“Pap-pa, me dood girl now!”
LII
EDWIN A. ABBEY, R.A.
I
When Irving was having the enforced rest consequent to the accident to his knee in December 1896, he made up his mind that his next Shakespearean production should be Richard II. For a long time he had had it in view and already formed his opinion as to what the leading features of such a production as was necessary should be. He knew that it could not in any case be made into a strong play, for the indeterminate character of Richard would not allow of such. The strong thing that is in the play is, of course, his suffering; but such, when the outcome of one’s own nature, is not the same as when it is effected by Fate, or external oppression. He knew therefore that the play would want all the help he could give it. Now he set himself to work out the text to acting shape, as he considered it would be best. Despite what any one may say to the contrary—and it is only faddists that say it—there is not a play of Shakespeare’s which does not need arranging or cutting for the stage. So much can now be expressed by pictorial effect—by costume, by lighting and properties and music—which in Shakespeare’s time had to be expressed in words, that compression is at least advisable. Then again, the existence of varied scenery and dresses requires time for changes, which can sometimes be effected only by the transposition of parts of the play. In his spare time, therefore, of 1897 he began the arrangement with a definite idea of production in 1899. When he had the general scheme prepared—for later on there are always changes in readings and minor details—he approached the man who in his mind would be the best to design and advise concerning the artistic side: Edwin A. Abbey, R.A.
II
Irving and Abbey were close friends; and I am proud to say I can say the same of myself and Abbey for the last twenty-five years. Irving had a great admiration for his work, especially with regard to Shakespeare’s plays, many of which he illustrated for Harper’s Magazine. The two men had been often thrown together as members of “The Kinsmen,” a little dining club of literary and artistic men of British and American nationality. Abbey and George Boughton and John Sargent represented in London the American painters of the group. Naturally in the intimate companionship which such a club affords, men understand more of the wishes and aims and ambitions of their friends. Irving had instinctive belief that the painter who thought out his work so carefully and produced effects at once so picturesque and so illuminative of character would or might care for stage work where everything has to seem real and regarding which there must be an intelligent purpose somewhere. Irving, having already produced Richard III. with the limited resources of the Bateman days, knew the difficulties of the play and the effects which he wished to produce. When afterwards Abbey painted his great picture of the funeral of Henry VI., Irving recognised a master-hand of scenic purpose. Years afterwards when he reproduced the play he availed himself, to the best of his own ability and the possibilities of the stage, of the painter’s original work. It was not possible to realise on the stage Abbey’s great conception. It is possible to use in the illusion of a picture a perspective forbidden on the stage by limited space and the non-compressible actuality of human bodies.
When he came to think over Richard II., he at once began to rely on Abbey’s imagination and genius for the historical aspect of the play. He approached him; and the work was undertaken.
III
Abbey has since told me of the delight he had in co-operating with Irving. Not only was he proud and glad to work with such a man in such a position which he had won for himself, but the actual working together as artists in different media to one common end was pleasure to him. Irving came to him with every detail of the play ready, so that he could get into his mind at one time both the broad dominating ideas and the necessary requirements and limitations of the scenes. The whole play was charted for him at the start. Irving could defend every position he had taken; knew the force and guidance of every passage; and had so studied the period and its history that he could add external illumination to the poet’s intention.
In addition, the painter found that his own suggestions were so quickly and so heartily seized that he felt from the first that he himself and his work were from the very start prime factors in the creation of the mise en scène. In his words: