The San Francisco call., 1909-12-12

NJ
~ clares he is never in really
ardent mood except in public.
And that 1 should say. will be a ter
rible blow to the matinee girl who
adores Ince in her adoring moods.
II must be a terrible thing TO have
TO become ardent according to book,
to be romantic for remuneration and TO
be Romeo FOR wages. but Ince says it
isn't difcuIt bit. 1T is the easiest
thing I do says he.
But how about the eyes that are
upon you. when you clasp the heroine
in your arms?" asked.
Whose eyes2' said he. Yankeelike.
why, the audiences eyes"
But I don't see them at all The
tender words are given to the ears of
the heroine only; the langourous glances
are for her eyes alone. 1t is as though
we were alone in a room which had
suddenly lost wall. The crowd out
side is there. but we don't know it any
more than Mary Jane knows that her
imp brother is hiding under the sofa
an audience TO her sighs. We know of
the crowds presence only when some
irreverent and irrelevant person
usually in a far seat in the gallery
purses his lips and smacks an echo to
our bliss. At that sound everybody tit
ters. and / wake up to the realization
that a good scene has gone wrong, and
that a romantic blossom has been
blghted."
Having made love so often, asked,
on the stage. do you suppose you could
be unconscious Of the righteousness Of
the situation in real life should you
participate in an extemporaneous
scene?"
a most embarrassing query. and L
shall not answer" said the handsome
John incidentally. CThe pun being un-
premeditated and quite accidentally
But I want to remark this:
There is a line about all the world
loving a lover. You have heard it and
have heard it. but it is not necessarily
true. The men in an audience observ-
ing the soft spots in the armor of the
hero. and being witness TO his weak
ness. are inclined TO put him down as
a soft. sentimental fool, as susceptible
as they are themselves. and naturally
they are offended at the exhibition Of
a weakness which they themselves
have been guilty Of. II I get on my
knees. there is no doubt that the
earliest titters come from the gentle
men whose wives have seen them in
similar position Of humbleness; if 1
protest in wordy phrases the sentiments
that the book unfolds, then some chap
remembers having said something of
the same kind. and he wonders If his
wife win ever give him away; and TO
show how stupid it is, he laughs so
loudly that the mother of his children
could hear him three blocks away if
she were not sitting on the inside
seat. II I stammer my love in uncouth
and unliterary language, then some
fellow in the audience recalls what
bum speech he made, when he had
2 good one framed up, but forgotten.
and he laughs. too. The moral Of all
this being that the hardest things on
the stage TO get over the footlights
2 thought is the more unwilling we are
10 admit that it has ever occurred to
US. Making love on the stage thus
becomes the easiest and the most diff
cult 10 90. It is the easiest because,
being human, the actor understands
sentiment; it is the hardest because,
being human, he's afraid somebody
viii laugh at an episode which pos
sibIy duplicates one in his own memory.
IF there is sight which will pull
q grin over the countensnce of the
sourest mortal in the world it is the
exhibition Of real affection. That's
where all the jokes come from about
brides and grooms, and 1 have a sus-
picion that the aspersions which have
been cast upon the mother in law for
the last thousand years are due to a
subconscious realization Of the fact that
she, too, has had 10 listen to represen-
tations Of affection which would be
funny in book, perhaps.
But" continued Ince, warming to
his subject with the ardor of Paolo
telling his story when Da Rimini was
away, what is finer than the devotion
OF man 10 woman, or the faithful love
OF wife to husband. 1t is a subject
that no actor has done entire justice
10. nor has any poet fathomed the
deeps Of it, have seen. off the stage
old men who were courtiers to their
wives, chivalrous gentlemen with
whom time has not tampered. save to
put gray in their hair and fine mem
ories in their hearts. I have seen bent
women who have travelled to the very
brink OF time with their mates, as
much sweethearts as they We're when
they blushed at the portals of the first
kiss. These are wonderful things to
contemplate in life, but it is hard TO
nut them on the stage, because some
body is bound to laugh at the wrong
time. and giggle is loosed for fear
sob VIII sound. Our unwillingness to
admit susceptibility is one of the evil
dences of the reality of love and the
..t, % sentiment We prove If in