Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1909-10-31
BY W. HERBERT BLAKE

HE agitation. lot CIlllQTeH IIle-
alter in this city, to serve as a
u memorial to the late Nine. Hell
ena Modjeska, is one which every per
son interested in the stage and its
deeper educational uses will earnestly
support and further. That some
former efforts of this kind else
where in the country have met
with financial difficulties is only rea-
son for caution in laying the founda-
lions of the local institution rather
than excuse for abandoning the pro-
ject. The clientele of such a playhouse
is assured, for eVerv constant Yaude-
vile attendant knows that children
make wonderfully good audiences, both
in the matter of attentiveness and APP
probation. Indeed, the generally high
average quality and tone of present
day vaudeville is partly due to keen
understanding of this fact by the prin-
cipal circuits and managers That is
why an occasional affront to decency
on the variety stage is felt as such in
stantly, and in many cases is followed
by liberal use of the blue pencil.
Now the advocates of a local chill
dren's theater have in this condition
solid basis of encouragement. If chill
dren already exert this unconscious in
fluence for decency on the stage by
merely attending those performances
which appeal specially to the youthful
in every one, would they not attend
theater exclusively given over to their
use? 1t is neither visionary nor over
enthusiastic to believe that they would.
The completion of such an institution
in Los Angeles would mark a long step
forward in public appreciation and un
Outstanding of the drama. And 1t
would mean a progressive education of
the next generation in one of the no
blest of the arts and the most eXacting
of sciences.
Charles Belmont Davis in the current
Golfers lambasts the stars for alleged
Indifference to their work. He says
the average star or leading man is dill
gent enough in memorizing his own
lines, and particularly his cues, but
that he has a singular and languid in
difference to the parts of his fellow
actors and to the drama as a whole.
MANY of them" says Mr.. Davis, go
through q season with the vaguest no
ton of what the play is about, and
there is an authentic case of a star who
dcleu COullHuOuSlJ l1I IOuI SSdSpllS III
the same play, and because he did not
come on until the second act never saw
the first act played"
To this rule MIR. Davis mentions "sev-
eral brilliant Xceptions'-One would
fain sometimes be an exception, be-
cause the magazine writers invariably
style them brilliant" shining or
''redeeming." e. H. Sothern is such,
we are told, but it is much easier to
think of players who by their self
conferred work on the stage clearly
prove that they obey the rule laid down
by Mr.. Davis.
It is one of the great benefits of the
stock company system that it really
tends to disrupt this abnormally sell
fish view of an actors work and that
it keeps him in fairly constant per-
sonal touch with his fellow players.
This makes for versatility and adapta-
bility as well as creating an esprit de
corps which is any dramatic organiza-
tons surest warrant Of long and pros
porous life.
Apropos OF Oliver Morosco's SUCCESS
ton that the newspaper critics of the
city participate mildly in the cast
which will soon produce Jesse Lynch
Williams stolen Story" at the Bur
bank, an idea suggests itself The play
requires a number of "supers," 1 be-
ieVe, in its scene laid in the local"
room. Why not impress into the SER
vice some score of newspaper men, re-
porters, copy readers and editors to
fill the minor roles? The great fault of
the play, if 1 remember the criticisms
on it's original eastern production, is
the fact that it pictures a newspaper
Office as it was some fifteen or twenty
years ago, doubtless when Mr.. VIII
liams was actively in the game"
Even in the last ten years many fea-
lures of newspaper work have been
greatly changed. Everybody writes in
long hand in 1.-THE Stolen Story" and
the city editor does all the desk work
For the purposes Of verify and to please
a newspaper crowd, who will undoubt-
eddy throng the Burbank on the after
noon of the plays first production, why
not show the "game" as it is played to-
day, rather than in the dim past of Mr..
Williams cub and salad days? Give
us typewriters, paste pots shears, shirt
sleeves, a mob of wildly earnest young
men working with a frantic system and
a little group of superciliUus individuals
engaged in tearing their work to pieces.
In other words, give us modern news
paper atmosphere. Mr.. Williams in
teresting play viii do the rest, for it's
theme is one which is as true of the
Park rows of today as Of those Of a
decade ago The externals change but
the spirit Of it all is the same.
AS to the dramatic critics, am quite
sure they appreciate Mr.. Morosco'sI