THE EPILOGUE
FENEMY
You ask me if I like the play. How do I know! If it’s by a foreigner, sure I like it; but if it’s by an American (particularly a young American) you can bet I’ll roast it. Why, it’s got to the point where some of these young American playwrights are getting to be better known than we are, and I’ll be darned if I’m going to do anything to help the thing along.
HILL
You’re right, Fenemy. Besides, they know how to do these things so much better abroad than our writers do. Take this play. Pretty good, to be sure. But I’ll wager it was written by some fellow who used to be a reporter—probably on my very paper. And I’m not going to be the one to give him the swelled head. No, sir!
DIXON
If Belasco had only produced this play it would have been a wonder. Belasco’s a wizard. I know it, because he has repeatedly told me so himself.
SUMMERS
Ah, gentlemen—gentlemen. Why indulge in this endless colloquy over this insignificant proscenium tidbit. Let us remember that howsoever good it may be it was still not written by Shakespeare and that however ably it may have been interpreted, Booth and Barrett and Charlotte Cushman, alas, are no longer with us.
HILL
Oh, you’re a back-number, Summers. You’re no critic—you’re a scholar! Why don’t you put a punch in your stuff and get a good job?
FENEMY
I wonder if it’s possible this play’s meant to be satirical. I’ll read what you say about it in the morning, Hill, and if you think it’s a satire, I’ll see it again and sort o’ edit my opinion of it in the Sunday edition.
DIXON
I must say again that I’m sorry Belasco didn’t produce the play. He’s a genius. Look what he did for The Easiest Way. If it hadn’t been for his lighting effects the show wouldn’t have stood a chance!
FENEMY
You’re right, Dixon. Anyway, The Easiest Way was just like Iris. Our writers can’t touch the English. Besides, Pinero’s got a title and Eugene Walter, we must remember, once slept on a bench in Bryant Park.
HILL
I like the title of this piece though, fellows. Fanny’s Second Play. It’ll give me the chance to say in my review of it: “Fanny’s Second Play won’t go for a minute.” Catch it? Second—minute. Great, isn’t it? I like plays with titles you can crack jokes about.
SUMMERS
Alack-a-day, things are not in criticism as they used to be. Dignity, my friends, is what I always aimed for—dignity and dullness. Poor Daly is dead and poor Wallack sleeps in his grave. Schoolboys, mere schoolboys and shopkeepers run the drama of to-day.
HILL
Oh, cut it out. Dan Daly wasn’t half as good a comedian as Eddie Foy is! And Shakespeare—why the only time that any interest in Shakespeare has been aroused in the last ten years was when Julia Marlowe and Sothern got married. Give me Sutro.
DIXON
But as I was saying, Belasco’s the man! Shakespeare in his palmiest moments never imagined a greater effect than that soft lamp-light that Belasco put over the chess table in the last act of The Concert.
FENEMY
Correct again, Dixon! Do you think Belasco would use German silver knives and forks on a dinner table in a play of his? Nix! The real stuff for him! Sterling! And you can say what you want, it’s attention to details like that that makes a play. I suppose Fanny’s Second Play may be pretty good drama, but I never had any experience like the hero in the show and by George, I don’t believe it could have happened! Besides, my sister never acted that way and consequently I must put the whole thing down as rubbish. The author doesn’t understand human nature. No, sir, he doesn’t understand human nature!
HILL
The society atmosphere, too, is perfectly ridiculous. Why, I’ve been in the Astor as many as five times and I never saw any society people act that way. Our American playwrights are not gentlemen, that’s the rub.
SUMMERS
Ah me, when Sarah Siddons and Clara Morris and Ada Rehan were in their prime—those were the days! What use longer, I ask you, gentlemen, to inscribe praise to actresses if one is no more invited to meals by them? Times have changed. This Mr. Cohan, paugh! This Miss Barrymore, fie!!
DIXON
Sure thing! Warfield’s the only one left who can act and Belasco taught him all he knows. Belasco—there’s the wizard! Did you notice the way he got that amber light effect in Seven Chances? Wonderful, I say, wonderful——.
FENEMY
(interrupting)
But did you ever smoke one of George Tyler’s cigars?
HILL
About this play we saw tonight. I kind of think I’ll have to let it down a bit easy because the management’s taken out a double-sized ad. in the Sunday edition. And besides, say it should turn out next week to be by an English dramatist instead of an American! Then wouldn’t we feel foolish!
DIXON
(vehemently)
Well, we know who the producer is! Isn’t that enough? If it’s put on by Belasco, it’s great; if it’s put on by anybody else, it’s a frost—and there you are. That is, anybody but Klaw and Erlanger. No use throwing the hooks into them too hard. They pull too much influence with our bosses.
HILL
(with a self-amused grin)
I wonder what the magazine er-um-um critics, as they choose to call themselves, will think of this play?
DIXON
Humph! Magazine critics? Why they’re all young fellows. Impudent, too! They think that just because they’re educated they know more about the game than we do—than I do—and I’ve had my opinions quoted on as many as two hundred garbage cans in one week!
SUMMERS
Ah, dear me, gentlemen. In my time, a critic was a person with a taste for drama; to-day a critic is largely a person with a taste for quotation in the Shubert ads.
FENEMY
(to the others, tapping his temple significantly with his forefinger)
The poor chap actually thinks Molière knew more about playwriting than Jules Eckert Goodman!
HILL and DIXON
(laughing uproariously)
Fine! Fine!! Better use that line in your review tomorrow. Of course it hasn’t anything to do with Fanny’s Second Play, but that doesn’t matter. It’s too good to lose.
HILL
By the way, the Dramatic Mirror wrote me for my picture to-day. They’re going to print it in the next number. Pretty good, eh?
FENEMY
I should say yes! I wish I could get as much advertising as you get, Hill.
HILL
(suddenly)
By Jove! An idea! What if this play we saw tonight was written by Belasco, after all?
SUMMERS
Impossible, gentlemen. Had Mr. Belasco written it, we should have had an inkling of the fact through the recent lawsuit calendars.
FENEMY
Maybe it’s by Augustus Thomas. It’s got a lot of thought in it!
HILL
Yes, it certainly is full of thought!
DIXON
Sure, it’s got a pile of thought in it all right enough!
SUMMERS
(lifting his eyebrows)
What thought, gentlemen?
FENEMY
Didn’t you catch that curious new word in the second act? What was it, Dixon?
HILL
Psychothrapy.
DIXON
No, you mean psychothrupy.
FENEMY
No, no, it is psychothripy.
SUMMERS
Gentlemen, you mean psychotherapy.
ALL
Well, it doesn’t matter. It’s thought, anyway—something snappy and new. And Augustus Thomas is the only American playwright who thinks.
DIXON
Did you notice that reference to the “sweet and noble mother”? I think Roi Cooper Megrue wrote it—and I don’t like Megrue. He’s too fat looking. I think the play is punk.
HILL
But that third act attempted seduction climax sounds to me like Sheldon.
DIXON
(quickly)
Oh, then the play’s all right!
HILL
But we must remember that Sheldon is a young man and that he is a Harvard graduate. He needs taking down a little.
DIXON
But he’s a good friend of my dear friend Mrs. ——. Anyway, if only Belasco——.
FENEMY
(interrupting)
Well, I’ve got to get down to the office and write my review.
(looking at watch)
It’s got to be in at twelve o’clock and it’s ten minutes of twelve now, and I’ve got to fill a column.
(exits)
HILL
Between us, Dixon, I personally enjoyed this play immensely; but professionally, I think it’s very bad.
DIXON
My idea exactly. Of course, if Belasco——.
(Exeunt)