New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1914-11-01

know that in this country there rs no
man better able 20 express an opinion
upon this subject. With them Mr.
Miller pulled apart the curtains OF
mystery which have so often obscured
the obvious facts of the stage, and al
lowed his hearer TO observe the very
human mechanism which has made So
called illusion possible.
"Of all the managers or actors or
producers ! have known Dion Bouci-
cault came the nearest TO being what
! should call q genius continued Mr..
Miller. "And Bouci cauit was the first
to show me the sham which surround
ed much of the stage. One day ! pee
member saying to him that IL must be
very difficult for him to produce the
illusions OF which he was a master
"'DiHcult~ asked BOuccau.t, with
that brogue which was so delightful,
and why, my boy? IL is easy, so easy
that it is difficult 20 see how any one
can fail You just have TO follow
nature, that's all. When in one Of my
plays an old lrishman enters his house
and scrapos his feet upon the door mat
the critics mumur a touch Of
genius; when in reality the man who
first taught am actor not 20 scrape has
feet was the genius. for he was M
venting something, while ] was simply
following what every lrisnman dic
when he entered his house from the
beginning of time
"That was Boucicault, and his ad-
vice Is as applicable to-day as u ever
was. ! remember another incident that
was also most Characteristic. ! had
beer before coming under Boucicault
q member Of Augustin Days company,
and DAILY, master of stage psychology
that he was, did not always follow
nature i'm his stage directions. One OF
his great hobbies was an insistencc on
stage crossings at the end OF every
speech. No matter whether there was
reason for 10 or rot, an actor always
had 10 move across stage at the con
clusion of O remark. and ! had natu-
rally fallen into the habit. AT the first
rehearsal under BOucicault / received
my first lesson. ! had concluded my
speech and promptly crossed the stage.
Eoucicsult halted me with ms Jich
brogue.
"fAnd why did you do that he
asked
81 thought a moment and, strange TO
say, could not myself find an answer, 80
/ stumbled out with:
"'Why, for action, action! Just 70
! keep things gOing!
ITO keep things gOing| replied the
old fox, with whitening scOrn. My
young man, if ! can't interest. audi
ences with my pen, do you think you're
going to interest them with your legs =
81 had learned my lesson for good ana
all, and / nope ! shall never forget IT,.
/ To follow nature-that Is the sole duty
! and the sole art Of the stage manager,
and If more producers would realize
this we should have no lack Of capable
teachers Of acting.
81 do not feel that 10 is a lack Of
1 stage directors or a lack OF actors that
| this country is suffering from; % ls
/ from a lack Of plays and playwrehta.
| The acting is not all that 1t should be,
I because the demand is so great, and,
unlike as rs the case in Europe, we
must spread our butter very thinly II
/ is, | believe, nonsense to sneak OF the
/ superiority of the old school over the
new; there has always been good act
/ ing and bad acting. In the past the
/ type OF play required certain type of
PLAYER, and great emphasis was placed
| on 4 resonant voice and grand man
ner. Since then the plays have
changed. and such acting to-day would
be absurd, yet do not feel that there
| has been any diminution in the amount
/ of genius.
/ "The plays Of to-day are too photo
graphic. i'm the sense that they do no..
/ produce an emotional uplift. They are
/ too often the mere dramatization o.
newspaper headlines. We cry out too
much for the play with a punch. Yet
/ i'm reality the people prefer the simple
story Of elemental emotion. am look
I inc for the genius TO arise who will
F take a simple primal emotion and up
/ iift il bv the fire of his imagination.
Such a genius was william Vaughn
Moody. whose The Great Divide was
/ TO me the high water mark OF Ameri-
can dramatic achievement lu his
death America lost o great thinker, rs
great noet, q great dramatist Let Us
hope that some one will arise 20 take
/ his place.
"The American spirit is expansive
rather than restrictive. We are opti-
mists and are right IN being OPP
timists. only our dramatists must
bring 20 their work an Imagination and
a poetic fire which will raise their pro-
auctions TO the ranks Of literature. it
is for this that we must look and pray