Volume 1 — The Beginnings of Stage Careers.

By MATTHEW WHITE, Jr.

A Series of Papers That Will Be Continued From Month to Month and Include All Players of Note.

How did he start? How did she manage to get the chance to show what she could do? Was it "pull," persistence, or the fact of being born in the profession?

These are the things playgoers—and who is not a playgoer these days?—want to know about the players who have "arrived." There is a good deal of variety in the answers herewith set down. In some cases it is rather difficult to state just when the real start was made; in others, baby-day débuts can scarcely be considered to "count."

But of one thing the reader may be certain: in no instance has permanent success been won without work, be the actor a recruit from the business world, the society drawing-room, or the ranks of the Thespians themselves.

MANSFIELD'S OPPORTUNITY.

He Failed to Earn a Livelihood as a Painter, and Was Graduated from Comic Opera to the Drama.

Although Richard Mansfield's mother was Mme. Rudersdorf, the prima donna, he was in no sense cradled in the theater. His infant eyes first looked on the light in Heligoland, an island in the North Sea that then belonged to England. This was in the year 1857, and he was brought up with the idea that one day he should become a painter. It was while he was a schoolboy at Derby, England, that he received the first lift toward the career which has placed him at the head of his fellows on the American boards.

The boys arranged to act "The Merchant of Venice" on a certain grand occasion known as "Speech Day," and young Mansfield was cast for Shylock. So well did he acquit himself then that no less exalted a personage than a bishop shook him by the hand with the words that must still ring in the now mighty Richard's ears: "Heaven forbid that I should encourage you to become an actor; but should you, if I mistake not, you will be a great one."

Preparatory schooling over, his art studies at South Kensington were broken in upon by failing family fortunes, and the necessity of earning money in the present rather than waiting to gather in perhaps greater amounts in the future. So, through the agency of friends of his father, he set sail for Boston, where an opening had been made for him in the big dry-goods house of Jordan, Marsh & Co.

But business was not his forte. He spent all his leisure time in painting pictures, which he found, moreover, he could sell very readily. He burned for the more artistic atmosphere of the city by the Thames, and, encouraged by his success in disposing of his paintings, he threw up his mercantile job and departed for London.

And now began for him seven memorable years—years of keen disappointment, of deep bitterness, of hope deferred, of actual suffering in body as well as mind. The kind of pictures he had been able to sell with ease in Boston found no buyers in England, and matters went speedily with him from bad to worse.

The incident he had used in his play "Monsieur," of his hero's engagement to play the piano and toppling from the stool through weakness induced by hunger, is drawn from his own experience. The episode occurred at a concert-hall, when he was possessed of only one suit of clothes and no home.

Mansfield Meets W.S. Gilbert.

It was his ability to play and sing that really kept his body and soul together in these awful days and nights, for once in a while, by a clutch at the fringe of friendships left him from the old days, he could obtain an engagement to entertain a company of literary or stage folk. He fell in with W.S. Gilbert on one of these occasions. "Pinafore" had just taken the public by storm, and the makers thereof were hastening to utilize the wave of popular favor by thrusting all of their available wares to a ride upon its crest.

"I think that young man will do for Wellington Wells in 'The Sorcerer,'" Gilbert remarked to his manager, R. D'Oyly Carte.

It was to be a company for the provinces, and as Mr. Carte thought that the rather shabbily attired young person who officiated at the piano would not be exorbitant in his demands for salary, he decided that he would do, and offered Mansfield three pounds, or fifteen dollars, a week.

To the out-at-elbows, fate-buffeted artist, this seemed a princely sum, and he accepted the position with an eagerness he hoped was not as apparent as his necessities demanded it should be. But his spine stiffened a little later on when, having made good with Wellington Wells and one or two other impersonations in the Gilbert and Sullivan repertoire, he asked for a raise of salary amounting to two dollars a week. Mr. Carte declined to grant it, and Mansfield quit.

But, on the strength of his first engagement, it was not a heaven and earth raising matter to secure a second, and, like all the rest of his ambitious British brother actors, he steered his course across the Atlantic. He found a chance to appear as Dromez in the comic opera "Les Manteaux Noirs," which was done in New York at the Standard Theater, now known as the Manhattan.

This was in the early eighties. His next venture was Nick Vedder in a musical setting of "Rip Van Winkle," after which he returned to the Gilbert and Sullivan line and appeared as the Lord Chancellor in "Iolanthe."

A Lucky Misfortune.

And right here steps in one of the luckiest misfortunes that ever befell a man. For had Mansfield not turned his ankle while dancing as the Chancellor in Baltimore he might have remained in comic opera until he disputed twentieth century honors in the field with De Wolf Hopper and Jeff De Angelis.

The accident put him out of the cast and sent him back to New York, right in the path of A.M. Palmer, who happened to be looking for somebody to do Tirandel in "A Parisian Romance." This was a small part, but, being in straight drama rather than comic opera, was regarded by Mansfield as a step upward, and he did not hesitate about accepting the engagement.

What followed has been told so often from the Mansfield side that the reader may be glad to get the story in the words of the man who made it possible for a fellow actor to lift himself in a night from obscurity to fame. I quote from "Recollections of a Player," by James H. Stoddart, whose last creation on the boards was Lachlan, in "The Bonnie Brier Bush," and who is now living in retirement at his home in Sewaren, New Jersey.

From the Memoirs of James H. Stoddart.

"After the reading of the play the company were unanimous in their opinion that 'A Parisian Romance' was a one-part piece, and that part the Baron, and all the principals had their eye on him. After some delay and much expectancy, the rôle was given to me. Miss Minnie Conway, who was a member of the company and had seen the play in Paris, said that she thought the Baron a strange part to give me.

"'It's a Lester Wallack part,' she said.

"This information rather disconcerted me, but I rehearsed the part for about a week, and then, being convinced that it did not suit me, I went to Mr. Palmer and told him I felt very doubtful as to whether I could do him or myself justice in it.

"He would not hear of my giving it up, saying that he knew me better than I did myself; that I was always doubtful; but that he was willing to take the risk. He also read a letter which he had received from some one in Paris giving advice regarding the production, in which, among other things, it was said that Baron Chevrial was the principal part, that everything depended on him, and that 'if you can get Stoddart to look well in full dress he is the man you must have to play it.'

"I left Mr. Palmer, resolved to try again, and do my best. Mr. Mansfield was in the play for a small part, and, I discovered, was watching me like a cat during rehearsals.

"A lot of fashion-plates were sent to my dressing-room, with instructions to select my costume. As I had hitherto been, for some time, associated with vagabonds, villains, etc., I think these fashion-plates had a tendency to unnerve me more than anything else. So I again went to Mr. Palmer and told him I could not play the Baron.

Young Mansfield's Triumph.

"'You must,' said Mr. Palmer. 'I rather think Mr. Mansfield must have suspected something of the sort, for he has been to me, asking, in the event of your not playing it, that I give it to him. I have never seen Mr. Mansfield act; he has not had much experience, and might ruin the production.'

"At Mr. Palmer's earnest solicitation I promised to try it again. I had by this time worked myself into such a state of nervousness that my wife interfered.

"'All the theaters in the world,' said she, 'are not worth what you are suffering. Go and tell Mr. Palmer you positively cannot play the part.'

"Fearing the outcome, I did not risk another interview with my manager, but sought out Mr. Cazauran, and returned the part to him with a message to Mr. Palmer that I positively declined to play it.

"The result was that Mr. Mansfield was put in my place. The result is well known.

"Mr. Palmer was delighted, and I consoled myself with the thought that my refusal of the part had proved not only far better for the interests of the production, but was also the immediate cause of giving an early opportunity to one who has since done much for the stage."

Back To Comic Opera.

Oddly enough, in spite of his sensational success as the senile Baron, Mansfield's next engagement after "A Parisian Romance" had run its course at the Union Square Theater, was as Koko in Gilbert and Sullivan's "Mikado." But the halt of this company in Boston brought the young actor a chance to connect himself with the famous Museum stock there, and he bade good-by to comic opera for good when he first trod the Museum boards as Chevrial, following this up with the title rôle in "Prince Karl."

A dramatization of Robert Louis Stevenson's powerful story, "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," followed, also at the Museum. It was in New York, in the summer of 1886, twenty years ago, that saw Mansfield's practical start as a star, with "Prince Karl," at the Madison Square Theater, where he submitted "Beau Brummel" four years later.

Meanwhile he had been invited by Henry Irving to play in London, where he made his first Shakespeare production in the shape of "King Richard III."

RISE OF MISS ANGLIN.

The Clever Canadian Woman, in the Role of Roxane, Leaped from Obscurity in a Single Night.

From Mr. Mansfield it is but natural to pass to Margaret Anglin, who, from practical obscurity, leaped to distinction in a night as Roxane, the heroine of "Cyrano de Bergerac." This was produced at the Garden Theater, New York, on the 2d of October, 1898, and the next morning readers of the papers were asking themselves why they had never heard before of this young woman, who had almost shared equal honors with the redoubtable Richard himself.

The first meager information about her was furnished by Acton Davies, in his Evening Sun notice of the play, from which it may prove interesting to quote a couple of paragraphs:

"It rarely happens that an actress scores a success so unostentatiously as Miss Margaret Anglin. All that had previously been known of her were the facts that she was a Canadian, and that last season, while understudy in the Sothern company, she played Lady Ursula in Hope's play with such amazing success that it compelled Miss Virginia Harned to recover from a somewhat serious illness and resume her rôle after missing one performance. When Miss Anglin first appeared as Roxane last night, a sigh went up from all parts of the house: 'Here's another blond and simpering ingénue.'

"But as soon as she spoke Miss Anglin arrested attention. Her voice was charming, and she moved about the stage with an ease which showed that, however short her training may have been, she was in every sense an experienced actress. As the play progressed, this young girl, who has neither beauty nor a fine stage presence to assist her, fairly captivated the audience by the grace and tenderness with which she invested a most thankless and trying rôle."

Thus was Miss Anglin started on a career in which she has taken no backward step. On the night before the twentieth century came in, when, as leading woman of the Empire stock, she came forward in "Mrs. Dane's Defense," she justified every prediction that had ever been made regarding the trend of her attainments, which she had varied since the Roxane days, by proving herself an exquisitely pathetic Mimi with Henry Miller in "The Only Way." And during the present season as the star Zira in Wilkie Collins's revamped "New Magdalen" she kept people coming to the Princess from September until the middle of January.

How did she obtain her opening in the first instance, you ask? I had the reply to this from her own lips for the benefit of The Scrap Book audience.

"I had the ambition to become a professional reader. Rather an absurd one, wasn't it? The stage itself seemed to hold no special lure for me. Well, after some opposition on the part of my family, I came to New York at seventeen, with money enough to pay for a season's tuition at a school of acting, which had just been opened in connection with the Empire Theater.

"I was one of the very first pupils to be enrolled, and in spite of my indifference to the theatrical side of elocution I could not but be dazzled by the bait which Charles Frohman dangled before the eyes of the students. This was the promise of an engagement to four of the pupils who should acquit themselves with the most credit at the public performances of the school.

"The crucial afternoon arrived, and I went through my part. I dare say Mr. Wheatcroft, our principal, was more excited than I, as it was the initial performance of his pupils, and I knew that I had several other opportunities in which to make good in case my part did not show me up to the best advantage on the present occasion. Judge of my amazement, then, when word came from Mr. Frohman that he stood ready to give me the part of Mildred West in 'Shenandoah' right away.

"To be sure, it was only a tiny rôle, but in my recollection now it bulks big, as it proved the gateway to a career which I had no idea of following when I paid down my four hundred dollars for a year's tuition in the dramatic school."

MRS. CARTER'S HARD FIGHT.

Compelled to Earn Her Own Living, She Had Difficulty in Persuading Managers to Give Her a Hearing.

The speed with which theatrical fame is made and lost is startlingly demonstrated by a glance through a book on celebrated actors of the day, published only ten years ago. Out of thirty players, only five are now as much in the center of the limelight as they were then. The others are either dead or have sunk back into obscurity.

The volume contains no mention, for instance, of a name now so high on the dramatic scroll of to-day as that of Mrs. Leslie Carter. It was in that very year of 1896 that Mrs. Carter was laying the foundation of her vogue by her swing from the belfry in David Belasco's "Heart of Maryland."

She hails from the West, and grew up as Caroline Louise Dudley, with never an aspiration for the stage. She recalls the first performance she ever saw as being "Joe" Jefferson in "The Cricket on the Hearth" at MacCauley's Theater, Louisville. She was not particularly carried away by it, although for some time thereafter her father facetiously dubbed her "Tilly," after the Tilly Slowboy of Dickens's story.

After her father's death the family moved from Kentucky to Ohio, and here she met the wealthy Leslie Carter, of Chicago, and married him. But the match proved an unhappy one, a divorce followed, and Mrs. Carter was very ill for a long time. On her recovery she faced the necessity of earning her own living, and as she could neither sew, teach, nor manipulate a typewriter, she turned to the stage, as so many others, in similar cases, had done before her.

But it was a heart-breaking task to find some one to give her even a chance to show what she could do. The haunting of managers' offices day after day, the making of appointments with them that they never kept nor thought of keeping, the lying in wait for them at dark turns on the stairs, and the dashing across the street to intercept them in their walks abroad—all this fell to the lot of Louise Leslie Carter, as she was known when Belasco finally consented to put her out in "The Ugly Duckling," by Paul Potter.

But the play failed, and all seemed lost except two things: Mr. Belasco's faith in Mrs. Carter and her trust in his judgment of her abilities. Another essay was made the next year—1891—this time in a vehicle of an altogether different description, "Miss Helyett," a musical comedy with the score by Edmond Audran, who wrote "Olivette" and "The Mascot," and in which Mrs. Carter played the part of a Quaker maiden who has droll adventures among the Spanish Pyrenees.

This did better than "The Ugly Duckling," but still the star failed to "arrive," and still she and her manager kept up their belief in each other. Mr. Belasco now decided to try a play of his own making, and with this the victory was won.

No, not quite all. It remained for "Zaza," adapted from the French, and brought out at the Garrick in New York, January 9, 1899, to round out the little story which David Belasco told in his curtain speech on that now historic night. He spoke only two sentences, but they comprised the career of the star who came to be the inspiration of all the theaters that now bear his name.

And this is what he said:

"Nine years ago a poor woman threw herself at my feet and asked me to help her. Now she is the happiest woman in the world, for she can telegraph to her son that you like her in 'Zaza,' and that the boy may be proud of his mother."

The next day's papers told the story of that evening in headlines like these: "Genius the Word for Mrs. Carter," "Mrs. Carter Scores the Greatest Hit of Her Time," "The New Bernhardt."

RICHMAN DESERTED TRADE.

He Was Employed in a Chicago Store and Spent Many of His Evenings in Amateur Dramatics.

Reference to the première of "Mrs. Dane's Defense," in the paragraph on Margaret Anglin, recalls the fact that that occasion marked the first appearance of Charles Richman with the Empire stock company, he having the opposite rôle to Miss Anglin. He had won golden spurs as leading man with Annie Russell in "Miss Hobbs" and "A Royal Family," to which company he had passed from "The Great Ruby" at Daly's, where he had been playing with Ada Rehan at the time of Mr. Daly's death.

Mr. Richman went from trade to the theater by way of the amateur stage. He was employed in a Chicago store, and spent many of his evenings with an amateur dramatic association, of which he was one of the most active members. A benefit performance for some charity on one occasion proved such a success that a friend with money and a desire to sprout the wings of an "angel" proposed to put the troupe on the road for a summer season.

"I was immensely excited and pleased over the notion," Mr. Richman explained in telling me of his start as a professional, "but the rest of the cast were rather dubious about undertaking the experiment, and their friends and relatives were decidedly opposed to it. But I persuaded and my wealthy friend cajoled, and finally we set out.

"Three mothers insisted on going along, so we must have resembled a moving boarding-house. The outcome may be imagined. The man of money parted with this in exchange for experience, but, happily, nobody had to walk the ties home. However, the die was cast so far as I was concerned. I had smelled of the calcium, and there was no more clerking for me. I came to New York, managed to meet the late James A. Herne, who cast me for Philip Fleming to the Margaret of his wife. Under his management I was also The Stranger in that oddly impressive play, 'Hannele.'"

Mr. Richman, who was sadly handicapped by mismanagement in his starring venture of two seasons ago, is now awaiting the completion of a new play to launch forth once more into the active midstream of theatrical endeavor, where his undoubted ability justifies his presence. During his career as leading man at Daly's he demonstrated his right to that high post by the worthy portrayal of characters as wide apart as Shakespeare comedies and Drury Lane melodrama could make them.

FAY TEMPLETON BORN TO IT.

This Popular Actress Has Made Successes in Three Distinct Lines as a Result of Changing Weight.

Fay Templeton has made three separate and distinct starts in her career, and this without counting her baby days one, when, her father being manager of a theater in Saint Joseph, Missouri, she was put in the bill whenever an infant was needed. In due course, however, she was whisked away from the footlights and sent abroad to be educated. On her return, Rice secured for her Gabriel in "Evangeline" and thus launched her—in tights—on the first of her three epochs—that of man's attire.

As Gabriel she became the talk of the town, but when she appeared at the same theater—the Fourteenth Street—some seasons later as Hendrik Hudson, in a burletta of that name, her former admirers declared that she was fat, and declined to worship longer at her shrine. Thus it came about that when Edward E. Rice, her old manager in "Evangeline," engaged her to break the title rôle in "Excelsior, Jr.," with which he opened the theater part of his Olympia in 1895, he stipulated that when the time came for rehearsals she must not weigh over one hundred and fifty pounds.

Whether she succeeded in getting herself down to just this figure is not a matter of veracious record, but it is true that she made a hit with her men's clothes and became an authority in the yellow journals on masculine attire. But the banting process was not to her liking, so that Miss Templeton finally decided to seek the sort of parts where her avoirdupois would cut no figure in the artistic results. In this way she came to join Weber & Fields's, entering upon the second phase of her career as a burlesque actress of the first rank.

Her imitations of Irene Vanbrugh in "The Gay Lord Quex," of Ethel Barrymore in "Captain Jinks," of Annie Russell in "The Girl and the Judge," were all of them wonders in their way, and possibly had she been content to remain at the Twenty-Ninth Street music-hall for more than a season after Lillian Russell's advent, the two partners might never have split. But quit she did, and went up to the New York, where her imitation of Fougère in "Broadway to Tokio" was called by one of the critics a classic.

Incapacity of authors to provide the proper sort of vehicle is responsible for Miss Templeton's passage to her third stage of triumph. This has just been reached in "Forty-Five Minutes from Broadway," that classless concoction of George M. Cohan which shows her as a sedate housemaid of somber clothes and repressed demeanor. But so subtle is her art that she fills the huge New Amsterdam Theater as only Mansfield has ever succeeded in filling it before. There is no tinsel, no dancing, not a single imitation, but in an entirely new field Fay Templeton has blazed a path by the sheer finesse of her skill in attaining results by the simplest means.