PLAYERS’ PRANKS
PLAYERS’ PRANKS
Practical joking might correctly be described as a remnant of the barbaric ages, when strength and muscle received the respect we now award to mind and brain. Indeed, it still passes current among modern barbarians for humour, while in civilized States, where humour is something that appeals to the intellect, joking in the practical sort is generally regarded as buffoonery. Having admitted thus much, it may be said that even practical joking is not all bad, and is sometimes “a source of innocent merriment.”
Joking of the practical kind is very often a pronounced characteristic of the actor, as the countless stories of players and their pranks abundantly prove. The reason for this is most likely to be found in the fact that it requires something of the actor’s talent successfully to carry out a practical joke, and actors, knowing they possess the ability, are often tempted to exercise it. The name of the genial J. L. Toole, of happy memory, will naturally occur to every one in this connexion, and the fact of that good-hearted soul having had a strong weakness for this diversion is ample proof that practical joking is quite compatible with geniality of character. The stories that are told of Toole and those which he told of himself would easily fill a couple of volumes. For the purpose of the present chapter a typical one will suffice.
BILLY AND BUNNY.
Irate Parent (in front row) of Small Boy assisting Conjuror. Disobedient young monkey! Why, it was only last week I forbade him to keep rabbits.
A FANCY SCENE—WINNING THE GLOVES.
From the grand pugilistic ballet of the fight for the championship, which might, could, should, and ought to be played at one of the operas.
THE MODERN LANGUAGES TAUGHT IN ONE LESSON!
German Professor (on “la Perche”) to Italian ditto below. Be steadier, Bill, will yer, or I’m blowed if I don’t come down!
The comedian once entered a dairy, and solemnly remarked to the shopman—“I will take a boy,” with a glance at his shelves. “A boy, sir?” asked the puzzled shopman. “Yes, or a girl,” replied the comedian. The man never doubted but his visitor was a lunatic, and said, mildly—“Pardon me, this is a milkshop.” “Come outside,” said Toole, and taking the dairyman by the arm he led him out of the shop and pointed to the sign. “I’ll take a boy or a girl,” he solemnly repeated. “Read what your notice states—‘Families supplied in any quantity.’”
E. A. Sothern, the famous “Lord Dundreary,” had an insatiable propensity for practical joking, and many are the stories of his pranks. One of the most amusing, though, perhaps, a little cruel, tells of his treatment of his guests on the occasion of a dinner party to a number of congenial souls. They were all assembled but one, who was rather late. After waiting a few minutes, the host suddenly exclaimed—“Here he comes—let’s all get under the table—make haste.” Anticipating a joke, they all scrambled under, except Sothern himself. Enter guest—“Hallo! where are all the other fellows?” “Oh, they all got under the table when they heard you coming. I’m sure, I don’t know why.” The ignominous crawling forth one by one that ensued can safely be left to the imagination of the reader.
THEATRE ROYAL—NURSERY.
Master Reginald’s tender years having prevented his attendance at the Pantomime, Messrs. Tom, Charlie and Co. kindly give him a résumé of the evening’s performance.
It is always a good thing when we find the subject of a practical joke joining good-naturedly in the mirth, and this we have in a story told by the late Mr. G. A. Sala of a joke played upon him by Lord Dundreary. “I remember going down to the Derby,” writes the famous journalist, “in a highly festive fashion, with poor Edward Sothern, the never-to-be forgotten Lord Dundreary. On this particular day Sothern, the kindest, but still the most provoking of practical jokers, was as full of mischievous pranks as an egg is full of meat. He offered to bet me a guinea before we reached Clapham that I would lose my temper, and lose it badly, before 2 p.m. ‘But why, my dear Sothern,’ I asked, ‘should I lose it? The weather is beautiful, I did my work by getting up at six this morning, I am in the best of all good company, and I haven’t got a penny on the race.’ ‘Never mind,’ persisted Lord Dundreary, ‘I will bet you one guinea that you will blaze up like a vesuvian thrown into the fire before 2 p.m.’
AN EX(BUS)HORSE-TIVE ARGUMENT.
Mazeppa. Now, just you bang that ’bus door smarter to-night, or the old hoss’ll never get a good start.
Carpenter. All right, miss. Cue’s “wild career.” [N.B.—The noble steed is an old “Favourite.”
A PICT-URE.
Show-ing what Mas-ter Tom did af-ter see-ing a pan-to-mime—but you would not do so—oh dear no!—be-cause you are a good boy.
A SWALLOW OUT OF SEASON.
Scene—Boxing-night.
Gentleman in Front (bawling). ’Ar-reee!!!
’Arry, at Back. ’Ullo!!
G. in F. (as before). Where’s Bill-leee!!
’Arry. Why, the young beggar’s been an’ swallered his sixpence in the crowd, and they won’t let ’im in!
“It was half-past one when we reached the course, and one of the officious red-jackets who haunt the Hill stepped forward and gave me the customary brush down. I strolled a few paces onward, when another red-jacket pounced down on me, and, notwithstanding my expostulations, brushed me down again, hissing meanwhile as though he were grooming a horse. I essayed to light a cigar, when a third brush-fiend was upon me; but when a fourth made his appearance, brandishing his implement of torture, the dams of my long pent-up temper broke down, and a torrent of adjectives, the reverse of complimentary, flowed over the fourth brush-demon. My wrath was at its height when I found myself quickly tapped on the shoulder, and beheld the maliciously chuckling countenance of Sothern. ‘I will trouble you for one guinea,’ he said, and proceeded to explode with laughter. Of course he had followed me about, and feed the brush-fiends to harry me to desperation.”
W. J. Florence, a well-known American comedian in his day, was very much on a par with Sothern in the matter of practical joking, and the story of a good-natured trick he played on the latter, as related by himself in one of his posthumous papers, is very entertaining. “Meeting Sothern on Broadway one fine morning,” so the story goes, “I told him that there was an oat for him at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, taking care to pronounce my words in such a careless, inarticulate way that the genial comedian thought I said there was a note for him at the hostelry I had named. He accordingly started off post-haste up town—we had met near the battery, whither we both had strolled for a morning constitutional—to get his oat. When he reached the Fifth Avenue Hotel and the clerk, in response to his inquiry, handed him out the grain of oats which I had left for him, he saw the joke immediately, and laughed at it most heartily, devoting the remainder of the day to telling everybody he met what a capital joke Florence had played on him.”
“With a neck like that, what a fine thing it must be to be thirsty!”
Experienced Young Fellow. Ah, Clara, you should have seen the Pantomimes that I’ve seen; these modern affairs ain’t half so good.
The late Fred Leslie was another popular comic actor who, like Sothern and Toole and so many of “the profession” past and present, was never so happy as when planning some harmless practical joke, which was always sure to amuse every one concerned. One of his most successful efforts in this direction was made during his tour in America with the Gaiety Company, and is related by the late Clement Scott in his recollections of this celebrated comedian.
TWO TRANSFORMATION SCENES.
Scene No. 1.—“The Rosy Realms of Boundless Bliss.”
Scene No. 2.—En route from Rosy Realms to Rag-and-Bottle Alley, St. Giles’s.
One night (says Mr. Scott) several of his confrères had been invited to a supper, and the number included the musical director of the theatre they were then playing at. His absence from the orchestra nearly the entire evening in question was generally commented on, and it subsequently leaked out that he had been busily employed composing the music of a song which he intended to submit to them for approval before the party broke up. The night being a fine one, it was agreed to walk from the theatre to the house of their host. The composer, when he sallied from the stage door, was seen to have a huge roll of music, carefully tied up, peeping from one of his overcoat pockets. This was just as carefully abstracted, and some one was deputed to stroll leisurely onward and engage the victim in apparently earnest conversation, while the rest remained behind and committed the music to memory, after which the manuscript was skilfully returned without arousing the slightest suspicion.
At the termination of the meal, and before the musician could reach the piano, Leslie began to whistle a few bars of the melody, which, it is scarcely necessary to add, attracted universal attention. When pressed to continue, Leslie gave the air from beginning to end, and when, at the conclusion, he remarked that it was an old English ballad, cold beads of perspiration gathered on the forehead of the unhappy composer. His solemn asseveration that he had that evening written an original melody to the same air, note for note, was received on every hand with apparent unbelief; and in order to verify Leslie’s statement, most of those present followed his lead and sang or whistled the composition through. The musician, we are told, was allowed to play it over, and the resemblance, of course, was so striking that he himself began to doubt his own sanity. But when he came to know of the trick by which he had been bamboozled, he enjoyed the joke as much as those who carried it out.
NOT THE CORRECT WAY OF PUDDING IT.
Master Gussy. Oh, boohoo! What a shame to go throwing plum-pudding about like that!
THE HUMANIZING INFLUENCE OF PANTOMIME.
Depraved Child. Oh, mamma, do look, the clown’s been and run a red-hot poker right through that policeman—isn’t it fun?