B 424293
ARTES
1817
LIBRARY VERITAS
SCIENTIA
OF THE
ЦЕН
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
TUEBOR
6 J·QUÆRIS-PENINSULAM-AMCENAM
CIRCUMSPICE
822.9
K75
Famous Actors and Actresses
and Their Homes





Copyright, 1901, by Irving R.Wiles
From a
Copley Print, Copyright 1902,
by Curtis & Cameron, Publishers, Boston
Famous
Actors & Actresses
And Their Homes
By
Gustav Kobbé
Author of "Signora, a Child of the Opera-House"
Opera Singers," etc.
66
With Numerous Illustrations from Photographs
LIBRARYY
02
MICH, UNIV


Boston
Little, Brown, and Company
1903


YHASE
ЛІСИ ЛИГА
Copyright, 1903,
BY THE CURTIS PUBLISHING CO.
Copyright, 1903,
BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.
All rights reserved
Published November, 1903
UNIVERSITY PRESS • JOHN WILSON
AND SON • CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.
Contents
PAGE
MAUDE ADAMS
ETHEL BARRYMORE
1
43
G
OJ 6-12-05
JOHN DREW
WILLIAM GILLETTE
RICHARD MANSFIELD.
JULIA MARLOWE
ANNIE RUSSELL
67
99
137
175
203
•
E. H. SOTHERN AND HIS WIFE, VIRGINIA HARNED 247
FRANCIS WILSON
289
"THE LAMBS" "
317

"THE PLAYERS'
341

137311
[v]





Illustrations
Julia Marlowe
From the Painting by Irving R. Wiles
Maude Adams
Maude Adams in one of her Early Rôles
Maude Adams at Nine Years of Age.
Maude Adams as a Child
Maude Adams
Maude Adams
Frontispiece
PAGE
5
11
13
21
29
Ethel Barrymore in her Favorite White Costume.
Light and Shade
A Quiet Corner
At the Piano.
Ethel Barrymore in her Library
Ready for a Walk
On the Piazza, Easthampton
John Drew in his Library
37
95
103
107
དྡུཎྜུ༠༤2རྱ་ཆྱེ

John Drew and his Daughter ready for a Ride
85
John Drew, his Daughter, and their Pets
88
•
John Drew in his Study
John Drew
.
.
.
The Gillette Homestead, Hartford
William Gillette
[vii]

ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
The "Den" at the Homestead
113
Deck View of the Aunt Polly
117
The Salon on the Aunt Polly
125
The Engine built by Gillette when a Boy
129
William Gillette's Houseboat, the Aunt Polly
134
Richard Mansfield and his Wife and Son
143
Teaching Georgie to ride
147
157
A Quiet Cup of Tea
.
Garden
·
Richard Mansfield and his Wife in their New London
A Favorite Spot on a Summer Day
One of Julia Marlowe's latest Portraits
163
•
169
183
"Now beg for it!"
185
Julia Marlowe in her Automobile
.
189
Ready for a Walk
·
.
195
A Favorite Nook at Highmount
. 199
Through the Green
201
Annie Russell
207
Annie Russell
215
Annie Russell in her Japanese Corner
219
Annie Russell out of Doors .
225
Annie Russell at the Helm .
Out for a Ride
231
•
235
Annie Russell and "Donald," who plays the Prince
in " A Royal Family"
E. H. Sothern in his Library
242
.
253
[viii]

ILLUSTRATIONS
E. H. Sothern and his Fox Terrier
Mrs. E. H. Sothern (Virginia Harned)
Starting for a Walk
·
E. H. Sothern and his Wife in the Main Hall of their
PAGE
260
269
277
Home
.
Francis Wilson at Home .
283
293
Francis Wilson in his Library
297
Francis Wilson at Home .
305
A Quiet Game with his Daughter
Harry Montague
Reading Room of "The Lambs' "
The Dutch Grill of "The Lambs'
311
319
323
·
327
Lester Wallack
.
333
"The Lambs'" Assembly Room
337
Edwin Booth.
343
Second Floor Hall of "The Players'
347
Joseph Jefferson
.
351

Reading Room of "The Players' ".
355
Grill Room of "The Players' "
358
The Illustrations are from Plates made by John Andrew and Son.
[ix]



MAUDE ADAMS


Famous
Actors and Actresses
& Their Homes
M
MAUDE ADAMS

AUDE ADAMS sells wood,
pigs, and poultry. No; this is
not another Maude Adams.
'Tis the same who is known
But
all the country over as Lady
Babbie, L'Aiglon, and Phoebe Throssel.
she cares more for Ronkonkoma, Long Island,
N. Y., than for Thrums; for the fields on her
farm more than for the field of Wagram,
and for her St. Bernards, her horses, her
pigs, and her chickens than for the neighbors
on Quality Street.
If she were not an actress, she doubtless
would be a farmer. She is one now, when-
[3]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
ever she has a chance. But I mean that she
would do that and nothing else. For she
fairly revels in country life and in her farm
acres at Ronkonkoma. She would like nothing
better than to spend the rest of her life there,
at least, so she thinks. At all events, every
moment she can spare when she is acting in
New York or its vicinity, she spends there,
even if she has to charter a special train to
reach it. This is her regular method during
her New York engagements. Every Saturday
night a special train is in readiness for her
at Long Island City, and on Monday she takes
it back again, leaving Ronkonkoma at the last
possible moment for her to be in time at the
theatre. This love of healthy outdoor life is
characteristic of many prominent members of
the theatrical profession, and of none more so
than Miss Adams.
Could she spend all her time on her farm,
she would look after the work there with so
[4]


Maude Adams
Photographed by Sarony
MorM


ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
much personal attention and such enthusiasm
that she no doubt would solve the problem
which so many millionaires and astute finan-
ciers, who have taken up farming as a side
issue, have failed in,- how to make farming
pay.
Nor would there any longer be an
abandoned farm" problem: she would "take
up" all of them if she could.
66
Like retired army officers, who seem to
enjoy nothing better than hoeing in a garden,
she is simply "possessed" by all that apper-
tains to the care of her garden and her farm.
Those who know her best believe that, if she
ever leaves the stage, she will settle on her
farm and stay there the rest of her life. Great
would be the rejoicing among the living crea-
tures thereon. For in common with every
one else they love her. It is said at Ronkon-
koma that when a Maude Adams pig is to be
sold it sheds real tears and that the fowl droop
their wings in sorrow.
[7]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
one in
Maude Adams has three homes,
the city, one in the mountains, and this farm.
But this last is the one nearest her heart.
There she can enjoy freedom and at the same
time privacy.
On her two hundred acres,
which she hopes soon to enlarge and extend
through to the waters of Long Island Sound,
she can roam around at will. There is space
and variety enough for her to enjoy horseback
riding without leaving her own bailiwick.
At the same time, because it is her own, she
can keep away from curiosity-seekers.
For even more than farming Miss Adams
loves privacy. It is said at Ronkonkoma that
while the splendid St. Bernards on her farm
are maintained chiefly for their beauty and
because of her love for animals, one of their
chief functions is to scare off camera fiends.
And, if you will stop to think, you probably
will realize that already you have found out
more about Miss Adams from what you so
[8]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
far have read in this article than you ever
have known before. For less is known of
her personally than of any other prominent
person on the stage. Didn't your own know-
ledge of her stop right at the footlights?
She
A writer of my acquaintance, represent-
ing one of the greatest newspapers in this
country, went down to Ronkonkoma with a
professional photographer. Miss Adams was
away, but Mrs. Adams, who knew the writer,
admitted him and the photographer.
allowed photographs to be taken, but with
the distinct proviso that they were to be held
subject to her daughter's order. She also
immediately notified the newspaper which had
sent down the expedition of this condition.
The upshot of the matter was that Miss
Adams bought the negatives and has retained
the only set of prints made from them.
To preserve the privacy she loves, she has
placed everything pertaining to publication
[9]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
about her in the hands of her manager, Charles
Frohman. A writer for whom she has the
deepest respect might apply to her for an
interview. He would at once be referred to
Mr. Frohman, who straightway would say
"no." For he, partly from regard for her
own desire for privacy, partly from a well-
defined policy which he adopted as soon as
he became her manager about eight years ago,
has limited publicity concerning her absolutely
to her stage appearances. It has been a re-
freshing contrast to the reams of "stuff"
about stage favorites that appear in print.
Moreover, because of this policy, this chapter
may give additional pleasure to the reader, not
as one of the few, but as absolutely the first
touching her personality which is authentic.
There has been written considerable about
Maude Adams, but nothing about "Maudie."
For ever since she was a child she has been
66
Maudie" to every one around her, - her
[ 10 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
disposition is so bright and sunny. When as
a child she wanted to go on the stage in the
same company with her mother, and her father
protested that

he did not want
a daughter of
his making a
fool of herself,
she protested,
"No, Papa,
'Maudie' not
make a fool of
herself;" and
I have a pho-
tograph of her
taken in San
Photographed by Thors, San Francisco
Francisco Maude Adams in one of her Early Roles
when she was nine years old, on the back
of which is scrawled, For Papa from
'Maudie,' nine years old." A sweet pic-
ture it is too, and with much of the witchery
[ 11 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
of the woman as she is now. I have seen few
child pictures which so clearly prophesy the
charm of the little one at maturity. And so
it is that "Maudie" has remained "Maudie "
to this day. One of the child rôles which
she played when she still was billed as
"Little Maudie," was in "The Boy Wan-
derer." Another juvenile rôle in the same
play was taken by Flora Walsh. In the
interesting illustration of these two stage
children, which accompanies this chapter, the
smaller child to the right, as you look at the
photograph, is "Little Maudie."
It should be noted that she no longer is
"Maudie " to many besides those who know
her well in the profession. Her friendships,
though very close, are few, and perhaps these
are the most satisfactory friendships to have,
and the kind to be proudest of on both sides.
Probably her most intimate friend is Mrs.
Thomas Hastings, of New York, who before
[ 12 ]

Photographed by Thors, San Francisco
Maude Adams at Nine Years of Age

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
her marriage was Miss Helen Benedict, and is
a daughter of E. C. Benedict, Grover Cleve-
land's friend. A pretty picture of Mrs. Hast-
ings on horseback is on Miss Adams's desk.
The people who try to become acquainted
with Miss Adams are legion. Among them
are many young girls. She is, however, most
circumspect in not permitting even those who
attract her to go beyond the group of enthusi-
asts who gather at the stage door after every
matinée to watch her come out, unless they
have their parents' permission to know her.
Miss Adams appreciates that an actress is
more or less of a public woman, and she is
aware that some people might object to their
children's acquaintance with a professional
woman. Therefore, however straitlaced or
mistaken she may consider these views, she
holds it is not for her to sit in judgment upon
them, in dealing with young people who still
should be amenable to their parents' authority.
[ 15 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
One girl, to whom she took a great liking,
came several times to see her at her New York
house, until Miss Adams found out that her
little friend's parents knew nothing about her
visits. She immediately forbade her to come
again. The following week she was booked
for Philadelphia. When she reached the ferry
there was the girl to say good-bye to her and
"dying" to cross the ferry with her.
Do they know at home that you have
come here to see me?" asked Miss Adams as
sternly as she could.
The girl was obliged to answer that they
did not. Miss Adams at once had her driven
home in her own carriage.
While Miss Adams has many animal pets
on her farm two of her special favorites are in
New York. One of these is a fine St. Bernard.
She keeps him in her house, on East Fortieth
Street, both as a pet and in a measure for pro-
tection, because there are only women in the
[ 16 ]


ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
family, her mother and grandmother, who
live with her. The big dog lies on the rug near
the front door. Any footstep outside, save
hers, and he would rouse the house with his
barking. But when she comes home from the
theatre at night, he simply looks up and wags
his tail as she passes in. The same is true if
her tour has taken her months away from New
York and she reaches the city and her house
late at night. The friendly look and wagging
greet her. The intelligent animal seems to
know that he must not disturb the silent
household, however glad he may be to see his
mistress again. This St. Bernard is one of the
many from her farm. Usually he is the only
passenger, besides herself, on Miss Adams's
special train for Ronkonkoma on Saturday
night. She thinks an airing and a visit to his
country cousins do him good.
She keeps several saddle-horses on her farm
and is on horseback much of the time there.
[ 17 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Yet her favorite saddle-horse is in New York
and does not even belong to her. Its name is
Minnie, and is the property of a public stable.
When, however, Miss Adams is in New York,
playing or rehearsing, the mare generally is
reserved for her use. The zest she takes in an
exhilarating canter is another trait Miss Adams
shares with other leading members of her pro-
fession, Miss Annie Russell, Miss Marlowe,
Mr. Drew, and Mr. Mansfield, for example.
-
All sorts of silly stories are afloat regarding
Miss Adams's health. True, she is not robust-
looking and never was. In fact, her charm lies
not a little in a physical frailness that gives an
appealing touch even to her humor and adds
delicacy and charm to its quaintness. Yet she
is an indefatigable worker in her profession
Mr. Frohman says she would play a matinée
every day if he would let her- and never has
missed a performance because of illness. In
fact, I believe she has a remarkable record for
[ 18 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
keeping engagements, and never has failed to
appear as billed save on one occasion when the
train on which she and her company travelled
was stalled in a blizzard. Nor does she find it
necessary to "rest up" between performances,
but busies herself reading and in healthy,
outdoor exercise. In fact, one reason why
she wants to extend her farm to the Sound is
that she is very fond of swimming and expert
at it, and would like a bathing beach on her
own place.
Horses Maude Adams has loved since a
child. When she is on tour she rides when-
ever she finds opportunity. Some years ago,
when her mother travelled with her, she had a
boy connected with the company ride with
her, as her mother did not want her to ride out
alone. A paragraph praising her horseman-
ship appeared in a local paper. Straightway
another paper pooh-poohed it as a "press
agent's" yarn and wound up by expressing the
[ 19 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
opinion that probably Miss Adams "would n't
know a thoroughbred from a drayhorse, if they
were hitched to a post." She laughed over
the matter, but the boy, who adored her, was
so indignant he wanted to go before a notary
public and swear to the correctness of the first
paragraph.
Lately Miss Adams has taken up auto-
mobiling and in New York frequently drives
in one.
In order not to be too conspicuous
she leaves the guiding of the machine to the
chauffeur until the Park is reached, when she
becomes the chauffeuse and takes charge.
When people were taking up golf with a rush,
whether they could hit the ball, "swiped"
the air, or dug up the ground, it was reported
that she had adopted the game, and somehow
or other the idea got abroad that she was a
more or less enthusiastic golfer. This is but
another instance of the incorrect things that
are published about her. She is not a golfer.
[ 20 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
In the spring, during the long run of "The
Little Minister" in New York, she went several
times with the members of her company to the
links at Van

Cortlandt
Park, but it
was to see her
friends play,
not to play
herself. She
knows, from
hearsay, a few
of the weird
terms of golf-
language, such
as the names
of some of the
Photographed by Thors, San Francisco
Maude Adams as a Child
clubs, but she never hit a golf-ball but once.
Then the ball found her so attractive it rolled
barely a club's length from her. She says
golf hardens and tightens the muscles, and
[ 21 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
she prefers exercise that limbers and loosens
them.
The amusing story of Maude Adams's wholly
accidental stage début, while she was a baby,
has been told, but, so far as I know, never with
entire correctness. Her mother, Mrs. Annie
Adams, was leading woman of the stock com-
pany in Salt Lake City, where Maude was
born some thirty odd years ago. Annie
Adams had married William Kiskadden, a
banker, but for stage purposes had retained
her family name, as Mr. Kiskadden's people
had made some objection to his marriage with
an actress, although now that Miss Adams has
become so famous, the Kiskaddens are only
too proud of the connection, and would be glad
enough to see Maude Kiskadden" on the
playbills instead of Maude Adams.
66

However, to little Maude's début! One
night Mrs. Adams was supporting a visiting
star in a play called The Cottage Girl."
[ 22 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
This was followed, according to the custom of
the day, by a roaring one-act farce, "The Lost
Child." In this Mrs. Adams had no part. A
baby is required in this farce. The infant is
rushed on and off the stage several times, and
finally is brought on by a waiter on a platter
and set down on a table before the father, who,
throughout the many amusing contretemps of
the play, has been hopelessly distracted in his
search for the child, which really has not been
lost at all.
As the story always is told, Mrs. Adams is
supposed to have had baby Maude spending
the evening with her in her dressing-room.
But such a thing was no more permitted be-
hind the scenes in those days than it would be
now. There was no baby behind the scenes
save the one required in the farce. Immedi-
ately after "The Cottage Girl" Mrs. Adams
had dressed, but instead of leaving the theatre
at once, remained to watch the farce. She
[ 23 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
was standing by the call-board; the baby had
been rushed on and off several times; the
performance was nearly over. Just then Mrs.
Adams chanced to look down the passageway
to the stage door. The keeper had just opened
it, and she saw her maid with Maudie in her
arms. They had come for Mrs. Adams to go
home with them.
That moment the stage baby set up a howl,
the kind of howl which means a shrieking
spell that nothing can quiet. The manager
was in despair. The fate of the farce hung in
the balance. It was at the most critical point.
In a moment the cue would come for the baby
to be rushed on, on a platter. Looking about
him in a hopeless way, the distracted manager
caught a glimpse of a baby at the stage door.
Half running, half sliding, he pushed past Mrs.
Adams, snatched Maudie from her nurse's
arms, shoved her on the platter just as the cue
came, thrust the platter onto the waiter's arms,

[ 24 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
and a moment later platter and Maudie were
on the table in full view of the audience.
And the audience? A howl of merriment
went up from it. At first every one behind
the scenes was nonplussed. Then they saw
the point. The original baby, which the audi-
ence had seen a few minutes before, was only
six weeks old. Maudie was seven and a half
months, so that her appearance presented the
startling phenomenon of a child having taken
on something like twenty pounds in five min-
utes. But the louder the audience laughed,
the more Maudie was pleased, until inspired
by the merriment and the brightly lighted
house, she got upon her hands and knees and
cooed at the audience, which again was con-
vulsed. Altogether Maude Adams's début as
a baby was a grand success and one which to
this day is recalled with amusement in Salt
Lake City.
Notwithstanding this successful début, she

[ 25 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
did not again appear on the stage until she
began playing child rôles with J. K. Emmett
in San Francisco. In one scene she had to be
tied to a mill wheel, and at a certain point
scream, that scream being the critical moment
of the scene. She would look at her mother,
who was on the stage with her, and as the
time grew near whisper, "Muffer, must I
scweam now?" That "Muffer," by the way,
has been a treasure to her daughter, un-
failing in her devotion to her. When as
a grown up girl Maude appeared for the
first time in New York it was in "The Pay-
master" in the old Star Theatre. In this
play is a tank in which the character played
by Miss Adams has to jump. But the mother
would listen to nothing of the sort. When
the scene came, she "made up" to look the
character, and it was she, not Maude, who
took the cold plunge.
It was in this play Charles Frohman first
[ 26 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
saw her, and with prophetic eye he discerned in
her what she has since become, the sweet
embodiment of golden girlhood. He immedi-
ately engaged her and has since managed her
with a skill that defies criticism. For, under
his management, Miss Adams has become, in
hard professional parlance, “the best piece of
theatrical property in the world."
His own stock company plans not having
yet matured, Mr. Frohman first "loaned" her
to Charles H. Hoyt for "The Midnight Bell,"
in which her success as Dot Bradbury, though
a minor rôle, was conspicuous enough al-
ready to justify his foresight. After that he
"loaned " her to Daniel Frohman for E. H.
Sothern. Then Charles Frohman being ready
to launch his stock company, she appeared at
the then Twenty-third Theatre, N. Y., in Gil-
lette's comedy "All the Comforts of Home,"
playing the opposite rôle to Henry Miller.
Since then she has placed her professional
[ 27 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
career unreservedly in Mr. Frohman's hands.
During her third season in his company she
called at his office one day. A casual remark
he made nearly staggered her. It was that
John Drew was to star under his management
the following season and she was to be Drew's
leading lady. I hardly could hold myself,"
she says in telling of it.
"I had to clasp my
knees to make sure I really was there." The
wiseacres, when they heard of Mr. Frohman's
purpose, shook their heads ominously. But
when the event, "The Masked Ball," came
off at Palmer's (Wallack's) in October, 1892,
Miss Adams "made good." This notwith-
standing, the wiseacres again shook their
heads when they heard four years later that
the following season Mr. Frohman would star
her. But her success as Lady Babbie in
"The Little Minister," produced at the Em-
pire Theatre, N. Y., in September, 1897, after a
preliminary week in Washington, was so great
[ 28 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
that it formed a veritable triumph and a
thoroughly legitimate one.

Apropos of
Babbie, it is in-
teresting to note
that for a long
time before Barrie
dramatized his
novel Mr. Froh-
man had been
urging him to do
SO. The author
had always re-
plied that he saw
no play in the
book. But dur-
ing the "Rose-
mary" run with
Miss Adams and
John Drew, he
Photographed by Burr McIntosh
was over here on
Maude Adams
[ 29 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
business connected with copyright matters and
chanced to drop in to see the play. After
the second act he came breathless into the
manager's office. "Mr. Frohman," he ejac-
ulated, "I have found my Babbie. I will
write the play if I can have Miss Adams for
the heroine."
Miss Adams's success did not turn her head.
She always has been ready for the work Mr.
Frohman has selected for her and has left its
selection absolutely to him. He dropped in
at the theatre one night between the third
and fourth acts of "The Little Minister," and
notified her to "get up" in Juliet, as she was
to play it the following spring. Next morning
he sailed for Europe, and she proceeded at once
to prepare herself for "Romeo and Juliet."
"L'Aiglon" was negotiated for and secured,
and she was cast for the part before she knew
anything about it, and the newspapers an-
nounced that she was to have the title rôle
[ 30 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
almost simultaneously with Mr. Frohman's
communication of that fact to her.
Another incident, which shows how little
her success has spoiled Miss Adams and illus-
trates the charming simplicity of her nature,
occurred during the rehearsals of "Quality
Street." She did not like the lighting of a
certain scene.
Instead of making a fuss about
it, she came to the theatre the next day a little
earlier than usual, borrowed a pot of paint
and a brush from the scenic artist, unscrewed
a few of the electric lamps from the footlights,
and, seating herself on the stage with these
various things about her, proceeded to put
a coat of paint on the lamps, and was com-
pletely absorbed in this occupation when the
other members of her company began to arrive.
Miss Adams never really studies a rôle in
the sense of memorizing it. Long as the
part of L'Aiglon is-longer than Hamlet
she never gave any special preparation
[ 31 ]


FAMOUS ACTORS AND
of this kind to it. She reads a new play
when Mr. Frohman has selected one for her
and studies it as a whole. Then she goes
to her books for information concerning the
period, place, architecture, costumes, etc. She
devotes a great deal of time to the study of
these phases of the play and gives little heed
to the actual lines. They come to her seem-
ingly without effort at rehearsal, and before
the play is produced she has every word of
the piece at her finger-tips. Her researches
have placed her thoroughly en rapport with
all the subject-matter of the piece, and she
is thus enabled to feel and know what she is
doing without blindly or half aimlessly grop-
ing through it, as would be the case if she
had not obtained a complete mental grasp of
the work.
From the time when
66
Maudie," then a
little girl, appeared with Emmett in San
Francisco until the present day, Miss Adams
[ 32 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
has been on the stage, with the exception of
a few school years in Salt Lake City during
which she lived with her grandmother. Mean-
while her mother, an actress of excellent repu-
tation, was travelling with theatrical companies.
The principal of the Salt Lake Collegiate In-
stitute at the time Miss Adams attended it was
Prof. J. F. Millspaugh, who now is President
of the State Normal School at Winona, Minn.
Of course Miss Adams was on the Institute
register as Maude Kiskadden; and Professor
Millspaugh, in writing to me about her school-
days, expresses the wish that she had retained
that picturesque name. But when she re-
sumed the stage, Adams was a valuable stage
asset for her on account of her mother's repu-
tation. Moreover, mother and daughter have
been together almost throughout Miss Adams's
entire career.
"At the time I knew her best," writes
Professor Millspaugh, with reference to Miss

[ 33 ]


FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Adams, "she was, I think, about thirteen or
fourteen years of age, rather tall and slender,
somewhat delicate in health, though I think
seldom ill, of beautiful face and a charm of
manner and personality that I still recall with
great vividness and pleasure. Her ability as
a student, though she was still in the grammar
school, was excellent, and she was considered
by her class-room teacher one of the best
pupils, if not the very best, in a room which,
as I remember, contained several very bright
children.
66
But it was in dramatic recitations that
Maude displayed a native brilliancy that I
have never seen approached by any other
child, and very rarely by an adult. Her
naturalness, simplicity, and naïveté were
simply captivating. I do not know how her
pieces were chosen, though I suspect that
her teacher, who idolized her, and doubtless
her mother, selected them; but they always
[ 34 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
seemed to have been written for her particular
use. One could never think of her impersona-
tions as such; we were always in the imme-
diate presence of the character itself, fresh,
vivid, real. She did not appear to interpret
another's personality; for the time she was
that personality. The charm of it all was her
total ignorance of her power; and so long as
I knew her she remained the simple, beautiful,
artless school-girl.
"Of course Miss Adams had an admiring
circle of devoted friends, but she was always
simply one of them, as loyal to them as they
to her. Her teacher, Mary E. Moore (since
deceased), a very keen, intellectual woman,
was prompt to appreciate her pupil's genius
and foresaw for her a great future, though
she was strongly opposed to the stage. She
hoped that the brilliant girl would continue
her academic education and ultimately devote
herself to literature; but of course she hoped

[ 35 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
against hope. Maude Adams's training, her
environment, her ideals, and, above all, her
inborn talent, carried her to the only place
where these could find realization.
"Only once since I knew her as a school-
girl have I seen Maude Adams. That was
as Babbie in Chicago. Of course I was de-
lighted her interpretation was masterful, her
acting was brilliant, her art was superb. But
during the entire performance I could not
help thinking of a time when she did not
know the meaning of the word 'interpreta-
tion,' when she was entirely artless, and when,
instead of acting, she was just herself.
Charmed as I was with Babbie, I am sure
I liked Maude Kiskadden better."
What Professor Millspaugh says of Miss
Adams's remarkable gift for dramatic recita-
tion is significant, and is fully borne out by
others who heard her at the time. One of
her recitations, recalled by them as especially
[ 36 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
effective, was about some bric-à-brac and
relics supposed to belong to an old maid.
The manner in which this slip of a school-
girl repro-

duced the
quaint idio-
syncrasies of
an elderly
spinster, mak-
ing a regular
character
study out of
the recitation,
charmed all
who heard her.
It was after
this her teach-
Maude Adams
er, Miss Moore, begged Mrs. Adams to
have Maude educated for an instructor in
elocution. "I am sure," said the dear lady,
thinking she was holding out a most brilliant
[ 37 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
prospect, "she eventually will reach a position
in which she can command a salary of at
least from $1800 to $2000." Mrs. Adams
hardly could repress a smile. She had an
inkling of what her daughter's future was to
be, for she knew that even while still a
child, Maude always had taken her work
most seriously. Two thousand a year-by
no means to be sneered at. But, by com-
parison, Miss Adams's income from the stage
is a fortune.
Nevertheless her mode of life is as simple
as is her bearing toward her professional as-
sociates and friends. Her house in New
York is a small English basement; it is,
however, in an excellent location, between
Fifth and Madison Avenues. She has had
it "done over," but wholly with a view to
comfort. Between the front door and the
stairs she has had put in folding doors, making
a little waiting-room, which, when the doors
[ 38 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
are drawn, is completely shut off from the
rest of the house. Beyond the doors is a
hallway and beyond this Miss Adams's library,
with her books and her desk. Except for the
door and windows at the rear, bookshelves line
the walls to a considerable height. It is not
a large room, nor are the books overwhelm-
ing in number; but they are well chosen.
Miss Adams has a mildly developed fad for
old books and old jewels and may be said to
have shown zeal as a bibliophile so far as re-
lates to Shakespeare and Napoleon. She can-
not be said to have a passion along any of
these lines, but she has a fine collection of
Napoleonic bijouterie, and among her books
are a splendid first edition of Spenser's "Faerie
Queene" and first editions of Dickens and Em-
erson. She owns all the known "lives" of
Napoleon and many fine Shakespeare editions.
A much prized possession is "Vecellio on
Costume," in two volumes, published in 1598.

[ 39 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
From this book her Juliet costumes were
taken. She does not pretend to keep up with
the torrent of present-day books.
She pre-
fers the old authors. Of the new she reads
only just enough to keep up with the trend.
It may be said that she knows what is between
the covers of the few the very few-good
new books.
On the second floor of Miss Adams's house
are the dining-room and the drawing-room.
In the latter are a piano, a harp, a 'cello, and
a guitar, rather a curious combination of in-
struments unless you play them all, which she
does, just a little on each. She allows noth-
ing outside her profession to absorb her too
much, and, with her, music again may be de-
scribed as only a "mildly developed fad." At
one time the harp had a pictorial and romantic
attraction for her. She took lessons on it for
three months and carried a harp all over the
country during her first season with Drew, but
[ 40 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
gave it up for the 'cello, which she prefers to
any other instrument.
The same simplicity which prevails in her
New York house characterizes her cottage at
Onteora, in the Catskills, where she usually
goes for a few weeks' seclusion before the
opening of her season; and her Long Island
home. In the structure she has built on this
farm she has preserved the old farmhouse, and
the additions have the substantial lines of the
original. It is roomy, with large open fire-
places and many windows. During her ab-
sences a superintendent runs the farm for her,
but when she summers there (instead of in
France, as she did several years in order to
perfect herself in the language) she rides all
about the place, personally superintending the
making of new roads, putting up new fences,
and looking after the many other things that
are to be done.
Miss Adams has remained unmarried. A
[ 41 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS
friend of mine, who of course must remain un-
named, lived at the same boarding-house with
her and her mother when they first came to
New York to play in "The Paymaster." He
was greatly attracted by her and paid her much
attention, escorting her and her mother to the
theatre and back every night. Miss Adams
accepted his attentions in a frank, friendly way.
But when matters had gone along a little while
Mrs. Adams took opportunity to say to him,
66
Mr., it's only fair to you that I should
tell you you're wasting your time. Maudie 'll
She is too devoted to her art
never marry.
ever to think of such a thing." And so it
seems.
[ 42 ]


ETHEL BARRYMORE
Y




E
ETHEL BARRYMORE

THEL BARRYMORE is
essentially girlish, — girlish in
her love of pretty clothes;
girlish in her enthusiasm for
authors, artists, and people;
girlish in spirits; girlish in her love of fun and
pleasure; girlish in her years, which have been
twenty-three. She is an actress because she
cannot help herself, even if she would stay the
hand of heredity. Her father, Maurice Barry-
more, was formerly an actor; her mother,
Georgie Drew Barrymore, was an actress; her
brother, Lionel, is an actor. Her uncle, John
Drew, is the actor we all know of that name.
Her grandmother, the famous Mrs. John
Drew, is one whose memory every theatre-
[ 45 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
goer cherishes; and her grandfather, "John
Drew the elder," was considered the best Irish
comedian on the American stage. "I just had
to be an actress, don't you see?" laughingly
says Miss Barrymore. What else could
I be ?"
66
Charmingly girlish on the stage, she
equally so when she is away from the foot-
lights. She is, practically, the same "off" as
66
"on
the boards. As she dresses in her plays
so she dresses in her home,
—
- prettily but
simply. For with all her girlishness she has a
wise little head on her shoulders. And this
shows in her ideas of dress. She always dresses
well, yet rarely expensively.
It is the way
a dress is cut and made and worn that makes
it pretty," she says; "the material does n't
matter much. Put good work into the most
ordinary material and you have a pretty dress.
I once had a dress made of hopsacking, - just
the rough, common kind. I had it well made
[ 46 ]


Copyright, 1903, by J. Byron
Ethel Barrymore in her Favorite White Costume

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES

and well cut, and it
was as much admired
as any dress I ever
had. Take this red
corduroy I have on
now. I could just as
well have had it of
red velvet. It would
have cost much more.
But I preferred it of
corduroy; first, be-
cause it costs less,
and, second, because I
like to take an inex-
pensive material and
make something
pretty out of it."
Another point
which this sensible
girl carries out in
her dressing is ab-
Copyright, 1903, by J. Byron
Light and Shade
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
solute simplicity. She says: "It is n't always
easy to get a dress simple, I know, but when
you do, just see what you have: the most artis-
tic thing you can get in the way of a gown.
Really, I just hate conspicuousness in dress. It
is not only vulgar, to my way of thinking, but
it makes a girl look so stupid. Honestly, it does.
I know lots of girls who would look perfectly
charming if their dresses were more simply
made. But they put a lot of fussy things on
them, and they spoil their dresses and their
own looks. For no girl ever looks well in a
fussy dress, at least, none of the girls that I
know, and I know lots. On the other hand,
a perfectly simple dress, well made, always
makes a good-looking girl the more charming,
and makes a homely girl look better."
—
Miss Barrymore's whole philosophy of the
art of pretty dressing is that "it is just as easy
to dress well as it is to dress badly, if a girl
will only be simple." For several years she
[ 50 ]


ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
She had thought
She
wore only black and white.
over the matter carefully and decided that it
was the easiest way to dress inexpensively and
at the same time well. Think of that as a
sensible decision for a young girl. Her dresses
were absolutely simple, and yet were the envy
of every one who saw them. They fitted her
youthful, girlish style of beauty so well, and,
as a result, were completely becoming.
rarely wears a shirt waist, preferring complete
suits of the same material. A short time ago
she had a simple dress of lavender, with plain
collar and cuffs of white, which was charming
in its effect. She always has several simple
dresses of this sort in her wardrobe. Miss
Barrymore employs a first-class dressmaker,
but her taste is her own; and before she had
risen so high in her profession she had to make
her dresses herself, and so she thoroughly
understands what she asks of her dressmaker.
She believes that every girl should dress to
[ 51 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
suit her own individuality, and not wear this
and that kind of gown because she saw this
and that kind of person look well in it. Ac-
cordingly she draws a design for every gown
that is made for her, to show the dressmaker
just how it is to be "built." In the same
manner she plans all her own stage costumes,
proceeding on the principle that in a modern
rôle the costumes should not be a bit more
emphatic or conspicuous than those worn off
the stage. It was she herself, with her girlish
yet artistic taste, who decided on the white
scheme of dress she uses in "The Country
Mouse." Every costume she wears in this
play is an exquisite white dress, and every one
of these costumes she planned herself. She
considered white appropriate to the simplicity
(or assumed simplicity) of the roguish girl in
the play.
Jewelry and trinkets in general have little
attraction for her. On the other hand, she
[ 52 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
loves lace and furs, and says that when she
gets rich the accumulation of beautiful furs
and old laces will be her hobby. It almost
makes her purr when she speaks of sables.
But Miss Barry-

more is not all
66
dress." As her
ideas about
Copyright, 1903, by J. Byron
clothes show,
A Quiet Corner
this young girl
has a mind, and she gives her mentality
just as much attention as she does her
wardrobe. Miss Barrymore's home is an
apartment on West Fifty-ninth Street, New
[ 53 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
York City, overlooking Central Park. If
you walk through the lower end of the
Park you can locate her apartment by the
plaster cast of the " Winged Victory" in
one of the windows of the sitting-room.
The antique masterpiece stands there like a
beacon to the homing-place of this girl. The
room in which it is an ornament, and the
adjoining music-room, are just such abiding-
places as one might expect an art-loving girl to
have, and I use "art" in its broadest sense.
—
Miss Barrymore is artistic in every fibre. Her
love of music amounts to a passion. For eight
years while she was at the Convent of Notre
Dame in Philadelphia, where she was edu-
cated, she studied music with one of the Sisters,
who was an accomplished musician; and she
herself showed so much talent that she almost
decided upon the career of a pianist, and the
question of sending her to Germany to com-
plete her musical studies and fit her for the
[ 54 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
concert stage was seriously considered. De-
spite her passion for music, however, she her-
self decided against the step. "A woman,"

Copyright, 1903, by Burr McIntosh
At the Piano
she argued, "must play much better than any
other woman in order to amount to anything."
Though she did not become a professional
pianist, piano-playing still remains one of her
greatest diversions.
Often when she comes
[ 55 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
home from the theatre at night, she sits down
at her piano after a light supper and plays.
One of the most prominent things on her
piano is a volume of Brahms. She is familiar
with the songs of Richard Strauss, the most
advanced of all composers, from playing them
over. I saw Richard Strauss at a party in
66
London last summer," she said.
66
He was
sitting there just like an ordinary man listen-
ing to what was going on. But I felt," she
added with girlish enthusiasm, " as if I were
in the presence of a divinity." When she is
in Boston she never misses a Boston Sym-
phony matinée that her professional engage-
ments will allow her to attend.
What she knows of German she picked up
from playing Wagner's music dramas in the
vocal scores and from hearing his works per-
formed. On the music-rack of the piano, one
day when I visited Miss Barrymore, there was
an open score of "Tosca," Puccini's opera.
[ 56 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
There was music all over the grand piano;
on the sitting-room table was a set of Schu-
mann's works-music, music everywhere. "It
seems to me," she exclaimed, "that I have
more music than any one else in the world.
There is all this"- with a wave of the hand
that took in both rooms "and lots more in
England."
—
Just as her enthusiasm for music leads her
to hear as much of it as she can, even when
she is "on the road," so her love for painting
and statuary takes her to the galleries. She
still goes into ecstasy over the Rembrandt
which she saw in the Glasgow gallery. There,
too, she saw Whistler's portrait of Carlyle,
which she admires immensely. A reproduc-
tion of his famous portrait of his mother hangs
in the sitting-room of her apartment, and an-
other conspicuous picture there is the "Pearl
Diver," from the Louvre. "I like it so much,"
she exclaims, "that I never cared to know
[ 57 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
who did it!" In sculpture the Winged
Victory" is her special adoration. "It seems
to swing through the world," is the way she
describes the sense of movement with which
it fairly thrills the beholder. The Venus of
Melos is mentioned. "You never have seen
it," she exclaims, "unless you have approached
it by that long, dark passage at the end of
which it stands, a thing of beauty and light,
in the Louvre !"
When she talks about books and authors
Miss Barrymore particularly reflects the en-
thusiasm of the girl. She "simply adores"
George Eliot. She "worships" Robert Louis
Stevenson. She has a "tremendous feeling"
for Balzac. All around her, in her home, are
books. And she says some entertaining and
characteristic things in talking about them.
For instance, she says she has never met a
man who did not recognize himself in "Senti-
mental Tommy," especially in the Tommy
[ 58 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
of "Tommy and Grizel." She admires Henry
James from his first book to his last. Then
she says she thinks his last could have been
written in five pages, but is "so glad he pre-
ferred to do it in two volumes." She reads
much of Turgenieff, "the only Russian writer
who strikes me as international." All these
enthusiasms are highly interesting, especially
in the light of her greatest literary love, which
Alice in Wonderland." This she takes
with her wherever she goes. "I read 'Alice
in Wonderland' every other day just to keep
myself alive," is the way she expresses her love
for the book.
is
66
Miss Barrymore has a healthy love of recrea-
tion. She has been the belle of several Yale
"Proms," and is an exquisite dancer. In fact,
dancing is in her estimation an art, not a mere
accomplishment. She has really studied it,.
that is, from an historical point of view, — and
has a large volume treating of the dance from
[ 59 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
antiquity to the present day, which she reads
much. This is quite different from just "learn-

ing to dance" as a
social grace. She
says she sometimes
dances while sit-
ting in a chair;
that is, she sits
Copyright, 1903, by J. Byron
Ethel Barrymore in her Library
there and makes
up dances.
Her attitude
toward "SO-
ciety" is ex-
ceedingly
interesting for
a young girl.
In the begin-
ning of her
career, when
she was not
very busy, she

Ready for a Walk
Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
went out in society a good deal. But with
increasing duties she has done so less and
less. For the average society man and woman
with their small talk and gossip she cares
very little. Great "functions
functions" with their for-
mal demands do not attract her. But at
the end of every season here she runs over
to London, because "London is the greatest
place in the world for complete relaxation.”
There she goes a great deal into society; for
66
they have been entertaining so many years
there that they do it with less strain and
formality than over here. I like to meet the
men and women who do things,'" she says.
"When you leave a dinner-table after meet-
ing such people they have given you new
views of life to think over, and have said lots
of things worth remembering. That is the
kind of society I like to move in."
When she returns to this country during
the summer, she usually visits the Richard
[63]


FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Harding Davises at Marion, Massachusetts.
She is a warm friend of Mrs. Davis, and at
her wedding was her only bridesmaid. At
Marion she devotes herself to tennis and swim-
ming, of which latter she is very fond. She
runs down the beach, dashes into the water,
swims out to an anchored boat, clambers up
its side, and, after basking awhile in the sun,
poises herself on the gunwale, and, like a flash,
dives off and swims about, playing tag or
splashing water over a friend with the palm
of her hand. Her usual attire ashore is a
simple sailor blouse and skirt. "You can't
'dress up' at Marion," she says, "because if
you did the natives would die; it is such a
primitive little place." From the Davises
she is apt to go to the Maxfield Parrishes at
Windsor, Vermont, where there is a settle-
ment of artists and literary men. She has the
highest admiration for Mr. Parrish as an artist,
ard thinks he and Howard Pyle are the lead-
[64]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
ing figures in American illustrative art to-day.
Mr. Parrish has designed her bookplate.
more.
Such is the happy, girlish life of Ethel Barry-
Hard work she has, for the work of
the actress is full of fatigue, and many are the
nights when this young girl comes home from
the theatre glad of the rest which the night
will afford, and glad of the following day of
domesticity in the little home where she and
her two brothers live together. When away
from home her books and music are her com-
pany, for unlike the average actress she has
not acquired the dog habit. Dogs she loves,
- loves them so much that she cannot bear
to keep any in the city. "But," as she says,
"if ever I buy a country place it will be over-
run with them." And so, in all her thoughts
there is a sweet and tender note, - the note
that belongs to the girl that Ethel Barrymore
is, sweet and wholesome.
[65]

ว

JOHN DREW

H
M
JOHN DREW

ORE than any other actor on
the American stage, John
Drew occupies what gener-
ally is understood under the
term "a social position." He
"moves in society" - whenever he has time to
-and is welcome there.
One of the most frequently quoted passages
from Emerson is that in which he tells of the
Boston woman who said that the sense of
being well dressed gave her a feeling of deeper
tranquillity even than religion. Somewhat sim-
ilar is an exclamation I once heard from a New
York woman:
"What would we do without the
Bible and the Social Register'?" The "So-
cial Register" is a book in which is given a list
[ 69 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
of New York society people. It is impossible
to buy one's way into it. There are million-
aires' wives who for years have been gnashing
their teeth because they do not see their names
in print in it. Now if John Drew had a fixed
residence in New York, his acknowledged so-
cial position undoubtedly would entitle him
to a place in what aptly has been called the
"Society Bible."
66
Drew is what is known as a "society actor;"
and his personal knowledge of society and its
ways has aided him greatly in acting and
"dressing" society rôles. Just as women
look up to certain actresses as models in the
art of costuming themselves, and copy or try
to copy them in their own attire, so to a host
of men Drew is a glass of fashion and a mould
of form, though men do not set so much
store by these things as women. However, a
conversation I overheard between two "swell "
youths shows that they are not wholly indif-
[ 70 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
ferent to matters of this kind. They were
talking about theatricals.
Have you been to see John Drew?" asked
one of them.
"No. Why?"
66
"He wears the longest tails to his dress coat
that have ever been seen here."
"Then they must be the latest 'swagger'
thing out. I'll go to see them to-night."
I do not consider Mr. Drew's social position
a matter of such importance that it need be
cried from the housetops. But it is interest-
ing in his case because, while most people hunt
for it and harp on it when they 've attained to
it, his real pride lies in his profession. Never
has he turned his back on that or on its mem-
bers. Never has he, for the sake of social
connections, given up his friends in his own
calling. That he has been entertained by
So-and-So in Newport or had this and that or
the other socially well-known person at his
[ 71 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
daughter's "coming out" reception, does not
mean nearly as much to him as the fact that
he represents the third generation of Drews on
the stage and his daughter the fourth. For
after Miss Louise had been presented to so-
ciety in due form, she followed the traditions
of the family and went on the stage, becom-
ing a member of her father's company. Miss
Ethel Barrymore, who also is a great social
pet, is another representative of the latest gen-
eration of Drews on the stage. She has Drew
blood in her veins, her mother, the charm-
ing comedienne, Georgie Drew Barrymore,
having been John Drew's sister. Thus Louise
Drew and Ethel Barrymore are first cousins.
Another clever young actress, Miss Mendum,
also is Mr. Drew's niece.
It is his devotion to his profession which,
together with his agreeable personality, makes
John Drew one of its most popular members
within its own circle. People hear a good
[ 72 ]


Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
On the Piazza, Easthampton
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
deal about the high-toned Players' Club; but
the real typical actors' club is The Lambs'.
No one is better liked there than Drew. He
has held various offices and has been the
"Little Boy Blue" and even the "Shepherd,"
the highest officer among The Lambs. Drew
is various in his make-up. He is a society
man and at the same time a man of domestic
tastes, yet withal has a dash of Bohemianism
-
in his blood that has kept him just within right
touch of his own profession on and off the stage.
It is pleasant to see a man unspoilt by prosper-
ity and flattery, retaining the respect and affec-
tion of his own. He has not only the "Drew
blood," but also the Drew esprit de corps.
That is one reason he was so much pleased
when his daughter decided of her own volition
to go on the stage. For with every prospect
of the lively and supposedly enjoyable life
which a properly introduced girl can lead in
New York society, the stage was her deliber-
[ 75 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
ate choice. "She is going to play with me
when I go out on the road,'" said Mr. Drew
to me in speaking of her. "She will be the
fourth generation of Drews on the stage,
which is very nice. A friend of mine, an
architect, has a son who wants to go down
to Pierpont Morgan's office and become rich
soon, and my friend does n't like it. He wants
his son to become an architect, like himself.
But you cannot compel a man to follow a
calling which he does not like.
The stage,
however, seems to have a certain hereditary
fascination, rather more so than any other
profession, I should say."
Although John Drew is an actor, he has
been singularly fortunate in having been able
to gratify his taste for domesticity because his
long connection with the late Augustin Daly's
company kept him much in New York and
enabled him to have a home there. Mrs.
Drew was a Miss Josephine Baker. One of
[ 76 ]


ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
her grandfathers was Mayor of Philadelphia.
Her immediate antecedents, however, were
theatrical. Her parents were on the stage; she
herself was an actress, and a clever one, in rôles
like Moya in "The Shaughran," when she
married John Drew. Her brother, Lewis
Baker, is a member of her husband's company.
When Miss Baker became Mrs. John Drew,
or soon afterwards, she left the stage. For a
considerable time while Mr. Drew was able to
lead a "fixed life" in New York, they occu-
pied an apartment in Fifty-fifth Street. It was
small, but they made it very artistic, attrac-
tive, and comfortable. Its furnishing was quiet
and refined, of the good old-fashioned kind.
"Cozy," a word so often misused, applied to it
with more than the usual degree of actuality.
— -
There they lived with their daughter, then a
mere child, who went, as she still does, with
her parents and among her intimate friends,
by the nickname Bee." If it is asked
66
[ 77 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
how the name "Louise" ever was converted
into
66
66
Bee," the answer is that Bee" is
a contrac-

tion of the
French
"Bébé,"
our "Baby." An
only child, no
matter how old
Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
John Drew in his Library
she grows, always is apt to remain the " Baby"
of the family and of her own and the fam-
ily friends.
But that the Drews derived
[ 78 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
their pet name for their daughter from the
French has a certain significance, because
French is a language almost as familiar in
the Drew family circle as English. Mr.
Drew is a very good French scholar. He
not only reads French, but speaks it with
ease. I remember one evening, during his
engagement at Wallack's in 'One Sum-
mer's Day," hearing him carry on a conver-
sation in that language with a member of
a well-known New York French-American
family who had called on him in his dressing-
room. When during the last Coquelin-Bern-
hardt tour in this country Mr. Drew gave a
dinner to Coquelin the host conversed as flu-
ently in the guest's native tongue as the guest
himself. It was Monsieur Drew entertaining
Monsieur Coquelin.
Mr. Drew acquired this accomplishment
without a university education.
prepared for a university course.
He was not
66
Mother,"
[ 79 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
he said in speaking of this, "did not think a
university course stood much for individual
development. I do not know that it would
have assisted me in playing The Second in
Command,' for instance. Perhaps there is
something in the feeling of being a university
man.' Yet we know of many dunces who
come out of universities." His most advanced
regular schooling was at the Protestant Epis-
copal Academy in Philadelphia, and after that
he took on some tutors and that sort of thing.
He learned languages, got some taste of general
literature, and even studied Socrates, but he
went on the stage when he was nineteen.
During the years the Drews were regularly
settled in New York they led a very agreeable
life there. While Mr. Drew's professional
work prevented him from entertaining much
at the hours customary for social entertain-
ments, he always made a point of having sup-
per after the play in his own home, instead of
[ 80 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
at any one of the restaurants frequented by
fashionable theatre parties, and often he brought
home one or two intimate personal friends
with him. They were very pleasant little
supper parties, informal but served in perfect
taste.
Mr. Drew is a good talker. He has ideas
and a clever way of expressing them. The
meal and the "talk" afterwards generally were
the substance and the sum of these suppers.
Cards? No. Mr. Drew never learned to
play them. Memorizing a rôle is easy for him.
He is what is known in the profession as a
'quick study." He remembers quotations
and generally can place them; and things he
read many years ago, if he read them carefully,
he still retains. In fact, he is retentive at any-
thing but cards.
whist, but cannot
66
as they are played.
sessions were not
Thus he knows the rules of
remember how the suits fall
Nevertheless these supper
brief. For there is some
[ 81 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
of the night owl in Drew; but he knows how
to rest too. During the daytime, for instance,
he cares little for entertaining or being enter-
tained. Once some one said to him, "I sup-
pose you never get to bed much before twelve
o'clock." (This was putting it very mildly.)
"No," answered Drew, with just a suspicion of
sarcasm in the tone of his voice, "but on
the other hand I don't get up much before
half-past six."
About the only day the Drews had for
dining out was Sunday. On other days Mr.
Drew's professional engagements forbade that.
They had frequent invitations during the week
which for this reason they were obliged to
decline. But Sunday dinner found them
either hosts in their apartments or guests at
some well-known house. Possibly it is not
amiss to state that among the well-known
New York families with whom the Drews are
intimate are the Hewitts and the Brockholst
[ 82 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Cuttings. They often were asked to the As-
sembly Balls, which were among the most
important social functions of the New York
season, and they visit in Newport. They also
have been made much of in England. Among
others who entertained them there have been
the present Dowager Duchess of Manchester
(Consuelo Yznaga) and Lady Dorothy Nevil,
the latter considered one of the brightest
women in England. It may be again remarked
in passing that Mr. Drew, the actor who above
all others is received socially, who thus has
done his full share toward bringing about the
greater social recognition of the stage and the
higher regard for it held by the world at large
which is one of the signs of the times, and who
is looked upon as the American "dress suit"
actor par excellence, because of the ease and
distinction with which he carries himself in
society rôles, does not happen to be a society
man who has broken in upon the stage; but
[ 83 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
that, in him, an actor to the core, one of the
third generation of a family of actors, and
proud of it, has been made most welcome
in "society."
Mr. Drew always has been fond of exercise
and has kept himself in the best physical trim
for his work. He belongs to the Riding Club,
a rather exclusive organization in New York,
and when he lived in the city, could be seen
almost every day on the bridle-path in Central
Park. When his daughter was old enough
and had learned to ride sufficiently well to
leave the ring, she usually accompanied her
father. Her teacher was Mrs. Beach, who has
had most of the Newport women as pupils in
riding.
No parents could have been more careful
in the bringing up of a child than have been
the Drews with their daughter. Nothing has
been omitted in her education. Part of the
time her parents were living in New York
[ 84 ]

10
Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
John Drew and his Daughter ready for a Ride
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
they had her placed at an excellent private
school and then at a convent in Philadelphia.
When Mr. Drew was obliged to go abroad
with the Daly Company, she went with her
parents and they utilized the opportunity to
place her at a convent school in Boulogne.
She quickly became proficient in French and
won a prize for an article in the convent paper.
In order to give double pleasure to her parents,
she told them nothing about it until she sur-
prised them with the prize itself.
Since his appearance as a star, Mr. Drew's
domestic life has been more or less broken
up, although with every opportunity that has
presented itself he has clung to it as tena-
ciously as possible; at the same time not
allowing his having become somewhat of a
rover to interfere in the least with the careful
education of his daughter. She was sent to
the noted "finishing school" of the Marquise
San Carlos de Pedroso in Paris, a very high-
[ 87 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
class school, to which many fine families of
various countries send their daughters, and
where Miss Drew made many charming friends.
Having perfected herself in French at the De
Pedroso school,
she was placed for
nearly a year in
Dresden,


where she
studied Ger-
man and music.
When she
returned to
New York in
Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
time for the
John Drew, his Daughter, and their Pets
season of 1899-
1900, Mr. Drew's popularity as a star had en-
abled him to prolong his seasons in the city;
and he had rented a furnished house in West
Twenty-first Street. Here the Drews began
entertaining again, their social circle growing
[ 88 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
wider. One guest of their former New York
home was, however, missed here. For Mr.
Drew's distinguished mother, the elder Mrs.
John Drew, who always had been made wel-
come at the Fifty-fifth Street apartment and
was a not infrequent guest there, had since died.
It was at the Twenty-first Street house Miss
"Bee" was introduced to society at a tea
given in her honor. Shortly afterwards she
made a tentative appearance on the stage.
Her father was playing Richard Carvel, and
she took her début as the pretty Maryland
girl, Betty Taylor. It was not, however,
until the following season that she regularly
went on the stage, joining her father's com-
pany when it left New York, and in the
rôle of Nora Vining in "The Second in Com-
mand." Mrs. Drew also travels with her
husband and daughter, so that, although "on
the road," the family keeps together. In fact,
with Mr. and Mrs. Drew, Miss Drew and
[ 89 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Mrs. Drew's brother, there is quite a family
party.
For a man of fifty Mr. Drew is very young-
looking, not only on the stage, where disguise
is possible, but also off it in the garish and
tattle-tale light of day. He is quick, mobile,
and agile, --- in fact, still so very much of the
young man that there would be no occasion
for the professional fib about age, even if he
cared to take refuge behind it. The public
makes little inquiry into a stage favorite's
age until it becomes noticeable, and, like the
famous Roman who would rather people ex-
pressed surprise that no statues were erected
in his honor than because there were, it is
better for an actor to have the public marvel
that one of his age should look so young than
that one so young should look so old.
Mr. Drew is not a strong man in the pro-
fessional sense in which the term "strong
man" now is employed. He does not lift
[ 90 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
tables with his teeth nor balance grand pianos
on his toes. His tables are put to the usual
domestic uses, and his piano is there for his
daughter to play. But he is a man of fine

Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
John Drew in his Study
physique and always has kept himself in good
condition. He tells me he does not do this
because of the strain imposed by modern
theatrical conditions, the two matinées a
[ 91 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
week and the insistence of the public of
to-day that an actor, no matter how popular,
always shall be at the top notch, so that he
always must key himself to give out the best
that is in him, but because he is fond of
it. On this point he said playfully, "If I had
to exercise to keep myself in condition I
would shirk it. But I am fond of it, and I
keep in pretty good shape anyhow. The con-
dition of the stage is such that the men and
women on it must keep in good physical trim
to stand the strain. But I do not think they
have such a hard time of it."
When he is in New York, besides riding in
Central Park, he goes to the Racket Club,
where he plays court tennis. This is a rattling
good game and a hard game, as any one not in
good condition who tries it soon finds out.
But it is one of Mr. Drew's favorite forms of
exercise in winter, when there is not much
doing outdoors, and he is accounted a hard
[ 92 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
man to beat. He is a capital fencer, and
when the club had a fencing master often
played with the foils.
Summer is his time out-of-doors. He is in
the open air as much as possible. His cottage,
which is quite new, is at Easthampton, L. I.,
and in this spot where lived John Howard
Payne, the author of the immortal lyric,
"Home, Sweet Home," the Drews have their
ingleneuk. Unlike Southampton, one of its
neighbors, and next to Newport and Bar
Harbor, probably the best-known summer
resort of society people in the United States,
Easthampton is rather an unpretentious place.
There are superb cottages at Southampton;
Easthampton is more quiet in character.
was discovered by artists, and artists still
frequent it and love it for its quaint and
picturesque characteristics. At the same time
there is enough society there to keep things
going, and a run over to Southampton for
It
[93]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
a Saturday evening dance at the Meadow
Club is quite feasible. Moreover, it has a
charming social centre in its own pretty Maid-
stone Club, with golf links sloping down from
the outskirts of the village to the sea.
In fact, when all its aspects-picturesque,
social, and artistic. are considered, East-
hampton is just the sort of place a man of
Mr. Drew's quiet and refined tastes would
select for a residence which, perforce of cir-
cumstances, can be only a summer one. It
is enough out of the world for him to "lay
off" and find total relaxation in the absence
of all formality, yet enough in the world
for him to be of it when he wants to.
Outdoor exercise, however, is his chief
summer devotion and outdoor exercise of
the more exacting kind. The beautiful golf
links of the Maidstone Club see comparatively
little of Mr. Drew. Some years ago he took
a lot of lessons in golf from a professional
[ 94 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
in Chicago, and was a fairly good golfer.
But he is not much of a golfer now. His
interest in the game is waning, because-
unlike other men of fifty- he does not

Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
John Drew
consider it strenuous enough.
He shows his
physical "fitness" in his preference for tennis,
which he plays fast and well. Tennis is his
game afoot, but riding is his favorite exer-
cise. Formerly he rode to hounds a good
[95]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
66
deal, but now he feels he cannot risk a rib
or shoulder out, as he may not always have
the part of a wounded officer to play, as in
The Second in Command." Accordingly
he has rather dropped out of fox-hunting,
and does not ride to hounds more than per-
haps once of a summer, if there happens to
be a pack at Shinnecock Hills near South-
ampton. But when he does, the old spirit
revives in him, and he is as clean over his
fences as any one in the field.
All the roads around Easthampton, how-
ever, know him well. He keeps three or four
ponies down there, and constantly indulges his
passion for riding, which his daughter shares
with him; and it is the usual thing to see
them out together. He also is a good
swimmer, and can plunge through the surf
and swim out with the youngest.
The Drew Cottage is quite unpretentious,
a gray shingled house in Colonial style with
[ 96 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
a large porch on one side and a commodious
entrance hall, which also is the living room.
"I presume you have a 'den'?" he was asked
by some one who could not imagine any one
of distinction getting along without something
going by that much misused term. "I have
a library in my cottage," was Mr. Drew's
simple answer. He has, however, no fixed
line of reading. He himself calls his reading
desultory. "That is the kind of reading for
66
an actor," he says,
—
-"desultory - getting
hold of everything one can find."
Mr. Drew treasures several relics which he
keeps in his home. They include two large
and beautiful silver cups which were presented
to his mother and father many years ago; a
silver ewer and two cups given to them by
people of Philadelphia; and a portrait of his
mother by Sully. He also values highly a
silver set presented in California to Mr. and
Mrs. Baker, his wife's father and mother.
[ 97 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS
A glimpse into Mr. and Mrs. Drew's refined
home, a knowledge of their charming family
life with their daughter, between whom and
themselves there is the deepest devotion, goes
far to explain why the occupation of the
paragrapher who used to earn a living writing
jokes about actors walking home on railroad
ties, is gone.
[ 98 ]

WILLIAM GILLETTE
W
WILLIAM GILLETTE

any career.
ILLIAM GILLETTE, by
reason of his distinguished an-
cestry, the standing of his fam-
ily, and his bringing up, was
in a position to fit himself for
He deliberately chose the stage.
He was born in Hartford, Connecticut, July
24, 1855, in the old Gillette place, now occu-
pied by his sister, Mrs. George Warner, a
sister-in-law of the late Charles Dudley War-
ner.
There Mr. Gillette still reserves a "den."
This he occupies on his occasional visits to
Hartford. His "den" is his "home," so that
he still has an abiding-place among his own
people and in the house of his birth.
[ 101 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
The roomy old house stands in among glori-
ous old trees, far back from the street, and in
the best-known part of Hartford usually re-
ferred to as "Nook Farm," after the residence
made noted by Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe.
Next door to the Gillette place is the Charles
Dudley Warner residence; near by, "Mark
Twain's" former house; while just over the
way is the Isabella Beecher Hooker place. It
was amid such surroundings "Will," as all
his old Hartford friends call Mr. Gillette,
spent his youth.
His father, Francis Gillette, was a remark-
able character, a stern man of few words,
who seldom said anything on any subject, but
when he did, meant business. His boys would
no more have ventured to argue with him, if
he requested them to do something which they
did not very well like, than they would have
argued with a thunder-storm. A lifelong
friend of William Gillette's has related to
[ 102 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
me how William once attempted to tell his
father a lie in order to avert severe corporeal
punishment, which he felt sure would follow
a statement of the truth regarding a certain
episode of his conduct, but found when his

Photographed by the Warner Photo. Co.
The Gillette Homestead, Hartford
father looked at him that he could not do so.
The consequence was, that in spite of himself
he told the truth and got the thrashing. Fran-
cis Gillette was educated at Yale, and after-
wards studied law, but before he practised to
any extent was mixed up in politics and inter-
[ 103 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
ested in reforms of various kinds, with the re-
sult that he did not continue his professional
career. He was one of the first of the anti-
slavery men in the North and an associate of
Wendell Phillips, William Lloyd Garrison,
and others. His house was several times
stoned by mobs in those exciting times, and
he himself narrowly escaped personal attack
there on various occasions. But it made no
difference with him or his behavior.
He was sent to the U. S. Senate and was
in Washington at the most disturbed period
of the antislavery discussions. One affair
there, growing out of the Fugitive Slave Law,
nearly cost him his life. Three escaped ne-
groes were being pursued through the streets
of Washington, and were hidden in houses by
their few sympathizers. But the mob and the
officers were on their track, and it was evident
that their pursuers soon would be able to find
them, as several blocks of houses where they
[ 104 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
were supposed to be concealed had been
surrounded.
Francis Gillette was going through the
streets and was an indignant spectator of this
man hunt, when he received word through a
trusted messenger that if the mob could be
diverted for a few moments, they would be
able to get the negroes out of the city. He
immediately jumped on to the porch of a
house, and began a most violent harangue in
favor of antislavery, rebuking in the most
scathing terms the men who were in pursuit
of the negroes. The result of it was that a
crowd soon began to gather round and, as they
became more and more excited, they got ropes
and determined to hang him on the spot. In
five minutes he had drawn the entire mob
around him and they had become so violent
that the few police who had assembled were
unable to handle them. The mob leaders put
a rope around the senator's neck and started
[ 105 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
to drag him to a lamp-post in order to string
him up.
In the mean time the hunted negroes
had been gotten out of the way successfully,
and were hustled over the line out of the City
of Washington. The only thing that saved
Francis Gillette from an abrupt ending to his
career was the arrival of a squad of police just
as the order was given to string him up.
The Gillettes have been of stern stuff even
from before Francis Gillette's time. Two of
them, ancestors of William Gillette in direct
line, served in the Revolutionary War, one of
them being killed in the battle of Trenton.
William Gillette's own brother Robert was
killed at the storming of Fort Fisher in the
terrific charge over half a mile of level sand.
Among the articles found on Robert's body
was a shattered watch. Many years later
William Gillette had the fragments of this
timepiece put together; and if you ask the
hour, the watch he draws out is the very one
[ 106 ]

William Gillette
Photographed by Frank Warner
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
his brother wore when he led his command
across the shot and shell swept plain in front
of Fort Fisher. Another brother died in the
army, and when William's father drove him to
the station on his first leaving home to try a
theatrical career, he said, "Well, William, I
have taken two sons to this station, and they.
never have returned; I trust you will prove
an exception to the rule." That was all he
said when William left home to go to St.
Louis, where he made his first effort to get
on the stage.
Yet even that much was considerable for a
man of Francis Gillette's temperamental reserve
to say. The son appreciated it and remembers
it to this day whenever he wishes to give a
characterization of his father. He had an-
other reason to feel kindly toward him. The
elder Gillette wished the young man to be-
come a lawyer. Yet, as Mr. Gillette has told
a friend, his father was the one member of the
[ 109 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
family who did not raise a strong objection
when his son decided to go on the stage.
With his usual reserve he said nothing at all
on the subject, but the young man felt on
starting out that he had his father with him.
Later, when he found himself stranded in
New Orleans, it was his father, though he
ill could afford it, who sent him the money
to get back to Hartford, and when he reached
home, while no fatted calves were slaughtered,
his reception was all right.
The characteristics of the father are well
worth bearing in mind in considering the son,
for Francis Gillette's personality has left its
mark upon William. Not only has the lat-
ter shown true New England grit and tenacity
of purpose throughout his career, but none,
save his most intimate friends, have been able
to penetrate the reserve which, like a veil,
hides the real gentleness and humanity of his
nature from a mere casual acquaintance. It
[ 110 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
will be remembered that in his best-known
stage creations, notably "Secret Service" and
"Sherlock Holmes," a certain austerity of mien
and action hides the deep love that shines
forth in the end.
Doubtless, some of the gentler aspects of
his nature come to him from his mother. Her
maiden name was Elizabeth Daggett Hooker.
Like Francis Gillette, she was a descendant
of the earliest white settlers of Massachusetts.
Thomas Hooker, who drew up the first civil
constitution for the Commonwealth, which
afterward was taken as a model for the Con-
stitution of the United States, was her direct
ancestor four or five generations back. He par-
ticipated in the early settlement of Hartford.
In whatever affectionate remembrance Wil-
liam Gillette holds his father, his mother
always came first with him. She was a tiny,
delicate little creature, and he always had such
an air of care and love and devotion toward
[ 111 ]


FAMOUS ACTORS AND
her that it was very beautiful to see them
together.
That William Gillette's adoption of the
stage was the result of natural impulse is the
opinion of those who knew him as a boy. As
one of the most widely known New England
divines, Rev. Joseph H. Twichell, D.D., puts
it," Will Gillette was a born actor. The first
time I ever saw him in that character was in
a play he, with other lads, performed in his
father's house, when he was no more than
twelve years old, before a Ladies' Benevolent
Society of the church of which I am pastor."
Before that, when he was about eleven, he
had astonished his family by rigging up a
miniature theatre. It was made of a large
box with the front cut out and the top taken
off. In the front he built a proscenium about
three feet high and of much the same width,
with drop curtain, borders, etc. He had foot-
lights, which were small candles arranged on
[ 112 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
a frame underneath so that they could be
operated up or down, and thus he got the
lighting effects which he had seen in real
theatres. The scenes slid in from the top,

Photographed by Warner Photo. Co.
The "Den" at the Homestead
and he had a great deal of real enjoyment in
painting these scenes himself and arranging
everything to work properly. The various
characters in the plays, or whatever else he
produced, were worked in a number of ways.
Some were suspended by very fine black
[113]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
thread or wire, and others, when the nature
of the scene would allow it, were worked from
below. The first thing he gave in this theatre
was a minstrel performance. The curtain
rang up on what is known as the "first part;"
that is, the entire company seated in a semi-
circle with various instruments. These min-
strels in this particular scene were worked
both ways.
would work the arms and hands, in order to
give them the appearance of playing their
various instruments, and then he gave them
various motions from below and behind as
well. In this instance all the wires and
threads above were attached to a single piece,
so that he could work them in unison, as he
did not have enough hands to work each char-
acter and manage the other business required
in the scene.
Some fine wires from above
He imitated various instruments with his
mouth, and also worked bells and imitations
[ 114 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
of tambourines with his feet.
ing overture each one in the
After the
After the open-
semicircle would
stand up in turn and sing a song or do some-
thing else appropriate to the occasion. Also
between these musical selections the end men
would carry on a supposedly funny dialogue
with each other and the interlocutor. This
dialogue was the part which the boy Gillette
liked most. After this part of the show was
over, sketches were introduced in which char-
acters went on and off and various catastrophes
happened. The next performance in this min-
iature theatre was a real theatrical performance
with plays which Gillette himself wrote for the
occasion and which were received with consid-
erable applause. Two or three years later the
boy organized a juvenile company among his
friends, built a stage in the large attic of the
Gillette house and gave performances there.
Though these youthful efforts on the stage
and at playwrighting may not be classed as
[ 115 ]


FAMOUS ACTORS AND
more than boyish diversions and attempts,
their bearing upon the career of the future
actor and dramatic author must be considered
as highly important. During the younger
years mind and feelings are more plastic than
during later periods of life, and in a crude way
William Gillette was as a "kid" gaining a
technical facility in expression and writing
which must not be undervalued. A young
fellow who exercises any talent of this kind
at all goes at the thing in a very straight and
direct way, by the shortest cut, - and this
—
may be the reason a Gillette play has about
the least possible amount of dialogue, the
author realizing that "situation" counts for
more than the spoken word.
Young Gillette did not go directly on the
stage after his school years. He first tried the
entertainment platform. He gave public read-
ings and recitations, including costume imita-
tions of various actors, among them Booth, the
[ 116 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
elder Sothern, John T. Raymond, and Jeffer-
son. From his father, who in the Senate had
heard Webster's reply to Hayne, and who
was highly adept in reproducing the voice,

Photographed by the Warner Photo. Co.
Deck View of the "Aunt Polly"
gesture, and mannerism of any one by whom
he had been impressed, William had picked
up some capital imitations of some of the
great statesmen of the day, and these he also
introduced in his programs.
[ 117 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
After several seasons on the platform, Gil-
lette finally determined to get away somewhere
and go on the stage. He had money enough
to take him to St. Louis, where he tackled
Ben de Bar, who was the manager of a theatre
there and of another in New Orleans. De
Bar would not have anything to do with him
at first; but Gillette was desperate, and, when
the manager turned away, hung on to him and
actually turned him around again, expostulat-
ing that he simply must be allowed to join the
company, and that he did not want any salary
whatever. This was a "whopper," but it did
the business, for the pecuniary part of it in-
terested the manager. As a result, Gillette
was engaged for small parts at the old St.
Charles Theatre, New Orleans, and it was
there he made his actual stage début.
Next season, through the influence of Mark
Twain, he secured a minor position in John T.
Raymond's company for the New York sea-
[ 118 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
son, and, during that time, he attended lec-
tures at the New York University. In 1874,
as a member of the Globe Theatre Company,
Boston, the illness of Harry Murdoch se-
cured him a chance to play Prince Florian in
"Broken Hearts." An eye-witness, and a crit-
ical one, of that performance, tells me that
while it was awkward, it was curiously inter-
esting. At all events, it made an impression
and gave Gillette some standing. When the
play was put on again, later in the season, he
was allowed to retain the rôle, although Mur-
doch was perfectly well. The management
explained that it was traditional, when an
understudy went on and played a part, to
let him have it at a later production. This
was one of the few stage traditions that ap-
pealed to Gillette at that time as the proper
thing. During this engagement, the daytime
saw him at Boston University and the Insti-
tute of Technology.
[ 119 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
For two seasons thereafter, he acted with
the Macaulay Stock Company in Cincinnati,
occasionally going over to Louisville for a
week. Near the end of the second season,
Kate Claxton came to Cincinnati with "The
Two Orphans." He played the comedy part
so acceptably that she offered him an engage-
ment for a travelling season, and "as Macaulay
was not paying salaries at that time," Gillette
accepted.
It was during his connection with the Ma-
caulay company he wrote his first play for the
professional stage, "The Professor." He was
several years getting it produced, until Mark
Twain, for old acquaintance' sake, again came
to his aid. I was present at the first perform-
ance of "The Professor," which also had the
added importance of presenting Gillette for
the first time in a leading rôle in a metro-
politan theatre.
It was at the Madison Square in 1881.
[ 120 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Gillette was capital in his droll personation of
the whimsical, near-sighted professor who, after
all, wins the love of the heroine, charmingly
played by poor Georgia Cayvan. It was not
long before Gillette was heard of again. For
at the same house I attended, in the following
October, "Esmeralda," the joint work of Mrs.
Frances Hodgson Burnett and himself.
Here I simply would give a list of Mr. Gil-
lette's principal plays, were it not for an inci-
dent showing how the canny New Englander
now and then crops out in him. Under
the title of "Digby's Secretary," he made an
adaptation of Von Moser's Bibliothekar."
Charles Hawtrey, the English actor, made
another version, "The Private Secretary," to
which A. M. Palmer secured the American
rights.
66
In 1884 both versions had their first per-
formance on the same night in New York,
Mr. Palmer's at the Madison Square, Mr.
[ 121 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
—
Gillette, with himself in the leading rôle, at
the Comedy. Mr. Gillette rang up his cur-
tain at 8 P. M.; Mr. Palmer at 8.15 P. M.,
Mr. Gillette, it will be observed, a quarter of
an hour earlier than Mr. Palmer. Both ver-
sions were successful. One afternoon, a year
and a half later, Mr. Gillette walked into Mr.
Palmer's office and announced that Mr. Palmer
owed him a year and a half royalties on " The
Private Secretary." The ground? Gillette's
priority of production, that ringing up of the
curtain a quarter of an hour earlier. You may
be sure an astute manager like Mr. Palmer
would not have yielded an inch had Gillette
simply been "putting up a bluff." But the
final result was that a new version was made
of the best portions of both plays, and, with
William Gillette in the leading rôle, "The
Private Secretary" successfully toured the
country.
Among Gillette's best-known plays are
[ 122 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
66
66
Held by the Enemy," "Too Much Johnson,"
Secret Service," and " 'Sherlock Holmes."
"Too Much Johnson" was a failure at first.
It was winding up its brief career with a last
two weeks in Brooklyn, when the failure of a
production at a New York theatre called for
a stop gap there. "Too Much Johnson" was
brought across the river, ran the whole sea-
son, and went on the road a prosperous enter-
prise. The romantic story is told that while
battling with illness in a cabin in the North
Carolina woods one winter, Gillette wrote the
play which made him famous, Secret Ser-
vice." But if any one had chanced to look
into the library of the Players' Club, New York,
one summer, he would have seen, almost any
time, William Gillette seated at a desk writing;
and it was then and there the greater part of
Secret Service" was written.
66
66
A friend of Gillette's, C. W. Burpee, of Hart-
ford, has kindly gone to considerable trouble
[ 123 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
to give me some glimpses of the pleasure his
occasional homecomings give to his relations
and friends there. It is true he does not often
find opportunity to revisit the home of his
boyhood; but that he still has a warm spot in
his heart for a home, is shown by the way he
arranges his rooms in hotels, and even his dress-
ing-rooms at the theatres. He always carries
with him reminders of his home friends and
his home life, and his valet quickly learns that
good places for these reminders, whatever his
quarters, are deemed by Mr. Gillette as of
as much importance as good places for his
utilitarian belongings.
Then, between the acts, or while others of
the company are hurrying away for a little
recreation, he will sit down among these re-
minders and write one of his inimitable letters
to the "folks at home," to whom they come
like rays of sunshine. If he has time for but
a word, he will enclose some clever or amusing
[ 124 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
newspaper clipping, occasionally with humor-
ous side notes.
His sister and her family at the old home-
stead in Hartford are ever in his mind.
There
are daily tokens of this. When he is across

Photographed by Warner Photo. Co.
The Salon on the "Aunt Polly"
the water, these tokens often take the shape
of long cablegrams. Incidentally, Gillette
never did seem to have any appreciation of
the cost of telegraphing; oftentimes he will
wire a fairly long letter when a few words or
[ 125 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
the post might have sufficed. He does every-
thing on a generous scale.
Then what joy there is at the beautiful old
homestead when he returns! He walks in,
the same Will Gillette he is on the stage, dis-
sipating all humors of mind and body, and
carrying every soul along with him for a round
of pleasure and happiness while he is in the
house. During these brief vacations he likes
best to give himself up entirely to the family.
He sees so much of the world the rest of the
twelve months that he counts these few hours
precious in the society of those dearest to him.
If at times he has to resort to cunning to de-
fend the hours from the hosts of friends and
admirers and stage aspirants who try to seek
him out in his home, he is to be commended
for it. He loves company and always is genial;
but there are moments which he feels he has a
right to dispose of as he will.
Gillette does n't throw away restraint when
[ 126 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
he enters his home; for he never appears to
have any, in the cold sense. He is free and
light-hearted as a schoolboy, full of quips and
pranks and funny anecdotes. Withal he is
courtly, in the good old meaning of the days
of chivalry. The tender side of his nature has
full sway. He adores his sister as a young
man adores his sweetheart, and to her children
he ever has stood as the fairy-tale prince, only
real. He's all realism. Realism with him is
nature, and what glimpses of this nature one
obtains before the footlights are genuine, as is
apparent where he gives himself up absolutely
to his nature, in his own home. Withal, how-
ever, there's one thing he can't be induced to
do, and that is to talk about himself or his
affairs. He is as close-shelled as an oyster,
—
a mighty good-natured oyster. No, what he
wants when he gets home is to learn what the
others have been doing, and how they have
been faring, and he is so busy asking ques-
[ 127 ]


FAMOUS ACTORS AND
tions about that, that there's no time for
him to talk about his own experiences, save,
of course, an occasional droll incident, told
merely to keep up the general merriment. Let
a home friend come to the table preoccupied,
his mind full of the cares of life, and put out
by petty annoyances, and the moment Gillette
appears it's all laughter and sunshine. He is
a tonic.
If he had nothing else to win the
love of people, that alone would be enough.
He can't sit still long at a time, even when
he is at work. If he goes up to his den on
the top floor for a few hours' writing, he soon
can be heard moving about and singing, and
the family know that he is looking over some
of the idols of his boyhood. His den is full
of specimens of his skill with carpenter's tools,
from the table and its quaint chair to the novel
window-seats. And on a stand near by is a
complete engine he made when a boy, along
with knick-knacks of all sorts. His brain is
[ 128 ]

Photographed by Warner Photo. Co.
The Engine built by Gillette when a Boy

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
ever active. While he is writing a play, he prob-
ably is designing a boat at the same time; or,
if he is wandering carelessly around the grounds,
under the old trees he loves so tenderly, that
whistling is not idle, it probably is some air
that he is composing.
—
He is simple in his habits. His food is of
the plainest. Nevertheless, he is particular
about it. He prefers bread to the choicest
meats; but it must be a particular kind of
bread, that is, particularly plain and whole-
some. There is no use in killing any fatted
calf when he comes home; he would rather
have crackers and cheese, if the right kind
of crackers and the right kind of cheese.
But his preferences are learned only by ob-
servation; he never is heard to express them,
and he will appear as happy over a splendid
dinner that he will hardly touch, as over a
saucer of shredded wheat. In his dress there is
the same simplicity, but always with good taste.
[ 131 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
By his spirits you would think that he en-
joyed the best of health, yet, since his severe
illness a few years ago, he has been heir to
many of the ills of the flesh. Your only path
to that conclusion, however, is through his diet
and his general habits, for outwardly he is all
good feeling. He comes home to rest; the
family know that, as a matter of course, but
never from anything he may say. If any one
remarks he looks tired, or must be worn out,
he laughs at them.
He is quick at repartee, and appreciates a
jest. Sometimes he may be teasing toward
his intimates, but it's teasing of a kind that
causes a bubbling laughter. There are no
barbs on his arrows. And when all is said,
the most impressive thing about his home
life, the one phase of his character which
you will observe when he least thinks that
he is being studied, is his thoughtfulness
for others, especially the aged and all those
[ 132 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
of whom the rest of the world is likely to be
forgetful.
Mr. Gillette is a widower. He was devoted
to his wife, and is devoted to her memory.
The illness which took him to Tryon, N. C.,
is believed to have been largely due to his
grief over her loss. He buried himself in the
pine woods, and all the natives saw of him was
the figure of a gaunt, silent man passing along
the road from his cabin to the village and
back. One day, however, he fell in a faint
by the roadside and was taken into one of the
cabins. This incident broke the ice between
him and the natives, with many of whom he
soon became good friends. His houseboat,
the "Aunt Polly," is named after one of the
"characters" at Tryon.
This houseboat is a great source of recrea-
tion to the actor whenever he spends a sum-
mer in this country. He had another before
this. She steered badly, and nearly falling
[ 133 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
foul of some canal boats in the Hudson, one
of the canallers yelled out that the craft was
a "holy terror." Mr. Gillette promptly named
her the "Holy Terror." She was a queer-look-

......
William Gillette's Houseboat, the "Aunt Polly"
ing affair. On one occasion when approach-
ing a drawbridge in the Connecticut River, the
keeper of the bridge hailed her.
"Where from?"
[ 134 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
"New York."
66
"When?"
"July fourth."
"What century?"
The "Aunt Polly," however, is a staunch, sea-
going hull, with powerful engines and capable
of high speed. She is a houseboat only in the
sense that slender lines have been sacrificed to
roomy, sensible, comfortable cabin accommoda-
tions. Only a few very intimate friends ac-
company Mr. Gillette on his cruises. Once
he put in at Provincetown, Mass., and went
ashore. He met two boys who were going
fishing. He began talking with them. In-
stead of continuing on their way to the shore,
they followed him about. Other boys joined
them, and after a while a troop of youngsters
were in his wake.
"I thought you were going fishing," said
one of Gillette's friends to one of the first two
boys.
[135]
FAMOUS ACTORS
'He's better than any fishing," they an-
swered, pointing to the actor. Then the
friend told them who Gillette was. "We
don't care who he is," they exclaimed.
we know is, that he's just the thing."
"All
Many people consider Gillette a cynic; but
his relations and his intimate friends know him
in a wholly different light. To them he is one
of the most lovable of men.
[136]

RICHARD MANSFIELD

C
RICHARD MANSFIELD

AN you imagine Richard III.
or Henry V. quailing before
the "hist!" of a baby's nurse?
Yet I have seen the Duke of
Gloster as frightened at that
warning as when he staggered across Bos-
worth Field shrieking, "A horse! a horse!
My kingdom for a horse!" and bluff Harry as
disconcerted as if at Agincourt the French-
men had been at his heels instead of he at
theirs.
True, it was neither the real Richard nor
the real Henry, but the greatest living im-
personator of both, Richard Mansfield; and
the scene was neither Bosworth nor Agincourt,
[ 139 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
but the hall of the Mansfield residence on
Riverside Drive, New York. The actor had
seen nurse enter with baby in her arms, and
had rushed forward with a paternal "Ah!
Was it my dear little-" Then the indignant
"hist" from nurse and the utter rout of the
impersonator of a long line of heroes. For
the nonce nurse ruled supreme, or was it
King Baby, even though asleep and gently
breathing beneath his veil of fine white
tulle?
George Gibbs Mansfield, with his round
baby face and dimpled hands, is a mighty
personage in the Mansfield household. At
the age of three, he already has mastered
one rôle, that of miniature tyrant; and the
person he most lords it over is " Papa." For
instance, "Papa" is at his table in his study
deeply immersed in the manuscript of " Beau-
caire." One of the pages he has read becomes
loose and flutters to the floor. He is only
[ 140 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
half conscious of its flight, and he is too
absorbed in the new play to put down the
manuscript, lean over, and pick up the stray
leaf. He goes on reading.
Suddenly there is a crisp, crinkly sound
on the floor. The actor pauses a moment
and looks down. There is a figure on its
hands and knees, and one of the hands is
just closing on the edge of the leaf.
"No! No! Georgie!"
The little hand draws back. In a moment
"Papa" once more is absorbed in the manu-
script. That crisp, crinkly sound again.
Papa more severely: "No! No! Georgie!"
Again the manuscript; again the sound.
Papa, trying to be very angry, a rôle he can
act perfectly on the stage, but at which he
is an utter failure between the four walls of
his own home: "Georgie, did n't I tell you
not to touch that? What do you mean by
being so naughty?"
[141]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
A little face looking up, two lips parted
in a roguish smile, and issuing from between
those lips, two words: "Teasing Papa!"
Good-bye, "Beaucaire"! Who cares what
becomes of you? A small fortune already
is invested in scenery and "properties," but
what of that? He who is to handle your
sword and sport your cockade, is scampering
about the room on hands and knees playing
"bow-wow" with a baby boy!
Richard III., Henry V., and Cyrano have
done other curious things at the behest of
Georgie. History does not record that either
the villain of the hump, the hero of Har-
fleur, or the long-nosed Gascony poet and
campaigner was of a mechanical turn of mind.
Yet their impersonator, having removed the
hump, put the crown on a shelf, and the nose
in storage, has been known to repair suc-
cessfully a broken-down "choo-choo" train
of course for Georgie. Here is a scene as
[ 142 ]


Richard Mansfield and his Wife and Son
Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
enacted on Riverside Drive in front of the
Mansfield house.
The park of which the drive is a feature
falls rather abruptly to the Hudson, which is
skirted by a railroad. The actor and his boy
are strolling along the walk at the edge of the
high bank, the actor accommodating his usually
brisk gait to the little fellow's short steps. A
train puffs by below. An idea suddenly oc-
curs to Georgie. He withdraws his chubby
hand from his father's hold, places his elbows
to his sides and toddles ahead, working his
little arms like piston rods and ejaculating,
Choo-choo! choo-choo!"
66
He comes to a sudden stop. His father
catches up with him, expecting to take his
hand and stroll along again. But no such
thing for the little fellow. "Train broken,"
he says.
The actor takes a few steps, holding a hand
back of him, waiting for a little hand to be
[145]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
placed in it. But a voice repeats more em-
phatically, "Train broken!" and then adds
imperiously, "Papa mend it!" Here is a
nice situation, but the actor's stage-training
comes to his rescue. With a perfectly sober
face he walks back to where Georgie stands
immovable, takes his cane as if it were a
screw-driver, makes a few passes in which he
goes through the movements of tightening
up a few screws and adjusting a bolt or two.
"Now, Georgie," he says, "train's mended,"
and off starts Georgie, "Choo-choo, choo-
choo!"
The boy's mind seems to run to railroads.
"Papa," he said recently, "you 're a steam
engine."
66
66
But my son-" the actor began protesting.
Hush, papa! Steam engines don't talk.”
What I want to call attention to is the fact
that in both little scenes the child displayed as
pretty an imagination as the actor. He knew
[ 146 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
perfectly well that he was not a broken-down
train, and that the repairs made by his father
were "make believe; " also that his father was

Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
Teaching Georgie to ride
not a steam engine. But having "created" a
"situation," he acted it out to the last detail.
Evidently he has inherited some of the actor's
imagination. I am told that if at table he asks
[ 147 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
for an apple, out of the order of the menu, it
is only necessary to make believe take an apple
from the dish and go through the motion of
handing it to him, to have him perfectly satis-
fied. If the wants of the average child could
be so easily supplied, what a simple and inex-
pensive matter a family ménage would be.
But George Gibbs Mansfield is not even the
exception that proves the rule. He has a
good healthy appetite, and soon would be
heard from if an attempt were made to sat-
isfy it too often with edibles of the "make-
believe" variety.
The Mansfield baby is named after Georgia
Gibbs, a daughter of the late Edwin S. Gibbs,
who was prominently connected with a large
New York life insurance company. Mrs.
Mansfield is an intimate friend of the family,
and around the Gibbs country seat at Rye,
N. Y., cluster some of the most romantic
memories of the actor's life. For Beatrice
[ 148 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Cameron was visiting here during the sum-
mer Mr. Mansfield was courting her. The
actor lived at Portchester, and together they
took long drives through the country with its
picturesque vistas of Long Island Sound and
woodland roads-regular "lovers' lanes" - in
the interior.
Miss Cameron was Mr. Mansfield's leading
woman for several seasons before he married
her. They first met when she joined his com-
pany and was cast for Florence in "Prince
Karl," making a decided hit in the rôle.
"Mansfield is delighted with his new lead-
ing woman. He thinks she has a great
future," is a sentence from a personal letter
written about this time by one of the actor's
friends. Mr. Mansfield's high opinion of his
wife's ability as an actress has never changed.
He still thinks she plays Florence, Raina in
"Arms and the Man," Lady Anne in "Richard
III.," Mrs. Anderson in "The Devil's Disciple,"
[ 149 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
and Norah in Ibsen's "Doll's House," better
than any one else.
After Georgie's birth Mrs. Mansfield retired
from the stage. During the second "Cyrano"
season many of her friends urged her to reap-
pear, but her reply was, "No, my place is in
our home with our child." Finally, however,
even Mr. Mansfield joined in the solicitations,
and she yielded so far as to consent to make a
single appearance. As a tribute to her, her
husband broke the run of "Cyrano" for a
night, which, with the heavy scenery to be
gotten out of the way and the disarrangement
of the cast, means more than the uninitiated
might suppose, and revived "Arms and the
Man" for one performance at the Herald
Square Theatre, Mrs. Mansfield playing Raina,
one of her most notable rôles. The house was
packed, and she received an ovation- and no
one was more tickled with her success than her
husband.
[ 150 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
66
But although Mrs. Mansfield has not been
seen on the stage since that one performance
of George Bernard Shaw's play, she is sure to
be present at the "first night" of a new pro-
duction by her husband in New York. The
play over, a scene not on the program is en-
acted. Usually some of the Mansfields' inti-
mate friends are in the audience, and these are
invited to wait after the performance and go
back behind the scenes with Mrs. Mansfield.
Suppose it is the first night of Beaucaire."
It is after the final curtain. The star has
made his little speech of thanks, and the audi-
ence is filing out
filing out all save a favored few.
The actor retires to his dressing-room; the
stage is "struck." The Louis XV. carpet used
in a scene of the play is spread over the floor,
and big candelabra are placed about. Some
fifteen or twenty friends are conducted be-
hind the scenes by Mrs. Mansfield, and soon
Mr. Mansfield appears.
He has put on his
[ 151 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
glasses, but is minus his peruke, though he
still wears his Duke of Orleans costume. Mr.
and Mrs. Mansfield then hold a reception on
the stage, and it is some time before the lights
are lowered and the actor and his wife are
driven to their home on Riverside.
66
Some idea of Mr. Mansfield's devotion to
Beatrice" and "Georgie" can be gathered
from his maintaining this handsome house.
As he rarely passes more than eight or nine
weeks of the year there, he keeps it up prac-
tically for his wife and child, so that they
may enjoy its comforts while he is away on
his professional tours. The Mansfield resi-
dence is a fine white stone structure about
halfway between the beginning of the famous
Drive at West Seventy-second Street and
Grant's Tomb on the north. From the win-
dows of his study the actor, when at home (by
no means a superfluous limitation, since his
profession takes him so much away from New
[ 152 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
York), commands a superb view of the Hud-
son. Though a city house, and not even very
far uptown, as New York now goes, the out-
look is as extensive and beautiful as that from
many of the country seats further up the river.
Only a few hundred yards away is the boat-
house of Columbia University, and the pass-
ing craft range from the long tapering racing
shells of the Columbia crews to the large river
steamboats.
A large hall and reception-rooms are on the
ground-floor. As in the typical modern New
York dwelling, the stairs do not begin im-
mediately opposite the front door. Such an
arrangement would be considered a relic of the
hideous "high-stoop, brown-stone" era. Con-
sequently the hall has a spacious aspect which
suggests the country home rather than the
city house. The drawing-room, dining-room,
and music-room are on the second floor.
Mrs. Mansfield has her suite, including her
[ 153 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
boudoir in white, ecru, and gold, Louis XIV.
style, on the third floor.
The library and
study are on the fourth, and above this is
Georgie's realm, the nursery.
The manuscript of the play under consid-
eration or in rehearsal, books on its historical
period, costume plates, pads scribbled over
with notes and memoranda, personal letters
and numerous requests for autographs, give
Mr. Mansfield's desk an appearance of pic-
turesque confusion.
The disarrangement is
real, not posed for effect.
Before he went on the stage Mr. Mansfield
was a painter. A friend, hearing of this only
recently, said to him, "I understand you once
made your living by your painting."
"No," was the actor's quick reply, "in spite
of it."
Nevertheless, among the pictures in the
house are several from his brush, allowed to
hang on the walls, however, only through the
[ 154 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
pleading of Mrs. Mansfield. Among them is
a little Lakewood view to which she attaches
special value.
While the Mansfields were
stopping at this New Jersey winter resort, a
water-color in one of the store windows, re-
producing a view which could be seen from
their windows, caught her fancy. She asked
Mr. Mansfield to buy it, but he demurred on
some ground. In the afternoon she went out
for a ride on horseback. Mr. Mansfield usually
accompanied her, but that afternoon he made
the necessity of looking over the manuscript
of a new play an excuse. When his wife re-
turned from her ride the aquarelle she had
liked so much hung in her room. Mr. Mans-
field listened to her expressions of delight with
an amused air.
"And what about the manuscript?" she
asked.
"There is no manuscript."
66
"Oh, Richard, why did n't you go out riding
[ 155 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
with me? What have you been doing all
this time?"
"Painting that little scene for you, dear."
During his season Mr. Mansfield finds little
opportunity for diversion. An actor's hours
are late. Even after a play has been running
some time, a scene occasionally is apt to sag.
The best corrective is to rehearse it immedi-
ately after the performance. An exacting star
like Mr. Mansfield—as exacting, however,
with himself as with his company - rarely
closes the stage door behind him until after
midnight. After the work of the evening
(for while the audience is enjoying itself, those
on the stage are hard at work), supper and
some relaxation are necessary before retiring.
Two o'clock in the morning, therefore, is not
an unusual hour for Mr. Mansfield to "turn
in." This will explain why he does not break-
fast until about noon. He is fond of horse-
back riding for exercise, and a canter on one of
[156]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
his favorite saddle-horses, Liberty or King
Cole, follows soon after breakfast. On his
return he goes to work in his study until four

Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
A Quiet Cup of Tea
o'clock, when he dines.
The interval be-
tween dinner and the time for leaving for the
theatre he divides between rest and mental
concentration upon his rôle.
During this
[ 157 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
period of his day any interruption positively is
prohibited. The public little appreciates the
exactions of the stage. It thinks the actor
simply walks on
off when it falls.
when the curtain rises and
Does it realize, for instance,
that on matinée days the actor hardly has
washed off his "make up" from the afternoon's
performance, before he has to put it on again
for the evening? When Mr. Mansfield was
acting Cyrano at the Garden Theatre, New
York, the interval between matinées and even-
ings was so brief that he was obliged to take a
room at the Holland House near by for a slight
rest and a hasty bite between performances.
Mr. Mansfield usually is at the stage door
before any member of his company. He is
thus early not only to set an example, but also
because he is very careful in "making up" his
rôle. Having been a painter before he became
an actor, he looks upon this part of his work
with the artist's eyes. I once watched him
[ 158 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES

making up" for Dick Dudgeon in "The
Devil's Disciple." He was doing all the work
himself, his dresser simply holding a handglass
in varying positions so that, reflected in the
mirror before him, he could see his face and
head from all points of view. "There," he
said, pointing to the "make-up" box, "is my
palette; here," with a flourish of the haresfoot,
'is my brush; and here," pointing to his face,
my canvas." It was the artist, not the actor,
speaking.
"my
"Time is too valuable to be wasted," is Mr.
Mansfield's motto in the management of his
company. Work has taken the place of the
old-time Bohemianism of the stage. Young
people who think stage life is one grand frolic
should remember that the theatre, like every
other institution which has prospered, has felt
the influence of modern business methods.
the Richard Mansfield Company everything
has been reduced to a system. One of the
In
[ 159 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
star's favorite anecdotes relates to how he him-
self was made cognizant of its thoroughness.
"Every member of my company," he says,
in telling it, "has an identification card which
must be presented at the stage door. One
night we were playing in a new theatre in the
West. As I was passing in the doorkeeper
stopped me.
"Card, please.'
666
"But-' I began.
"You've got to show a card to get in.'
"I haven't a card.'
"Haven't a card? Do you belong to this
show?'
66
'No.'
"Then what are you doin' here?'
"This show belongs to me.'
"Then the doorkeeper looked up, recognized
me, and probably would still be apologizing if
I had n't assured him that he had done exactly
right."
[ 160 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Mansfield's success came to him compar-
atively early in his career, yet he had his
full share of hardships beforehand. He was a
prankish boy; but there was no one to discern
in his pranks the overflow of vitality which,
when directed into proper channels, makes for
genius. He was born on the island of Heligo-
land in 1857. He comes rightfully by his
genius for the stage, for his mother was the
celebrated opera-singer, Emma Rudersdorff.
At ten years he was placed at a school in
Germany. His artistic tastes led him to paint
his classroom door a vivid green. He was so
proud of this achievement that he signed his
name to it, which, of course, led to his dis-
covery and punishment.
His mother came to this country in 1869.
She sang at the Boston Peace Jubilee in 1872,
with such success that she settled in Boston,
and Richard, who then was studying at Yver-
don, Switzerland, was sent for. He was
[ 161 ]


FAMOUS ACTORS AND
employed for a time in a large Boston dry-
goods store, but his artistic aspirations were too
strong to be overcome. He could sing, play,
mimic, and paint. The last seemed to him his
special bent.
He rented a studio, painted
water-colors, and sold them among his friends.
In a comparatively brief time, however, all
these were happy possessors of Mansfield
aquarelles, and the sales fell off in briskness
until he found himself in the not very cheer-
ful position of an artist who could paint much
faster than he could sell.

He
In this dilemma he decided to turn his
talent for music and mimicry to account.
hired a small hall, had tickets and circulars
printed, and, falling back upon his Dickens,
announced "Vincent Crummel's Entertain-
ment." He played the piano and sang, and
gave "imitations" of performers on various
instruments, very much as he did later in
"Prince Karl." In 1875 he went to England,
[162]

Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
Richard Mansfield and his Wife in their New London Garden
7
>
>
,
>
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
where he made a precarious living by painting.
Often the only meals he had were those he
secured at houses of friends who invited him
to help make the evening pass by his clever
parlor entertainments. Finally he decided to
give these professionally, but, at the very first
one, excitement combined with exhaustion
from hunger caused him to faint at the piano
after striking one chord.
Shortly afterwards a chance meeting with
W. S. Gilbert, who had seen him entertain as
an amateur, secured him the rôle of Sir Joseph
Porter at £3 a week in a "Pinafore" company
which was to do the provinces. He remained
three years with Gilbert, played an engage-
ment in comic opera in London, and then,
in 1882, returned to the United States in a
comic opera company organized by D'Oyly
Carte.
I was present at his first appearance on the
stage in this country. It was at the Standard,
[ 165 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
now the Manhattan Theatre, New York, in
September, 1882, in "Les Manteaux Noirs."
His rôle, Dromez, the stupid miller, was a
minor one, but it was the single success of
the evening. So was his Nick Vedder in
Planquette's "Rip Van Winkle." The public
did not care for either piece, but it was very
plain that individually Mansfield had made
a hit.
Soon afterwards he became a member of
A. M. Palmer's company at the Union Square
Theatre, where I saw him, unknown here save
for a few comic opera rôles, fairly burst upon the
audience as Baron Chevrial, the first night of
"A Parisian Romance." No such sensational
event in theatricals has occurred since, yet
his securing the rôle which made him famous
in a night was through the merest accident.
He originally was cast for a minor rôle, Tirin-
dal, the blasé youth of the piece. But during
the last week of rehearsal J. H. Stoddart gave
[ 166 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
up the rôle of the Baron. He had found it
uncongenial, and had been unable to make any-
thing of it. The part then was given to
Mansfield. At rehearsals he kept the "busi-
ness" of the rôle to himself, so that at the per-
formance the rest of the company, as well as the
manager, were as much amazed as the audience
at the marvellous realism with which Mans-
field portrayed the old roué on the verge of
collapse. After the supper scene, in which
Mansfield, summoning to his aid every resource
of realistic art, had acted the Baron's horrible
death by apoplexy with overpowering force,
the audience, excited to the highest pitch,
fairly rose at the young actor and gave him
such an ovation as rarely has been witnessed
in a New York theatre.
The actor now was in a peculiar position.
He had made such a success that although only
a few months had elapsed since his first appear-
ance on the American stage, he was ready to
[ 167 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Con-
star. But he was a star without a play.
sequently he was "loaned" around by Mr.
Palmer; but, except for the rôle of the amusing
French tenor in "French Flats," which he
played in San Francisco, and in which he made
a hit, none of the characters suited him. He
was playing Koko in "The Mikado" in Boston
when he received the manuscript of "Prince
Karl." This he brought out at the Boston
Museum in April, 1886, and from this produc-
tion his career as a star may be said to have
begun. He alternated the new play with "A
Parisian Romance," and later added his power-
ful interpretation of " Dr. Jekyll and Mr.
Hyde." His wonderful versatility was shown
in his ability to combine a light piece like
"Prince Karl" with the two others mentioned,
and he soon gave further evidence of it by
producing "Monsieur," a charming little piece
of his own writing.
In 1889 the actor who a few years ago had
[ 168 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
fainted from sheer hunger at his first attempt
to give a drawing-room entertainment in Lon-
don, and had afterwards knocked around the
provinces in comic opera, received an invi-
tation from Henry Irving to occupy the Ly-

Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
A Favorite Spot on a Summer Day
ceum Theatre. The most important addition
to his repertoire during this engagement was
"Richard III.," of which he made a magnifi-
cent production. In the autumn he brought
this over to America, but it was staged so
elaborately that in order to be financially suc-
[ 169 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
cessful a continuous succession of crowded
houses was necessary, and, these failing, the
piece was withdrawn. "Beau Brummell,"
66
Don Juan," "Nero,"
Nero," "Ten Thousand a
Year," "The Scarlet Letter,"
66
66
Merchant of
Venice," "Arms and the Man," "Napoleon,"
66
King of Peru," Rodion the Student,"
"Castle Sombras," "The Devil's Disciple,"
"The First Violin," "Cyrano de Bergerac,"
"Henry V.,"" Beaucaire," and "Julius Caesar"
have followed.
An interesting anecdote is connected with
his Shylock. Although his first Shakespearian
production on the stage was " Richard III.,"
Shylock was his first Shakespearian rôle. For
he had appeared in it at an amateur perform-
ance when he was a pupil at the Derby School,
England. His acting attracted the attention
of Dr. Selwyn, then Bishop of Litchfield, who,
congratulating him, said, "I have no desire to
encourage any one to become an actor, but
[ 170 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
He found the
should you choose to, I believe you will be a
great one."
While he was playing Baron
Chevrial at the Union Square, Mansfield
adopted a rule of temperance which he has
followed during his entire career, and to which
he believes he largely owes his physical vigor
and his capacity for hard work.
strain of Chevrial so great
champagne between the acts.
occurred to him that if he kept on he would
require a greater and greater quantity before
his nerves responded. He at once put an
end to the habit, and has since relied upon
temperate living for the conservation of his
forces.
that he drank
One night it
Richard Mansfield is known to look upon
Garrick as his model. The Garrick Theatre,
New York, was so named by him when he
took over the management of the house, and
it has retained its name since it passed into
other hands. He believes that, like Garrick, a
[ 171 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
-
true actor should be able to assimilate all
kinds of rôles, comedy as well as tragedy.
In his own career he has illustrated the
correctness of this theory, when applied by
actors as great as Garrick and Richard
Mansfield. His Prince Karl and Beaucaire
are delightful examples of the comedian's art.
Nothing in the line of eccentric character act-
ing, touched with tragedy, can surpass his
Cyrano; and for eloquent declamation his
Henry V." is unrivalled. In spite of the
gorgeous spectacular mounting which he gave
to that Shakespearian "historie," the dramatic
force of his own acting stood out in bold relief
from the glittering background of costumes
and scenery.
There are a host of admirers
who consider Mansfield the greatest actor of
the English-speaking stage of to-day, and not
so very few who rank him as the greatest
living actor.
Yet those who know him best may be
[ 172 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
pardoned if they rank him even higher in a
rôle in which the public knows him not,
in his own home, with Mrs. Mansfield as
leading woman and "
and "Georgie" as leading
juvenile.
[173]

JULIA MARLOWE
T
JULIA MARLOWE

HE popular actress we know
to-day as Julia Marlowe is, in
reality, not Julia Marlowe at
all. That is to say, Julia
Marlowe is purely an assumed
name, and one of four different names which
its owner has borne.
As a matter of fact, her real name is Sarah
Frances Frost, and as such she started in the
world. Her parents were English people who
came to America from Caldbeck, in Cumber-
landshire, England, settled in Kansas, and
then moved to Canton, Ohio. Her birthplace
usually is given as Caldbeck. But in the little
Ohio city, famed throughout the world as the
home of William McKinley, she was born in
[ 177 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
1868,- thirty-five years ago. Her father died
when she was a child, and her mother married
the proprietor of a small hotel in Cincinnati
which was frequented by stage people. In
this way the little girl came into her first
touch with the theatre; and when she was
twelve years old she appeared on the stage
for the first time in a juvenile "Pinafore"
company. And with this appearance Sarah
Frances Frost became Fanny Brough, her
mother's family name.
"I had practically no childhood," the ac-
tress once said to me. "As a child, I
went to no child's party; as a girl, I had no
girl friends. The experiences which come
to growing children as part of their girl-life
came to me only as part of my stage ex-
perience. The first long dress I wore was
not as a girl, but on the stage as Myrene'
in 'Pygmalion and Galatea.'" And so the
girl grew up, practically on the stage.
[ 178 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
She had the usual experience of all actresses
in going from one part to another, but wherein
she differs, perhaps, is in the unusual and per-
sistent attention which she has always given to
the training of her voice. She believes that
the voice is the principal tool of the actor, and
it was because of her clearness of utterance
and the projective quality of her voice that, in
her early career, she received promotions that
were withheld from others. And this care of
her voice has brought her what is universally
conceded to be one of the most beautifully
modulated voices on the stage to-day. What-
ever else she may neglect in her daily routine,
vocal exercise is an inexorable part which is
never overlooked. To have a piano ready for
her in her apartments is one of her strictest
instructions to her personal avant courier. It
must be there on her arrival at her hotel; for
by half an hour's brisk vocal exercise she coun-
teracts the ill effects upon her voice of hours
[ 179 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
in overheated sleepers and of the change from
cars to the sharp air of a winter morning.
When she was sixteen years of age "Fanny
Brough" disappeared from the stage. She
moved to Bayonne, New Jersey, and there,
under the direction of an actress who had
adopted her as a niece, she lived for three
years, devoting each day to study and the
development of the powers which she felt
were within her. At this time she was
saucer-eyed, yellow-skinned girl of a melan-
cholic temperament, high-strung, eager, rest-
less, and unbearable to herself when unoccu-
pied. Her mouth was drooping and pensive,
indicative of her chief joy in life, which was to
revel in the woes of tragedy queens. Her
training was so severe and uninterrupted that
a detailed narrative of it would half suggest an
extract from a labor report on the padrone
system. Miss Marlowe herself says that the
training for the stage in those days was "splen-
[ 180 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
did in its results, if the victim lived through
it." But she went eagerly at her task. She
never needed the spur, and, if anything, the
aim of her instructor possibly should have
been to keep her from working too hard. No
one deluded her with the assurance that she
was a genius. Her tasks included lessons in
voice development, musical notation, gymnas-
tics, dancing, the history and literature of the
drama, stage deportment, and the meaning and
essence of many classic rôles. She was taught
how to walk properly by passing to and fro
before a pier-glass, watching herself and being
watched by her teacher.
Fencing was an important feature of her
training. It developed the muscles of the
arms and shoulders, made the wrists and hands
strong and flexible, and gave the girl a keen
eye for distances. Standing about eight feet
from the wall, with a rapier in her hand, she
would lunge a hundred times at a wafer half
[ 181 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
an inch in diameter, becoming so expert that
she could pierce it nine times out of ten.
In her training, lessons in elocution practi-
cally were avoided. Her voice development
always was purely musical, and this is the only
kind of vocal culture she herself considers
appropriate either to actor or singer.
In the rehearsing of plays her instructor
served both as audience and prompter, reading
all the parts save the heroine's, which the
pupil took. Scenery and the positions of the
other characters were indicated by tables and
chairs. The first rehearsal of
66
Romeo and
Juliet" was held in a cottage at Bayonne ;
and the back of a venerable haircloth sofa
was the balcony rail.
For three years this unremitting training
continued, and when she emerged from her
retirement it was as "Julia Marlowe." Her
desire was now to be launched as a star at the
head of her own company. A weary round
[ 182 ]

Photographed by Sands & Brady
One of Julia Marlowe's latest Portraits
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
of the managers' offices followed, but in no
instance did she receive even more than scant
attention to

her request to
be "starred."
Several posi-
tions were of-
fered her in the
best stock
companies, but
these she con-
sistently de-
clined. "I
must be an
independent
player: I must
be able to fol-
low out my
Photographed by Sands & Brady
"Now beg for it!"
own ideas," she said, and to this determination
she adhered.
One of her old Ohio acquaintances, a the-
[ 185 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
atrical manager, finally came to the girl's res-
cue, organized a company, and the name of
Julia Marlowe first appeared as a
66
star." She
made a brief tour of some towns in Connecti-
cut, playing in "Parthenia," and on October
20, 1887, she played for the first time at a
New York theatre. She hired the theatre
herself for one matinée, and it is a curious
commentary upon the difficulty which con-
fronted the actress in securing an opening in
New York that part of the money necessary
for the expense of the performance was fur-
nished by the keeper of an oyster saloon on
Third Avenue, an acquaintance of Miss
Marlowe's" aunt by adoption."
The matinée was a success, and the perform-
ance won much praise for the new actress.
Lester Wallack, Richard Mansfield, and Wil-
liam Gillette all offered her prominent places
in their companies. But she declined them
all. Independent she would remain, she said.
[ 186 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
The next autumn she played in Boston, and
there, in 1888, she made the success which
firmly established her as a "star." From this
point she went on.
But illness and disappointments were among
the experiences in store for the promising young
actress. She had no sooner opened her third
season when, while playing in Philadelphia, she
was stricken with typhoid fever. Her company
was disbanded, and for more than six months
she was not able to play. When she did make
her reappearance, it was practically under her
own management. Her aunt had up to this
time been her manager, and so closely had she
been shielded from all business matters that
she knew nothing about the business or
financial side of her life. Her earnings thus
far had about paid for the mere cost of her
living and the material for her clothes. She
made all her own clothes both for the stage
and for private life. She knew nothing about
[ 187 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
the handling of money, and while she knows
more to-day than she did, few actresses on the
stage have so little conception of the purchas-
ing power of money. When she is on tour,
funds placed at her disposal invariably are in
the form of checks, never in cash. For there
is a tradition in the profession that you can
find "Marlowe money" stuffed under mat-
tresses and between wainscotings in half the
hotels of America, the bills being placed there
for safekeeping by Miss Marlowe and her
maid, who then straightway forget all about it
and send to the treasurer of the company for
more when the time comes for departure.
In 1894 the actress changed her name for
the third time by marrying Mr. Robert Taber,
her leading man. But the marriage did not
prove the sympathetic, artistic union which
their friends hoped for, and it was dissolved.
She resumed the name of Julia Marlowe, and
has not since married.
[ 188 ]

Julia Marlowe in her Automobile
Photographed by Sands & Brady
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Miss Marlowe's method of studying a new
rôle is singularly individual. She does not
memorize the lines in the ordinary sense. Sup-
pose it to be a classical play. She first studies
the life of the author in its
literary and ethical intentions.
bearings on his
Then she takes
She never
While she is
up the heroine and endeavors from history to
absorb the spirit, the manners, of the period.
Having thus recreated its "atmosphere," she
reads the play about fifty times.
deliberately memorizes a line.
saturating her mind with the
absorbing its spirit, lines and cues take care of
themselves and become fixed in her memory.
narrative and
The question often is mooted whether stage
people while preparing for a production feel
themselves to be, for the time being, and while
going about other affairs, the characters they
are studying. Miss Marlowe says no. It is
true that when she was studying "Prince
Hal" she wore armor in her apartments and
[ 191 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
even at meals - but not because she imagined
herself "Prince Hal," as some have thought.
The fact is, the armor pinched her unmercifully
unless she walked with a particular stride, and
it was to master it that she wore the metal
costume when moving about her rooms. Fin-
ally the distress from wearing the armor be-
came so great that she put on several suits of
thick jerseys under it. "Even then," she says,
"when I fell in this armor, as I sometimes did
on reaching the wings after a hurried exit, it
took two men to put me on my feet again."
Miss Marlowe's likes and dislikes outside of
her profession are those of an active, healthy-
minded woman, interested in everything pos-
sessing more than ephemeral significance. In
literature she loves best the books of those
men who wrote truth straightforwardly, come
what might. Hence you find on the most
accessible shelf of her library worn and marked
copies of Thoreau, Whitman, Stevenson,
—
[ 192 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
more especially his essays, Balzac, and Mere-
dith. Balzac's "Lily of the Valley" and
Meredith's "Diana of the Crossways" she con-
siders the greatest novels ever written. Her
favorite poets are Shakespeare, Keats, and
Swinburne. The Bible she reads much for
both its moral and literary influence, and
hopes for the day when some playwright
will submit to her a really great and rever-
ent drama on a Biblical theme. Last winter
she was deep in the plays and essays of
Maeterlinck and the Nature books of Grant
Allen, and in the study of philosophy and
French literature.
Her special hobby, if you can dignify it by
no better term, is book-collecting, and last
summer at Bad Nauheim this love for books
led her to take lessons in bookbinding from a
venerable German craftsman in whose work-
shop she spent many busy and happy hours
between whiles. In painting, she has a rap-
[ 193 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
turous appreciation of the painters of the
Barbizon School. For good music she has a
genuine love, and an equally genuine loathing
of so-called "popular airs," the playing of
which is never permitted in any theatre where
she is appearing. The three things she hates
most are "popular music, being photographed,
and the dumpy outlines of the Statue of Lib-
erty on Bedloe's Island."
Miss Marlowe's outdoor diversions are golf,
driving, and, recently, automobiling. She
does a prodigious amount of walking all the
year round.
Her love of Nature is almost
primitive in its intensity. Asked once what
was her greatest ambition, she said it was to
"lead such a normal life that I can get up
every morning in time to see the sun rise."
Often she will dismiss her carriage and revel
in facing wind and weather on foot. An ac-
quaintance of mine accompanied her from her
hotel to the theatre one March night in the
[ 194 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
teeth of a driving storm.
The sidewalk was
like the bed of a mountain stream, and the
wind made
umbrellas a

sarcasm. She
enjoyed every
step of the
walk and
reached the
theatre in a
gale of laugh-
ter and high
spirits. It is
this abundant
vitality, this
capacity for
getting fun out
of things
Photographed by Sands & Brady
Ready for a Walk
which annoy or bore most people, that give a
compelling charm to her art and a rare, sweet
vivacity to her personality.
[195]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
For a time Miss Marlowe had a house of
her own in New York City, but this she has
now given up. Her only home is her coun-
try place in the western part of the Catskill
Mountains. This she calls Highmount,"
66
and from the windows of the house there is
a glorious view of a dozen mountain peaks.
The house is a large one of Colonial archi-
tecture, a part of which, the brick terrace, the
theatre-going public saw reproduced on the
stage without knowing the fact. For the first
tentative rehearsal of "When Knighthood was
in Flower" was given on the brick terrace on
to which the main living-room of her house
opens. This terrace was so effective for group-
ing and for exits and entrances that the archi-
tecture of it was copied in the reproduction of
a Tudor brick terrace which forms a part of
the stage setting in the first act of the play.
Her estate consists of four hundred acres,
and only the smaller part of the large estate
[ 196]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
is laid out in lawn, garden, and driveways.
That portion of her possessions which she has
with admirable taste allowed to remain wholly
"unimproved," is by far the greater part of
the estate. Still in its original wildness, it is
crisscrossed by mountain streams, cleft by deep
ravines, and overgrown with a network of vines
and forest trees that have never known the
woodman's axe. Here the happiest hours of
Julia Marlowe's life are spent, and thither she
goes immediately her professional work ends
for the season, which is usually toward the
end of May, and there she remains until early
September. During the months she spends
there she practically lives out-of-doors and
returns to her work in the autumn strong in
body, burned and tanned as to face, and physi-
cally and intellectually refreshed for the long
season of travelling and acting.
It is at "Highmount" that she finds most
opportunity for the outdoor diversions she
[ 197 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
loves, - her golf, trout-fishing, walks to in-
teresting points all along the mountain-side,
and a daily horseback ride. Hours for read-
ing and for consultation with playwrights who
come up to " Highmount" from New York
are reserved for the evening and for stormy
days. With the minor domestic details of
household routine she has nothing to do.
She never knows in advance what will be
served on her table, and, indeed, does not
wish to know. Her only preference in these
matters is for French cooking and the dishes
made famous by the Creole cooks of Louisiana.
Of these she is very fond, and she has provided
her cook with an extensive library of Creole
receipts collected from her friends in the South
and from famous chefs in that region who hap-
pen to know of her liking for their dishes.
It is a very simple existence, this home life
of the real Julia Marlowe. Whoever has
studied her in her country home realizes how
[ 198 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
thoroughly unspoiled she is and how free from
affectation she has kept herself.
She never

Photographed by Burr McIntosh
A Favorite Nook at Highmount
poses, never idles. Hers is a busy, cheerful,
sensible round of exercise, reading, visiting,
modest hospitality, and unaffected good cheer.
[ 199 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Every guest within the gates of "Highmount"
is there because he can contribute something
of intellectual or spiritual value. Invariably
the company drifts time and again during the
day to the library, and each one is permitted
to seek a comfortable corner and busy himself
with his own book, or to engage in general
conversation if that is his mood.
Her
With the pseudo-Bohemianism affected by
some theatrical and literary notables Miss
Marlowe has absolutely no sympathy.
home is "Liberty Hall" in the fine, high
sense of the phrase. The social atmosphere
in which she lives is based upon intimate and
affectionate companionship, and there is no
suggestion of ostentatious hospitality in it.
You will not see many famous people in her
circle of guests. Humble folk with brains are
the recipients of her most generous hospitality.
Often they are people who have known the
bite of real poverty and to whom the comfort

[ 200 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
and even luxury of a fortnight's visit with her
come as a real benison in their hard, pinched
lives: teachers of high attainments but with
slight knowledge of the world's ways, who are

Through the Green
Photographed by Sands & Brady
eking out a precarious existence in New York
by giving lessons; musicians upon whom for-
tune has not smiled; struggling authors who
can find no publishers; brave, earnest men and
[ 201 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS
women engaged in philanthropic work,-these
are the honored guests during the weeks of
her summer leisure.
It is a free, happy life that Miss Marlowe
spends here. A visitor on going into the house
unexpectedly one afternoon found the entire
household, guests and all, seated in a circle on
the floor, the centre of attraction being Miss
Marlowe's pet spaniel, and one of those toy
animals which street fakirs sell, and which
jump about in a most lifelike manner. The
victim of its pranks was the dog, and the
group on the floor was in gales of laughter
at his bewilderment over the gyrations of the
toy. The merriest of the group was Miss
Marlowe herself, at that moment what she
always is at " Highmount," the woman, not
the actress.
66
-
[ 202 ]

ANNIE RUSSELL

A
ANNIE RUSSELL

ANNIE RUSSELL is one of the
sweetest and most popular ac-
tresses on the English-speak-
ing stage. Yet it is a question
if any rôle she has played, with
the exception of Sue, has at all put her true
powers to the test. The actress whom Eng-
lish critics, after seeing her in "Sue," called
the Duse of the English-speaking stage, cer-
tainly never has had another opportunity to
show her true mettle. The parts Miss Rus-
sell plays usually are those of young girls; and
of young girls she once said to me, "They may
be pretty, graceful, good, dainty, sweet, but
they are not interesting. In the mean time,
one cannot play the Princess Angela in a
[ 205 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
manner which will show between the lines
that one is able to play Lady Macbeth."
When will Miss Russell have another op-
-to play
portunity to appear in a strong rôle,
-
not indeed a vile woman, but an intelligent
one; the kind of woman who knows as much
of real living and suffering as Miss Russell
herself does? When? Alas! she is so charm-
ing in the rôles which lie so very easily within
her range that the public has "specialized
her. Her grace, her daintiness, her exquisite
pathos, her sly, elusive humor, have made
rather lovable creatures out of what, for the
most part, she herself considers a precious lot
of simpletons. And so there has risen in the
popular imagination an idée fixe, the Annie
Russell part," the young girl endowed with all
the charming qualities with which Miss Rus-
sell's refined and delicate art invests her rôles.
Indeed, Miss Russell makes such an adorable
girl on the stage that, however more serious
66
[ 206 ]


Annie Russell
Photographed by Miss Ben Yuseff


ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
her own ambitions may be, the public hardly
can be blamed for insisting that a girl she shall
remain to the end of her theatrical days - and
may that end be long in coming!
Annie Russell was born in Liverpool, Eng-
land, in 1864. Her father, Joseph Russell,
was Irish, a civil engineer, and a Dublin Uni-
versity man. Her mother, Jane Mount, came
of a Suffolk family. None of Miss Russell's
father's people or her mother's had ever had
any connection with the stage.
Very early in her childhood she was placed
in a convent in Dublin, and she was only five
years old when she was taken out of it and
brought to America. Her mother, sister, and
brother came with her to Montreal on the first
journey to this country. She has little or no
recollection of the voyage; but of a return
voyage to England there remains impressed on
her memory the fact that the ship was wrecked
in the straits of Belle Isle, and that after the
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FAMOUS ACTORS AND
passengers were safely gotten ashore they had
several days of cold and hunger and little to
eat beside hardtack before they were picked
up by a passing vessel.
As a child, she disclosed a great knack for
imitating people. Consequently, when it be-
came necessary for her mother to support her-
self and her three children, it was decided
to turn Annie's mimetic faculty to account.
Rose Eytinge, who was coming to Montreal
to play "Miss Moulton," advertised for a child
for one of the children's rôles in the piece.
Annie was taken to the theatre, tried by the
manager, and accepted. But when, on Miss
Eytinge's arrival, she learned that the child
never had been on the stage, she was greatly
annoyed and declined to give her a trial.
Annie and her mother both were in tears, and
these moved the actress to hear the girl recite a
few lines with the result that Annie promptly
was accepted. Thus, at the age of eight, she
[ 210 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
made her début at the Academy of Music,
Montreal. Later she was taken to New York,
where she secured an engagement with Hav-
erly's Juvenile "Pinafore" company. She also
played the little boy in "Rip Van Winkle."
Eva in "Uncle Tom's Cabin" was Annie's
next rôle, and then she played page parts
with Edwin Booth. Of her experiences in
his company her liveliest remembrance is that
in "Richelieu" she had to take the great ac-
tor's hat. She used to guard it carefully, and
when possible eluded the dresser and handed
it in to Mr. Booth's dressing-room herself, in
hopes of a word from him. Once she was re-
warded by a pat on the hand and the remark,
When you grow up, little girl, you shall
play Ophelia."
Before she was quite twelve, though far
older than that in knowledge and experience,
she made a tour of the West Indies with Mr.
and Mrs. E. A. McDowell, who were great
[ 211 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
favorites on the Canadian stage. Her brother,
Tommy Russell, afterwards the famous "Lord
Fauntleroy," but then only three years old, was
the child actor of the company. Annie went
along, ostensibly to care for him, but she also was
made useful in many minor ways on the stage.
The tender and beautiful relations still ex-
isting between herself and her brother, and one
of the great joys of their home life, began with
this tour. He was sweet, pretty, intelligent,
but too generous. His giving away his toys the
sister did not mind. When, however, he would
take off his little cap, or his coat or sash, as he
frequently did, to give away to some darky
child, she had to punish him. Then he would
fly into little rages and scream out,
Annie
isn't the boss of Tommy!" But Annie was,
for she had to be very careful of their earnings
and send home a certain amount of them every
week to their mother in New York. The boy
appreciated his sister's love; and once, when the
66
[ 212 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
manager fined her for letting Tommy appear
on the stage with a soiled little undergarment
hanging, one leg of it, below his dress, and
making the audience laugh in a serious scene
at his futile little attempts to hitch it up, and
Annie cried nearly all night, Tommy sobbed
with her in complete though not understand-
ing sympathy.
Besides making her little brother's clothes
and frequently mending them—and taking
general care of him, she played in drama and
burlesque and got an occasional leading rôle
such as the Colleen Bawn and Josephine in
"Pinafore." She looks back on the experi-
ence as invaluable. For in the burlesques she
"let herself out" and did pretty much what-
ever came into her head-or her heels. She
remembers very well playing a burlesque
of "Hamlet" and dancing while she sang
Hamlet's lines, -
""T is not alone my inky cloak, good mother."
[213]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
66
On her return to the United States she
made with one stride a great advance in her
profession. She reached New York in August
and applied at the Madison Square Theatre for
a position. Mr. William Gillette, whom she
saw, said she was too young for anything he had
in view. A few weeks later she learned that
they were to put on Esmeralda," a play
by Frances Hodgson Burnett and William
Gillette. From what she could find out about
the play it seemed to her that the title rôle
would suit her. Remembering her previous
experience with Mr. Gillette, and how he had
told her she was too young, she resorted to a
ruse; and when she went to see him again, she
played a rôle without his knowing it. She
had made herself a long black dress, had done
up her hair and borrowed some stage jewelry,
and in this disguise she now came before
Mr. Gillette and put in her application without
his recognizing the supposed over-young per-
[ 214 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
son, who had come to see him a few weeks
before, so cleverly did she act the age she

Photographed by Sarony
Annie Russell
thought he would consider suitable. He gave
her a page or two of the part to study and told
[ 215 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
her when to come back for trial. The part
was given out in competition; and on the day
set one girl was to come at ten o'clock in the
morning, the next at half-past ten, the next at
eleven, and so on. Miss Russell "won out,"
and she played the rôle nearly eight hundred
times.
After" Esmeralda" she appeared as Hazel
Kirke, Mary Standish in "Pique," Fuchsia
Leach in "Moths," Lady Vavir in "Broken
Hearts," Sylvia in "Our Society," Maggie in
"Engaged," a little girl in "The Martyr," the
title rôle in "Elaine," one of the most exquisite
productions made on the American stage, and
a young girl in "Captain Swift."
After achieving striking successes in most
of these rôles, her health gave way under great
mental strain and bodily suffering. She was
forced to undergo a serious surgical operation
and it was four years before she again appeared
before an audience.
[ 216 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
A friend, Miss Agnes Hill, who was with
her as nurse and companion during these years,
and who thus had every opportunity of observ-
ing her under circumstances of great physical
distress, cannot speak too highly of Miss
Russell's fortitude under suffering and of the
wonderful mental activity she displayed. Her
mind and her ability to exercise it were her
great source of consolation in this long and
trying period, though at times they must have
made her enforced physical inactivity doubly
unbearable. Others were forging ahead in a
profession in which she should be a leader,
because, despite a mind as keenly sensitive as
ever, she lay, a physical wreck, upon a cot.
Here seems the right place to point out
that Miss Russell's activity of mind largely
is due to her own initiative. Of schooling in
the usually accepted sense, she has had very
little. Her regular school-days have been few.
She went to a private school in Montreal for
[ 217 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
several months; afterwards in New York she
attended public school for part of a year.
Beyond this her education has been carried on
by private teachers whom she herself engaged
from time to time, and she always has sought,
by her own efforts, to cultivate her mind and
stimulate its activities, for she is capable in a
marked degree of giving the closest attention
to any matter in hand, and is curious, espe-
cially, regarding literary and artistic achieve-
ments. I wish to emphasize these characteris-
tics of concentration and of curiosity,
latter in its best sense. Among her teachers
she possibly rates most highly the late Abby
Sage Richardson. It was Mrs. Richardson
who taught her between her fourteenth and
eighteenth years, and as Miss Russell herself
says, was her greatest inspiration in that time.
Through her she was introduced to the litera-
ture of the eighteenth century, and to Shake-
speare and other dramatists of the sixteenth.
the
[ 218 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Where she picked up French I doubt if she
herself knows. When Miss Hill first met her,

Photographed by Mrs. McKee Rankin
Annie Russell in her Japanese Corner
Miss Russell was eager that they should read
French together.
That unfortunately was not
[ 219 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
66
possible, owing to the former's utter ignorance
of the language. It was characteristic of Miss
Russell, however, that she wasted no time in
lamenting, but set about searching her com-
panion, much as one might ransack a chest
of odds and ends for useful bits. She finally
pounced upon Latin. Then, as Miss Hill her-
self writes me, began "the best snatches of
time I ever shall have with Horace." But woe
betide the nurse-companion if she went off on
any tangent. Will you please 'tend to your
business?" came the despairing protest from
the cot and sternly pinned her down to the
particular point of Latin under consideration.
When English was read to her, though she
might be resting with eyes closed, she knew
intuitively if the reader looked ahead in any
story. Perhaps ten lines-skimmed - when
"Pig," uttered with unspeakable reproach,
would make the reader start guiltily and close
the book.
[ 220 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Nor would she ever allow me," says Miss
Hill, "to read English peacefully to myself
in her presence. French, yes, because until I
had learned that, there was no going on with
it for her. Sometimes she talked to me of
artists and their work, and always cleverly.
'Omar Khayyam,' she would say, for instance,
'I learned about when I posed for some of
Mr. Vedder's drawings, in the happy days
before the Omar Khayyam societies and their
ilk had induced the flippant to speak of the
learned Persian as Omar Khi-yi.””
66
Miss Russell's re-entry upon the stage after
four years of illness was made at Wallack's
Theatre as Marjorie in Sydney Grundy's
New Woman." After her years of isolation
from the theatre, the welcome she received
was thrilling. Although she had not set foot
upon the boards for so long, she required no
more preparation in resuming her professional
work than the ordinary number of rehearsals.
[ 221 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
But her methods had undergone a change.
She always had had the first requisite of the
actor, the ability to put himself wholly into
another's place. This she always has consid-
ered back of all methods and more than all.
But to this intuitive feeling for natural acting
that had made even her first appearances not-
able, she had during her long illness added a
constantly increasing conviction that many ac-
cepted conventions and devices of the stage
were absurd. These she had eliminated by a
process of pure mental abstraction while lying
in suffering on her cot. As a result, she re-
turned to the stage not only in "The New
Woman," but actually herself a new woman
so far as a throwing off of certain traditions of
the stage was concerned. She was more nat-
ural and consequently more artistic than ever
before. It was a remarkable instance of abil-
ity to put into immediate execution theories
which had been evolved only in the abstract.
[ 222 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Since her return to the stage, Miss Russell
has played a season as leading lady for Nat
Goodwin, has supported Sol Smith Russell in
"A Bachelor's Romance," has been seen in
"The Mysterious Mr. Bugle," "The Scenario,"
a most forceful performance, "Katherine,"
Miss Hobbs," "A Royal Family," "The
Girl and the Judge," "Mice and Men," "Sue,"
and "Dangerfield, '95."
66
66
She made so much of this last, a little
curtain-raiser, that in the spring of 1898 Mr.
Charles Frohman put it on in England, call-
ing her over to play it. It is a slight affair,
but Miss Russell rightly felt that on her
London success in it much depended. This
thought possessed her and even terrified her,
and on her first night in London she started
off very badly indeed to a cold house. This
lasted half through the play, when, by sheer
force of will, she gathered herself together,
broke through her own fright, and carried
[ 223 ]


FAMOUS ACTORS AND
through the half-hour to a triumphant con-
The little play as acted
clusion for herself.
66
by her made a veritable sensation, and it be-
came the thing" to go early to the Garrick
for the curtain-raiser; and this although in
London the curtain-raiser generally is skipped
by most of the audience. London's curiosity
was aroused by this performance to see Miss
Russell in something that would give her more
opportunity; and this led to the putting on of
"Sue" and her triumph in it.
Miss Russell has two homes,
-
one in New
York, the other on the coast of Maine.
Both
she shares with her brother Tommy, between
whom and herself relations simply are ideal.
To please her he gave up the stage, went
through college, she paying his way, and then
into business.
Her New York home, small but furnished
most tastefully, she and Tommy leave with
the close of the theatrical season, and off to
[ 224 ]


Photographed by Burr McIntosh
Vor M
Annie Russell out of Doors
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
the Maine ast they go. Here, at Pemaquid
directly on the water, Miss Russell purchased,
three years ago, some forty acres of land, and
there last summer she finished building a house
which she calls The Ledges," - the house
66
standing practically on ledges of rock running
to the water. It is here that Annie Russell
is at her best. From the moment she reaches
her seashore home she forgets her work and
fairly revels in an outdoor life. Every tree
on the place is known to her: she knows every
stick of wood in her house, for she practically
designed the house herself, and it was built
after her plans. "It is n't what I'd call han-
sum, Miss Russell," said the builder when he
finished it, "but I did it as you said, and there
it is." And there it is, for a fact, as simple
and artistic a little home as one could wish
for, with its low windows looking out on the
sea, a big living-room with its wide fireplace,
and the upstairs rooms furnished with their
[ 227 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
pretty flower-patterned chintz hangings and
fresh, dainty papers. For practically two bliss-
ful summer months, June and July, Miss Rus-
sell leads an idyllic life of outdoor leisure here.
Her brother spends the larger part of the sum-
mer there, the mother and sister and a favorite
nephew come, and there is always an intimate
friend or two.
66
A goodly part of the Maine place has been
left natural, and through these wooded paths
Miss Russell roams at will. The rising hour
at The Ledges" is half after seven, and fif-
teen minutes later sees Miss Russell taking a
plunge before breakfast, not in a tub, but a
swim in the ocean, which means a cool dip off
the Maine coast in early summer. But from
a swimming raft constructed in the water di-
rectly in front of the house plunges Miss
Russell with the glee of a girl, leaving the
less-venturesome men standing on the raft
wondering how cold the water is. It is need-
[ 228 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
less to say that a hearty breakfast follows this.
With this over, comes the stable, which, next
to the big living-room in the house, is the
young mistress's favorite place. Here her
favorite pony "Sallie" whinnies at her the
moment she appears, and in a few moments
Miss Russell is on the pony's back and off for
a ride of "a few miles," as she says, which,
however, frequently lengthens into a ride of
twenty-eight miles. She is perfectly at home
in the saddle, riding her spirited little animal
with absolute ease, and is rarely so happy as
when, with her hair flying in the wind, she
dashes along a country road with her guests
in the rear vainly trying to keep up with her.
The pony and rider return supremely happy,
and then with a second dash into the cold
water of the ocean, Miss Russell dresses and
is ready for dinner, as fresh and lively as a
girl of twenty.
If Miss Russell is at home in the saddle, she
[ 229 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
is equally so in a boat. Sailing is another one
of her regular diversions, and her delight is to
take the tiller in a good stiff breeze and sail
her own boat with a spirit that communicates
itself to every one with her. She thoroughly
enjoys whatever she does and gets from every
enjoyment the fullest mental and physical
benefit. If it is a picnic on the rocks, she is
the liveliest of the party. If the men start a
game of baseball, Miss Russell is immediately
in it. "I may not always pitch a ball quite
straight," she says, "but that makes it all the
harder for the men to get any hits on me."
Some days Miss Russell gives herself en-
tirely over to the running of the place. Then,
with a hired man at each side, she walks from
stable to vegetable garden, and from truck-
patch to the flower-beds, and from the flowers
to the hayfield, directing this and suggesting
that. The haying time is her delight, and
then the hayfield sees much of her. Working
[ 230 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
with her men, she uses the large rakes herself,
pitches the hay on to the wagon, and then
clambering up drives the load to the barn.

Annie Russell at the Helm
There isn't much of the successful actress,
beautifully gowned, about Annie Russell at
these times,
standing on a load of hay, with
sunbonnet on her head, whip in hand, skilfully
[ 231 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
driving her horse and load over ruts and rocky
places. But she has nine months of the year
to be the actress, she wisely argues.
When August comes the days are not so
care-free. Then the manuscript of the next
winter's new play is taken up and reading
and studying begin. The secluded, pictur-
esque spots in her own woods begin to know
her, and there she studies and thinks over the
part which she is to create. All her study-
ing is done in these spots, with Nature in its
most beautiful moods all about her. Hours
are thus spent.
66
"I had a glimpse of her work when she was
studying her rôle in The Royal Family,'" a
friend of hers said to me recently. "I had
gone out to a quiet corner of the woods where
I was reading. The sound of her voice aroused
me. She was singing the little song that she
sang in the play, -
"Over the mountains, happy and bold,'
-
[ 232 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
getting the effect, the feeling of it, in the open
air. After what seemed to me a long time I
moved so as to get sight of her. Her horse
stood in the path, his head down, grazing.
His mistress, seated calmly on his back, was
going over and over the lines of the song;
now shaking her head and frowning, now smil-
ing with satisfaction. What she was after was
utterly out of my ken. So I slipped away and
left her in peace.
"One day, too, last summer, unaware that
any one was watching her, she began dancing
and laughing in a quiet spot of the woods while
repeating some words which I could not under-
stand. I stood quite still behind a tree watching
and enjoying this charming, fairylike picture
until suddenly she discovered me and stopped.
At first she was embarrassed. Then we both
had a good laugh, and she explained that she
was studying what people have this year seen her
do when dancing as Peggy in Mice and Men.""
[ 233 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
thor-
Early in August the letters from her man-
ager in New York begin to come, business
arrangements have to be attended to, and
the first letters go to the dressmakers in the
metropolis. It may be interesting for the
thousands of girls and women who yearly ad-
mire Miss Russell's clothes to know that all
her dresses are of her own design. Her aim
in dress is always for the simple effect,
oughly modish, with ever a touch of novelty
and originality, but, in the final effect, invari-
ably simple. Of course, as every woman knows,
this is the most difficult of all effects to success-
fully reach, and so the interviews with dress-
makers are peculiarly tedious. Miss Russell
has a practical knowledge of both dressmaking
and millinery acquired by her when necessity
was the mother of invention. She then learned
to make her own clothes, and they were often
as pretty in design and as well made as those
for which she now pays large prices. But,
[ 234 ]

Out for a Ride
Photographed by Pach Brothers
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
whatever her dress, whether it is on or off the
stage, it is always of her own design.
When the days of her outdoor life are over,
Miss Russell turns to horseback riding in the
city for exercise, and whatever leisure she has
left is devoted to singing lessons and reading.
She reads in the original French and Italian,
in both of which languages she is an adept.
She learned Italian during her stay in Italy,
when, years ago, she went there for health and
study. When her knowledge of French be-
gan I question whether she herself knows.
Probably when, as a child, she heard the patois
of the Canadians, among whom she lived for
a number of years. Since, she has taken les-
sons, and to-day to hear her talk with a learned
Frenchman, in his own tongue, about Japan-
ese lacquers, is to get some idea of her fluency
with the language. Her friends are chiefly
people with literary or artistic leanings, and
her social diversions, when busy, are confined
[ 237 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
to having friends at dinner at her own home
or attending little dinners at the homes of
these friends. "Society," as such, knows Miss
Russell not. She has little taste for it and
even less time.
A single word about Miss Russell's life on
the stage may not be amiss here as illustrating
her unselfish disposition; that is, with regard
to her attitude toward dear old Mrs. Gilbert.
One evening when she reached the theatre
Miss Russell received a highly complimentary
letter anent the performance, but in the letter
Mrs. Gilbert's name was mentioned first. In
the theatrical world this is a great breach of
etiquette toward the star. Many another ac-
tress would have torn up the letter in anger.
Not so Miss Russell. She sent it to Mrs. Gil-
bert. "You dear, sweet child!" exclaimed
Mrs. Gilbert, when they met during the in-
termission, "to send me a letter in which I
was spoken of before you! Who else but
[ 238 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
you would have thought of doing such a
thing?" Then she embraced Miss Russell
and called her every pet name she knew.
Miss Russell has a great admiration for
Mrs. Gilbert as an actress and deep affection
for her as a woman. She finds this veteran in
her art so patient and strong in all the hap-
penings of every-day life, so eminently just
and so lovable.
She considers it an honor to
be associated with her.
Indeed, just here is
an indication of Miss Russell's character that
one does not find in the average actress. It
is her wish and custom to have always the best
actors in her company, and to give them the
full opportunities of their talent, never cutting
out their good lines nor destroying any point
of theirs while she is on the stage, in order
that she may shine more brightly. Rather
she is always trying to help them in their
She believes in an evenly balanced
company, instead of the star trying to stand
scenes.
[ 239 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
out by contrast with poor actors, and is wholly
out of sympathy with any star system that
treats the members of a company as though
they were "a squad of black beetles." She
has regard for the same sensitiveness of tem-
perament in others as she possesses herself,
and consequently, with such a representative
woman as Mrs. Gilbert, she gives her all the
chance possible to get at her public, and to
her public to get at her.
Some people, who wonder at the fact that
Mrs. Gilbert is frequently allowed the honors
of the evening, have said that Miss Russell
has nothing to do with these conditions and
that they are laid down for her by her man-
ager. This is not so. A successful star's sup-
port is absolutely in the hands of the star.
Miss Russell need not have Mrs. Gilbert as
a member of her company if she does not
choose. But, on the contrary, she delights in
having her and in making her last years upon
[240]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
66
the stage as full as possible of the happiness
of successful recognition. In Miss Russell's
speech at the last night of the Lyceum The-
atre in New York City she said for Mrs. Gil-
bert:
I am sure you share my hope that in
the new Lyceum we may, for many years to
come, continue to pay homage to this most
honored gentlewoman of the stage." The
storm of applause which greeted this was as
gratifying to Miss Russell and touched her
more deeply than if meant for herself.
One more instance illustrative of Miss Rus-
sell's gentleness: One Christmas evening when
the curtain fell on the performance of "A
Royal Family," the company remained on the
stage instead of rushing to the dressing-rooms.
The fair Princess Angela, taking the little boy
who played the young Prince by the hand, ex-
plained that Santa Claus had notified her by
letter that he would visit the theatre that
night. Then entered a member of the com-
[ 241 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
pany dressed up as Santa Claus, and bearing
a large Christmas tree with lighted candles,
which he placed in the centre of the stage.

Copyright, 1900, by J. Byron
Annie Russell and "Donald," who plays the Prince in "A Royal Family"
What a delight it would have been for the
audience to have watched this touching little
after-play,
the child in ecstasy, the King, the
Queen, the Prince, the Princess, the Cardinal,
[ 242 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
the courtiers, the ambassadors, the ladies-in-
waiting, in all their gorgeous raiment, children
again, some on their hands and knees playing
with building-blocks, others running after a
mechanical rabbit, and the Cardinal and the
Dowager Queen (Mrs. Gilbert) pulling at
strings attached to two wooden monkeys that
were having a prize-fight! The whole Court
of Caron had become kin to a little child,
and the beneficent fairy godmother who had
waved the magic wand was none other than
Annie Russell.
Off the stage, as I have said, Miss Russell
is exactly the same as on the stage, — graceful,
dainty, and charmingly womanly. She has not
had an easy life, for she has known straitened
circumstances which she has overcome with
her own efforts and perseverance. She has
known years of illness from which she emerged
to find that she had practically to learn how to
walk. It is this public remembrance of her
[243]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
severe illness that sometimes leads to the
belief that she is frail and partly an invalid,
whereas the exact reverse is the truth. In
fact, she is one of the few actresses on the
modern stage that has never disappointed an
audience because of illness. But all these
experiences have served only to refine and
strengthen her character, until to-day she
stands as
one of the sweetest and most
womanly young women on the American
stage.
But pleasing as she is to look upon on the
stage; capable as she is as an actress, as an ex-
emplification of the most difficult of all acting,
the simple and natural; gracious as she is
in her New York home, - the sweetest Annie
Russell of all is the outdoor Annie Russell in
her summer home on the Maine coast, where
the paths wind among the spruces as the
waterways do about the island. Here, where,
warmed by the sun and sheltered from the sea-
[244]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
winds, the crushed bay and sweet fern mingle
their pungent odor with the perfume of the fir
balsam and of the wild roses; here, whether
the young mistress is at play or at work, is
where she is happiest; here, whether plunging
in the water before breakfast, in the saddle of
her favorite pony, at the tiller of her boat, or
driving her hay to barn, or lying in the Nan-
tucket hammocks listening to the swash of
water on the rocks and looking at the little
home which she has bought with her own earn-
ings, Annie Russell is the soul of gracious
young womanhood and contented happiness.
[245]


E. H. SOTHERN AND
HIS WIFE
E. H. SOTHERN AND HIS WIFE,
VIRGINIA HARNED

H, DEE!" exclaimed Mrs.
Sothern, with great emphasis
O
and in a voice that sounded
as if she were very angry,
though there was a twinkle
in her eyes quite at variance with her tone of
voice. At the same time she reached out for
a piece of bread, and made a gesture as if to
throw it the whole length of the table at Mr.
Sothern. Then she gazed helplessly at the
high centre-piece of flowers, and with a de-
spairing look which said, "I can't throw it
over that and hit him too," she put down the
bread and ended the little by-play of comedy
with a pretty laugh.
[249]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
66
Dee" is Mr. Sothern's nickname. No one
knows what it means or whence it is derived.
His father, whose memory he worships, called
him Dee; his intimate friends, who worship
him, call him Dee; and his wife calls him
Dee, except that, when she is speaking of him
to mere acquaintances, she refers to him sum-
marily as "E. H.".
"E. H."-"You know E. H.' has
6
a great eye for light effects," or "Of course,
no one on the stage has a voice like E. H."
Has any one ever heard "Dee's" wife call him
Mr. Sothern"?
Mrs. Sothern has among her friends three
young women who with herself and Mr.
Sothern made a tour through Scotland.
Whenever she is with them they refer to Mr.
Sothern in broad Scotch as "feyther." He,
having been the only man in the touring party,
was invested with that dignified title, and ever
since has gone by it with them. Mrs. Sothern
enjoys telling how, when they would come to
[ 250 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
—
an inn, "feyther" would sit at the head of
the table and begin cutting a big loaf of bread.
By the time he had finished with it, they had
too, they had eaten it all up, and would
exclaim in chorus, "Feyther,' cut some
more!" In great part the Sotherns' holidays
are spent abroad foot-touring in the Austrian
Tyrol or in the highlands of Wales and
Scotland.
But to return to Mrs. Sothern's emphatic
"Oh, Dee!" and her abandoned attempt to
throw a piece of bread at him lengthwise the
table. It was led up to rather amusingly.
Some one had broached the subject of house-
keeping. Dee," remarked Mrs. Sothern, play-
66
fully, "you had much better dinners at my
house before I married you than you 've ever
had since, did n't you?"
Mr. Sothern looked very serious.
It is one
of the characteristics of his humor that he
can assume the gravest aspect in moments of
[ 251 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
banter.
66
Every-
He looked appealingly at the com-
pany about the table. Before I was married,"
he said, "I ran my house and ordered the meals.
When I married that woman over there, she
said to me, Now, Dee, you won't have to
keep house again, I'll do all that.' Of course
I was only too glad to hand it over to her.
When we sat down at table the first night in
our own home, I was all expectant. It would
be delightful to eat a dinner with the ordering
of which I had had nothing to do.
thing would be a surprise. Well, it was a sur-
prise. What do you think she had for that
first dinner? A ham! Absolutely nothing
but a ham! Yes, indeed, it was a surprise
-but I at once resumed charge of the
housekeeping myself. Remember," he added
pathetically, "it was, 'Now, Dee, you won't
have to keep house again.' I never have
dared, since that one trial, to let the house-
keeping go out of my hands."
[ 252 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
"The fact is," said Mrs. Sothern, after she
had put down the bread she had intended as
a missile for her husband's head, we had a
full course dinner. But Dee dotes on having
66

Copyright, 1902, by J. Sarony
E. H. Sothern in his Library
cold chicken with his ham, which I did n't
know - so I left out the cold chicken, that's
all."
66
But I am still keeping house, and you will
observe that we have at present on the table
[ 253 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
not only a fine ham, but also a delicious cold
chicken," was Mr. Sothern's peroration. Then
every one laughed, and no one more so than
"Virgie," as Mr. Sothern calls his wife.
Both are strongly developed artistic person-
alities and naturally their views sometimes
differ. Mrs. Sothern enjoys telling how at
dinner one time they got into an argument
which waxed so fierce that she left the table
and went upstairs to her room. A professional
friend, a woman, was dining with them, and,
to relieve the awkwardness of the situation,
she said to Mr. Sothern: "Never mind,
Virgie will soon be all right again."
"All
66
right again?" calmly said Mr.
Sothern. "She's all right now. I would n't
live with a woman who had n't mind enough
of her own to disagree with me." The friend
slipped upstairs and repeated this to Mrs.
Sothern, who at once "melted" and came
downstairs; and the rest of the evening passed
[254]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
off most agreeably.
Mr. and Mrs. Sothern
are in fact a chummy couple, and it was a
great hardship to them two seasons ago, when
managerial policy parted them professionally.
From the time they separated in September
they were not to see each other until the fol-
lowing May. At no place did their routes
meet. He played East; she went West.
Their nearest meeting was to be in Philadel-
phia in March, when Mr. Sothern was to close
on one Saturday night at one theatre, and his
wife was to open the following Monday at
another. But the temptation to meet his
wife was too strong for the actor, and he ar-
ranged that his engagement should be extended
to three weeks instead of two, so that it would
overlap his wife's engagement one week.
It was a hazardous thing to do, financially,
for even the strongest plays do not run long in
Philadelphia. The chances were for a financial
loss, and Mr. Sothern's manager naturally de-
[255]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
murred. "I myself hardly believed the play
would run profitably for three weeks," said Mr.
Sothern, "but I told my manager to chance it,
and I would pocket the loss." And loss it
was. The meeting cost Mr. Sothern exactly
one thousand dollars. "But
But it was worth it to
see my wife," he laughingly added.
The two never had seen each other in their
plays, so Miss Harned arranged to give a
Wednesday matinée that week in order that
her husband could see her, and the husband,
who never plays a mid-week matinée, gave a
Thursday matinée so that his wife could see
him in his play.
This incident very aptly illustrates the
itinerancy of an actor's life; but, for the more
special purpose of this article, it shows the
happy relations that exist between Mr. and
Mrs. Edward H. Sothern.
"I think," said Rowland Buckstone, Sothern's
lifelong friend, "that Dee owns a few neck-
[ 256 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
ties. Everything else he has given to his
wife."
Sothern and
Buckstone
inherited their
—
friendship from their fathers. The elder Buck-
stone, who acted here many years ago, so many
that he was obliged to travel from New York to
Philadelphia by stagecoach, the coach breaking
down at night in the middle of a forest, gave
the elder Sothern his first engagement at the
Haymarket, London. The two boys first met
as children, about four years old, when the
Sotherns were visiting the Buckstones. They
were put to bed together, and the tradition is
that Sothern" stage-managed the bed." Buck-
stone recalls one occasion when there was com-
pany at the house, and the boys were to be
admitted to the parlor to be "on view" at a
certain time. Just as they were about to be
called in, the "grown ups" in the parlor heard
"Eddy" protesting to the nurse, “Tumpany
or no tumpany, I won't have my face cleaned
[ 257 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
with 'pit'!" It was so evident to the company
what the nurse was attempting to do, and the
situation was so familiar to them from their
own childhood, that they were convulsed.
Sothern was rather a silent boy. Some one
would ask,
66
Where is Eddy?" and when
they looked about he would be sitting by
himself in a corner.
splendid talker.
Now, on occasion, he is a
Another intimate friend of E. H. Sothern's,
one who knew his father intimately, and has
known "E. H." since his youth, is Dr. Francis
A. Harris, of Boston. Mr. Sothern's loyalty
to his father's memory also finds expression in
his loyalty to his father's friends. Dr. Harris
is enthusiastic about him, and says the charm
of his friendship lies in everything that makes
human friendship desirable, -modesty, gener-
osity, patience with the shortcomings of
others, forgiveness and forgetfulness of injury,
courtesy to all, of either sex, a keen appre-

[ 258 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
ciation of humor, a ready wit, the rare
quality of being a good listener as well as a
most interesting talker, and this on many
subjects quite outside the range of his profes-
sion, and a purity of character quite unusual.
"Indeed," writes Dr. Harris to me, "in all
the years of our acquaintance I have yet to
hear him tell an anecdote the least bit off
color,' or listen with approval to one told by
another, even though the hour, the 'spread,'
and the character of the company might have
condoned."
It was in the early seventies, when young
Sothern came over from England to visit his
father, that Dr. Harris first met him. He
found him a modest, rather retiring youth, full
of keen desire for sport, but with none of the
bumptiousness and self-assertion so common to
young men of that age. There was a fishing
excursion to the Rangeleys, the company being
made up of the late William J. Florence and
[ 259 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
George Holland, Mr. Henry M. Rogers, a dis-
tinguished lawyer of Boston, the Sotherns, and
Dr. Harris. On this trip young Sothern's
whole personality was
a constant source of
pleasure to his father's
friends, especially his

E. H. Sothern and his Fox Terrier
respect and
love for his
father, and his
self-restraint,
so much in
contrast with
the average
American
youth.
This filial regard is one of the very strong
points in his character. Although during the
last part of the elder Sothern's life "Dee" was
separated from his father through circum-
stances which he could not control, his loyalty
[ 260 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
never wavered. His strong affection endured
to the very end, and no man ever had a son
who carried the fond memory of his " governor "
in more cherished remembrance. He has often
been begged and advised to assume some of
the rôles which made his father famous, but he
has steadfastly refused, not from distrust of
his ability to portray adequately the characters,
but because he feared lest the public, especially
the old friends of his father, should disapprove
and charge him with presumption.
Sothern's generosity has been manifested
in many ways aside from temporary financial
help to those of his profession in straitened
circumstances. It has been shown in advice,
encouragement, the frequent and generally
successful attempt, in the language of Dun-
dreary, "to help a lame dog over a stile."
This generosity often has been repaid with
the rankest ingratitude, but this has had no
influence in shadowing his sunny nature, or
[ 261 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
prevented his again trying to help those in
need.
A man whom Sothern had befriended in
every way took offence at what he considered
the insufficiency of his rôle, and left Sothern's
company in a huff. When, a little later, Dr.
Harris happened to mention some little cour-
tesies he had extended to Sothern's former
friend, not knowing of the estrangement, and
even then getting but the meagrest details, and
added that had he known the situation his
action might have been different, Sothern re-
plied, "It was awfully sweet of you, dear old
Doc; I would not have had it otherwise for the
world." At another time when a friend both
of himself and his father was in prospective
financial straits, Sothern, in the most unob-
trusive way, handed him a check in four
figures and said, "Call again," and though after
that he himself was hard pushed by the com-
parative failure of a play, he would not hear of

[ 262 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
repayment. He also has always manifested a
respect and interest in all the old friends of his
father, men who would naturally be thought,
owing to the disparity of years, able to afford
little of interest to him in their lives or
personality.
Of the Sotherns' domestic life Dr. Harris
writes: "Those who have been fortunate
enough to see it, know how happy it is, and it
is most amusing to see and hear the excited
discussions between Dee' and Virgie' when
the twinkle of the eyes of Sothern, matched by
the lovelight in those of his wife, showed how
unreal was the mock battle. And it is touch-
ing, when they are apart, to hear the tributes
of each to the other in regard to personal
qualities. These and the enthusiastic apprecia-
tion of the professional abilities of each from
the other are convincing proof that there are
other happy marriages among the profession
besides that of Mr. and Mrs. Kendal."
[ 263 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
As a boy Sothern had shown a fondness for
drawing, and his father had wanted him to
become an artist. But, much to the father's
disappointment, he failed to pass for the Royal
Academy schools, although old Frith had
assured the elder Sothern that his boy would
get in. It was then he came to America to
join his father, having been here only once
before, in 1875, for the trip recalled by Dr.
Harris.
In England he had been to school at Dun-
church, in Warwickshire. He remembers that
one of his schoolmasters was passionately fond
of riding to hounds, sometimes spending from
eight to ten hours a day at it, and that the
boys would be obliged to have their lessons
early so that their sporty instructor could get
away to the meets.
A curiously amusing reminiscence of his
school-days is of a time when there was mumps
at the school, and he, and some of the other
[ 264 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
boys who had escaped it, managed, after much
manoeuvring, to enter the sick ward and rub
faces with the sick boys, so that they too might
get mumps and delighted they were when it
developed, for they thought it more fun to
have mumps than to study.
This escapade, and several others in which
young Sothern was engaged, had an amazing
sequel, and one probably impossible in any
country but England. A couple of years ago
- many years after he had left school-he
visited Dunchurch and his old principal, who,
after all that lapse of time, was so perceptibly
shocked by the various bits of school mischief
which Sothern laughingly began to recall, that
the visit was almost spoiled.
The elder Sothern had a tender regard for
his son, who has since become so eminent an
actor. A year before his death he wrote to
his friend, Miss Lucy Derby, now Mrs. Fuller,
of Boston, "Eddy, my second son, is at the
[265]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Boston Museum, playing very small parts by
my advice. . . . He's a dear, clever lad, and
for my sake treat him as a brother. He will
call upon you. He is as nervous as I am, so
assume that you know him as well as you
know me at once." The letter is quoted
from Mrs. Fuller's article, "The Humor of the
Elder Sothern" in the Century Magazine.
E. H. Sothern's Boston engagement was his
second. His début had been an absolute
failure. It occurred in 1879 at Abbey's Park
Theatre, New York, as the cabman in "Sam"
in his father's company. He had only the line
66
Half a crown, your Honor. I think you
won't object," but even these few words so
rattled him that he forgot the second sen-
tence; and though his father, with whom he
had the scene, kept prompting him and whis-
pering" go on," he did not " go on," but "went
off." The elder Sothern wrote to his friend,
Mrs. Vincent, of the Boston Museum com-
[ 266 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
pany, "Poor Eddy is a nice, lovable boy, but
he never will make an actor." Nevertheless
Eddy has made himself one.
The fact of his being the son of the famous
Sothern did not pave a royal road to success
for the great comedian's boy. The father
died the first year the son was on the stage.
The latter's early career was full of hardships.
The fascination of stage work," he said, in
recalling those years of vicissitudes, "lies in
the comradeship of people all eager to accom-
plish a certain object. When you are hard
up and shoved about from one company to
another, life on the stage would be unbearable
but for that comradeship."
One of his amusing, yet also disheartening
experiences was when he was obliged, in a
performance of "Richard III.," to play, single-
handed, two armies, the army of Richard
and, a few minutes later, the army of Rich-
Unfortunately the audience "sized
mond.
[ 267 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
up" the army, and, to make matters worse,
identified the second instalment. However,
in 1886, his talent asserted itself in his per-
formance of Captain Gregory in "One of
Our Girls," with Helen Dauvray. This in-
duced Daniel Frohman, in the spring of
1887, to cast him as Jack Hammerton in
"The Highest Bidder," a play which, under
the title "Trade," by John Madison Morton,
the author of "Box and Cox," Sothern had
found among his father's effects. A hit in
this led to his being starred by Daniel
Frohman, who still is his manager.
And right at this point, at the very outset
of his career as a star, Virginia Harned came
into his life. Mr. Frohman had seen her at
the Fourteenth Street Theatre in a play
called "The Long Lane," and had sent for
her to come to see him. As she tells it,
"I sailed into his office next day and there
was Sothern. Shortly before he had met

[ 268 ]

2
20
Photographed by Scrony
Mrs. E. H. Sothern (Virginia Harned)
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
with an accident, and he was on crutches.
After I had talked over matters with him
and Mr. Frohman, and thought everything
settled, Mr. Frohman said:
666
Now, Miss Harned, would you mind
standing up so that we can see if, perhaps,
you are not too tall for Mr. Sothern?'
"I remember exclaiming inwardly, 'Oh
my! Why did I wear heels!' But I sort
of crouched as much as I could without
its being noticeable. Mr. Sothern got up
on his crutches and stood beside me. 'Well,
Frohman,' he said, it seems I still can hold
my head up.' So I was engaged as his lead-
ing woman."
After the first night of "Lord Chumley,"
in which Sothern began his starring career,
Mr. Frohman asked Miss Harned, "Why
did you not come to me before?"
"Because," she replied, "you would have
asked me, 'What can you do?' and I would
[ 271 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
have had to reply, 'Nothing."" Miss Harned
had indeed been on the stage but a very
short time before she became Sothern's lead-
ing woman.
She herself was aware that her engagement
was a very rapid advancement. But she
never referred to that fact until five years
later, when Mr. Frohman wanted her and
Mr. Sothern, to whom she meanwhile had
been married, to part company professionally,
and, for business reasons, to star alone. The
Sotherns were anxious to remain together,
so, partly to bring home to Mr. Frohman
the fact that he was responsible for their
first meeting, Mrs. Sothern asked, "Why
did you engage me to be Mr. Sothern's lead-
ing woman after hearing me only once?"
66
Because," Mr. Frohman answered, "I saw
that you were born to be a leading woman."
Mrs. Sothern's birthplace was Boston. Her
family name was Hicks, her father being a
[ 272 ]

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Virginian and her mother from New England.
She was brought up in the South. When she
was very small about six years old -- her
ambition was to be a circus-rider,
—
an am-
bition with which many children, who don't
know anything about it, have been fired. At
fifteen she went abroad and spent two years
in England. For the stage she studied with
Emma Waller, chiefly Shakespearian heroines.
Going on the stage she assumed the name
Virginia Harned, Virginia from her father's
native State;
family name.
Harned from her mother's
After her engagement as Mr. Sothern's
leading woman, she remained with him three
years. She then acted under A. M. Palmer's
management, during which she made her great
success as Trilby. About three seasons after
she left Sothern's company he was preparing
to produce" An Enemy to the King," and
she was to tour with Henry Miller as joint
[ 273 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
star. At a critical moment in the prepara-
tions for the production of An Enemy to
the King," - only three days before the first
performance, Mr. Sothern's leading woman
was taken ill. In this dire emergency he
turned to Miss Harned. Could she make ready
in three days to play the rôle? It involved
learning the lines, working out the "business,"
and rehearsing,-doing in three days something
to which weeks of preparation should be given.
It was a terrible ordeal, but for his sake
she went through it. The performance oc-
curred at the Criterion Theatre, New York.
At dress rehearsal she fainted. She was in
such a wrought-up state the night of the pro-
duction that, when off the stage, she had to
have applications of ice-bags to her head,
while, in addition, some one sat by and fanned
her. But everything passed off all right.
She had saved the play for the man she
loved and who loved her. For a few
[ 274 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
weeks later, in 1896, they were married,
and she definitely cancelled her engagement
with Mr. Miller. Since then, except for a
brief engagement in Sardou's "Spiritisme,"
which, though a failure, played here three
weeks longer than Sarah Bernhardt could
keep it alive in Paris, and until, for purely
professional and business reasons, she and
her husband headed separate companies, she
and Mr. Sothern have acted together. Ex-
cepting three or four years, her whole stage
career has been with him. Their principal
performances have been in "The King's
Musketeer," which is a version of "The
Three
66
Musketeers," Hauptmann's The
Sunken Bell," and "Hamlet."
There is a pretty anecdote connected with
the production of "The Sunken Bell," which
shows how one artistic nature can influence
another, even when that other already is
idealistic. Miss Harned had seen the play
[ 275 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
during a brief rest abroad, and discerning
opportunities both for her husband and her-
self in the principal rôles, besides recognizing
the poetic depth of the play itself, was anxious
to add it to their repertoire. Mr. Sothern,
however, after reading the play, did not have
quite the same high estimate of it, and nothing
further was done about it at that time.
During the following summer the Sotherns
were in Vienna. One day Mr. Sothern, pass-
ing a jeweller's, saw a very beautiful jewelled
necklace in the show window. He went in,
priced it, and examined it. It could be worn
as a necklace, or taken apart and turned into
bracelets, earrings, brooches, and other per-
sonal adornments.
"The mechanism of it appealed to Dee
about as strongly as the beauty of the jewels
and their setting," says Mrs. Sothern, with a
laugh, in telling the story. "Dee came back
and told me about it, and asked me to go
[ 276 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
around with him and look at it, and, if I
liked it, he would buy it for me. Certainly
it was exquisite. But the price? It was

just about as much
as it would cost to
produce
Sunken Bell.'
The
"Well, Virgie,'
Dee said to me,
when we had re-
turned to our
rooms, 'what about
the necklace?'
"Dee,' I said,
'I'm just as happy
as if I had it. Give
me "The Sunken
Copyright, 1903, by J. Byron
Starting for a Walk
Bell" instead.' So I had 'The Sunken Bell,'
but not the necklace. But I am sure I never
would have had as good a time wearing the neck-
lace as I had in playing in The Sunken Bell.'"
[ 277 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Mr. Sothern is one of the few theatrical
stars of the day who is fostering the romantic
drama, and who has demonstrated practically
that Shakespeare does not "spell ruin." He
is noted for his liberal dealings with play-
wrights. A little more than two years ago
Ernest Lacy, of the Central High School,
Philadelphia, wrote to Mr. Sothern, who was
then playing in that city, that he had an
idea for a new play, but did not care to
trouble him unless he wished to hear it. The
actor immediately sent a messenger boy to
Mr. Lacy's house with a letter saying that
he was most anxious to learn of any idea in
the play line that Mr. Lacy might have. That
evening they met after the performance and
talked until the gray light of morning. "Bear
in mind," Mr. Lacy said to me, "that I had
not the shred of a plot-only an undeveloped
theme- and that I was, as I still am, an un-
known adventurer in the realms of playwriting.
[ 278 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
"To gather materials for the play, it was
necessary for me to spend some time abroad,
and to purchase expensive books and engrav-
ings. When, therefore, at the end of our con-
versation he asked, 'What do you wish me to
do?' I replied that I desired him to pay a
considerable sum of money in advance and to
agree to other stipulations usual in such con-
tracts. Without a moment's hesitation his
answer came, I will do it; draw up the con-
tract.' When, for the second time, it became
necessary for me to go to England, he willingly
advanced more money. Although causes
which I need not give, have seriously delayed
the progress of the play, his words have always
been, Take your own time; give me the best
that is in you; and, success or failure, I will
find no fault."
Friends of the Sotherns are fond of telling
two anecdotes, one relating to Mrs. Sothern,
the other to him, and both equally charm-
[ 279 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
ing and readily explaining, if further explana-
tion were needed, the affectionate regard in
which both are held by many. Behind one
of the principal counters at one of the large
New York dry-goods stores is a small, hunch-
back, but patient and sweet-tempered woman.
One evening, after her day in the store, she
got into a crowded car. Straightway a strik-
ingly handsome young woman rose and in-
sisted on giving the hunchback a seat. Later
she was able to find a seat beside her, fell into
conversation with her, and, before leaving the
car, gave her her visiting card and asked her
to come to see her. The deformed woman
called in due time, and now she has no kinder
friend than the handsome stranger who gave
up her seat to her. Around her neck she
wears a locket in which is a picture of the
woman whom she now fairly adores. Were
she to open the locket for you, the face of
Virginia Harned would look out at you.
[ 280 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Some of Mr. Sothern's people are buried in
Brompton churchyard, London. Once he wit-
nessed there the funeral of a child, over whose
grave the grief-stricken parents placed some of
the little fellow's toys. When he went there
later most of the toys had disappeared. On
visiting the churchyard again he found that on
the mound over the boy only a hobby-horse
remained. Rain had caused the paint to run
off in streaks, and the coarse hair of the mane
and tail was tangled and matted. The grave
looked lonely and forsaken. Still later the
hobby-horse had fallen apart; only the mound
remained.
Moved by the pathos of such evidence of
forgetfulness and neglect, Mr. Sothern, who
had brought with him some flowers for the
graves of his own kin, dropped a rose on the
little chap's last resting-place.
"There, little fellow," he said, "have one
with me."
Uor M
[ 281 ]

FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Whenever, thereafter, on his trips to Eng-
land, he visited Brompton churchyard, he had
a flower for this grave; and when, a few sea-
sons ago, Mrs. Sothern went abroad alone,
almost his last injunction to her was, not to
forget that boy's mound at Brompton.
With all his tenderness, Sothern adds to its
charm a delightful vein of humor. I have
seen a photograph of him taken when he was
a youngster, on which he has written, "This
is a picture of myself in my celebrated charac-
ter of my own father. For is it not said that
'the child is father to the man'?"
The Sotherns have a handsome freestone
house in West Sixty-ninth Street, near Cen-
tral Park, W., in New York City. There is
a handsome grilled entrance, and Venetian
grillage guards the lower windows. Any
sombre aspect which might result from this
is offset by the bright potted flowers behind
the grillage. The hall is roomy and arranged
[ 282 ]

Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
E. H. Sothern and his Wife in the Main Hall of their Home

ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
for sitting. The walls are decorated with
mounted heads of wild beasts; near the broad
stairway is a jar full of weird javelins, and on
the stairway landing a tall clock. Noticeable
is a deerskin, head and all, thrown over the
banister. Back of the hall is the dining-room,
where again there are heads of wild animals
on the walls-a
an especially fine one of a boar
and a chest of silver, all tributes to E. A.
Sothern, E. H. Sothern, and "Virgie." The
room is furnished in heavy black oak.
The hall of the second floor might be called
66
a Hall of Fame," not of E. H. Sothern,
but of his father, for its most conspicuous ob-
ject is a screen cabinet full of relics of the elder
Sothern. The drawing-room is in green and
silver, and is done in the style of the three
Louis. On the floor above are the library,
where Mr. Sothern does much of his work,
and some of the bedrooms. Mr. Sothern tells
me that he can best study a rôle lying flat on
[ 285 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
his back in bed and staring at the blank ceil-
ing; then there is nothing to interfere with
his vision of the stage in his imagination. The
blank ceiling becomes the space behind the
footlights; he sees the setting of the scene
as it should be; the other characters come
and go; and, as he goes over the lines of
his own rôle, he can see himself on the stage
and work out all the "business" of the part,
without his clear theatrical perception being
interfered with by any of the furnishings of
his own house.
The wild animal heads which decorate the
hall and dining-room of this house are not his
trophies. He says himself that he could not
persuade himself to kill a deer, adding that
he shot one, when he was young, and that
he has felt like a murderer ever since.
At dinner one evening at the Sotherns,
a friend happened to mention the tragedy
at Meyerling. Mrs. Sothern expressed the
[ 286 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
opinion that Archduke Rudolph must have
been insane.
"Not necessarily," said Mr. Sothern, look-
ing up and speaking without the suggestion
of a smile and in the serious tone which he
assumes whenever he cracks a joke, "even
kind men have been known to kill their
wives."
About midnight the friend who had been
their guest met them walking up Broadway
after the theatre. "I want you to observe,"
said Mr. Sothern, stopping him, "that al-
though kind men have been known to kill
their wives, Mrs. Sothern is still alive."
[ 287 ]

FRANCIS WILSON
A
FRANCIS WILSON

T the instant of the drop of the
curtain, every night when he
is playing in New York, Fran-
cis Wilson hurries to his dress-
ing-room, jumps into his street
clothes and catches the last train, which leaves
the Grand Central Station at 12.06 midnight,
for New Rochelle. The most attractive invi-
tations allure him not. "Oh, I'm a home
body, you know," he says as he smiles his win-
ning smile and is off for his train. His anxiety
to catch this train has made the actor a very
quick dresser. No matter how late it is when
the performance is over, he somehow or other
always catches the train. After a certain open-
ing night, when the play ran unusually long,
[ 291 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
his family and a party of friends had all they
could do to make their way out of the theatre
and with all speed reach the Grand Central
Station with only a few moments' leeway to
catch the train. But there on the platform
was the "home man" waiting for them. It
is the same if he plays in Harlem, Brooklyn,
Jersey City, Williamsburg, or Newark: every
night finds him at home. And if he plays in
Philadelphia, Baltimore, or as far as Washing-
ton, each Sunday morning finds him on the
train bound for home.
A friend in Philadelphia tried to persuade
the actor from his usual course one Sunday,
holding out to him a most attractive Sunday
amid books and paintings in his home.
66
"I know," smiled the actor; "I'd love to
do it. Honestly, I would. But I'll tell you
the truth. At half-past one this afternoon the
two dearest little girls in the world, with their
mother, will be in a trap waiting for me at the
[ 292 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
New Rochelle station, and I would n't disap-
point them for anything.
it, old man, can't
you? I only see
them once a week
now, you know."
And with a
smile, as only
Francis Wilson
can smile at a
friend, he swung
himself on the
car bound for that
home where cen-
tres everything,
outside of his art,
that is precious to
You can understand

one of the most
domestic actors
Copyright, 1900, by J. Byron
Francis Wilson at Home
on the American stage. I have known Francis
Wilson to take this journey home from Boston,
[ 293 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
returning again early on Monday, and I have
known him to travel fourteen hours to be at
home three hours, and then turn around and
travel fourteen hours back.
And it is a most interesting home to which
the actor goes,
- a home, too, with a bit of
a history. He calls it "The Orchard," be-
cause the ground was an apple orchard when
he bought it, and apple-trees still surround the
house. He arranged to build a small home
there in 1891. About the time that he began
to build he produced "The Merry Monarch.”
Success came, and before he had his cellar
finished he decided that the profits from his
opera warranted a larger house, so he told the
builder to wait for a few days" until he
"added a room or two." This was done.
66
Meanwhile the opera grew more profitable.
He decided to add another room.
The opera
progressed, and with its progress rose Wilson's
ideas. By this time the architect and builder
[ 294 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
were mystified at Wilson's sudden and con-
tinued additions. Finally he added a private
theatre on the top floor, where it is erroneously
supposed he often rehearses his operas in mini-
ature, the fact being that it was built for a
playhouse for his children.
umes.
Francis Wilson is noted as a book collector.
In his library he has over ten thousand vol-
The library has grown until every
room overflows with books, and even in the
walls of the halls shelves have been built.
His taste in the choice of books is exceed-
ingly good, his Napoleonic collection being
considered one of the finest and most valu-
able in America. Some of his first editions
are priceless. His shelves are full of auto-
graphed copies of books and of complete rare
manuscripts.
In the first period of his book-collecting
he was what might be termed a book-hunter.
His collection of Napoleana dates from then.
[ 295 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
But for some time past his original hobby for
collecting rare editions has been superseded by
a desire to get together a complete library of
English literature. He also has made a fine
autograph collection, including a manuscript
of Washington Irving, a most interesting let-
ter of Byron offering his yacht to join in the
search for Shelley's body, several Washington
letters, and the autographs of Napoleon, all
the members of his family and his generals.
His affection for Eugene Field gives peculiar
value to the latter's autograph in his collec-
tion. When playing "Nadjy" the comedian
introduced a song entitled "The Tale of Woe,"
which he had heard sung in England.
At a
performance in Chicago the poet recognized
the words as some fugitive verses of his own.
He met Wilson, and a warm friendship sprang
up between poet and comedian.
Every moment of leisure Wilson has when
at home is spent in his library. Nearly the
[ 296 ]

M
Francis Wilson in his Library
Copyright, 1900, by J. Byron
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
whole summer he remains at New Rochelle,
and at least fifteen weeks of the theatrical
season are so arranged that he can be there.
He reaches home generally at 12.30 A. M., goes
straight to his library, eats his customary bowl
of milk and crackers, and sits down and talks
with his wife, who nearly every night waits up
for him. When Mrs. Wilson retires the actor
starts to read and write, which he usually keeps
up until about three o'clock. Then he retires
and sleeps until eleven, when he rises.
In
Into his library he goes, and stays until one
o'clock, which is his hour for luncheon.
the afternoon it is the library again until five,
when the principal meal of the day is eaten in
the Wilson home, and at seven the actor is off
for New York and the theatre.
If he can get a friend to sit up with him in
his "den," after his return from the theatre, he
delights in taking up problems in art or litera-
ture, or in discussing a writer with the utmost
[ 299 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
thoroughness. Many a friend has sat there
with him and talked until he could not keep
But when the friend retired
his eyes open.
the actor settled down and read a couple of
hours longer. His friends, like his books, are
such as can help him along in what he missed
in early life. In addition to a wide range of
purely literary works, he reads political econ-
omy and history just as part of a general men-
tal drill. His books are not for show. They
are riddled with underscorings.
The time he does not spend with his books
is spent with his pictures, for whatever wall
space in the Wilson home is not taken up
with books is taken up with paintings. And
the paintings are paintings. There is a Rem-
brandt, a Corot, a Rosa Bonheur, six or seven
Mauves, a Cazin, a Jacque, three by Neuhuys,
several Blommers, two or three Jules Bretons,
several Thaulows, a Schreyer, a Ziem, a Mon-
chablon, one of the best of Detaille's water-
[ 300 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
colors, and so on, each painting the careful
choice and the loving pride of the comedian
and his wife.
It is upon books and paintings that the ac-
tor's large income is mainly spent. He has
no expensive personal habits to gratify. He
is absolutely prohibition in principles, never
touching a drop of liquor nor taking a stim-
ulant of any sort. He never smokes. He
dresses neatly but inexpensively. In all his
habits he is essentially frugal. He never
touches coffee nor tea, and he also is a light
eater. He rarely takes more than two meals
a day, and one of these is so light that it hardly
would count with a person not accustomed to
a frugal life. In season a slice of watermelon
often serves for the crackers and milk on his
arrival at home from the theatre. "No won-
der the rascal's always well," said a noted phy-
sician to Wilson's friend Leon H. Vincent, the
author and lecturer; "he never eats anything!"
[ 301 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
Aside from his books and pictures he lavishes
the best on his wife and family. Francis Wil-
son was married twenty-three years ago, when
he was twenty-six years of age. It may sur-
prise some who see the agile comedian on the
stage to know that he is forty-nine years old.
He was born in Philadelphia, February 7, 1854.
His wife was a Miss Mira Barrie and was act-
ing in the company with him when he fell in
love with her.
He has two children, Frances, who is six-
teen years of age, and Adelaide, who is four-
teen. They are charming girls and devoted
to their father and mother. Both are now in
Paris at school and studying music for a year,
when they will return to prepare for college.
With these two the father is a merry, youth-
ful companion. He is the life of the house,
and as young as the youngest boy and girl in
his children's circle of friends. Laughter and
bright spirits pervade the Wilson home, and
[ 302 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
the father's funniest pranks are cut up in the
house at New Rochelle.
Francis Wilson's friendships are few but
strong, and he has a way of holding them.
His closest friends are men of literary tastes
and persuasions. In each city where he plays
he has one or two of these bookish friends, and
these suffice for him. What time he does not
spend in their company and in the libraries
of their homes he can always be found in the
principal bookstore of the city.
Latterly antique furniture has captured his
tastes, and now the old furniture shops see
much of him. A year ago he heard that there
were in Boston some chairs and settles made
out of the old pew-ends of Shakespeare's
church at Stratford-on-Avon. The comedian
hastened to the shop and purchased a settle.
"That evening, while I was playing," said
he, "I saw nothing but Shakespeare chairs
and settles, and I thought what a ninny I had
[ 303 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
been not to have bought a dozen of those
chairs for our dining-room. I could n't wait
for the next morning to come, so I sat up all
night and read; and bright and early at 8
A. M., I was at that shop. Afraid somebody
would get there ahead of me, you know. I
got 'em - thirteen of 'em.
thirteen of 'em. I knew that when
they arrived at home Mrs. Wilson would feel
like kicking me until she knew what they
were, then she'd feel like kissing me."
And now around the Wilson dining-table
stand the fine old chairs with the Prince of
Wales plume on the top (they can be seen in
the photograph of the family at dinner on the
opposite page), and host and hostess and their
daughters and friends each sit in a Shake-
speare chair, while the actor smiles at the way
he sat up all night in Boston waiting for the
little shop to open. But all this is Francis
Wilson's delight.
Wilson's accomplishments are chiefly liter-
[ 304 ]

Francis Wilson at Home
Copyright, 1900, by J. Byron
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
ary. He writes exceedingly well, as "The
Ladies' Home Journal" readers discovered
when they read his cat story, "Lady Jule,"
published last year. He has written for other
magazines, and is the author of three books
about Eugene Field. The actor is now writ-
ing his first long story, and it will soon be pub-
lished. His literary bent is pronounced, and
it is not unlikely that, like Clara Morris, Fran-
cis Wilson will be known quite as widely as a
writer as he is as an actor. He reads in French
as easily as in English. Last summer it was
the delight of his life to take his family to
Italy, and before he went he dug away at the
Italian tongue. One of his branch courses he
took by patronizing an Italian barber and con-
versing with him every day in Italian. He
never allowed the barber to speak to him
in anything but Italian. In this
way he
quickly picked up a conversational grasp of
the language.
[ 307 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
He has also been successful as a lecturer,
and two summers ago lectured before the great
Chautauqua Assembly at Chautauqua, New
York.
The most remarkable phase of Francis Wil-
son's life is that all the knowledge which he
possesses is self-attained. He is one of the
most striking examples of what a man can do
for himself. His youthful education was sadly
neglected. The circumstances of his parents
did not permit much in the way of education
for their children, and what they could give
to Francis was pushed aside by him in his
desire to act and study for the stage. No
sooner had he reached the stage, however,
than he realized that to be an actor in the
truest sense of the word meant reading and
knowledge. So he started to dig out for him-
self what he had not allowed others to do for
him. Even in the days when he was a min-
strel, on his railroad journeys throughout the
[ 308 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
country, while other members of the company
were sleeping, cracking jokes, or passing their
time in idleness, Wilson could always be found
in the quietest and most secluded corner of the
car absorbed in some book. In this way and
in these odd moments he dug out for himself
not only a knowledge of English literature, but
also completely mastered the French language
and read the best French books in the original
editions. He would inveigle one of the mem-
bers of the company to hold the book while he
recited passage after passage in French to see
if" he knew it." He never allowed a moment
to be wasted. A leisure minute meant to him
a sentence in some book. And so it is to-day.
Between a matinée and a night performance
he employs every moment in reading or writ-
ing. His most treasured piece of baggage is
not the trunk which contains his costumes, but
one which he had especially built to hold fifty
books. This trunk goes wherever he goes, and
[ 309 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
when he has finished the fifty books with him
the trunk is sent home, a new fifty are substi-
tuted, and the trunk catches him at the next
city where he plays.
Thus, self-educated himself, he believes in
the same method for others. He is probably
the only American actor who has a Chautau-
qua circle in his company. This circle has
stated meetings once a week or fortnight, and
over these Francis Wilson presides with an
enthusiasm that communicates itself to all its
members.
Nor does his interest in education stop with
himself and those immediately about him. A
most touching anecdote of his eagerness to
help others along on the road of knowledge
was told me by Kemble, the artist. One
night last winter on his way to the theatre in
New York he noticed a boy, an Italian fruit-
vender, crouched near a gasoline torch, writ-
ing. Stopping and asking the boy what he
[ 310 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
was writing, he found out that the lad had no
time to go to school, but was trying to learn

Copyright, 1902, by J. Byron
A Quiet Game with his Daughter
during odd moments while tending the fruit-
From that time until his engagement
stand.
at the theatre closed, Wilson wrote out a daily
[ 311 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
lesson for the boy, obtained his written answers
the following day, and on the third handed
them back to him corrected.
In his recreative moods he is as versatile as
he is in his bookish moods. He is consid-
ered one of the most expert fencers in the
country, and is a long-distance swimmer of
repute. He loves the water, and in summer
swims every morning with his family off the
beach at New Rochelle. He delights and ex-
cels at golf, is an expert at chess, plays an in-
vincible game of ping-pong, and at tennis on
his own place is the joy and life of a game
with his two girls.
His wife and children are always present on
the first night of a new opera, and when he
comes to Philadelphia the right-hand box on
his opening night is reserved for his mother and
his sisters, all of whom reside in Philadelphia,
for Wilson's ancestors on his father's side were
Quakers; his mother's people were Virginians.
[ 312 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
66
Sending grapes to an admirer?" smilingly
asked a friend of the actor once, finding him
in a fruit-store.
"That's right; an admirer who has admired
me for nearly fifty years," replied the actor, as
he gave his mother's address to the fruiterer.
Thus, surrounded by his family and books
when at home, and always in the company of
his books when he is travelling from city to
city, Francis Wilson leads a happy, studious
life. The days are never long to him. "They
haven't hours enough to suit me, and so I
borrow a few from the night," he once said
to his intimate friend, Edward Bok. And
when those who have been in his audience
at the theatre are soundly sleeping from the
evening's pleasure he has given them, Francis
Wilson is sitting deep down in an easy-chair,
either in the library of his own home or in his
room at the hotel absorbed in a book, oblivious
of time or place.
[ 313 ]

TWO
66
HOME" CLUBS
FOR ACTORS
66
THE LAMBS"

T
HE Lambs' Club, on West
Thirty-sixth Street, New York,
is the most popular actors' club
in the world. Its doors never
are closed. A few seasons ago
E. W. Presbrey, the playwright, and a Lamb,
who lived near the club, was burned out at five
o'clock in the morning, and narrowly escaped
with his life. In his pajamas and bare feet he
ran around the corner and through the open
doors of the Lambs' Club. Practically he was
at home. That word "home" conveys one
reason why the club is so popular. It is the
one retreat from the furnished room and board-
ing-house open to many members of the pro-
fession. It is the "home" club of many
[ 317 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
players. No wonder it has a large member-
ship and a large waiting list.
As a club it enjoys the unique distinction of
containing both actors and an audience, and a
highly select audience, too. For there is a
lay membership as well as a histrionic one.
The non-histrionic members are of two classes,
those who, although not actors, follow some
artistic pursuit, like painters, sculptors, archi-
tects, or some occupation allied to the stage,
like playwrights; and out-and-out lay mem-
bers, classed as non-professional. Usually the
latter are men of leisure or semi-leisure.
A splendid audience both classes of lay
members form when there is an exchange of
wit, a suddenly improvised dialogue or bur-
lesque (often just a spark of wit will fire a
whole train), or one of the regular monthly gam-
bols. Once an actor always an actor, and
actors make proverbially bad audiences. That
is just where the importance of the Lambs'
[ 318 ]

Harry Montague
Photographed by Sarony
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
lay membership comes in. The professional
members always have an audience to whom
they can act.
Sometimes a group of actors may be dining
at one table and a lay member or two at the
adjoining table. The actors' talk will be the
more brilliant for the lay auditors' proximity.
The actors have an audience, that is enough
to set their wits going.
Maurice Barrymore was one of the best
beloved as well as one of the most brilliant
members of the club. When he was at his
best his speech was so salted with epigrams
he never failed to have an admiring audience.
His friends always tried to give the conversa-
tion a turn which would enable him to cap it
with a clever "line." They "fed" him, as
the term is in theatricals.
I remember once dining at the Lambs' at a
table near that at which "Barry" sat with
three other actors. They were talking about
[ 321 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
adaptations of French farces, and of how much
the French originals lost in the English ver-
sions. It was fascinating for me to watch the
men with Barrymore lead the talk step by
step and with the greatest skill up to the point,
when it became possible for one of them to
turn to Barrymore with the direct question:
66
Well, anyhow, Barry,' what is the differ-
ence between a French farce and an American
adaptation?'
"The same difference," was Barrymore's
swift reply, "that there is between Fifth
Avenue and South Fifth Avenue."
Any one familiar with New York will ap-
preciate the aptness of the distinction. Some-
how "Barry's" table companions had divined
the point to which he wanted the talk led. If
the lines had been written dialogue and care-
fully rehearsed, the episode could not have
gone off better.
When" Barry" broke down mentally, and it
[ 322 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
was found necessary to place him in an asylum,
it was only through his friends in the club
that he could be induced to go. A group of

Reading Room of " The Lambs""
them accompanied him, and with tears in their
eyes turned from the door of the private re-
treat whither, unknown to himself, they had
with infinite tenderness conducted him.
Perhaps the wittiest members at the present
[ 323 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
time are Wilton Lackaye, Willie Collier, and
Henry E. Dixey. Lackaye's wit is subtle and
satirical. One day, as he was going down-
stairs, an actor whose specialty is female im-
personations was coming up. Lackaye stepped
to one side and removed his hat, and allowed
the female impersonator to pass as if he were
making way for a lady.
A story illustrating Lackaye's wit is told on
Joseph Jefferson. Lackaye at the time was a
member of Jefferson's company, and one day
he had a dispute with him on a question of
expenses, which he thought should come out
of Jefferson's pocket. The latter demurred,
and finally Lackaye yielded the point.
That's very nice of you, Lackaye," said
Jefferson, "and to show my appreciation of
your courtesy I'd like to give you one of my
landscapes."
66
"I'd be glad to accept one, Mr. Jefferson,"
replied Lackaye, "but only on one condition."
[324]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
What is that?" queried Jefferson, rather
surprised at the other's emphasis.
66
Water-mills are barred.".
The "old man" saw the point and smiled;
and Lackaye now is the possessor of what he
calls a unique work of art, a Jefferson land-
scape without a water-mill.
—
The other day Willie Collier came into the
clubhouse. He was immaculately attired in
a new gray walking suit. The first man who
spied him was an actor who has been "rest-
ing" the entire season.
"Ah!" he exclaimed on seeing Collier,
here comes the matinée idol actor!"
And how is the idle matinée actor?" was
Collier's quick retort.
A rapid exchange of wit like that is the
delight of the lay members. Herbert Spencer,
I think, says it requires two people to establish
happiness, the exhibitor and the spectator.
At the Lambs' the professional element is the
[ 325 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
exhibitor, the lay element the spectator. Be-
tween them they establish happiness. Is there
wonder that all members, professional and lay,
love the club?
Recently it became necessary to raise $50,000
for club purposes. It was decided to issue
bonds. The actors in the club asked to have
the first chance to subscribe. Reluctantly the
lay members, who were equally anxious, con-
sented to the arrangement, hoping, however,
that part of the amount would remain to be
taken up by them. But the actors simply
fell over themselves in their eagerness to
help the club which means so much to them;
and so far as subscribing to these bonds is
concerned, the lay members were left out in
the cold.
This bond issue was toward the fund for
a new clubhouse, the club being so flour-
ishing that it has outgrown its present quar-
ters, though the building was especially built
[ 326 ]

66
The Dutch Grill of The Lambs" "
Photographed by Byron
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
for the club. Stamford White, who is a
Lamb, will prepare the plans for the new
structure.
The Lambs' Club, now so flourishing, is an
offshoot of the some-time defunct Lambs' of
London. Its beginnings were very modest.
It had its inception mainly through members
of the famous old Wallack stock company,
when Wallack's Theatre was at the corner of
Broadway and Thirteenth Street, just below
Union Square. This old-time theatrical land-
mark has disappeared, and a clothing store
stands on the site; but the Lambs' never was
so prosperous as now.
Some verses by Edward E. Kidder, the
playwright, entitled "The Lambs," well ex-
press the genius of the club:
Oh, brilliant brotherhood of brains,
Oh, club unique for wit and worth,
Where Momus dwells and Genius reigns,
In touch with all the best of earth,-
[ 329 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
To those of us who love you well
Your qualities need not be told;
We know the many joys that dwell
Within the fold!
Not ours alone to clink the glass,
Or welcome Pleasure in her round,
To hear the merry jests that pass,
To fill the air with joyous sound;
A worthier purpose moves us on,
A minor chord is in our glee,
Our hearts are where our Lambs have gone
On land and sea.
A band of sympathetic love
Unites as one "our happy few;"
Here can the victor share his joys,
The vanquished find nepenthe, too;
A trinity shall aid our band
To hold its power forevermore:
The open heart
—
The open door!
the open hand
—
The Lambs' enjoys what probably is the
unique distinction of having crossed the At-
lantic and reproduced itself here, and moreover
of having survived the parent club, which Mr.
[ 330 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
John Hare started in London in 1869. The
first dinner was held in the Gayety restaurant,
with Hare in the chair as first shepherd. Some
ten years the Lambs of London browsed to-
gether. Then they grew into old sheep. Some
died, some married, with the result that the
last dinner of the London Lambs was held in
1879. The few survivors of the London Lambs
now are honorary members of the New York
flock, whose motto is "Floreant Agni!" (May
the Lambs Flourish!).
The Lambs' of New York was started in a
most informal way, about Christmas time,
1874, by members of the Wallack's Theatre
stock company, who then were playing in the
first run of "The Shaughran." Prominent
among them were Harry Montague and Harry
Beckett. It was intended merely as a supper
club. The name was adopted at the sugges-
tion of Harry Montague, who mentioned hav-
ing belonged to a club called the Lambs' in
[ 331 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
London.
At this first meeting there were
seven present. It was held in the blue room
of the uptown Delmonico's, then at Four-
teenth Street and Fifth Avenue.
For several years the suppers continued to
be held in various restaurants. After a while
the membership had increased sufficiently to
warrant the hiring of clubrooms. The club
in 1877-78 occupied the second floor of the
old Monument House, at No. 6 Union Square.
In May, 1877, it was incorporated. Montague
was Shepherd and Beckett the Boy; and among
the members I find, besides these, Lester
Wallack, Dion Boucicault, Charles F. Cogh-
lan, "Billy" Florence, E. M. Holland, John
McCullough, Eben Plympton, John T. Ray-
mond, E. A. Sothern, and a number of lay
members.
The first great grief of the club came with
the death of Harry Montague in San Fran-
cisco, in August, 1878.
Those who were at
[332]

Lester Wallack
Photographed by Sarony
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
his funeral in
66
The Little Church Around
the Corner" never will forget the gathering
of sobbing mourners.
Lester Wallack succeeded as Shepherd, and
was in turn succeeded by Beckett. This was
in 1879, when the club removed to 19 East
Sixteenth Street. Prompted by a laudable
desire to economize, the entire cash assets of
the club being only $80.40, Beckett insisted
on himself carrying many of the articles be-
longing to the Lambs' from the old quarters to
the new. Finally his frequent trips aroused
the suspicions of a policeman, who halted him,
and on searching under his coat discovered
various component parts of the club's billiard
table, but finally was convinced of the come-
dian's identity and innocent purpose.
Arrived at the club, Beckett gravely in-
formed his friends that he had had an en-
counter with four policemen, but had taken
down their numbers. Then he unveiled the
[ 335 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
component parts of the billiard table, which
had been concealed about his person.
The quarters in Sixteenth Street simply were
rooms. In April, 1880, the club at last found
itself under a roof controlled by itself alone.
This was at No. 34 West Twenty-sixth Street.
The event was celebrated by a supper and
entertainment. Among the notables present
who since have passed away were Lester Wal-
lack, Harry Edwards, "Billy" Florence, Dion
Boucicault, Charles A. Dana, John McCul-
lough, and the elder Sothern. One of the
guests was Gen. Horace Porter, now ambas-
sador to France. By an error his name re-
cently was included in an account of this
entertainment as among those "who have
since passed away." In a humorous apology
for the mistake, issued by the club, it was sug-
gested that the error recalled the bon mot of
the late Tom Appleton, that " all good Ameri-
cans, when they die, go to Paris."
[ 336 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
The idea of the present clubhouse in West
Thirty-sixth Street was first broached by
Thomas B. Clarke, Jr., one of the most pop-

"The Lambs"" Assembly Room
ular members of the club, so popular that,
although a non-professional member, he has
been a Shepherd, the only member of his
class, save the late Judge Brady, to have
been thus honored. Besides being a shrewd
[ 337 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
adviser and one of the "best fellows" imag-
inable, Mr. Clarke has donated to the club
some valuable art objects and a fine col-
lection of more than three hundred drinking
vessels, of all descriptions, and covering a
period from the tenth century B. c. to the
present time.
A list of club members includes practically
every noted actor and playwright of America.
Once a month the club gives in its own little
theatre a "gambol." This consists of per-
formances of skits written by members of the
club, and, of course, the performers also are
club members. No outside talent is ever
called upon or allowed to intrude itself; nor,
with such a brilliant membership to draw
upon, would this be necessary. The "all star
gambol" in the spring of 1898, when in a
week's tour a company of Lambs' gave an en-
tertainment which left the club debt free, is
well remembered. All other gambols, with
[ 338 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
the exception of an annual invitation affair,
have been strictly club events.
Every year also the Lambs' have their
66
washing,"
an outing at the country place
of some member.
The club also owns a
66
pas-
ture," the country seat of Charles H. Hoyt,
which he bequeathed, together with a fund
for its maintenance. Poor "Charlie" Hoyt
was one of the friskiest Lambs' and in love
with the club.
Those who have held the office of Shepherd
longest, Lester Wallack and Clay M. Greene,
were in that position each for seven years.
Mr. Greene has been in many ways a valu-
able member of the club. Other Shepherds,
besides those already mentioned, have been
Florence, Edmund M. Holland, and De
Wolf Hopper. Mr. Greene again is the
present Shepherd, and Thomas B. Clarke is
the Boy.
Since the incorporation of the Lambs' as a
[ 339 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS
club its doors never have been closed to its
members.
The first house rule in the Lambs'
book is believed to be unique in clubdom.
It reads: "The clubhouse of the Lambs' shall
never close."
[ 340 ]
I
"THE PLAYERS"

T would be difficult to point
out the differences between the
Lambs' and the Players' with-
out quite unintentionally run-
ning the risk of possibly hurting
Perhaps the simplest
somebody's feelings.
method of differentiating them is to say that
the Players' is purposely the more dignified of
the two, while the Lambs', equally with pur-
pose, is the "good time" club of the dramatic
profession. I think I also can say with safety
that in some ways the Lambs' means more
and comes closer home to the actor than does
the Players'.
The latter is quite out of the theatrical dis-
trict. Its handsome house is in an old-fash-
[ 341 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
ioned neighborhood (and still an excellent
one), No. 16 Gramercy Park. It is a fine
New York mansion done over; the grounds
run back to the next street, as do also those
of the house adjoining, where Samuel J. Tilden
lived, so that there is an outlook on the park
from the front and on a broad garden space
from the rear, and the house was delivered
to the club altered, decorated, furnished, and
fully equipped by its founder, the late Edwin
Booth, a much-loved name within its walls.
Though founded by an actor, the club re-
ceived its apt name at the suggestion of an
author, Thomas Bailey Aldrich. It was in
the summer of 1887 that on the "Oneida," the
steam yacht of Grover Cleveland's friend, E.
C. Benedict, there were Edwin Booth, Law-
rence Barrett, Mr. Aldrich, Laurence Hutton,
and William Bispham. Mr. Booth there for
the first time intimated that he would like to
found a club in memory of his father, Junius
[ 342 ]

Edwin Booth
Photographed by Sarony
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
Brutus Booth. In the course of the ensuing
talk over the proposal, Mr. Aldrich suggested
the felicitous name which the club now bears.
Early the following year (January, 1888)
Augustin Daly gave a breakfast at which the
yacht party were present, and among others
Samuel L. Clemens (" Mark Twain "), "Joe"
Jefferson, John Drew, and Gen. William Te-
cumseh Sherman. By the following month
the club had been incorporated, among the
incorporators being Edwin Booth, Lawrence
Barrett, Augustin Daly, Joseph Jefferson,
Harry Edwards, James Lewis, John Drew,
Samuel L. Clemens, and General Sherman.
The presence in this list of the names of
Sherman and Clemens showed that, in spite
of its name, the Players' was not to be
limited to actors. Under the constitution
eligibility to membership embraces any one
who is "engaged in literature, painting, sculp-
ture, architecture, or music, or who is a patron or
[345]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
connoisseur of the arts." Thus amateurs and
connoisseurs are included, despite the definition
of an amateur as "a person who loves nothing"
and of a connoisseur as a "person who knows
nothing."
At midnight on the last night of 1888, when
bells, whistles, and horns were ushering in the
new year, Edwin Booth, standing in front of
the fireplace in the great hall on which a log
crackled and blazed, presented in the simplest
manner possible to the members of the club,
by that time already grown to 100, a deed of
gift to the house. From above the mantle,
as he stood there, not as the actor, but as the
simple, lovable man and loyal son, there looked
down upon him the face of his father, Junius
Brutus Booth, out of the canvas, by Sully.
It sometimes has been said in criticism of
the Players' that the mixed membership has
resulted in swallowing up the actor element,
and that the last person you meet at the
[ 346 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
The
Players' is a player. But this is not so.
membership of the club was, at Mr. Booth's
suggestion, based on the social interests of the
actor in relation with kindred arts, and it can

Photographed by Byron
66
Second Floor Hall of The Players'
99
be said for the club that it is run on a broader
gauge than any other club of its kind in the
world.
But its policy toward the actor is more
liberal than that of the Garrick of London, or
[ 347 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
of any of the other actors' clubs, save the
Lambs'. Few of the younger actors can, for
instance, gain admittance to the Garrick. But
with the Players' the policy toward the pro-
fession is most liberal. In the deed of gift
Mr. Booth stipulated that actor members of
the club should be classed as non-residents,
which, of course, greatly decreases their initia-
tion fees and dues. Moreover, the profession
is well represented in the management of the
club. Joseph Jefferson is the president, and
Daniel Frohman, who knows the profession
like a book, is chairman of the house com-
mittee. In this way the actor's interests are
fully subserved.
It does not require many visits to the
Players' for one to discover that, while Booth
intended the club to be a memorial to his
father, the affection in which his own mem-
ory is held has defeated his object. Junius
Brutus Booth is too remote to inspire in the
[ 348 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
members anything more than an interest as
a historical personage. Edwin Booth, on the
other hand, is a real memory to many members.
Most of them must have seen him act; many
of them knew him personally and have come
under the influence of the diffident yet kindly
welcome of the greatest figure on the Ameri-
can stage during the last century. Indeed, the
highest achievements of the American stage
are centred in his name.
Moreover, the acts of founding the Players'
and of presenting the house to the club were
done in such a simple, wholly unostentatious
way as to show the lovable simplicity of the
man in his private relations. Furthermore, he
had attained such dignity in his art that the
club, while in no wise lacking in good fellow-
ship, partakes in a large measure of his own
dignity.
Small wonder that of the two annual fes-
tivals celebrated by the Players' one is "found-
[349]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
er's night," held every New Year's Eve, when,
on the stroke of twelve, the loving cup is passed
around and silently drunk to the memory of
Edwin Booth. On the last " founder's night"
of the nineteenth century the following des-
patch was received from Palm Beach, from
the absent president of the club :
To My Brother-Players: I join with you in this,
the departing hour of the old century, in keeping green
the memory of our beloved founder, Edwin Booth, and
I wish you all a happy new year.
JOSEPH JEFFERSON.
Edwin Booth lived at the Players'.
As one
of the club's tributes to his memory the room
which he occupied, and in which he died, is
kept just as it was. The monthly meetings of
the Directors are held in it, as a matter of
sentiment to symbolize that his still is the
guiding spirit of the Players'.
In the rear of this room is the one which
was occupied by Lawrence Barrett. This is
[ 350 ]

Joseph Jefferson
Photographed by Sarony
Bor M
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
living purposes.
now one of the rooms let to members for
It has been used by such
distinguished members as Samuel L. Clemens,
E. S. Willard, and Barrett's friend, William
H. Crane.
A short flight of steps from the entrance to
the house brings one to the reading-room, from
which twelve low steps lead to an alcove built
over the entrance. Over the mantel in this
alcove is Sargent's portrait of Edwin Booth.
It fills the entire space from mantel to ceiling,
and shows him, not as the actor, but as he
stood when he presented the club with its
abiding-place on that New Year's Eve so mem-
orable in its annals.
—
There are two other Sargent portraits in
the club, one of Jefferson as Dr. Pangloss
and one of Barrett, and also Macready's por-
trait by Washington Allston; Rachel's by
Gilbert Stuart's daughter, Garrick's by Sir
Joshua Reynolds, the elder Sothern's by Frith,
[ 353 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
and a portrait of John Gilbert, the first of the
Players' to die, by J. Alden Weir.
In referring to the Lambs' I said that
Maurice Barrymore had been one of the
wits of that club, and that many of his
brilliant sallies were remembered there. He
also belonged to the Players', and at least
one of his bon mots uttered there has been
preserved.
About the time the Players' was founded, the
Booth-Barrett combination had been formed,
and had raised the price of tickets to $3,-
something quite remarkable for those days.
Naturally, it was the subject of considerable
conversation at the club. One of the canvases
there is Collier's large portrait of Booth as
Richelieu, his right arm raised and three
fingers extended, as he invokes the curse of
Rome upon the heads of Julie de Mortimer's
enemies.
"Hello!" Barrymore exclaimed one day, as
[ 354 ]

Reading Room of "The Players'
Photographed by Byron
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
he came face to face with this portrait, just
after a discussion of the combination's policy,
66
there's a picture of the 'old man' raising the
price to $3!"
Between the reading-room and the grill-
room is a hall with safes, which contain many
dramatic relics. One of these is a sword used
by Frédéric Lemaître. Here also is the crooked
staff on which Charlotte Cushman leaned in
her impersonation of Meg Merrilies. Fechter's
"blond" wig, which he wore in "Hamlet," and
which occasioned so much discussion, is also
among the relics. It is amusing to note that
while in the wordy warfare that raged about
it, it always was referred to as "blond," it here
is seen to be distinctly red.
Here are a ring which belonged to David
Garrick and a lock of Edmund Kean's hair;
Edwin Forrest's spring dagger, the blade
of which obligingly slid back into the hilt
every time he killed himself; a salver and
[ 357 ]
FAMOUS ACTORS AND
pitcher of silver presented in 1828 to Junius
Brutus Booth, and the loving cup presented
by Boston admirers to William Warren.

66
Grill Room of " The Players" "
Photographed by Byron
The grill-room, with its oaken beams, high
wainscot, framed playbills and portraits, runs
the full width of the house, and is one of the
most comfortable and homelike rooms of its
kind in town. Outside is a broad piazza over-
[ 358 ]
ACTRESSES & THEIR HOMES
looking the spacious gardens of the Players'
and of the old Tilden mansion next door. On
this piazza the members take their meals al
fresco in suitable weather. It is doubtful if
any other club in the city has such a beautiful
yet homelike outlook.
There are various Shakespearian mottoes
in different parts of the house. That in the
grill-room reads: "Mouth it, as many of our
players do." Booth himself made an apt para-
phrase of Ben Jonson's lines from the First
Folio, and they may be read under the marble
mantel in the hall:

—
Good Frende For Friendship's Sake Forbeare
To Utter What Is Gossipt Heare
In Social Chatt Lest, Unawares,
Thy Tonge Offends Thy Fellow Plaiers
In the grill is a playbill of Garrick in "Ham-
let" at Drury Lane in 1773. The King was
played by "Mr. Jefferson." This was our own
Joe's" great-grandfather.
It is a distinguishing feature of the Players'
[359]
FAMOUS ACTORS
that it owns what is the best dramatic library
in this country. Here are Booth's own books,
constituting the working library of a great
tragedian. Barrett's library also belongs to
the Players'. Together the Booth and the
Barrett number about 39,000 volumes. John
Gilbert's widow made the addition of that
much-beloved player's library.
There are more than 100 volumes of the
older dramatists and a collection of over
30,000 playbills. Above the shelves are death-
masks of Garrick, Kean, Malibran, Goethe,
and Devrient, and portraits, all of actors, save
one of George Washington. But then he may
be classified as our "leading man."
Besides "Founder's Night," the only annual
celebration of the club is "Ladies' Day." It is
characteristic of the club's dignity that this is
held on Shakespeare's birthday, April 23.

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