One thing you will do well to remember if you ever become a member of any theatrical business or mechanical staff:
If you have occasion to purchase anything for the show or theatre at any time, be sure to get the company's stage manager's OK, or order or voucher of some kind in advance. It is an invariable rule of the craft that any purchase of over five cents made without this formal sanction will not be paid by the management, but will be considered as a donation—however involuntary—on your part.
There is one very important man behind the curtain at every performance on every stage, whose rule is arbitrary and absolute, and who is not on the company payroll. This is the house fireman, a city officer, with the power of the city and state behind him. The fire regulations are posted in plain sight on every stage. "No smoking" is one peremptory order that admits of no violation. Woe unto the actor or actress, principal or chorus girl, who tries to sneak a smoke in a dressing room, if found out! The fireman is using his nose as well as his eyes, and the familiar odor of a surreptitious cigarette will lead him straight to the culprit. Mr. Fireman is authorized by law to enter any dressing room under such circumstances, and no matter what the state of your toilet, he will exercise his authority, enter your room—and remove you forthwith. Fine or imprisonment, or both, are the legal penalties for violation of the no smoking law, and for using a flame or canned fuel, in most theatres. Principals have before now been taken off the stage in the midst of a performance and landed in jail, necessitating the dismissal of the audience. It is a mighty important man who can do a thing like that, and consequently the fireman commands the profoundest respect of every member of every company, from the chief all the way down the line.
No man is ever employed back of the curtain line in any first class theatre who is not known to be of good character. Those who are old in the theatrical business know this fact. If you harbor any other idea of these men, get it right out of your mind. Every theatre manager today demands that his employees be qualified in respect to character as well as in ability.
Now that I have taken you back of the curtain line and out into the front office and shown you just how the wheels go 'round that make the show go, you have become aware that there is something more in the theatre business than a mere group of good actors and singers and dancers doing their best to please you up on the stage. The more the machinery of the stage is kept out of sight, the better the management and the greater the satisfaction, both to the folks behind the curtain and the audience out front. Your attention should not be distracted from the play, the opera, the spectacle, by the intrusion of any noise or the appearance of anything or anyone not concerned with the actual presentation. The drop curtain or the tableau curtain should move silently and without revealing the human agents that manipulate them.
Scenes and sets should be made in silence and out of view of the spectators. No person should ever be in evidence on the stage, not even momentarily, save only the actors, whose presence you expect and welcome. Otherwise the illusion is interrupted, perhaps destroyed—and ours is an art where illusion holds a major place in imparting pleasure. Such an extraneous element would also break the continuity. It is not tolerated in the best houses.
So you see there is a definite reason why the "men behind the guns" in the battery of the stage are out of sight and so, often, out of mind. The hard work of the producer and his faithful subordinates is shown only in the superior attainments of his troupe and the ensemble as presented to your vision. They, themselves, the men who finance, prepare, rehearse and drill the show into shape, are seldom in evidence—never on the stage.