The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1909-06-23
MAUDE ADAMS
IN STUP[NDOUS
OUTDOOR PLAY
Plays Joan of Arc" at Harvard
With Supporting Company
of Two Thousand
Over $4,000 Spectators at
Greatest Performance Ever
Attempted
[Seeeial Dlspoleh 10 The Coll

BOSTON. june 22-Before an audi
ence of $500 persons, and under the
immediate direction OF the German de-
partment of Harvard university. Maude
Adams and company of players, with
the assistance of 1.40e supernumera-
ries. gave tonight the greatest spectac-
ular out of door performance. all things
considered. ever attempted in this
world The play was an English YER
sion of Schillers dramatization of the
story of Joan of Arc, maid of Orleans
And it is wen nigh impossible to de-
scribe adequately the stupendousness of
the task of producing the piece on the
scale on which it was given by John
Alexander, the artist.
The mere vastness of the stage set
all theatrical standards awry. dwarfed
the crowds of people in it, made speech
and lighting totally new problems
Luckily the audience was composed. for
a large part, of persons who knew their
Schiller and to whom the production
was as much a ceremonial, a celebration
of the historical fame of Joan of Are
as 1t was a spectacle, and II was to them
far more spectacle than drama
BACK DROP ACROSS FIELD
Half way down the sides of the great
j stadium the scene was set, at the back
4 a "cyclorama back drop OF blue sky
cloth stretched across the great field
from wall to wall. supported by spruces
1 still in their bark which would have
made mainmasts. The top of the cloth
came to the top of the stadium itself
! inside this was set scenery represent
/ ing wonderfully well the great tripli-
cate porch Of cathedral with it's broad
steps. West of the cathedral-each of
whose portals swallowed easily march
ing columns of six or eight men
abreast-fowed down to the plain two
roads from skyline height One ran
around and below the other, the rocky
ramparts dividing them. And finally on
each side was clear road. At the front
of all and quite near TO the seats stood
( a lowering oak tree. Round the wall of
! the stadium had been erected a covered
way in which lights We're set supple
menting calcium lights on the colon
made high over head.
/ CosTUMING BEAUTIFUL
! The costuming. especially the plate
armor. was marvelously beautiful and
historically accurate, through the ut
most of painstaking. Miss Adams was
I received with tremendous enthusiasm
at every appearance, from the time
when as simple peasant, she saw
the vision commanding her TO serve
+ her king in war. to the last, when a
/ huge knight in armor bore the body
( of the maid-for in Schiller's play she
/ is killed in battle, not burned eat the
stake-on to the scene and the soldiers
carried her off again on their shields.
. With Miss Maude Adams was a COM
pany numbering about 1000 persons.
The greater part of the working force
of the Frohman syndicate was actually
engaged in the production.
STUDENTS ARE SERFS
The motley crowds of serfs were
made up of Harvard students. Men
of the state militia marched as arch
ers and spearmen in the French and
English armies. Horsemen from mill
tia batteries clattered into the arena
in coats of mail, while able actors in
armor tramped the greensward and
clashed in duels in the most realistic
manner. And through all the scenes
threaded the slim figure of Miss Ad-
ans as the French maid-first in a
homely peasants dress then in a bril-
liant armor and seated on milk
white charger, and finally in the
nightly costume that at last became
her shroud.
The performance moved with re-
markable smoothness. considering its
immensely and the fact that oppor-
tunity for repeated rehearsals had not
been found,