"The Three of Us", a well-known domestic comedy, depends for its chief interest upon a scene in the third act, where Rhy MacChesney pays a midnight visit to Louis Berresford. When the piece was put into rehearsal, the idea was that Berresford, hearing a knock at the door, bade the girl hide herself, which she did, only to be discovered later. George Foster Platt, the stage director, who recently filled that post at the New Theater, objected that this was trite, conventional, unnecessary. "Why shouldn't the young woman tell the truth—that she came on a perfectly legitimate errand, meaning no harm, and that she has nothing to fear—and refuse to hide?" The author adopted his view, a new scene was written, and the play, largely because of the unexpectedness of this turn of affairs, ran for an entire year at the Madison Square.
The knowledge of the stage director must cover the mechanical features of production as well as the literary. It is essential that he should understand the full value of light and scenic effects, and how to produce them. A stage may be, and generally is, illuminated by means of five different devices—from the "borders", which are directly overhead; from calciums, in the balcony or on either side of the stage; from spot lights, which really are calciums whose light is focused upon one spot; from footlights, and from "strips", which are placed wherever light from more remote sources would be obstructed.
The "borders" are long, inverted troughs, stretching from the extreme left of the stage to the extreme right and suspended from the roof of the theater. When it is said that the light coming from the "borders", or, indeed, from anywhere else, may be raised or lowered, may be white or blue or red or amber, or a combination of these colors, reproducing the glow of a lamp, or the first gray glimmer of sunrise, it will be understood that the director has a wide range of effects at his command.
Just as the reading of a line may alter the impression created by an entire passage, so may the least variation in illumination. Comedy scenes, for example, must be played in full light, as sentimental scenes are helped by half lights. If you could witness the second act of "Charley's Aunt" performed in the steel blue of moonlight, and the last act of "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" in the glare of "full up", you would be amazed at the result.
Color has as subtle an influence. I have seen the people in a play fairly melt into the background of a yellow setting, causing their action to seem vague and illy-defined. Augustus Thomas' "The Harvest Moon" had a scene in which the same subject matter was repeated successively in different settings. Unless you had witnessed this performance, you would hardly believe how wholly unlike were the impressions produced. Costumes and music have an equal portence, and both call for the exercise of nice discretion.
The personality of the stage director, and his manner at rehearsal, are vital considerations. In acting, more than in any other art, the feeling of the artist reaches through his work. Everyone who has watched rehearsals has come to the conclusion, at one time or another, that actors are something less than human. As a matter of fact they are simply children, calling for the patience, the forbearance, and the flexibility of view-point necessary in a nursery. Wholly self-centered, having little contact with the outside world, their standards, their emotions, their false valuations make constant difficulties for the man who has to play upon them as upon a piano.
The dramatic instinct and the egregious ego form a provoking blend. I have known an actress, at a dress rehearsal, the night before the public performance of a play, to go into violent hysterics, apparently reduced to a nervous wreck by the strain of her work. "Great heavens!" I have said to the director; "she won't be able to appear tomorrow." "Acting, my boy", that gentleman would reply. "Acting for our benefit and her own. She'll be all right in ten minutes." And in ten minutes this same woman, done with her scene, would be advancing most logical reasons why she should have somebody's dressing room and why somebody else should have been given hers. I don't know exactly what temperament is, but most actors think they have it.
Player folk are full of superstitions, and many of these relate to rehearsal. Few actors will speak the "tag", or last line, of a play until its premiere. If that line were spoken the play would fail. Managers are not exempt from similar ideas, a mixture of ignorance and experience. A good final rehearsal is supposed to forecast a bad first performance, and this notion is not without reason, since the people, made sure of themselves, are pretty certain to lose the tension of nervousness. When the actors like a play at rehearsal the manager grows fearful. An actor usually likes best the play in which he has the best part, and that is not invariably the best play.
Small, indeed, is the share of glory that goes to "the power behind the throne." His name adorns no bill-boards, and, on the program, you will find it most frequently among the announcements that the shoes came from Hammersmith's or that the wigs are by Stepner. The manager knows the stage director, though, and respects him, reputation of this kind being more profitable than reputation with the great, careless public.