 rent the
greater part of their front to the proprietors
of restaurants and cigar divans who crowd
out the bills OF the play with menus of table
d'hote dinners for three and six and colored
advertisements of Turkish cigarettes.
But the music halls of London want all
the room they can get.
From the high bronze urns on their roofs
flames of gas lick up the evening fog and
signal back to the dignIfed white lamp on
the tower Of the House OF Commons that
their people too are still sitting. Their win
dows and half fronts of stained glass blaze
out over colored awnings, uniformed and be-
medaled servants crowd the steps and side
walks in superfuuus numbers and velvet
carpets lead invitingly up broad stairways
to foyer hung with silk curtains.
The music halls are at night the real peo-
ple's palaces, and though the queens who
rule in them are numerous they have but
one King. He has reigned now for 20 years
and is called the Great McDermott. 5. ii.
McDermott is his name.
find that the average strangers IDEA of
q music hall is place where one sits at q
sloppy table and views q variety perform
Rnce dimly through a cloud of tobacco
smoke to an accompaniment of elinking
beer glasses. He may fad it hard to con-
ciliate this idea with the fact that the Shah
visited one of these palaces, the Empire
Music Hall, with the English royalties and
he can hardly believe that three of the halls
in the West End are largera and as handsome
as any theater in the States; that one en-
ploys 600 people, and that if he went into
certain parts of these halls in anything but
evening dress he would feel very much out
of it
A NIGHT WITH M'DERMoTr.
The king of the music halls came down
the steps of the hotel at 9 o'clock one night
just as his royal hrougham drew up in front
Of them and my democratic hanson turned
the corner.
I'VE are all in very good time" said His
Majesty graciously. He was in evening
dress with an Inverness cloak hanging from
his shoulders and in his hand be carried q
blonde wig, his only article of makeup.
"The Pavilion" be said to the driver.
81 am only doing three turns tonight" he
continued as the brougham rolled toward
the musI' hall. ''The Pavilion, the Royal
and the Charing Cross. But they will give
you an idea Of the different sorts of halls and
the different artists
On the stage the King of the Music Halls
looks like man OF 25. He is probably
about 80. Twenty years ago he introduced
q new song, which said that 1--WE don't want
to fight, but, by Jingo, if we do, etc., etc.
The people who felt that way came to join
in the chorus, the papers quoted it and
when an honorable member of the Lower
House rose and recited it in Parliament it
became famous. And so McDermott gave
q new word to political nomenclature and a
new title to the Conservative party and soon
became as famous as the song. Since then
almost every good comic song that you have
heard has had him Tor a sponsor. He has
his pick Of the best songs just as a good
jockey has his choice of the best mounts.
The brougham escaped from the circular
puzzle of moving vehicles in PiccadIlIy
Circus and drew up at the stage door of the
pavilion. As we descended, three men, in
the fantastic get-up of a knocka bout negro
act hurried out OF the stage entrance and
jumped into waiting four wheeler.
How r Mac" called one of them in a
cockneY accent that came very strangely
from black face. "We've taken ali the
laugh outot that house. You're too late"
A young girl closely veIled and wrapped
in long dolman got out of hanson and
followed us in. McDermott raised his hat
and the girl nodded. Late as usual"
She said impatiently, Il got blocked on the
Surrey side. 1t seems to me they're always
tearing mp those streets" As she spoke she
whipped of the veil and bonnet and let the
| dolman drop from her shoulders. Her
Nshoulders were bare and very, very pretty,
and her skirts were short and fashioned
alter those introduced in the States BY the
Gaiety Company. Her name is Lottie Con-
nors, and she dances almost as well as Lefty
Lind. There is more abandon and less of
grace, but she gives one very good idea of
how very good a music hall dancer is.
ELEGANCE AND EASE
From the wings l could see that the house
was as richly decorated as a theater could
well be. There were no tables, an unob-
trusive brass ledge on the back of the seats
serving TO hold the glasses, and the tobacco
smoke was drawn out OF the way through
an opening in the root. The seats in the
balconies only extended few rows back,
the balcony being given over to a prom
enade, where men and women walked on
heavy velvet carpets or lounged in arm
2 chairs, or over the railing that separated
the lobby from the seats. In the boxes
that lined the first balcony were many
theater parties, the women without bounets
and in evening dress. In the gallery and
in the promenade that surrounded the stalls
and pit were the ubiquitous 'Arrits from
the banks and shops who give most of the
lie to that part of a music halls perform
ance, and it is a very large part, which
takes place before the curtain.
One of McDermott's songs gave these
young men q chance to express themselves.
In it he said that he had asked Mr.. Glad
stone how he came to lose his place. A
somewhat delicate question for even so dis
tinguished a monarch as the McDermott to
ask. but the Grand Old Man answers
graciously:
IAN for the sake Of Ireland, all for the Emer-
aid Isle.
I've seen the world and my friends grow cool,
In myeld, old age they call me fool;
But III live to see Ireland gain home rule,
And they'll give me back my place"
Not satisfied with this, McDermott asks
Lord Salisbury in the next verse how he
thinks Gladstone lost his place, and is
courteously informed that it was due to his
love of power.
What cares he for the Unions rightsf
The Lb'ral party he disuuites;
For what?-for the votes of the Parnellites.
That's why be lost his place"
These two verses have the effect of stirring
up all the Conservatives and Liberals in
the house, or at least the very lars part OF
them who like to make noise, and the En-
glishman, for one who poses as a seli-con-
tanned individual, can get more excited and
make himself more conspicuous in public
place than any other representative of any
other nation. The hooung, bowling and
kissing having drowned the applause, or
vice versa, the song is continued. In
lea it is possible that a well delivered line
or song bearing on the political situation
might stir up the audience to sope tenn
porarv degree of applause or disapproyal