“C. J. Matthews.”
mr. toole as "ibsen."
This letter Mr. Toole read to me, exactly mimicking the tone and manner of his old friend whom he still misses. I laughed heartily. “Well, now, Mr. Toole,” said I, as we settled down for a conversation on the art he loves so well and has served so faithfully, “has the public taste altered much since you first started in your theatrical career?” “No,” he replied, “upon my word I don’t think it has very much. My dear old friend Irving, however, has effected as great a change as any man, and his influence has always been for good.” “And what of the other Henry?” said I, “Hendrik Ibsen?” “Henry Gibson?” said Toole, looking up; “why, I never heard of him.” “No! Ibsen,” I explained, “Ibsen,” smiling as I mentally contrasted the great Norwegian physiologist and social Reformer, and the simple-minded, homely, old-fashioned Englishman whom we all love so well. “Oh! Ibsen, Ibsen,” said Mr. Toole, “I didn’t catch what you said; I thought you said Gibson, and I couldn’t think who on earth you meant. Well,” he said, “I don’t like his work myself. It’s so unwholesome, you know. It seems to me such a vitiated taste. They put it down to my ignorance; but if you ask me what I think,” he went on confidentially, “I should say there are very few who really care about him. He happens to be the fashion just at present. I played Ibsen in ‘Ibsen’s Ghost,’” he continued, “and they said it was a beautiful make-up. I don’t know what the old gentleman would have thought of it himself. Have you seen Irving’s Lear?” he suddenly remarked, after a moment of silence. “I can remember many Lears, but I have never seen anything like his. I have been tremendously moved by it; but it is far too great a strain for him.”
toole and ibsen.
Mr. Toole then drifted into eulogy of his almost life-long friend, upon whose generosity and the beauty of whose character he never wearies of expatiating. “And how do you think the comedy of to-day compares with that of past years, Mr. Toole?” said I. “Oh, well,” he replied; “I don’t think things have altered much. It is true that there was a great gap when Keeley, Buxton, Benjamin Webster, Sothern, and Charles Matthews all passed away within a few years of each other. But we’ve lots of good comedians now, to say nothing of the vast increase in the number of theatres, which, of course, gives far more opportunities to new men than was the case in my early days. For my own part, though I almost invariably play low comedy parts, yet, as a rule, I prefer pathos, I think.” And, as he spoke, Mr. Toole handed me a photograph which represented him in that very pathetic character Caleb Plummer in “Dot.” “There,” said he, “that’s one of my favourite characters, but people come to see me for fun, they don’t look much for pathos in me, except, perhaps, in the provinces. Ah! I like the provinces,” he continued. “I have many friends in them. The Scotch are a splendid people to play to, but then English people, by which I mean English and Scotch alike, are very clannish, and very tender to an old friend. I always feel when I appear upon the stage that I am in the presence of friends.
mr. toole as caleb plummer
in "dot."
I don’t think that French actors are so much regarded as English actors. We feel the affection of our people so much. But, then, we go in and out as private friends amongst the people, more than the Frenchmen do. Their best actors go out to a party, and they act for money, just as they would in the theatre. I think that is very infra dig. myself. It seems to me that as soon as the curtain is down the actor’s work is over for the night, and when you go out to a man’s party you are his guest, but you cease to be so if you take his money. With singers, however, the case is quite different. Some say I am over fastidious, but, mind you,” went on Mr. Toole, very earnestly, “I think it would be very snobbish not to join in the fun that is going on as a friend, and help to make everything go pleasantly. As a rule, however, I consider that on this account the English actor’s social position is higher than that of a French actor. You ask me about criticism,” said Mr. Toole a little later, as we wandered on through different fields of thought, over our wine and cigars. “Well,” he continued, “it is very difficult to say whether it has improved or not during late years. In the old days, you know, we had some very good men; there was Oxenford, there was Bayle Bernard, there was Laman Blanchard, all very good men indeed. In the present day, Clement Scott is exceedingly clever, of course; but some of the young men are too much up in the clouds for me—they are very smart, I daresay, but I don’t know what they’re driving at, you know; all the same, I don’t think criticism has any more influence than it had of old, in some cases not so much.” And then, branching off on another line, Mr. Toole said—“Did you notice those remarks in the paper the other day about Fanny Kemble’s father, and how he came to grief as a theatrical manager? I smiled when I read them. I knew well enough how it was; it was that infamous ‘order’ system. Kemble actually gave 11,000 orders in one season. It’s altogether a rotten, bad system. Hundreds apply to me every week for orders who haven’t the slightest claim upon me, and especially wealthy people, who are invariably the greatest offenders in this respect, and yet, when they are refused orders, they at once book seats for the play.