Omaha daily bee., 1906-07-29

as means OF, livelihood and / have yet
10 discover the pitfalls and snares which
we are informed by the newspapers sur
round the average actress / have tray
eled In almost every civilized portion of
the globe, and while / have not accumu-
lated garage fun OF automobiles, nor
rant me in carrying around a safe, have
found that woman will be just as much
tSoySb she were the wife an Of cisre Ss
man, IL she will deport herself properly.
True, there are some women who, by some
strange influence, become associated with
the stage who do not adorn IT, but, thank
goodness, they are in the slightest mi
ncrity. And IL Is pleasing to say that
think this Thaw case will cause some. of
the butterflies to stop and consider and
mayhaps in short time we people who
strive to be honest and honorable will be
delivered from the odium which has been
cast upon US through the discretion of
the hoy.p9lloy l believe there are as
stage today as you will find in any walk
of life. 1t all depends upon the tempera-
ment Of the girl IL she is naturally bad,
she would accomplish her purpose in a
Sunday school as quickly as upon the
stage. II she is good at heart she need
have no fears of the temptations of the
stage: No, indeed; have no sympathy
for the chorus girl who sports an auto
mobile or a luxuriously furnished suite of
apartments, The stage does not furnish
these
Ben Teal, general stage director for
Charles Frohman, and a man of unlimited
experience with all sorts of people on
the stage, discusses the matter thus in
the New York World.
There was a time when the announce
msnt Of tragedy or a sensation was
followed by the question: WHO was the
woman at the bottom of TT"
Today the inquiry has been changed to:
Who is the actress at the bottom of it?'
hn
who write for II, have not learned to diff
ferentiate between the real actress and
the woman who has merely appeared be-
mind the footlights. Perhaps this appear
ance was limited to one week, one night
but her name has been on a program:
therefore she must be an actress in public
estimation. Perhaps she never went be-
yond the rehearsal stage, being dismissed
for tncompetency-but name and photo
graph are blazoned as Miss Smith, an
actress"
That is why earnest men and women Of
our profession resent the reflection which
Ihawz White scandal casts upon the
AT the outset 1 wish to make 1t clear
that there are two classes of people on
and those who make IL an excuse.
The promiscuous or indiscriminate use of
where 1t sometimes partakes of the nature
Of a charity, inasmuch as 1t covers a null
titude of sins. As a matter of fact, IL you
study the lives of the serious-minded people
of the stage, especially its women, you
will find that they have not the time to
indulge in one-half the designations pc
culiar to society women. Bear in mind,
am now drawing no lines. 1t is not a
question Of cast, OF star, leading woman
or extra lady" but of stage folk in gem
eral, in melodrama, legitimate, high-class
comedy or musical productions.
This applying the term actress" to every
person who ventures tentatively or ex-
perimentally on the stage is about as APP
propriate or honest as 1t would be to call
a news tout a journalist, a stencil worker
artist.
The difference between the proper search
for recognition and the indulgence of mere
pleasure along Broadway is as great as
between delight and despair, success and
failure, light and darkness. The stage is
no more responsible for the morals of its
beauties than society is responsible when a
young woman of the so-called smart set
goes astray. There are just as many
moral wrecks in society as on the stage,
The trouble is that too much Importance
Is given to women who do not go on the
stage to become actresses, but to use the
stage as q cloak to cover the real life
they lead, the life that started by defying
parental and all other discipline, the life
that will not admit discipline in any shape
or form These are the girls that fit from
one stage manager to another, who never
hold a position, because they Will not work.
The real actress is fortunate II she has
time to secure her two or three meals a
day, an occasional bath and six to seven
hours sleep. The rest of the time she is
rehearsing studying. thinking. Without
the combination of willingness, work and