The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1900-08-15
PRESS AGENT is GONE.
YELLOW JOURNALISM KILLS OFF
THEATRICAL FEATURE.


Have to Hire Men TO Invent sensa-
tiOnaI Fakes-They Can Give
Hint Now and the Yellow Journals
Do the Rest-Attractions of All
Kinds Are Now Seized Upon by
such Newspapers for Sensational
Write-ups.
From the Chicago Inter Ocean.
The press agent expertly shifted the
toothpick from one side of his mouth to
the other without interruptng his flow of
conversation. For a second it seemed
suspended in the air and moved with his
tongue while he talked.
Still nothing doing" he said, with
begins TO look as if the demand for our
services isn't what it used to be. One
manager recently said he always engaged
his actors early in July because they were
! always so thin and haggard with sus-
pense if they hadn't got engagements by
that time that it took EN- month or two
to recover. Now if that's true of an actor
who has nothing to do but repeat what
other people have written, how much
! more important must II DE III my buSA-
ness, where a man not only has 10 rely
on his own brains. but has TO work to get
the results OF his efforts into the papers
afterward? Either of these things is by
| itself enough work for one man, but it's
| the press agents duty always to combine
! both branches OF the business, and then
he has TO walt around until month be-
| fore the season begins to get a job at
| that. I tell you ii jars me, and anything
~, he iOIgC
| Somehow or other l have the feeling
| that they don't want US now in the same
| old way that they used to. They don't
cry for u.s. In the best days of this bust
ness the press agent used to be IS i'm
| portant as the star. A manager engaged
| his agent before the ink was dry on his
| stars contract No man would think
about sending out a new play or new
| actor until he had a good press agent to
start ahead of him and SOW the necessary
seeds of interest But nowadays you'll
| fad that the managers trouble themselves
very little about the press agent They'll
| always take one in the end, but they don
pay him much, and they're always able
| to get him at any time without much
| trouble.
"Of course, they can't get man to do
| the sort of work that was wanted in the
old days. There were giants in the bust
ness then. They were well paid, and they
| deserved it, and a man who was press
agent in those days was somebody in the
| theatrical world, and stood in Importance
some where between the manager and the
| star. He hadn't been reduced to the
ranks of the also-rans, as he is to-day
| but he had a right to sit in the manager S
office if he wanted to- and the manager
was very glad to have him. That was the
| press agent of twenty years ago. He was
a legitimate business man, and he had a
right TO everything that came to him.
Killed by Yellow Journals.
yellow journalism and cheapening the
low journals would print any yarn that
| was brought to them and never ask any
questions. The trick was so easy that the
| managers couldn't see the use of paying
a man to do anything that took so little
trouble. To have a chorus girl bitten by
| a shark a Coney Island and to supply a
picture of her and the shark, too, didn I
take any more work than taking the fable
right into the newspaper office. The yell
lows were always willing and anxious to
| print it. Jobs of this kind got as cheap
os three or five dollars. and nowadays
they don't bring that price. The yellows
all do the press work of the chorus girls
and those little bit higher up in the
profession without wanting any pay al all.
find photographs of unknown soubrettes.
| Inconspicuous minor actresses. Now, all
that ii takes to accomplish this is to send
the photographs 10 the newspaper Offices.
Any Office boy can do that, and the work
really is high at 50 for the job.
The press agent of former times had to
do his work In a way that appealed to in
| telligent and careful men. He had to add
| some element of picturesqueness or bit
of novelty to his fake before 1t could get
into a paper where il would do any good
| But the yellows have never made any test
of that kind. They'll take anything that
| comes along. With no particular ability
| demanded in the men who do this kind OF
| work for them, the manag gers came to re-
gard the press agent in a wholly different
way From being an important function
| airy he dropped into a place far below that
j h formerly held. SO the yellow journals,
while they made his work easy for him at
the outset, finally did more TO reduce the
| value of the press agents services than
any other influence and to bring him down
to his present estate.
Il can only remember one case of real
| ly fine press work that has come under
my observation during the past ten years.
That was as good in its way as anything
| ever done In the palmy days of the pro-
fession. II established here foreign con-
cert hall singer who would never have
made any more impression than "A dozen
others of her kind if interest had not con-
| stantly been attracted to her in. the most
| sensational and novel way. She was kept
the heroine Of various exciting episodes
that We're all prepared with a sufficient
appearance Of probability to get into some
thing more than the yellow journals. That
was the sort Of thing that we all did in
the old days and IL was not regarded as
anything more than the duty of every
press agent. He would have been consid-
cred of very little account If he didn't do
something of the kind for everybody with
engaged him. That one year OF press work
gave the actress in question vogue that
made her at once as well known as II she
had acted here for decade
Methods Must Differ.
lone other cause for the decline of the
press agents power is to be found in the
doubtful value that managers have come
to put upon publicity Of a certain kind.
The concert hall singer | referred TO was
made in this country by the sort of adj
Vertising she received at the time OF her