I, that am cruel, am yet merciful;
I would not have thee linger in thy pain.
[Passing his poignard under the pillow, and turning away his eyes,
So,—so."
What, but that it is utterly vile and melodramatic, contrary to Othello's expressed resolve, and quite unnecessary?—for a better effect would be produced, if the actor averted his head and with both hands pressed hard upon the pillow, trembling in every limb at the horrible deed he is forced, in mercy, to bring to a quick end. This idea of stabbing Desdemona at last is not original with Fechter,—who here, and in several other places, has consented to follow our stage-traditions, and has been led astray.
* * * * *
Shakespeare on the stage is a sad falling off from Shakespeare in the closet. (I do not mean on the American stage only: the theatre in England is, if possible, lower than with us.) To a great extent this is unavoidable. Our imaginations are not kept in check by the pitiless limits that make themselves felt in the theatre. An army, when we read of it, seems something far grander than all that can be effected by the best-appointed company of actors. The forest of Ardennes has for us life and motion beyond the reach of the scene-painter's skill. But these necessary shortcomings are no excuse for making no attempt to imitate Nature. Yet hardly any serious effort is made to reach this purpose of playing. The ordinary arrangement of our stage is as bad as bad can be, for it fails to look like the places where the action is supposed to lie. Two rows of narrow screens stretching down from the ends of a broad screen at the back never can be made to look like a room, still less like a grove. Such an arrangement may be convenient for the carpenters or scene-shifters, and is very likely cheaper than a properly designed interior. But it does not look like what it pretends to be, and has been superseded on every stage but ours and the English by properly constructed scenery. Who ever went into a French theatre for the first time without being charmed by the reality of the scene? They take the trouble to build a room, when a room is wanted, with side-walls and doors, and often a ceiling. The consequence is, you can fancy yourself present at a scene taken from real life. The theatre goes no farther than the proscenium. Beyond that, you have a parlor, with one wall removed for your better view. It is Asmodeus's show improved. I went to a Paris theatre with a friend. The play began with half a dozen milliners chattering and sewing round a table. After a few moments, my friend gave a prodigious yawn, and declared he was going home, "for you might as well sit down and see a parcel of real milliners at work as this play." Tastes differ; and I did not find this an objection. But what a compliment that was to the whole corps,—actors, actresses, and scene-painter!—and how impossible it would be to make the same complaint of an English play!
"But," I have been told by theatrical people, "such an arrangement is all very well in French vaudevilles, where one scene lasts through an act; but it will not do for English plays, with their constant scene-shifting." I grant it is less convenient to the stage-manager than the present wretched assembly of screens; but it is not impracticable in any play. Witness the melodramas which are the delight of the patrons of the minor Paris theatres,—pièces à spectacle en 4 actes et 24 tableaux, that is, twenty-four changes of scene. I remember sitting through one which was so deadly stupid that nothing but the ingenuity of the stage-arrangements made it endurable. Side-scenes dropped down into their places,—"flats" fell through the stage or were drawn up out of sight,—trees and rocks rose out of the earth,—in a word, scenery that looked like reality, and not like canvas, was disposed and cleared away with such marvellous rapidity that I forgot to yawn over the play. Attention to these matters is almost unknown with us: perhaps, in strict justice, I ought to say was unknown until very lately. Within a few years, one or two of our theatres have profited by the example set by stage-managers abroad. At Wallack's, in New York, rooms have to a great extent taken the place of the old screens; and only the other night at the Boston Museum I saw an arrangement of scenery which really helped the illusion.
Let us hope there may be a speedy reform in the matter of the costume of the players,—at least in plays where the dresses are of our own time. You may count on your fingers the actresses in America who dress on the stage as ladies dress in polite society. And as for the actors, I am afraid one hand has too many fingers for the tally. Because people go to the President's Ball in frock-coats is no reason why actors who undertake to look like fashionable gentlemen should outrage all conventional rules. I once saw a play in which a gentleman came to make an informal morning-visit to a lady in the country, in that dress which has received the bitterly ironical name of "full American uniform," that is to say, black dress-coat and trousers and black satin waistcoat; and the costume was made even more complete by a black satin tie, of many plaits, with a huge dull diamond pin in it, and a long steel watch-chain dangling upon the wretched man's stomach. He might have played his part to perfection,—which he did not, but murdered it in cold blood,—but he might have done so in vain; nothing would or could absolve him from such a crime against the god of fashion or propriety. "Little things, these," the critic may say: and so our actors seem to think. But life is made up of little things; and if you would paint life, you must attend to them. Ask any one who has spent (wasted?) evening after evening at the Paris theatres about them; and, ten to one, he begins by praising the details, which, in their sum, conveyed the impression of perfection he brought away with him.
Unless you are a little cracked on the subject of the stage, (as I confess I am,) and have talked with a French actor about it, you have no idea how systematically they train their young actors. I will tell you a few of the odd facts I picked up in long talks with my friend Monsieur D——. of the Théâtre Français.