Anybody who has witnessed Milton Noble's "Phœnix" properly placed on the stage, or "The Streets of New York," must have been, the first time, both terrified, and still somewhat delighted, with the fire scenes. Of late years they have been made wonderfully thrilling, and almost perfect fac-similes of the Fire Fiend himself. The scene-painter gets up his house in three pieces. The roof is swung from the "flies"; the front wall is in two pieces, a jagged line running from near the top of one side of the scene to the lower end of the other side. If shutters are to fall, as in "The Streets of New York," they are fastened to the scene with "quick match," a preparation of powder, alcohol, and lamp wick. Iron window and door frames are covered with oakum soaked in alcohol or other fire-quickening fluid. Steam is made to represent smoke, and the steam itself is obtained by dissolving lime in water. A platform from the side affords a footing to the firemen who are fighting the flames in the very midst of the burning building, and an endless towel with painted flames keeps moving across the picture after the first wall and roof have been allowed to fall in, while red fire plays upon the whole picture and "flash torches" are made to represent leaping tongues of flame. There appears to be a great deal of danger from the operation of a scene of this kind, but if proper care is taken the danger is as worthy of consideration as that attending the presentation of a parlor scene.
THE RAFT SCENE.
"The World" has been pronounced a novelty in scenic effects. I went behind the scenes to see how the thing worked, and had the pleasure of finding out all about it. The play is in seven set scenes. The first had nothing unusual in it except that the ship with full steam on and the dock was produced very artistically. The ship and the buildings were in profile with a good stretch of sky beyond, that was all. Next came the explosion scene, when the vessel was, by the supposed use of dynamite, sent flying in splinters in mid-ocean, and all save four souls went down to the briny depths. The mere ship setting, with its boilers, its hatches, its galleries, spars and guys, was worthy of admiration. While the performers were leading up to the point where the awful and fateful moment comes, a man sat quietly behind the scenes ready to fire an anvil of guns, each charged to the muzzle; men stood at the numerous openings in the rear, and men with chemical red-fire occupied the side-scenes, while others with powdered lycopodium were under the stage beneath a half-dozen grated openings. At the left, in the wings, stood an array of "supers," to rush on and increase the commotion when the shock came. When the heavy villain announced that there was a dynamite machine on board, and the captain gave orders to his men to overhaul everything below and try to find it—then the thunder came. Bang went the young cannons in the rear. The stage shook, and the theatre seemed ready to fall about our ears; the females shrieked; the "supers" rushed on and shouted; then came the leaping flames from below and from the sides, until, finally, the whole picture was one burning glow and whirl of smoke, and the curtain came down in time, I suppose, to prevent a panic, for women shrieked, and men got up from their seats to flee from the theatre. Act three brought the grandest illusion of all—the great raft scene. This picture shows a raft tossing on a rolling ocean with a vast stretch of sea on all sides, the sky and waters apparently meeting as far away as if they were realities and not mere attempts at nature. This scene always struck me with awe until I saw it from the stage. The second act at an end, the stage manager has the stage cleared in a short time; then the carpenter and his assistants go to work. A "ground piece" of sea is placed across the stage at the first entrance. All the side scenes are removed and a huge curtain of light blue is hung in a semi-circle from one side of the stage, up around to the rear and then down to the other side. A couple of men now come down to the centre of the stage bearing something that looks like an old barn-door with four swinging legs, one at each corner. A pivot is fastened on the stage; the barn door is balanced on it and down through four small openings in the stage go the four arms or legs, at points corresponding with the four corners of the door. I can see now that the upper side of the door bears a slight resemblance to a rude raft, the timber being artistically painted upon its surface. Somebody sticks a pole in the side up the stage. A box is placed at one end for the villain who is among the saved; a cushion is furnished at the other end for the young lady who plays the lad, Ned; Old Owen, the miner, lies along the lower side and Sir Clement Huntingford, the hero, takes his stand at the mast, pale and haggard with hunger and anxiety. The sea cloth, covering the stage except for a rectangular aperture that goes around the raft and has its edges fastened to the raft, is spread; boys crawl under the sea and lie upon their backs; men stand in the side scenes holding the ragged edges of the already white-crested sea. Everything is ready now, and amid the right kind of music the curtain goes up on the magnificent raft scene. Four men under the stage have hold of the four pieces hanging from the corners of the raft, and by pulling in exact line give it the motion of the heaving sea; the men in the side scenes agitate the blue cloth and the boys beneath it toss and roll the cloth with hands and feet. Old Owen dies before Sir Clement sights a ship no bigger than a star away off in the horizon. He ties a rag to the mast for a signal; but the ship keeps moving past, until at last, to the despair of all on board the raft, it is about to dip below the horizon. But it suddenly tacks; there is a tiny rocket seen curving in the air; the ship has noticed the signal of distress and down comes the curtain upon the happy trio left alive on board their storm-tossed and frail raft. Passing over two acts that are only eventful the sixth comes, which represents the yard of a lunatic asylum, with two great walls on either side of an iron gate that is set well up the stage, and through which a stretch of the River Thames and the overhanging sky are seen. Sir Clement, who is the rightful heir to certain property, has been confined here through the machinations of his brother, who is in possession, and of another scoundrel. Here, though, the hero makes his escape by knocking the officers right and left and bounding through the gate; in a moment the walls part and a house with cornices and wide projections folds together like a stuffed valentine that has been sat upon. One of the walls moves off the stage to the left, the other to the right, each moving in an arc of a circle, and the whole disappearing from the stage, while Sir Clement is discovered paddling safely down the Thames from his pursuers. The walls are moved from the stage through the agency of men stationed inside. Rollers are provided for the scenic structures, and there are two men inside of each piece, the one in advance having a lookout hole and acting as guide. The only thing attractive in the last act is an elevator in the Palace Hotel. This is a simple mechanical effect, however, and needs no explanation. I should have said in describing the sea that the horizon rises gradually from the stage to a height of about three feet at the back, and the sail that is sighted is a tiny ship mounted on a frame work on rollers and pulled across the stage by a small cord. This raft scene is all that has been claimed for it, and the illusion has not its equal on the stage. The revolving tower in "The Shaughraun," and the vanishing scene in "Youth," are both worked in the same manner as the lunatic asylum walls in "The World."
CHAPTER XIII.
THE ARMY OF ATTACHES.
I have already written about the property-man, his many duties, and the great responsibility that rests upon him. I have also written about the prompter, and the vast amount of work he is required to do. But there remain behind the scenes and in the body of the house, other persons who go to make up the grand army of theatrical attaches, and whose place in the amusement world is one of some importance, as they are the adjuncts without which the drama would be left naked of its present beauty and splendor and the circumstances under which it would be patronized would be full of inconvenience and discomfort. The door-keepers of theatres are often interesting characters. Sometimes they have been selected outside the ranks of the profession, when, of course, they have little more to tell you about than the habits and peculiarities of the theatre-going public; but many of them are broken-down actors,—actors who have been "crushed," and in whose better days vistas of unlimited hope opened before their dazzled vision. These are full of reminiscences of the old-time saints of the sock and buskin. If one could believe all they have to say, these victims of circumstances could be looked upon as individuals whose destiny it had originally been to knock their shiny stove-pipe hats against the stars of heaven, but, by some strange fatality, had their backs broken and their majestic tread lamed, so that now they can only shuffle into a free-lunch saloon and bend their necks over the counter as they lovingly embrace a schooner of beer. There is always room at the bottom for the unfortunates of the profession, and they find such provision usually made for them, as taking tickets at the door, or working outside among the newspaper boys in the capacity of agent. The treasurer of a theatre and the ticket seller, who, in the broad sense of the word, may be looked upon as attaches, are people that all patrons of theatres are familiar with. They, with the door-keeper, must in the blandest manner at their command resist the advances of the very numerous dead-heads. A courteous refusal is always deemed the best, but frequently the harshest treatment must be resorted to to get rid of this theatrical nuisance, of whom I shall take occasion to speak later on, as well as of the free-pass system. The treasurer of a theatre is always on terms of intimacy with the professionals who frequent his house, and is usually a jolly-featured, good-natured man who knows how to entertain his friends, to retain the good opinion of his manager, while filling up the ticket-box with passes, and who understands and appreciates the full value of the saying that a soft answer turneth aside wrath. His salary ranges from $25 to $50 a week, while a good ticket-seller, who frequently is made to do all the hard work, may be had for $12 or $15. A door-keeper is paid from $10 to $15 a week.
MINNIE HAUK.