The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1897-04-18

young and old, high and law, rich and
poor, TO write plays. The number OF plays
produced in San Francisco alone would
supply the world with dramatic novelties,
and fresh as pirants for play wrights laurels
are always bobbiug up serenely, generally
among people one would least suspect
of any desire 10 follow in William Shake
speare's footsteps.
No one in the dramatic profession is
cleverer or more observing than Miss
Georgia Cayvan, and to her l apply for
information on the play writing epidemic
Miss Cayvan's prompt reply is that she
divides the world into two Catastrophe
who write plays and people who do not
and on the whole she thinks the former
class predominates.
IF any one would dare to tell the truth
to dramatists it would DO so much good,
she says with a smile that would soften
the bitterest truth and make It seem al
most pleasant fiattery. THE mass of
knowledge that is not possessed by
dramatists is vast very vast, but it would
be no use 10 presume TO point out the truth
to playwrights; they would become in
dignant at once. l continually receive
plays that bear all the earmarrs of having
been the round of many managers, and
am told what tiattering remarks each
has made, but evidently no one has
pointed out the faults. If this play has
escaped all the big managers, can it be any
use TO me? l wonder; but read it, if it is
typewriter, for goo1 plays are very diff
cult 10 procure, and one never dares 10
turn anything away. l carry manuscript
about with me and glance at it in odd
moments, but l have never had anything
frA ,l-,0 I-o,,
l should certainly have produced it. 1
mention as curious fact, not as an in
stance of my perspicuitv, that none of The
plays l have passed by have ever been
Kfterward produced with any success"
Miss Cayvan likes to read play in cold
type, and has horror of letting dram
atist read his work to her. "Play wrights
continually expect appreciation" she says.
II once let Robert Buchanan read one of
his works to me, and he went through it
with an air of, If you don't admire this,
you must be a born IDIOT
do you think the dramatist of the fu-
ture is likely to begin life as an actor?"
L ask. The dramatist OF the future is
more likely to be q woman than a man."
replies Miss Cayvan. Play writing is
falling so rapidly into the hands of
women. Just at present the profession is
in state of transition. The strong popu-
lar tendency toward the vaudeville Stage
makes me think that perhaps the great
pay of the future will combine the vaude-
vile and the spectacular with the dra-
matte; but there, again, You can never
ted, fashion changes so rapidly. It is
getting more and moro difficult TO find
the universal drama-piays of the class of
Camille and The Two Orphans'-that
appeal to people of all classes and nation
alities. The drama seems to be growing
more sectional, and French plays are more
and more difficult to translate and adapr, SO
America must look to Americans for its
plays
Quite recently Miss Cayvan was in
Europe for ten months, and practically
saw all the new plays, but she did not
admire any OF them enough to want TO
purchase. Her ambition is TO get good
American play. There are wonderful
periods for costume drama in American
history" she says refiectively. THE
period antedating the Revolution, for in
stance, when Washington was looked on
as dlsturber of the peace and when
fathers were beginning to turn against
sons and sons against fathers. The old
Virginia life holds great dramatic posi-
blllties, but it has been scarcely touched"
And all your labors in reading voluntary
contributions have been hopeless?" / ask.
Quite hopeless" replies Miss Cayvan
Tesignedly. Sometimes there are grains
OF merit in works submitted to me by IN
known authors, and l think this can be
nxed, but we soon find that an attempt to
reVamp the thing produces a hopeless
muddle, and we have to give up in des pair
but do not pass anything over, Cor who
knows when pearl may be found
among the chaff? and good plays are
hard, very hard, to get"
1t is not only stars like Mss Cayyan who
receive plays by the bushe Local stock
companies and managers of theaters are
deluged with them, and their cry is the
same as Miss Cayvan's, Nothing worth
producing" "Playsp says genial Al
Morgenstern of the Baldwin. III YOU
had been half an hour earlier l could have
shown you man with a blood-and-thun-
der drama-'Orotanski, the Dynamiter.'
He oblig1ngly said that We might have it
for 10 per cent royalty, and it would not
cost us more than $500 to paint the seem
cry. People come here all the time with
anything, but they imagine we have
pull with the travelling companies" And
then l am told q whimsical experience
that befell Otis Skinner the other day. He
received a play from San Diego with
name known to fame on the titie-page.
II am Colonel Robert Shakespeare. wrote
the San Diego playwright, "a collateral
descendant of William Shakespeare, and
l shall expect extra payment on account
of my name" From all accounts Robert
has not inherited the transce ndent genius
OF William Tor play writing.
find Manager Belasco sitting in his
office at the Alcazar, which is too small to
swing kitten in, much less the proven bal
cat. He makes his headquarters in the
smallest hole and corner available, with
the fell design OF keeping ont more than
one amateur dramatist at time. do
you receive many manuscript plays?" ask
from the doorway, wondering whether
my crowding in the office will necessiiate
Arthur Lotto, the business manager, hav-
ing to wriggie out. Belasco starts so vio-
lently that he would fall out of his revolv-
ing chair If there were any other space to
receive him, but ne is between Scylia and
Chary bdis, or between the desk and the
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