The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-02-02

entirely apart from the charge now made
for it.
The first London theatre To come out
boldly and announce that. following the
custom In the United States. the patrons
of the stalls no longer will be expected
to wear evening dress, already has bene-
fitted by the change. This is tie historic
Savoy, which was made world famous
by the production there of the Gilbert
and sullivan operas Granville Barker,
tho Shawesque actor-manager and play
wright who originally WAS talked of as
director OF the Millionaires theatre In New
York. has the Savoy now and the scrap
ping" of the evening dress fetish was
his idea. It has been practically dead
letter at the rest of the West End play
houses for some time, much water hay
ing flowed under the Thames bridges
and many nom dressing Americans hav-
ing crossed the Atlantic since Luther
Munday, as manager of his majesty's re-
fused to admit George Bernard Shaw to
the stalls OF that theatre because the
Irfshman was garbed in velvet suit,
but. until Barker set the example, no
West End theatrical management had
issued definite invitation to ''come Just
as you are" to its stalls.
The ideal always has been that the
house looked better If everybody in
the orchestra seats (and balcony. too. for
that matter) was in evening dress. In
vain William Archer declared that a
'starched all-dressed-in one costume
audience resulted in correspondingly
starehed unoriginal attitude toward the
drama: it remained for the American
residents of and American visitors to Lon
don every year have done more than any
other section OF Londons inhabitants TO
abolish evening dress,' said Michael
F'araday, manager of the Apollo theatre
Not long ago / heard of a New York
man who was staying for some weeks
| in London, and when he was told that
he had to get an evening suit before he
went to a certain theatre he bought one
But lie did not feel comfortable in the
! suit, and sent a note to the manager
saying that he wanted TO see the rule
which compelled people to so dress He
was told that no such rule was framed
| it was merely custom, whereupon he dis
posed of his suit and violated custom by
appearing afterwards in his lounge suit
| At the Savoy il was stated that the
innovation introduced there has had a
prompt and beneficent effect on the box
office receipts. II cannot say that il
| has had an enormous effect" said the
/ business manager. but IL has had a con-
siderable effect Our idea is to leave il
to the public to dress as they wish, and
We believe that in time this will become
4 general, just as II Is In the United States.
| lf 1t really becomes possible TO sit IL
the stalls of a London playhouse In
ordinary dress without feeling like a
rank outsider" as one does at present
the thing will be an enormous relief, fol
| it would be hard to name a greater
| bother than the necessity OF always
dressing TO go to the theatre. If one
| lives ever so little outside London prop
er, it means Juggling ones dress suit tc
the office in a bag, dressing either al
the office or in some public dressing
room,'' and then Juggling the bag home
again. The necessity for "dressng' al
ways has meant, too. that visit to the
more comfortable parts of a London
theatre had to be a formal arrangement
| fixed up some days before, and never
could be an eleventh hour impulse fol-
| lowed on the spur of the moment, IL one
happened to be bored after dinner