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Behind the Footlights

<h2 id="CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV THEATRICAL DRESSING-ROOMS A Star’s Dressing-room—Long Flights of Stairs—Miss Ward at the Haymarket—A Wimple—An Awkward Predicament—How an Actress Dresses—Herbert Waring—An Actress’s Dressing-table—A Girl’s Photographs of Herself—A Grease-paint Box—Eyelashes—White Hands—Mrs. Langtry’s Dressing-room—Clara Morris on Make-up—Mrs. Tree as Author—“Resting”—Mary Anderson on the Stage—An Author’s Opinion—Actors in Society.</h2> AFTER ascending long flights of stone stairs, traversing dreary passages with whitewashed walls, and doors on either side marked one, two, or three, we tap for admission to a dressing-room. Where is the fairy pathway? where the beauty?—ah! where? That long white corridor resembles some passage in a prison, and the little chambers leading off it are not very different in appearance from well-kept convict cells, yet this is the home of our actors or actresses for many hours each day. In some country theatres the dressing-rooms are still disgraceful, and the sanitary arrangements worse. Even in London it is only the “stars” who have an apartment to themselves. At such an excellently conducted theatre as the Haymarket, Miss Winifred Emery has to mount long flights between every act. Suppose she has to change her costume four times[Pg 276] in the play, she must ascend those stone stairs five times in the course of each evening, or, in other words, walk up two hundred and fifty steps in addition to the fatigue of acting and the worry of quick changing, while on matinée days this exertion is doubled. She is a leading lady; she has a charming little room when she reaches it, and the excitement, the applause, and the pay of a striking part to cheer her—but think of the sufferers who have the stairs without the redeeming features. An actress once told me she walked, or ran, up eight hundred steps every night during her performance. While speaking of dressing-rooms I recall a visit I paid to Miss Geneviève Ward at the Haymarket during the run of <cite>Caste</cite> (1902). It was a matinée, and, wanting to ask that delightful woman and great actress a question, I ventured to the stage door and sent up my card. “Miss Ward is on the stage; but I will give it to her when she comes off in four minutes,” said the stage-door-keeper. Accordingly I waited near his room. The allotted time went by—it is known in a theatre exactly how long each scene will take—and at the expiration of the four minutes Miss Ward’s dresser came to bid me follow her up to the lady’s room. The dresser was a nice, complacent-looking woman, l’âge ordinaire, as the French would say, arrayed in a black dress and big white apron. Miss Ward had ascended before us, and was already seated on her little sofa. [Pg 277] “Delighted to see you, my dear,” she exclaimed. “I have three-quarters of an hour’s wait, so I hope you will stay to cheer me up.” How lovely she looked. Her own white hair was covered by a still whiter front wig, while added colour had given youth to her face, and the darkened eyelids made those wondrous grey orbs of hers even more striking. “Why, you look about thirty-five,” I exclaimed, “and a veritable grande dame!” “It is all the wimple,” she said. “And what may that be?” “Why, this little velvet string arrangement from my bonnet, with the bow under my chin; when you get old, my dear, you must wear a wimple too; it holds back those double, treble, a nd quadruple chins that are so annoying, and restores youth—me voilà.” Miss Ward was first initiated into the mysteries and joys of a wimple when about to play in <cite>Becket</cite> at the Lyceum. While we chatted she took up her knitting—being as untiring in that line as Mrs. Kendal. Miss Ward was busy making bonnets for hospital children, and during all those long hours she waited in her dressing-room, this indefatigable woman knitted for the poor. After about half an hour her dresser returned and said: “It is time for you to dress, madame.” “Shall I leave?” I asked. “Certainly not—there is plenty of room for us all;” and in a moment the knitting was put aside,[Pg 278] and her elaborate blue silk garment taken off and hung on a peg between white sheets. Rapidly Miss Ward transformed herself into a sorrowing mother—a black skirt, a long black coat and bonnet were placed in readiness, when lo, the dresser, having turned everything over, exclaimed: “I cannot see your black bodice.” Miss Ward looked perturbed. “I do believe I have left it at home—I went back in it last night, if you remember, because I was lazy; and forgot all about it. Never mind, no one will see the bodice is missing when I put on my cloak, if I fasten it tight up, and I must just melt inside its folds.” But when the cloak was fastened there still appeared a decidedly décolleté neck. Time was pressing, the “call boy” might arrive at any moment. Miss Ward seized a black silk stocking, which she twirled round her neck, secured it with a jet brooch, powdered her face to make it look more doleful, and was ready in her garb of woe ere the boy knocked. Then we went down together. These theatrical dressers become wonderfully expert. I have seen an actress come off the stage after a big scene quite exhausted, and yet only have a few minutes before the next act. She stood in the middle of her dressing-room while we talked, and at once her attendant set to work. The great lady remained like a block. Quickly the dresser undid her neck-band, and unhooked the bodice after removing the lace, took away the folded waistband, slipped off the skirt, and[Pg 279] in a twinkling the long ball dress was over the actress’s head and being fastened behind. Her arms were slipped into the low bodice, and while she arranged the jewels or her corsage the dresser was doing her up at the back. Down sat the actress in a chair placed for her, and while she rouged more strongly to suit the gaiety of the scene, the dresser was putting feathers and ornaments into her hair, pinning a couple of little curls to her wig to hang down her neck, and just as they both finished this rapid transformation the call boy rapped. Off went my friend. “I shall be back in seven minutes,” she exclaimed, “so do wait, as I have fourteen minutes’ pause then.” The dresser caught up her train and her cloak, and followed the great lady to the wings, where I saw her arranging the actress’s dress before she went on, and waiting to slip on the cloak and gloves which she was supposed in the play to come off and fetch. A good dresser is a treasure, and that is why most people prefer their own to those provided at the theatres. Apropos of knowing exactly how long an actor is on the stage, I may mention that Herbert Waring once invited me to tea in his dressing-room. “At what time?” I naturally asked. “I’ll inquire from my dresser,” was his reply. “I really don’t know when I have my longest ‘wait.’” Accordingly a telegram arrived next day, which said “tea 4.25,” so at 4.25 I presented myself at the[Pg 280] stage door, where Mr. Waring’s man was waiting to receive me. Others joined us. A tin tray was spread with a clean towel; as usual, the theatrical china did not match, and the spoons and the seats were insufficient, but the tea and cakes were delicious, and the rough-and-tumble means of serving them in a star’s dressing-room only in keeping with the usual arrangements of austere simplicity behind the scenes. “What was the most amusing thing that ever happened to you on the stage?” Mr. Waring looked perplexed. “I haven’t the slightest idea. Nothing amusing ever happens; it is the same routine day, alas, after day, the same dressing, undressing, acting, finishing, going gleefully home, and returning next day to begin exactly the same thing over again. I must be a very dull dog, but I cannot ferret out anything ‘amusing’ from the back annals of a long theatrical career,” and up he jumped to slip on his powdered wig—which he had removed to cool his head—and away he ran to entertain his audience. Mr. Waring’s amusing experiences, or lack of them, seem very usual in theatrical life. What a delightful man he is, and what a gentleman in all his dealings. He is always loved by the companies with whom he acts, and never makes a failure with his parts. The most important thing in an actress’s dressing-room is her table—verily a curious sight. It is generally very large, more often than not it is composed of plain deal, daintily dressed up in muslin[Pg 281] flouncings over pink or blue calico. There seems to be a particular fashion in this line, probably because the muslin frills can go to the wash—a necessary proviso for anything connected with the theatre. In the middle usually reposes a large looking-glass, and as one particular table is in my mind’s eye, I will describe it, as it is typical of many, and belonged to a beautiful comic-opera actress. The looking-glass was ornamented with little muslin frills and tucks, tied with dainty satin bows, on to which were pinned a series of the actress’s own photographs. These cabinet portraits formed a perfect garniture, they represented the lady in every conceivable part she had ever played, and were tied together with tiny scarlet ribbons, the foot of one being fixed to the head of the next. The large mirror over the fireplace—for she was a star and had a fireplace—was similarly ornamented, so was the cheval glass, and above the chimneypiece was a complete screen composed of another set of her own photographs from another piece. These had to stand up, so the little red bows which fixed them went from side to side, by which means they stood along the board zig-zag fashion, like a miniature screen, without tumbling down. She was not in the least egotistical, it was simply the craze for photographs, which all theatrical folk seem to have, carried a little further than usual, and in her own dressing-room she essayed to have her own photographs galore. As she was very pretty and many of the costumes charming, she showed her good taste. [Pg 282] In front of the looking-glass was a large pincushion stuffed with a multiplication of pins of every shape and size, endless hat-pins, safety-pins, and little brooches, in fact, a supply sufficient to pin everything on to her person that exigency might require. There were large pots of powder, flat tablets of rouge, hares’ feet, for putting on the rouge, fine black pencils for darkening eyes, blue chalk pencils for lining the lids, wonderful cherry-red arrangements for painting Cupid’s lips, for even people with large mouths can by deft artistic treatment be made to appear to have small ones. There were bottles of white liquid for hands and neck, because it is more important, of course, to paint the hands than the face, otherwise they are apt to look appallingly red or dirty behind the footlights. There were two barber’s blocks on which stood the wigs for the respective acts, since it is much quicker and less trouble to put on a wig than adjust one’s hair, and probably no one, except Mrs. Kendal, has ever gone through an entire theatrical career and only twice donned a wig. Of course there were endless powders as well as perfumes of every sort and kind. There were hand-mirrors and three-fold mirrors, and electric light that could be moved about, for it is important to look well from all sides when trotting about the stage. Theatrical dressing-rooms are so small that the dressing-table is their chief feature, and if there be room for a sofa or arm-chair, they are accounted luxurious. All the costumes, as a rule, are hung against the[Pg 283] wall, which is first covered with a calico sheet, then each dress is hung on its own peg, over which other calico sheets fall. This does not crush them, keeps all clean, and avoids creases; nevertheless, the most brilliant theatrical costumes look like a series of melancholy ghosts when not in use. One of the actress’s most important possessions is the grease paint-box, which in tin, separated into compartments for paints, costs about ten and sixpence. Into these little compartments she puts vaseline, coco butter, Nuceline, and Massine for cleaning the skin. For the face has to be washed, so to speak, with grease, preparatory to being made up. A fair woman first lays on a layer of grease paint of a cream ground. On to that she puts light carmine on her cheeks, and follows the lines of her own colour as much as she can. Some people have colour high up on the cheek-bones, others low down, and it is as well to follow this natural tint if possible. She blue-pencils round her eyes to enhance their size, gets the blue well into the corners and down a little at the outside edges to enlarge those orbs. Then she powders her face all over to get rid of that look of grease which is so distressing, and soften down the general make-up, and then proceeds to darken her eyelashes and eyebrows. One little actress told me she always wound a piece of cotton round a hairpin, on to which she put a blob of cosmetic, heated it in the gas or candle, and when it was melted, blinked her eyelashes up and down upon it so that they might take on the black without getting[Pg 284] it in hard lumps, but as a level surface. She put a little red blob in the corner of her eyes to give brightness, and a red line in the nostrils to do away with the black cavern-like appearance caused by the strong lights of the stage. “I never make up the lips full size,” she said, “or else they look enormous from the front. I put on very bright little ‘Cupid’s bow’ middles, which gives all the effect that is necessary. After I have powdered my face and practically finished it, I just dust on a little dry rouge with a hare’s foot to get the exact amount of colour I wish for each act. Grease paints are absolutely necessary to get the make-up to stay on one’s face, but they have to be well powdered down or they will wear greasy.” “I always think the hands are so important,” I remarked. “Oh yes,” she replied. “Of course, for common parts, such as servants, one leaves one’s hands to look red, for the footlights always make them look a dirty red, but for aristocratic ladies we have to whiten our hands, arms, and neck, and I make a mixture of my own of glycerine and chalk, because it is so much cheaper than buying it ready-made. “Sometimes it takes me an hour to make up my face. You see, a large nose can be modified; and a small nose can be made bigger by rouging it up the sides and leaving a strong white line down the middle. It is wonderful how one can alter one’s face with paint, though I think it is better to make up too little than too much[Pg 285].” Thus it will be seen an hour is quite a usual length of time for an actress to sit in front of her dressing-table preparatory to the performance. Mrs. Langtry’s dressing-room at the Imperial Theatre may be mentioned. An enormous mirror is fastened against one wall, and round it, in the shape of a Norman arch, are three rows of electric lights giving different colour effects. The plain glass is to dress by in the ordinary way; pink tones give sunset and evening effect; while the third is a curious smoked arrangement to simulate moonlight or dawn. Dresses can be chosen and the face painted accordingly to suit the stage colouring of the scene. The lights turn on above, below, or at the sides, so the effect can be studied from every point of view. While on the subject of making up, a piece of advice from the great actor Jefferson to the wonderful American actress, Clara Morris, is of interest: “Be guided as far as possible by Nature. When you make up your face, you get powder on your eyelashes. Nature made them dark, so you are free to touch the lashes themselves with ink or pomade, but you should not paint a great band about your eye, with a long line added at the corner to rob it of expression. And now as to the beauty this lining is supposed to bring, some night when you have time I want you to try a little experiment. Make up your face carefully, darken your brows and the lashes of one eye; as to the other eye, you must load the lashes with black pomade, then draw a black line[Pg 286] beneath the eye, and a broad line on its upper lid, and a final line out from the corner. The result will be an added lustre to the make-up eye and a seeming gain in brilliancy; but now, watching your reflection all the time, move slowly backwards from the glass, and an odd thing will happen; that made-up eye will gradually grow smaller and will gradually look like a black hole, absolutely without expression.” Clara Morris followed Jefferson’s counsel and never blued or blacked her eyes again. I once paid an interesting visit to a dressing-room: it came about in this wise. In 1898 the jubilee of Queen’s College, in Harley Street, was celebrated. It was founded fifty years previously as the first college open to women. A booklet in commemoration of the event was got up, and many old girls were persuaded to relate their experiences. Among them were Miss Sophia Jex Blake, M.D., Miss Dorothea Beale (of Cheltenham), Miss Adeline Sargent, the novelist, Miss Louisa Twining, whose work on pauperism and workhouses is well known, Miss Mary Wardell, the founder of the Convalescent Home, etc. Mrs. Tree agreed to write an article on the stage as a profession for women. At the last moment, when all the other contributions had gone to press, hers was not amongst them. It was a matinée day, and as editor I went down to Her Majesty’s, and bearded the delinquent in her dressing-room. She was nearly ready for the performance, in the midst of her profession, so to speak; but realising the necessity of doing the work at once[Pg 287] or not at all, she seized some half-sheets of paper, and between her appearances on the stage jotted down an excellent article. It was clever, to the point, and full of learning. It appeared a few days later, and some critic was unkind enough to say “her husband or some other man had written it for her.” I refute the charge; for I myself saw it hastily sketched in with a pencil at odd moments on odd scraps of paper. Mrs. Tree is a woman who would have succeeded in many walks of life, for she is enthusiastic and thorough, a combination which triumphantly surmounts difficulties. She has a strong personality. In the old Queen’s College days she used to wear long æsthetic gowns and hair cut short. Bunches of flowers generally adorned her waist, offerings from admiring young students, whom she guided through the intricacies of Latin or mathematics. The Beerbohm Trees have a charming old-fashioned house at Chiswick, and three daughters of various and diverse ages, for the eldest is grown up while the youngest is quite small. Both parents are devoted to reading and fond of society, but their life is one long rush. Books from authors line their shelves, etchings and sketches from artists cover their walls; both have great taste with a keen appreciation of genius. Few people realise what an unusually clever couple the Beerbohm Trees are, or how versatile are their talents. They fly backwards and forwards to the theatre in motor-cars, and pretend they like it in spite of midnight wind and rain. [Pg 288] Theatrical work means too much work or none. It is a great strain to play eight times a week, to dress eight times at each performance, as in a Drury Lane drama, and to rehearse a new play or give a matinée performance as well, and yet this has to be done when the work is there, for what one refuses, dozens, aye dozens, are waiting eagerly to take. Far more actors and actresses are “resting” every evening than are employed in theatres, poor souls. “Resting!” That word is a nightmare to men and women on the stage. It means dismissal, it means weary waiting—often actual want—yet it is called “resting.” It spells days of unrest—days of dreary anxiety and longing, days when the unfortunate actor is too proud to beg for work, too proud even to own temporary defeat—which nevertheless is there. A long run of luck, the enjoyment of many months, perhaps years, when all looked bright and sunny, when money was plentiful and success seemed assured, suddenly stops. There is no suitable part available, new blood is wanted in the theatre, and the older hands must go. Then comes that cruelly enforced “rest,” and, alas! more often than not, nothing has been laid by for the rainy day, when £10 a week ceases even to reach 10s. Expenses cannot easily be curtailed. Home and family are there, the actor hopes every week for new work, he refuses to retrench, but lives on that miserable farce “keeping up appearances,” which, although sometimes good policy, frequently spells ruin in the end. <div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG src="images/i_288fp.jpg" width-obs="417" height-obs="600" alt="" /> Photo by Bassano, 25, Old Bond Street, W. MRS. BEERBOHM TREE. </div> [Pg 289] Some of the best actors and actresses of the day are forced into this unfortunate position; indeed, they suffer more than the smaller fry—for each theatre requires only one or two stars in its firmament. Theatrical folk are sometimes inclined to be foolish and refuse to play a small part for small pay, because they think it beneath their dignity, so they prefer to starve on their mistaken grandeur, which is, alas! nothing more nor less than unhappy pride. Clara Morris, one of America’s best-known actresses, shows the possible horrors, almost starvation, of an actress’s early years in her delightful volume, <cite>Life on the Stage</cite>. She nearly died from want of food, and after years and years of work all over the States made her first appearance as “leading lady” at Daly’s Theatre in New York at a salary of thirty-five dollars a week, starting with only two dollars (eight shillings) in her pocket. Her first triumph she discussed with her mother and her dog over a supper of bread and cheese. She had attained success—but even then it was months and months, almost years, before she earned enough money either to live in comfort or be warmly clothed. The beautiful Mary Anderson, in her introduction to the volume, says: “I trust this work will help to stem the tide of girls who so blindly rush into a profession of which they are ignorant, for which they are unfitted, and in which dangers unnumbered lurk on all sides. If with Clara Morris’s power and charm so much had to be suffered, what is—what must be—the lot of so[Pg 290] many mediocrities who pass through the same fires to receive no reward in the end?” Every one who knows the stage, knows what weary suffering is endured daily by would-be actors who are “resting”; and as they grow older that “resting” process comes more often, for, as one of the greatest dramatists of the day said to me lately: “The stage is only for the young and beautiful, they can claim positions and salaries which experience and talent are unable to keep. By the time youth has thoroughly learnt its art it is no longer physically attractive, and is relegated to the shelf.” “That seems very hard.” “Ah, but it is true. At the best the theatrical is a poor profession, and ends soon. Believe me, it is only good for handsome young men and lovely girls. When the bloom of youth has gone, good acting does not command the salary given to beautiful inexperience.” “How cruelly sad!” “Perhaps—but truth is often sad. When a girl comes to me and says she has had an offer of marriage, but she doesn’t want to give up her Art, I reply: “‘Marry the man before your Art gives you up.’” This was severe, but I have often thought over the subject since, and seen how true were the words of that man “who knew.” Half a century ago only a few favoured professionals were admitted into the sacred circle called Society, and then only on rare occasions, but all that is now changed: actors and actresses are the fashion, and may[Pg 291] be found everywhere and anywhere. Their position is remarkable, and they appear to enjoy society as much as society enjoys them. They are fêted and feasted, the world worships at their feet. In London the position of an actor or actress of talent is a brilliant one socially. <hr class="chap" /> [Pg 292] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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