Charles Frohman: Manager and Man

by Isaac Frederick Marcosson; Daniel Frohman

During the third week of the engagement she walked over from Thirty-second Street to the theater. As she passed along Sixth Avenue she happened to look up, and there, in huge, blazing electric lights, she saw the name "Ethel Barrymore." She stood still, and the tears came to her eyes. She knew that at last she had become a star.

Charles had said absolutely nothing about it to her. It was his unexpected way of giving her the surprise of arriving at the goal of her ambition.

The next day she went to Frohman and said, "It was a wonderful thing for you to do."

Whereupon Frohman replied, very simply, "It was the only thing to do."

Ethel Barrymore was now a star, and from this time on her stage career became one cycle of ripening art and expanding success. A new luminary had entered the Frohman heaven, and it was to twinkle with increasing brilliancy.

Her next appearance was in a double bill, "A Country Mouse" and "Carrots," at the Savoy Theater, in October, 1902. Here came one of the first evidences of her versatility. "A Country Mouse" was a comedy; "Carrots," on the other hand, was impregnated with the deepest tragedy. Miss Barrymore played the part of a sad little boy, and she did it with such depth of feeling that discriminating people began to realize that she had great emotional possibilities.

Her appearance in "Cousin Kate" the next year was a return to comedy. In this play Bruce McRae made his first appearance with her as leading man, and he filled this position for a number of years. He was as perfect an opposite to her as was John Drew to Ada Rehan. Together they made a combination that was altogether delightful.

It was while playing in a piece called "Sunday" that Miss Barrymore first read Ibsen's "A Doll's House." She was immensely thrilled by the character. She said to Frohman at once: "I must do this part. May I?"

"Of course," he said.

Here was another revelation of the Barrymore versatility, for she invested this strange, weird expression of Ibsen's genius with a range of feeling and touch of character that made a deep impression.