Writing for Vaudeville

by Brett Page

This etext was produced by Steve Bonner.

WRITING FOR VAUDEVILLE

WITH NINE COMPLETE EXAMPLES OF VARIOUS VAUDEVILLE FORMS BY RICHARD HARDING DAVIS, AARON HOFFMAN, EDGAR ALLAN WOOLF, TAYLOR GRANVILLE, LOUIS WESLYN, ARTHUR DENVIR, AND JAMES MADISON

BY BRETT PAGE

AUTHOR OF "CLOSE HARMONY," "CAMPING DAYS," "MEMORIES," ETC.

DRAMATIC EDITOR, NEWSPAPER FEATURE SERVICE, NEW YORK

THE WRITER'S LIBRARY EDITED BY J. BERG ESENWEIN

FOREWORD

Can you be taught how to write for vaudeville? If you have the native gift, what experienced writers say about its problems, what they themselves have accomplished, and the means by which it has been wrought, will be of help to you. So much this book offers, and more I would not claim for it.

Although this volume is the first treatise on the subject of which I know, it is less an original offering than a compilation. Growing out of a series of articles written in collaboration with Mr. William C. Lengel for The Green Book Magazine, the subject assumed such bigness in my eyes that when I began the writing of this book, I spent months harvesting the knowledge of others to add to my own experience. With the warm-heartedness for which vaudevillians are famous, nearly everyone whose aid I asked lent assistance gladly. "It is vaudeville's first book," said more than one, deprecating the value of his own suggestions, "and we want it right in each slightest particular."