In 1887, when, in collaboration, they wrote “Pawn Ticket 210” for Lotta
too much in his company; admits to her husband that her juvenile partiality for this early suitor still lingers in her feelings, and so causes that worthy man some uneasiness; but she ends by casting her girlish fancy to the winds and avowing herself a fond as well as a faithful wife. “The guests think they have seen him before.” They have! And also they have heard, rather more than twice before, two of the speeches which are uttered: “As a soldier it is my business to make widows,” and “Hell has no fury like a woman scorned.”
This is the story: Helen Freeman loved Robert Grey and by him was beloved. Robert Grey had jilted Lucile Ferrant, of New Orleans. Lucile informed Helen of this fact, and Helen therefore repudiated Robert Grey and wedded with John Rutherford, of the United States Senate. Matthew Culver, a politician, hostile to Robert Grey in politics and at the bar, and wishful to defeat Robert’s attempt to obtain an office, persuaded Lucile to apprise Rutherford that Robert and Helen had been lovers, and by many persons were thought to be so still. Rutherford, investigating this tale, discovered that Culver had maliciously and meanly schemed to make mischief and that the attachment of Robert and Helen was probably one of the sentimental “flames” which are customary in youth; whereupon he rebuked Culver, talked frankly with Robert Grey, advising him to stick to his legal business, and presently procured his appointment to a lucrative office, at the same time assuring Helen of his delicate consideration for her feelings and his intention to take good care of her. Culver then went to South America and stayed there, while Miss Ferrant repaired to the South of France, and Robert Grey greatly distinguished himself by laborious diligence in the public service. This adjustment might have been expected to content all parties concerned, but it did not content Rutherford. His wife actually had “loved another” before she loved him, and on that fact he brooded, stating that his heart contained nothing but “bloodless ashes.” Perhaps Helen’s sentimental fancy had lasted. Juvenile flame was only a phrase. As sagaciously remarked by Emilia in “Othello,”
“ ... jealous souls will not be answered so;
They are not ever jealous for the cause,
But jealous for they’re jealous.”
The distressed Senator, therefore, sat up till a late hour every night, grieving for his wife’s “lost love,” until at last Helen, observing his dejection, was moved to discover and avouch that her juvenile fancy for Robert Grey had been a girlish infatuation and to declare her “calm, peaceful, and eternal love” for her husband. Mr. and Mrs. Rutherford then sailed, aboard the Alaska, for Europe. It appeared, incidentally, that Jack Dexter and Kitty Ives, giddy things, though bright and good, hovering about the story, were lovers, but that Kitty’s mother did not approve of their engagement till after Jack had smirched his face with a bit of smoked glass, and also that all the persons concerned in these momentous affairs once saw an eclipse of the sun, which was visible in Washington.
Almost every person in this play is colorless and insignificant. The proceedings of the characters evince no natural sequence between motive and conduct. Given two young persons who love each other, they could not possibly be alienated by conjuring up the bugbear of a previous attachment. Nothing is so dead as the love that has died, and every lover instinctively knows it. Moreover, the ladies, practically without exception, are more pleased than disquieted by discovering that their lovers have found they could live without others but not without them. The fabric, in short, is one of elaborate trifling with serious things, for the sake of situations and effects. The play should have been called “The Husband” rather than “The Wife,” because it is Rutherford in whom the interest centres. The best scene in it is the one of explanation and reconcilement between the husband and wife, and this was the invention of Belasco, around which and for the sake of which the play was written. It contains a strain of rational, fine manliness that wins and holds attentive sympathy.
In studying the plays written by Belasco and De Mille in collaboration it is essential to bear in mind the apportionment of the labor, in order correctly to estimate Belasco’s share in them. The writing in that co-partnership was largely done by De Mille: the dramatic machinery, the story in action, was supplied almost entirely by Belasco, who acted the scenes, when the plays were in process of construction, the dialogue being beaten out between the co-workers.
This was the original cast of “The Wife”,—November 1, 1887: