Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-11-11
STRAND DARK AT MIDNIGHT
No More the Thespian Pirates Of His
Own Talents.
SOCIETY INvADEs THE STAGE
Actors Are Too Busy With the Great
Folks to Bother With. Artists
and Minor Playwrights.
Foreign Correspondence Of The star.

LONDON. November /, 1911.
In London bohemianism is dead-killed
by tubes, with the motor omnibuses aid
ing Our beloved Prague is as the city
of Petra in Edom. and the Bedouins who
encamp among the ruins live on drug
tablets and wear wooden scarfs and motor
overcoats in July. Two Of them entered
smokeroom in a hotel where l was the
other day What will you have?' said
the first ,"Oh, suppose the same" said
the second. "A small soda split" ordered
the first.
waiter was not resentfui. He was not
even annoyed. That showed that he was
accustomed to orders of that kind, and
began to sympathize with the license
holders. who are not only oppressed by
Mr. Lloyd George, but have to accept
gratefully in their richly furnished prem
| Uses the presence of young men modelled
on the curate In The Private Secre-
tary." No wonder people, and people
who ought really to know, are declaring
that the race is losing its stamina:
Catch Last Cube" Home.
We are seeing the last OF the old bo-
hemiau days. The history of the Savage
1 ~
one or two of its members who do not
catch the last tube home; the Garrick
is a more august body than the Athe-
naeum, and neither Thackeray nor Dick
ems would now be admitted let alone the
robust Sir William Russell. Actors are SO
| important in and so occupied with So
ciety that when they become managers
they have no time to read plays. ~
notorious that one great man implored
| to look at "Ksmet' was so engaged
with dear Lord Billygoat's luncheons ana
dinners and receptions day after day mat
he could not do SO. Oscar Asche, VINO
still retains his hold in bohemia-his Sir
| John Falstaff was noble citizens OF
that country-seized the chance and mas
| won fame and money.
| The actor must pretend that he Is in
| innate with the great ones or he does NOT
| count Hence the Decentralization OF the
Strand. Where are the actors and ac-
| tresses. with their friends the artists and
| the minor playwrights, who used to MAKE
! that thoroughfare the bohemian Rue De
la Paix, where every passerDy was
worthy of at least glance?
They are all pretending that they nave
barely time for rehearsalS because they
are so much in demand for society gath
erings. The more COURAGEOUS. perhaps
the more reckless, when they venture out
at uncanonical hours. confine themselves
to Bedford street. where the agents are,
and do not pass the Strand emo. Ihls ex-
plains why the British stage-see any
oritic-has gone to the demnition bow
vows. Five or six years, and all has
changed for the worst. and tnat Is pre-
cisefv the period in which the tubes have
become efficient in London.
Where the Blame Lies.
To tubes and motor omnibuses must be
ascribed the fact that quarter OF an
hour after the closing of the theaters the
Strand is bowling wilderness. All. all
are gone, the old familiar faces. carried
away in tubes and motor buses. and there
is none left with whom to discuss either
PLAYS or the acting. The taverns where
once the self-approving Thespian sat at
ease and told stories to his own glory
might close at 10 o'clock for all the trade
they do.
Some people still find Leicester Square
and Soho possess smack of the former
ease of manners and the bohemian atmos-
phere They are dull to extinction. Even
the oldest profession in the world IS even
now pursued by importations from the
fatherland or Belgium. and their CONVEX
sation is jargon. No one now makes
lively break of 1t by being thrown out
Of the Empire or the Alhambra. or by
hacking the doorkeeper or the Favlhoh
on the shins -
Time was of nights when the younger
bohemians did have their fling and found
1t end in the street at the hands of big
Empire cflptOyc Nv HIGHLY OOihS. AZ
victim picked himself up and tried to get
in again. Only that was not easy.
1t is said that the exit Of Scots from
their native country to Canada and Brit
ish Columbia is due to the discovery that
bohemiansm is nearly dead in London
Naturally, they prefer the bohemia OF
London to the wild life Of the dominions.
but they must have one or the other.
Making a Last Stand.
The Scottish journalists are themselves
engaged in last vigorous effort to re-
create the old atmosphere. but fear they
are going to read papers to eath other.
| Still. the fact Is there would be no bo-
hemians remaining were 1t not for Lam
castrians, Yorkists and Scots. There are
the Irish. but responsibility is full OF
| temptations for them. 1t Is the chief nov
city they find in England. Perhaps !
might include q few men OF Kent. Some
men of Kent have the real spirit in them.
but for the rest Of the southerners they
| lack virility and make responsibility a
fetish. The Savage Club. the Garrick,
| the Beefsteak are full Of southeruere.
Then the habit OF making swagger per-
sons honorary members tends to dull
ness. Not all great men are bohemianA
On the contrary. numbers OF them are
snobs. Beyond that they are filled with
acute jealousies and own a multitude OF
corns. Now there is nothing more dis
| tinguishes the true bohemian than the
habit of treading on other peoples corns.