Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-04-28
THE OIL WELL DRAMA.
Tragedian keene Recalls His Early
Campaigns About Pittsburg'
AN OIL AN'SPORTABLE THEATER.
Interesting RecollectiOns of 10 Sefton's
Stock Company.
ALOCAL LAERTES WATERY GRAVE

t'Wheu an actor gets to be as old as / am
he foreets many things" observed Thomas
w. Keene. the tragedian, as he sat in the
corridor Of the Hotel Anderson, the other
evening. ''but if should live to be as old
as the traditions of Memnon 1 could never
come to Pittsburg without recalling the days
of 1867 and 1868, when played in the stock
company here, with 10 Seton, in the
building which stood where Harris Theater
now stands. There were Jo Seton and his
wife. Annie Seton, and Mrs. LIE Forrest
and Oliver Doud Byron. and the O'Neil
girls in the company, but Seton himself
was the central figure.
"After the regular season Seton would
send me out into the oil regions starring.
/ was PLAYING Hamlet, Macbeth and Rich
ard III. then for the princely salary of SIG
a week, and furnishing my own wardrobe.
remember we'll the first town We struck
after leaving PIttsburg. 1t was Pleasant
willie. By the way, there was a Pittsburg
boy along with us named Harrison, now in
the glass business, 1 understand. But more
of him anon.
LOOKING FOR THE TOWN.
"Well, we reached Pleassntville. Alight-
ing from the train 1 walked around and
could discern only two buildings, one evil
IDENTIFY a hotel, the other a store.
"tWhere is the theater?' L asked of a
man who seemed to comprise the population
OF Pleasantville.a
" 1T will be here all right by the time
YOU are ready to play, this evening, replied
the population, coolly.
Well, but where are the people to play
top
"'Oh. they'll be here all right
81 took his word for it. Indeed, that
seemed to be the only thing in the vicinity
to take, and 1 had to be satisfied with it.
Ny confidence was not misplaced, either, for
along in the afternoon came a number of
diggers from Housewife, where the wells had
played out, bringing the theater with them,
along with their tools and other baggage. 1t
took them less than an hour to rap up the
light board shell, which constituted their
Temple of Thespis. So, there was my
theater. But was still at a loss to know
where nv audience was coming from, with
only two houses in view.
AN AUDIENCE ON DECK.
"Night came on, however, and a sight
was presented to one poor and hungry actor
that he will never forget. Out from behind
the derricks, along the little hills twinkled
an apparently innumerable number of Ian
terms From places where one would never
dream of human habitation thronged the
hardy miners, and long before L was ready
to step upon the stage there were 600 or 200
people in the theater.
"Well, we gave them Richard" and
more enthusiastic audience you never saw.
had sent to a tinshop in Titusville for
some sheets of tin, from which we cut little
circular pieces and fashioned our armors,
and tell you Richmond and the crookback
showed up as glittering warriors. That
night was Sll right. But the next we es-
sayed Hamlet" and that was mistake.
IN wATERY GRAVE.
1.-THE miners had pitched our theater over
a little brook. Heavy rains during the fore
noon mad swollen the stream, and in the
scene where LGerteS jumps into the grave of
Ophelid we had catastrophe. Young Har-
rison, of Pittsburg. whom mentioned, was
LderteS. The trapdoor in the floor was open
for the grave. Laertes took his desperate |
jump. There was a splash a cry and |
scream from the audience. LaerteS had
immersed himself in the swollen stream,
and it took the efforts of half the audience
to rescue him from his watery grave before
he could go on with the performance.
"There were a number of little mishaps
like this, but, Notwithstanding them, we
PLAYED to good business in the oil settle
nents for 43 weeks, and when we came
back to Pittsburg 10 Seton made me pres
ent of 5000 in addition to nv salary, which
was more money than had ever seen to-
gether before"
Mr.. Keene plays six weeks more this sea-
sou, and goes to Winnipeg. He will open
next season in California with new play
by Arden Smith. 1t is entitled "Launce-
lot" The story of the play differs from
Tennyson's in so far as to enable Elaine to
entirely recover his health, and to prove
tam celat mot guilty as charged in tine in
dictmeut,''