“How we scoured San Francisco,—school, church, and theatre,—for people to put in our cast! Every actor who was out of employment was sure of finding something to do in our mob scenes. I cannot conceive, in the history of the Theatre, a more complete or a more perfect cast.
“We engaged 200 singers; we marshalled 400 men, women, children, and infants in our ensembles. And in the preparation every one seemed to be inspired.... O’Neill, as the preparations progressed, grew more and more obsessed. He gave up smoking; all the little pleasures of life he denied himself. Any man who used a coarse word during rehearsals was dismissed. He walked the streets of the city with the expression of a holy man on his face. Whenever he drew near a hush prevailed such as one does not often find outside a church. The boards of the stage became Holy Land.
“I also became a veritable monomaniac on the subject; I was never without a Bible under my arm. I went to the Mercantile Library and there studied the color effects in the two memorable canvases there hung, depicting the dance of Salomé and the Lord’s Supper. My life seemed changed as never before, and once more my thoughts began to play with monastery life, and I thought of the days spent in Vancouver with my priest friend.
“The play traced the whole sequence of historical events leading to the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, and I remember how many effects we had to evolve for ourselves. In the Massacre of the Innocents we had a hundred mothers on the stage, with their babes in their arms. In the scene where Joseph and Mary came down the mountain side we had a flock of real sheep following in their wake. The entire performance was given with a simplicity that amounted to grandeur. All was accomplished by fabrics and stage lighting, and when O’Neill came up from his dressing room and appeared on the stage with a halo about him women sank on their knees and prayed, and when he was stripped and dragged before Pontius Pilate, crowned with a crown of thorns, many fainted.
“I have produced many plays in many parts of the world, but never have I seen an audience awed as by ’The Passion Play.’ The greatest performance of a generation was the Christus of James O’Neill.”
“The Passion Play” was succeeded at the Grand Opera House by a melodrama entitled “The New Babylon,” produced under the stage management of Belasco; and, on May 5, at the Baldwin, an adaptation by him of Sardou’s “La Famille Benoiton!” was brought out under the name of “A Fast Family.” This was performed for a fortnight, during which Belasco wrote a play which he called “The Millionaire’s Daughter,” and contrived for its presentment a remarkably handsome and effective scenic investiture.
“THE MILLIONAIRE’S DAUGHTER.”
Bronson Howard’s play of “The Banker’s Daughter” (one act of which was written by A. R. Cazauran) was produced, for the first time, November 30, 1878, at the Union Square Theatre, New York, where it held the stage till April 16, 1879, receiving 137 performances. It was regarded as one of the “sensations” of the time, and Maguire, desiring to secure its presentment at the Baldwin Theatre, began negotiations to that end with Palmer early in 1879. Palmer named terms that Maguire would not, or could not, meet and they were rejected. But a new play was urgently required for the Baldwin, and Maguire turned to Belasco, asking, “Can’t you make something for us on similar lines?” Belasco readily agreed to do this, but presently expressed doubt as to Baldwin’s consent to pay the heavy price of certain novel expedients of stage-setting which he wished to use.
“In my principal scene,” he said to me, “I wanted a striking, new effect,—walls of a delicate pink, hung with rich lace, and I knew it would cost a lot. I went to Baldwin about it, after talking to Maguire, who thought it impossible, and told him the story of my play, and what I wanted to do in the way of settings, and my fear about expenses. Baldwin said, ’I understand Palmer’s coming out here, to the California, with “The Banker’s Daughter.” I think he tried to stick us up on that piece, and I’d like to beat him. We don’t need to go to so much expense as you think, Davy. You say you want laces: well, I’ll let you have some lace, such as nobody has ever seen on a stage!’ And he did. It was real antique stuff, belonging to his daughter and himself, from their home. I designed the scene as I wanted it, had plain set pieces painted (they cost us only a few dollars) in delicate shades of pink, and draped Baldwin’s lace over them. The effect was beautiful,—I’ve never seen anything of the kind as good,—and it looked like the room of ’a millionaire’s daughter.’ But I was glad when the run was over and the stuff safely back in Baldwin’s home: there was over $30,000 worth of it used in that set, and it kept me anxious all the time.”
Belasco’s play of “The Millionaire’s Daughter” was produced at the Baldwin Theatre on May 19, 1879, and it was received with much favor. It tells the story of a woman who marries one man while believing herself to be in love with another, but who comes, through an ordeal of sorrow and suffering, to know the value of her husband and to love him. It is not important, though creditable as a melodramatic specimen of what Augustin Daly used to describe as “plays of contemporaneous human interest.” The chief parts in it were cast as follows: