Thus did he enter the field, not nominally of course, but in effect. There was at this time a rather successful drama hour on Sunday evening. “Our Town Playhouse” it was called and was devoted to serious fare; at least the viewers were told it was serious fare—truth to tell though, it was by any civilized standard, the crassest sort of sham, cant, and weak-kneed pornography imaginable. Grand set about to interfere with it.
His arrival was fairly propitious; the production in dress rehearsal at that moment was called All Our Yesterdays, a drama which, according to the sponsors, was to be, concerning certain emotions and viewpoints, more or less definitive.
Beginning with this production, Grand made it a point that he or his representative contact the hero or heroine of each play, while it was still in rehearsal, and reach some sort of understanding about final production. A million was generally sufficient.
The arrangement between Grand and the leading actress of All Our Yesterdays was simplicity itself. During final production, that is to say, the Sunday-night nation-wide presentation of the play, and at the top of her big end-of-the-second-act scene, the heroine suddenly turned away from the other players, approached the camera, and addressed the viewers, point-blank:
“Anyone who would allow this slobbering pomp and drivel in his home has less sense and taste than the beasts of the field!”
Then she pranced off the set.
Half the remaining actors turned to stare after her in amazement, while the others sat frozen in their last attitudes. There was a frenzy of muffled whispers coming from off-stage:
“What the hell!”
“Cue! Cue!”
“Fade it! For Christ’s sake, fade it!”