CHAPTER VI
THE STAGE
The golden age of American acting was not so very long ago. Most white-haired men remember it, and love to talk of the days of Booth and Forrest and Charlotte Cushman. Joseph Jefferson, the last survivor of the old régime, died just the other day, and to the very end showed the present generation the charm and humor of Bob Acres and Rip Van Winkle.
No doubt that golden age is made to appear more golden than it really was by the mists of time; but undoubtedly the old actors possessed a mellowness, a solidity, a sort of high tradition now almost unknown. These qualities were due in part, perhaps, to the long and arduous stock company training, where, in the old days, every actor must serve his apprenticeship, and in part to the study of the classic drama which had so large a place in stock company repertoire.
Success was infinitely harder to win than it is to-day. There were fewer theatres, so that the great actors were forced to play together, to their mutual advantage and improvement. The multiplication of theatres at the present time, and the vast increase of the theatre-going public, has led to the "star" system—to the placing of an actor at the head of a company, as soon as he has won a certain reputation. And, since care is taken that the "star" shall outshine all his associates, it follows that he has no one to measure himself with, he is no longer on his metal, and his growth usually stops then and there.
But let us be frank about it. The attitude of the public toward the theatre has changed. To-day we would not tolerate the heavy melodramas which enchained our parents and grandparents. The age of rant and fustian has passed away, and Edwin Forrest could never gain a second fortune from such a combination of these qualities as "Metamora." We are more sophisticated; we refuse to be thrilled by Ingomar, no matter how loudly he bellows. What we ask for principally is to be amused, and consequently the great effort of the theatre is to amuse us, for the theatre must cater to its public. So, if the stage to-day is not what it was fifty years ago, the fault lies principally in front of the footlights and not behind them.
BOOTH