The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-10-12
PROVED NO MATCH
 FOR COMEDIANS
Italian Change Artist Had To Yield To Weber
 And Fields

In 1894 Hammerstein wrote to Weber and Fields offering them an engage ment at the Harlem ope"a house for their own company at the close of their road season. aThe first appearance. of the Weber and Fields show at legiti- mate theater was such d success that Hammerstein suggested that Joe and Lew bring their own act to the new Olympia for four weeks. They asked $700 week he gave them $500. Biase Broadway saw the poolroom skit and showed such enthusiasm that Hammer stein extended the engagement and put the act on the spot, the favored position just before the intermission, writes Felix Isman and Wesley w. Stout in the Saturday Evening Post.
 In their fourth week they lost the spot to Signor Fregoli, a lightning change artist imported from Europe at some outrageous salary; but whatever Fregoli cost, he was worth it. The man was marvel, the like of whom the stage never saw before or since. He played by himself an entire drama with cast of half dozen characters, walk ing out one exit as an oll man and en- tering another almost instantly as a young woman. Ten expert dressers stood on the alert back of the set and swarm ed over him, changing costumes, wigs and make-ups at each exit.
 Hammerstein moved Joe and Lew to the first position following the inter mission and answered their howls with flattery.
 :sYou boys are so good that they will wait for you all night if they have to, , he apple-sauced.
 Their nose plainly was out of joint, nevertheless. Fregoli was the toughest of acts to follow, and Broadway had dropped the old sensation for the new. Joe and Lew sat on the curb across Broadway from the Olympia, where the Hotel Astor now stands, held their heads in their hands and started, two thinkers.
 Fields came to life suddenly.
 Hot zickerty!" he exclaimed. My brother, Nat, looks lot like me, and Bob Harris, my brother-in-law, is the image of you"
 Weber saw the point at once. A hur- ried travesty of FregOli's drama, with the number of characters cut to four, was contrived, and ofter two days re- hearsal, Nat Fields and Bob Harris were smuggled backstage. Nat was made hp us Il idI MOLHhH, dS d COlliC soldier, both burlesqued copies of two of Fregoli's impersonatiOns, and the hoax was sprung upon Hammerstein and his staff without warning.
 Before the rise of the curtain follow ing the intermissiOn, while the house still buzzed with its delight in Fregoli, Fields appeared on the apron of the stage in his familiar German makeup and addressed the audience. He was there to praise Signor Fregoli, not to bury him. The signOr was al wizard, Fields was far from denying. Still and all, WeDer and Fields long had'done all that the signOr did, perhaps more. Only Weber and Fields had had no Opportu- nity to do their stuff on Broadway. Even now Mrs Hammerstein was Op- posed, but had been won over to allow ing them to show three or four lightning changes. thank you.
 The curtain rose on the same set used by Fregoli. Mike and Myer entered clOwning the signor's very sober drama and substituting German sputterings for the grave Italian. The audience, not knowing what fOOlery to expect from these merry-andrews, waited expectant- ly. At q cue, Mike and Myer exited. At the same instant they entered from the other side of the stage in the guise of a fat woman and a comic soldier. If Fregolls changes were done with q scarcely perceptible pause, Weber and Fields were transformed with no in- terval whatever. The Italians rapidity was astonishing, the Americans was a physical impossibility. As the rear halves of Mike and Afyer disappeared, the front halves of the fat woman and the gendarme came into view through another exit thirty feet away The audi ence gasped it's astonishment. A moment later the gendarme quit the stage by the far right exit, the fat woman by the far left, and Mike and Myer re-entered simultaneously from back center The changes grew more bewildering. Now Mike and the fat woman were on. Flash! The woman was gone and Myer arrived from the other side of the stage. Flash Mike went out one door and the gendarme came in another. Flash! Myer and the gendarme in q twinkling became Mike and the fat wo- man, then Mike and Myer, then the gen darme, then the woman again, as de- ceptiyely as the double exposure and other trick phOtoplay of the films In their amazement, few in the house an ticipated the joker.
 There was an instant of numbed silence at the end, then a storm of ap- plause beat on the curtain. Mike and Myer came before it to take a bow. They took one bow, a second and a third. On the fourth Mike, Myer, the fat woman and the gendarme appeared arm in arm. The tricked audience sent up one mighty whoOp of mingled sur prise and gIee and came to it's feet. Up with America, down with Europe Weber and Fields again were the talk of Broadway, Signor Fregoli the eighth day of a seven-day wonder.