Fig. 1. Fig. 2.
These settings should be frames of light timbers. See Fig. 1. The inner opening is seven feet high by eight feet wide and the outer dimensions two feet wider. This frame should be covered with a black cloth and a gray gauze stretched across the opening. The space behind the frame should be curtained or screened at the back and sides with black or dark gray. Fig. 2. The floor behind the frame should be raised two feet in order to bring it well into view of the audience, and of course the frame must correspond. The pictures are arranged between the frame and the screens.
The frame and gauze can be omitted, and the picture presented in the space surrounded by the screens or curtains; but of course the best way is the one indicated.
With all accessories ready, and some previous rehearsals, these tableaux can be easily and rapidly presented.
In front and to one side the Grandma sits in an easy chair. No other accessories. The tableaux are presented in the settings described above, either one frame in the middle of the stage and about four feet back, or two frames set as in Fig. 3.
Tableau 1—On platform X.
Young mother sitting, facing audience. Plain, dark dress, kerchief or lace crossed over bosom, hair in low knot at back of neck and brushed smoothly over the ears in the manner of ante-bellum days.
Boy of eight or ten stands at her left, his arm over her shoulder, her left arm around him. He is dressed in long, narrow trousers, white stockings and low slippers, frilled white shirt front, short jacket (to the waist only), wide collar and bow tie.
Girl of six or eight sits on stool or low chair, leaning on the mother’s lap, looking in the mother’s face as the mother looks down at her. Any dress with short “baby” waist and short sleeves. Hair in two smooth braids or loose curls.
Tableau 2—On platform Z.