The daily sentinel., 1912-04-25
HAVING FUN WITH BILL
SHAKESPEARE

(By Edward H. Sothern in the Chi
cago Record-Herald.)
The keynote of Shakespeare's
birthday for an actor is happiness.
lie reveres the poet Shakespeare, but
he is proud of the player Shake
speare. More than anybody else he
rejoices. So. on this birthday ami
versary of 1912, | am going TO have
little fun at the expense of my
fellow actors and myself, and give
you some pungent illustrations of
what the dramatic critics have said
about us when we failed to meet
their standards in our efforts to in
terpret the beloved poet on the stage
Shakespeare is shining mark, and
the actor who appears in one of his
plays is an easy target to hit. And
1t may as well be admitted that some
of our critics have aimed well. You
can enjoy some of their persiflage
and laugh to dislocation; providing,
of course, you are not the object of
the attack.
Then it is different, for we actors
are notoriously in profound sympa-
thy with ourselves.
So here goes.
Cecil Raleigh, a worthy dramatist,
facetiously remarked at the o. +.
Club dinner in London, March, 1903:
"Beerbohm Tree has given London a
most remarkable series of plays with
only an occasional regrettable lapse
into Shakespeare.
There is no play by Shakespeare
that has been so much the occasion
of mirth as Hamlet" Once when
the play was presented by company
in Indiana, the paper next day said:
" Hamlet was acted at the opera
house last night. 1t was worse than.
expected"
Henry Watterson OF the Louisville
Courier-Journal once criticized a per-
formance of Hamlet" He wrote as
follows: Hamlet at the SIacauley
opera house last night. My God,
said the woodcock, and it flew away
When another company appeared
at Atlanta, one of the papers said:
Hamlet at the opera house last
night. The scenery was fine and
the orchestra played some appropri-
ate airs"
A critic In Denver, reviewing a
performance OF the play, wrote: Mr..
- played Hamlet at the Tabor
Grand last night. He played it till
l2 o'clock"
A histrionic genius presented
| Hamlet" at Cheyenne, and the critic
arose in his might and remarked: ::
THE play of Hamlet was given at
the opera house last night. Ii has
long been a question as to whether
Bacon or Shakespeare was the author
OF the play. 1t can now be definitely
ascertained. Let the graves of both
| hn Ha hnn ha
found to have turned in his grave is
the one who wrote Hamlet.
When George Ade was a reporter
on the Lafayette tInd.) Morning
Journal, a stock company presented
Hamlet at the Grand opera house.
Mr.. Ade wrote next morning: Com
pany good; play bad"
The mining camp produces some
weird and wonderful criticisms. Here
is a specimen, Hamlet being the
play: 'There is too much Ginning
in this piece. The author is behind
the times, and seems to forget that
what we want nowadays is hair-rais-
ing situations and detectives. In the
hands of skillful playwright de-
tective would have been put on the
track of Hamlet's uncle and the old
man would have been hunted down
in the manner that would have lifted
the audience out of their cowhides.
Our advice to the author is: more
action, more love-making and plenty
OF specialties. The crazy-girl scene
should be cut out altogether, and a
rafting good song and dance sub
stituted.'
Finally, the poet Wordsworth said
that he could have written plays as
good as Shakespeare's "if he had had
the mind"
Charles Lamb, remarking on this
boast, said: 1T was only the mind
that was lacking"