Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-10-19
DRAMATIC EVOLUTION.
CAUSES FOR THE POPULARITY OF
LIGHT ENTERTAINMENTS.
How Opera Bouffe and Negro Minstrelsy
Affected the stage-suggestions for
the Future.

Dramatic evolution is a term new 10
those who find their bread and butter a:
players, but it is fact, as much as scien-
tifc evolution is, and for similar reasons
But dramatic evolution is strange thing
and not often comprehended or even OBJ
served by the members of the profession o,
by the public. Nevertheless, it is full O.
interest and has as many positive and
startling phases as scientific or even ESQ
teric evolution.
Few people have stopped to ask them
selves how opera bouffe, opera comique
| farce-comedy and scenic melodrama have
| come about within the past few years, and
how they have assumed their present
mammoth proportions.
! They have been the natural conse
I quences of a very natural evolution, which
can be logically explained and justified.
Everybody has been writing more OF
! less about Dion Boucicault, and praising
or belittling him, as was thought best; but
| venture to say that very few OF these
writers have considered him as the pro-
duct, or one of the products, of dramatic
evolution, which he undoubtedly was.
| Mr.. Boucicault was born to the profes.
sion as Lee Morton at a time when the
English stage was suffering from diet oi
dramatic chestnuts and dearth of fresh
food for starving public. 1t had passed,
so to speak, through tunnel, and was just
emerging into daylight without an engi-
neer, or even fremen competent to keep ii
going, when Boucicault came upon the
scene and took in the situation. Mr.
Boucicault always was masterful in situa-
tions and equal to any emergency; so he
turned at once into practical industry and
| wrote London Assurance comedy Of
| the hour, men, women and modes-and OBJ,
; tanned instant recognition.
You see, at that time the theater-going
public loved and relished comedy, especi.
! ally of the school of Sheridan, Congreve
Goldsmith and kindred geniuses. and were
ready to accept something new in that
vein from anybody. London Assurance
was therefore received by those epicures
with as much favor as a new vintage o.
wine with pleasant bouquet, yet entitled
/ to classification with older brands or Ia
, bells.
| Later on and all through life, l might
! say, Dion Boucicault was selected by fate
; and circumstances to be the creature ol
dramatic evolution, and his own account
of the birth of his principal successes justi.
feS my claim. The "Colleen Bawn" was
written because there was nothing else to
be had Lied Astray,"" ""Arrah Ma Pogue,'
"The Shaughraun," and other great works
were brought into being to save theatrical
managers from disaster, at times when
/ there was no other dramatist to write for
them and nothing but old plays to draw
upon. Yes, Mr. Boucicault was evolved
by the processes that evolve all things in
nature, beginning at the decay Of what
was the termination of the new life in the
sty of decadence the budding and as
sumption of integrity, and the final frui.
ton and appearance of the newly evolved
product under the incubation and revul-
sion of necessity.
! And so it has ever been. All things
that are became entities by reason oi
natural evolution, let the causes be what
/ they might. 1t is with the causes, SO far
as they apply to the present condition Of
| the local stage, that / have to do in this
article
l was standing in front of the Broadway
Theater speaking to a well-known man
ager, who is connected with another house
! He said that the success Of ''The Merry
Monarch" was phenomenal because of the
character of the entertainment. "Do you
know he said, "that there is nothing
absolutely new in the production, except
perhaps the mise en- scene and some Of the
dresses. You don't agree with me? o.
course not. But let me say to you that al
every step of the entertainment | recog
say, l am reminded of old friends-pieces
which used to make the public laugh year:
ago, and that were written for the down
town theaters by that oddly versatile
| genius, John F. Poole. You smile again
But | am speaking correctly. | see bits O
business and suggestions which recall
| who Owns the Line? The Slippery Day
and half dozen other pieces which made
me and thousands laugh heartily when
was boy"
This seemed plausible enough, and SCI
me to thinking on the subject of dramatic
evolution and filled me with astonishment
| too, at the logical sequence of theatrica
entertainments. Looking backward with
my friend, not with Mr.. Bellamy, l dis
covered that the shows the critics con
denim and the public patronize to-day are
! the natural results of the past twenty
years of the dramatic work in New York
Take "The Merry Monarch" first, as
J lo,-n - firct o,N1 fol1nu- ha nj,
in direct line to its source, and you will
find that it is only the New York extract
of the opera boufie of Paris, the burlesqus
of Lydia Thompson's and Elsie Holt:
British blondes and the farcial extrava
ganza of Gotham itself. "The Merry
Monarch" has for its foundation the fun
! frolicsome measures and grotesquerie of it:
first two bases allied with the humor O.
| the American charcoal sketches Of thing:
local and journalistically current.
1t became fact through dramatic evo
luton here, and has succeeded because O
its legitimacy. Only the illegitimate off
spring of the dramatic period are shor
lived, and are dethroned by the public i
they are allowed to reign even for week
| ''T6e Merry Monarch" is a sovereign il
It's own right, hence its presence on the
stage.
Opera bouffe at the Casino has been re-
vived in a measure, but not in toto, tc
please those who may be termed old fogie:
or Francomanlacs, and the younger gener
alton, who have heard the tunes on the
barrel organs, but have never seen the
great original performances by Grau's
| Bateman's and other managers troupes.
When opera boufie was popular in New
York seventeen years ago it seemed tc
have taken hold Of the senses as well as o.
the fancies of the public At that time !
as well as others, believed that opera
| bouffe had come TO stay, and so it bad, fol
notwithstanding its disappearance as ar
integer from the stage for a few years. il
was found in fragments and in color dis.
| tributed throughout the profession Every
A nerican burlesque, every English ex-
travaganza was the child or wore some
part of the garb of the opera bouffe until
at this very hour the latter disports itsel
as "Mme. Angot" at the Casino and as
eThe Merry Monarch" in part at the
Broadway Theater. Dramatic evolution
has given us both and leaves no doubt as to
the truth of its existence.
The farce-comedy has been evolved from
negro minstrelsy, and the variety business
itself is only the product Of the old Eng
lish forms OF entertainment by individuals,
which, in turn, had been imported from