The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-01-08
STAGE BRIDGE FALLS
SCORE or SINGERS RECEIVE sE-
 HI0Us INJURIES.
Audience Badly Frixhtened, but Panic is Averted by Poliee and Ushers, Assisted by Impressarfo Hein- rich ConreId.

New York, Jan. 7--More than twen- ty members of the chorus of the Met. ropolitan Grand Opera Company were seriously injured tonight by the col lapse of the bridge in the street scene in the opening act of Carmen" None of the principals was on the stage ai the time Of the accident and the unin. jured members of the chorus heroical- iy massed at the front of the stage and sang On in an attempt to prevent the public from learning what had happened.
 The curtain was rung down as soon as possible and Heinrich Conreid, the impressario. prevented panic by urg- ing the great audience to remain seat. ed and not be frightened. The seri- ously injured were removed to hospi' tals.
 In addition to these. twenty or thirty more members of the chorus were painfully hurt
 All Of the exits of the theatre were opened immediately after the accident. but scarcely half a dozen of the hand- somely dressed audience left their seats. Within fifteen minutes after the crash the performance was re- sumed and few persons In Che big the. atre realized how serious the accident had been
 The bridge fell ten minutes after the first curtain was rung up and while people were still crowding down the aisies to their seats. Many were standing. Mme. Arnaud was acting "Carmen" with a cast Including Mime. Ackta, Mime. Jacobe. Dippel Journet and Dufriche. The opera had attract ed the usual big Saturday night crowd. vigna was conducting. The opera had
 ~h nFs the stage.
 The scene represented 8 street in Seville with a bridge stretching from the suardhouse and the cigarette mak- CTS house at the right of the stage over to the stairs leading up to the castle at the left This structure had done service many times. It was a massive affair, built of heavy timbers, reinforced with steel beams. Most of the 12o members of the chorus were off the bridge at the time 1t collapsed. but there were twenty or thirty men and women dancing up and down the structure awaiting the entree of Car- men.
 without the slightest warning the bridge at the centre of the arch gave way and the grinding and crunching of timbers being torn asunder with the shrieks of the women drowned out the glad song of the chorus and the accompaniment of the orchestra.
 Women in the audience jumped to their feet sereapins and endeavoring to make their way out of their seats. The members of the chorus not on the bridge at the time Of the accident did not lose their heads and immediately came closer together to screen the scene from the audience.
 Fat ba aNfn nP fhA akWtAkraa Au and the groans of the men buried in the debris of the bridge and almost smothered by the bodies of their fel- lows who had been thrown on top of them, were heard throughout the house.
 Then MT. Conreid and his stage di- rectors ordered a quick curtain. While 1t was descending the men and women of the chorus turned their backs on the audience and plunged Into the wreck age to rescue their friends. Some had sung together for years and many Of them were relatives. For the ten or fifteen seconds necessary for the de- scent of the curtain the audience had opportunity to see something of what had happened. The entire house was in an uproar Ushers made every ef- fort to reassure the people in the floor and balcony seats. Scarcely had the curtain reached the stage than MT Conreid went to the front and raising his. hand begged the audience to keep their places.
 Mir. ConreId remained at the front of tho stage until he was convinced that the ushers and the police, had the audience in hand.
 Although many members of the chorus sustained bruises and cuts which had to be dressed. they pluckily deter mined to continue and the second act went through without any other hitch