The age-herald., 1900-05-20
THEATRE SEASON HAS
 NOT BEEN AGOLD MINE
Grand Opera, Paderewski, Maud Adams and Others Reap the Big
 gest Rewards But Many Suffer.

players were changed several times in or der to win back waning favor. The sea- son began with Daniel Frohman's regular company, an organization of remarkable completeness, homogeneity, talent and in- telhgence. That excellent troupe of per formers presently made way for another company, headed by MT Reeves-Smith and Elsie De Wolfe, but fortune still withheld its smiles, and a third company, composed of English comedians, was imported The strangers did better than our own actors, yet even they closed the season earlier than was expected.
 The experiences of the Lyceum were, in considerable measure, those of the Empire which had to fall back on revivals, and Daly's, which now is enjoying it's greatest prosperity of the year in a resumption of "A Runaway Girl''
 ''As with the stock, so with many other companies. William H. Crane, hitherto an unfailing favorite in town, played a dis astrous engagement at Wallack's. Stuart Robson, who has almost as many friends met misfortune during his earlier visit, and barely retrieved himself by the later production of "Oliver Goldsmith" Helena Modjeska sounded all the depths and shal- lows of theatric woe during her season in the Fifth Avenue and that house drove out its manager, Edward Knowles, who, after four years of tenancy, was glad to surrender his theater to Proctor's yaude- vile.
 George Lederer abandoned the New York, Andrew Mccormack deserted the Broadway, and Roster and Bials, in it's vain effort to find prosperity, changed man. agement half a doen times Certain chroni- clers of the drama who are of an optim- istic, not to say brainless, quality, will bob up presently with their usual cheerful ar gument that everything succeeded during the season of 1S99-19OO But facts are facts, and these are awkward ones.
 Opeza's Great Year
 "A great deal of money, however, was spent for entertainment, the difference in it's investment being that much of it went to the favored few, while the neglected many went hungry. Grand opera took the largest individual amount MT. Grau lost by his attempt to educate Chicago but he gathered in nearly a million dollars at the Metropolitan, and his engagement in the east generally paid d large profit. Alto gether the money paid TOT grand opera amounted to within fraction of S1,500,000, and after paying all the expenses of his venture Maurice Grau is more than $100, 900 in 2ocket.
 'An even greater winner was Ignace Paderewski, whose profits from his Ameri- can tour reached the prodigious sum of $250OOO. These figures, 1t might almost be said, represents the box office receipts, for
 
 to nothing, and ninety-five cents out of every dollar paid for tickets goes into his bank account. Paderewski is a human Klondike and goldener than Cape Nome.
 Among actors the most prosperous Is Sir Henry Irving At 8 a seat nearly $5O0 900 has been paid out to see the famous Eng lishman and his leading woman, Ellen Terry This represents a large income to Sir Henry. His expenses are comparatively modest. The highest-priced player in the Lyceum company is Miss Terry, who re- ceives f100 or $500, week, all the year round. The organization is English, and English actors are more modest in their demands than Americans. Many of them would be glad of an engagement in this celebrated training school for little more than their living expenses. Considering one thing with another, Sir Henry is finishing the greatest season in financial earnings he has ever known. His American record un- til now has been personal profit of S75, ,O00 This year he will probably carry home $115,- GOO.
 Mrs. Carter's Prosperity
 Next in order of prosperity is Zaza In this role Mrs. Leslie Carter at once leaped into fame and fortune that have at present no rival on the American stage. With the exception of a short holiday at Bar Harbor and brief period of illness soon after her season began, she has been playing con- tinuously to crowded houses. Since last September more than $350 900 has been paid to see her impassioned art.
 By it's own announcements Zen Hur' has made more in less time, but the early Christians were not of much account in actuarial science, and we must accept their figures with grain of salt. It takes hard squeezing to get a 5000 audience packed into the Broadway, yet in his 19i performances Ben Hur maintains that he took in more than $400,000 which would be considerably above 5000 night.
 Actors mathematics need revision. Here is Lady Babbie declaring calmly that s2,00a