Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1891-04-17
ANY ONE CAN BE AN ACTOR.
Comedian Sol Smith Russell Tells of the
Trials of Theatrical Life.

Trials of Theatrical Life.
"Queer idea the public has of stage folk
and their life" said Sol Smith Russell.
'The opinion is almost universally held
that theatrical people live in the most lux
urious fashion, eat pie every ten minutes
and never do any work. The hards lips of
travel, the hours of soul wearying rehears-
ais and study, and the thousand and one
trials that beset the actors life are not rec
ognized because they do not appear in the
performance. They are behind the scenes,
and therefore not movable to the public.
But they exist and are very narrowing.
/ remember little incident which
brought all this home to me. In making a
jump between large cities it was necessary
to put in a week among the smaller towns
playing one night in a town. We had
played in one place, and after the perform
ance had packed everything for fitting to
the next stop, and were ready to go to the
train, which was due at midnight. When
we arrived at the station, however, we
found that the train was late.
How lateY we inquired.
"'Don't know said the comforting in
dividual at the station. May be one hour,
may be two; might be three
eve didn't dare go back to the hotel to
sleep because of the uncertainty of the
time when the train would come along, so
we sat around the waiting room, miserably
tired and sleepy, trying to find comfortable
positions on the barbarous seats.
"We waited there until nearly o'clock,
and at last the train came and we bounded
aboard, disguised, cross, sour The run to
our next town was something less than
two hours, so we could not sleep on the
train except to catch enough of a nap to be
aggravating and wholly discomposing 1t
was about o'clock when we turned out
of the car at the town where we were to
amuse folks that evening. 1t was the gray
of dawn, and in the pale light we were
CHASTITY lot. The baggage smashers hurled
our trunks and boxes out upon the plat
form with gleeful savagery, and as looked
about for some sort of hack to take us to a
hotel | heard the station agent, who was
assisting the baggageman to get our
trunks out, say to the trainman:
"'What is all this baggage anyway"
"'Oh,' said the baggage man, with in
finite disgust in his tone, 1T belongs to
some show company, | reckon. Anything
to get out of workin'.'
"'That's a fact, blame 'em,' growled the
station agent, and | smiled wan smile,
and went and informed the company that
we would have to walk with our hand bag
/
thing to get out of working! Dear me, if
| had told that story to the company l
think the station agent would have been
mobbed
"On another occasion, some years ago
now, played in small town, and did not
| leave until noon OF the following day. In
| the forenoon an elderly countryman saw
me about the hotel office, and after some
| little hesitation came up and said:
"'Be you the man that played last night
at the opry houseY
81 told him was the culprit.
Names Russell, aren't its'
81 said it was.
"'Well want to speak to you about a
| boy o. mine I've tried to make a farmer
of him, an I've 'prenticed him out twice to
learn trades. even put him in livery
stable an in a hardware store, but it want
no use. | hain't been able to make nothin'
of him. When l seen you last night
kinder thought maybe he'd make good
actor. He's pretty much the same kind of
a fool you be-
II took this guleless person into cor
ner and told him lies, for which | am still
doing penance. | assured him that the
stage was just the thing for his son; that
it required no intelligence, no mental bal
ance, no sort of acumen whatever to be a
successful actor; that it was something
anybody could do without half trying, and
that it was of all professions the most
gilded, luxurious and profitable in the
known world. He seemed to believe it
too. The Lord forgive mel But that's a
fair illustration the way we actor folk are
misjudg ed. "-Chicago Post.