The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-02-06

1 world is the heir of Shakespeare, then | it would be paving the great testator the honor due him to establish such a memorial"
 l Then you believe that what the stage needs is not more actors but better edu- | cated ones,' 1 suggested. l "rhe coming generation-the men and women who are to be our best actors and actresses-need a thorough, well rounded education. Faulty dietion, poor l expression, inferior powers of interpre- tation could all be remedies very easily. This is mot only true in America but | in England, the home of the mother | tongue. To me the glory of the English language is its purity of speech, and l | feel today that great deal of this is l being lost by our younger generation. So many young people that l meet, either socially or who come to me for work, are lax in their methods in this matter to a point that is almost criminal. some three years ago very clever young actor came to me for an engagement. knew him to have fine qualities and l wanted to engage him. During the first few moments of our conversation, how ever | was astonished to hear him say he didn't want 'tuh' play heavy parts; and he wanted 'seyenty-h' dollars week, an was willin' to take less in Nun Yuk' I wondered what would happend NtN |, these faults. However, I took chance and engaged him. At first he blushed like a girl when I corrected him, but after awhile he got over it, and today there is not an actor on the stage who speaks better English or who has finer | voice.
 "ro the classic roles especially, does correct enunciation and pronunciation mean more than to any other" l sug- gested
 Ut is the very reason that we have so few of the classics presented nowadays !" sad Nr. Faversham. "rhe younger actors cannot speak the lines-they cannot manipulate the words. Let me explain an elemental matter in an elemental illustra- ton. A very great woman in our profess sion, Carlotta I.eelereq gave me the fol- lowing poem as an exercise:
 An Austrian army, awfully arrayed,
 Boldly by battery. beseiged Belgrade Cossacks commanders, cannonading come, Dealing destruction, devastating doom, Every endeavor, engineers essay,
 For fame, for fortune fighting furious
 fray,
 General ganst general grappled' gasping good
 How honors heaven heroic bahrdihoodl
 And so on.
 After l had mastered that-you can readily see that l was capable of speak ing, almost any line in the English lam guage, correctly
 Vocal culture is another very necessary adjunct to the proficient actor said Mir FaVersham. q recall how my parents rescued me from my rawlings with a fit up company, and placed me in the school of Carletta Leclercq. She was then a power in England d-consuIted by Irving and many prominent managers. She used ? steal me in at rehearsal, and hide me back of the stalls, and once asked her why Miss Ellen Terry spoke so slowly and pedantically at rehearsals and she said to me:
 "she is getting her voice placed and is spacing"
 What an odd way to express it," in- terpolated.
 Ut was Miss Terry's method and a very wonderful one it was, too, she said and that if I'd work like she did at 1t that in years to come. | might learn to speak that way" said Mr. FaYersham. "The line that struck me especially that Miss Terry repeated so slowly was when Faust was offering to take her home, and noticed how beautifully she said 1t on the first night of the performance:
 "T am not Lady; neither am I fair;
 Home I can go without your care"
 "So," said MT. Fayersham in conclusion, "when you hear some one speaking of how beautifully Mr. So and So says his lines. or does this or that. you may know t has taken much practice and great the Belgrade poem may help a man to illumine the soliloquy of Hamlet, but it is a fact"