To return for a moment to an earlier phase of our discussion, it may be both interesting and profitable to note the fact that while the Abbey, the Manchester, and the New Theaters were all aided by material subsidies, the Portmanteau has stood on its own legs, albeit they wabbled a trifle on occasion, from the very start. A little, but only a little, money has been borrowed, and there has been just one gift, that of $5000. This last was accepted for the reason that it would enable the Theater to mount sets and costume plays in a rather better fashion than heretofore. While it was not absolutely essential to the continued existence of the Portmanteau it made presently possible productions which otherwise would have been postponed indefinitely; in British army slang it would be called "bukshee," meaning extra, like the thirteenth cake in the dozen. The record of the Portmanteau is its own, and that of its many friends who have been generous in contributing that rarest of all gifts, sympathetic understanding.
Before withdrawing my intrusive finger from the Portmanteau pie I should like to pay a small tribute to Stuart Walker himself. I do not think I have ever known a man who gave more unsparingly of himself in all his work. That dragon of the theater, the expense account, has often necessitated someone shouldering the work of half a dozen who were not there. Always it is Mr. Walker who has taken the task upon his back, cheerfully and willingly, and despite physical ills, under which a less determined man would have succumbed. His never wavering belief in his work and his ability to do that work have brought him through many a pitfall. It is not a petty vanity, but the strong conceit of the artist; that which most of us call by the vague term ideals. The spirit of the Portmanteau is to be found alike in its offices and on its stage; a spirit of unselfish belief that somehow, somewhere, we all shall "live happily ever after" if only we do the work we are set to do faithfully here and now. The theater, the organization which has that behind it, in conjunction with a keenly intelligent co-operation or team-play, will take a great deal of punishment before it goes down. Mistakes have been made, of course; otherwise neither producer nor company were human; but it is in the acknowledgment and rectification of errors that men become great.
The repertory theater, the new drama, and stage craft, have an able ally in the Portmanteau. We may look far afield for that elixir which will transmute the base metal of the commercial theater to the bright gold of art, but unless we remember that the pot of treasure is to be found at this end of the rainbow, and not the other, our search will be in vain.
Edward Hale Bierstadt.
New York City,
April, 1919.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I wish to acknowledge with gratitude the assistance given me by Mr. Brander Matthews, Mr. Montrose Moses, and by Mr. Charles Henry Meltzer in obtaining data, verifying dates and names, and by their kindly advice.
E. H. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Since America's entrance in the War given over to the "movies."