The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1906-10-21
SALT LAKE PRECINCT
For Justice of the Peace
HARRY S. HARPER
For Constable
SAMUEL ALLEN
READING A PLAY.

The beginner wants TO read his own
plays TO manager and star. not alone
Tor the delight of hearing himself talk.
but because he is mortally afraid that
every idea contained in the play may be
stolen and handed over 10 another.
playwright" says a writer i'm the Thea
ire Magazine. Therefore he insists
upon reading his own plays. II is one
of those awful dog days in August.
and you with your Ms. under your arm.
and your first presentation to an i'm
portant star ahead of you, it is easily
conceived that you are in a state of
mind. was there ever such a red hot
DAY as this| you think Arrived at
your destination, you are quickly ush-
cred into long room, received by the
star most graciOuSly who notices vour
trepldation, smiles sweetly. and in the
most frledly manner tries to place Won
at your ease. The lady is wearing a
Japanese kimOna, lot of jewelry, and
you notice that her hair seems mn
kempt and otherwise she is not the ra-
diant person you know from across. the
footlights. The manager and the star
CONFER Tor moment apart and this
gives you time to look about the room.
Then you notice that down the center
OF the room is arranged a long table.
and this are fully a hundred or more
stage costumes. each in a little pile of
us own, with shoes, stockings. gloves
hats, tights, cloaks. even swords and
daggers, some Shakespearean. others
modern, romantic. etc. Going over them
all, arranging them mending them
etc, is a neat French maid Presently
you adjourn to the rear room and near
an open window, and your first experi-
ence as playreader begins You read
on, the star attentive and courteous
the manager restless and preoccupied
Perhaps you have read for ten minutes
or more. when the manager pulls ont
his watch and, looking at it, says to the
star:
You viii be sure not to miss that
APO for Coney Island?'
Oh. no. (Then TO the readerl Go
on with the play. please
You have hardly started afresh
when the French maid enters. holding
up costume i'm her hands. greatly agi-
tated. and declaring in broken English
that the entire costume in evidence has
been ruined at the cleaners, whereupon
much excitement and a seemingly end
less discussion about the gown You
sweat blood. When you finally recon-
mence. everything is dead in your play
The lines you thought so fine are ridic-
ulous, even to yourself and what if is
all about even the wretched author has
forgotten. And so you wander on until
the manager cuts short the ordeal by
saying that he does not like the play
in its present shape, and after some
platitudes of regret and stage smiles
all around. you exit, while the man
ager, the star, and the French maid
hold post-mortem on your literary
remains.
"A day or two afterward you read a
press notice that Miss So-and-So will
open her season in San Francisco in
a new drama from the French. Sub
sequently you read an Associated
Press dispatch that the play written
by the man of passion in Paris lived
one tempestuous night; never in fact
was heard of upon any stage afterward
You are more than human if you do
not smile"