There is no doubt that "Joan of Arc" was the supreme effort of Miss Adams's career. She was the living, breathing incarnation of the Maid. When she was told that Charles Frohman had refused an offer of $50,000 for the motion-picture rights, she said:
Of course it was refused. This performance is all poetry and solemnity.
The following June, in the Greek Theater of the University of California, at Berkeley, Miss Adams made her first and only appearance as Rosalind in "As You Like It." Ten thousand people saw the performance. Her achievement illustrates the extraordinary and indefatigable quality of her work. She rehearsed "As You Like It" during her transcontinental tour of "What Every Woman Knows," which extended from sea to sea and lasted thirty-nine weeks.
Most managers would have been content to rest with the laurel that such a performance as "Joan of Arc" had won. Not so with Charles Frohman. Every stupendous feat that he achieved merely whetted his desire for something greater. He delighted in sensation. Now he came to the point in his life where he projected what was in many respects the most unique and original of all his efforts, the presentation of Rostand's classic, "Chantecler."
It was on March 30, 1910, that Charles crossed over from London to Paris to see this play. It thrilled and stirred him, and he bought it immediately. He realized that it would either be a tremendous success or a colossal failure, and he was willing to stand or fall by it. In Paris the title rôle, originally written for the great Coquelin, had been played by Guitry. It was essentially a man's part. But Frohman, with that sense of the spectacular which so often characterized him, immediately cast Miss Adams for it.
When he announced that the elf-like girl—the living Peter Pan to millions of theater-goers—was to assume the feathers and strut of the barnyard Romeo, there was a widespread feeling that he was making a great mistake, and that he was putting Miss Adams into a rôle, admirable artist that she was, to which she was absolutely unsuited. A storm of criticism arose. But Frohman was absolutely firm. Opposition only made him hold his ground all the stronger. When people asked him why he insisted upon casting Miss Adams for this almost impossible part he always said:
"Chantecler" is a play with a soul, and the soul of a play is its moral. This is the secret of "Peter Pan"; this is why Miss Adams is to play the leading part.
Miss Adams was in Chicago when Frohman bought the play, and he cabled her that she was to do the title part. She afterward declared that this news changed the dull, dreary, soggy day into one that was brilliant and dazzling. "To play Chantecler," she said, "is an honor international in its glory."
The preparations for "Chantecler" were carried on with the usual Frohman magnificence. A fortune was spent on it. The costumes were made in Paris; John W. Alexander supervised the scenic effects.
The casting of the parts was in itself an enormous task. Frohman amused himself by having what he called "casting parties." For example, he would call up Miss Adams by long-distance telephone and say: