Among the meanest and most stupid disparagements of Belasco which I have chanced to notice in recent years is one made by Mr. Albert Bigelow Paine, the adulatory biographer of Samuel L. Clemens (Mark Twain). In recording a conversation which he says he had with Clemens Mr. Paine writes: “‘I suppose,’ I said, ‘the literary man should have a collaborator with a genius for stage mechanism. John Luther Long’s exquisite plays would hardly have been successful without David Belasco to stage them. Belasco cannot write a play himself, but in the matter of acting construction his genius is supreme.’” (The italics are mine.—W. W.) Remembering that Belasco is, among many other things, the author of “May Blossom,” “The Heart of Maryland,” “The Girl of the Golden West,” “Peter Grimm,” and “Van der Decken,” it seems to me that Mr. Paine has, in that sapient comment, provided for thoughtful persons a useful measure of his intelligence. Furthermore, his disparagement of Belasco as a writer of plays suggests that it is competent, in this Memoir, to inquire as to what, precisely, are the “exquisite plays” of John Luther Long, one of Belasco’s collaborators in authorship. Mr. Long is a fiction writer of talent, which has been widely and generously recognized. His name is associated with six plays and no more,—namely, “Madame Butterfly,” “The Darling of the Gods,” “Dolce,” “Adrea,” “The Dragon Fly,” and “Kassa.” “Madame Butterfly,” as a play, is, exclusively, the work of Belasco: it was written and produced before he and Long met. “Kassa” is a commonplace farrago of theatrical absurdity, rant, and miscellaneous trash, tangled into a mesh of sacerdotal trappings and fantastic, complex, and dubious Hungarian embellishments and is as devoid of literary merit as it is of dramatic vitality. It was produced by Mrs. Leslie Carter, in 1909, after she had ceased to act under the direction of Belasco, and it was a failure. “The Dragon Fly” was written by Long in association with Mr. E. C. Carpenter, was produced in Philadelphia, in 1905, and was a failure. “Dolce” has not been acted or published and I know nothing about it. As to “The Darling of the Gods” and “Adrea,”—not only did Belasco “stage” those plays (that is, produce them), but he is at least as much their author as Mr. Long is; a fact which I venture to assume that Mr. Long would be the last to deny.

“The Darling of the Gods” owes its existence wholly to Belasco. When he had leased the Republic Theatre and while he was preparing to undertake its renovation he also began to plan his managerial campaign there. In a letter he writes:

(David Belasco to William Winter.)

“...It was a strenuous, anxious time for me. I had so many things to think of and so much to do that sometimes I felt like that man in Dickens who tries to lift himself out of his difficulties by his own hair! I saw that I was to be forced to fight for my professional life—and I wasn’t ready. The public had been taught, season by season, to expect always more and more from the actor, the author, and, especially, the producer. The standard of production was so high that the theatre-goer looked not only for great acting but also for artistic perfection and beauty in the stage settings. The progressive manager was forced to invest immense sums in his stars and productions, and it was because I did this without hesitation that I was so unpopular with some of my contemporaries. According to them I “spoiled the public” because I looked first to the artistic instead of to the commercial result.”

Belasco had for several years prior to 1902 desired to present Mrs. Carter in a series of Shakespearean and classical plays which, as he wrote to me in that year, “have long been in her repertory but in which I have never yet had the opportunity of bringing her out.” Mrs. Carter was then the principal player under his management: it was both justice to her and sound business judgment for him to open his new theatre with a performance in which she was the star. It would indeed have been a brilliant achievement for him to have opened it with a superb revival of one of Shakespeare’s great plays. But, on the other hand, theatrical management,—although, rightly understood, it entails, first of all, a moral and intellectual obligation to the public,—is a venturesome business, not an altruistic amusement: Belasco had invested more than $98,000 in making his presentment of “Du Barry”: it, plainly, was necessary to earn with that drama at least the cost of producing it before he could bring forth Mrs. Carter in another play. And it was obvious that while he could impressively open his new theatre with a sumptuous revival of that popular success it could not advantageously hold the stage there for more than a month or two and that he must have another striking dramatic novelty ready in hand with which to follow the revival. Among the many plays which Belasco wrote and rewrote during the strolling days of his youth is a melodrama entitled “Il Carabiniere,” which he called “The Carbineer.” The scenes and characters of that old play are Italian. Belasco resolved to refashion it for the use of Blanche Bates. But the multifarious demands on his time and strength made it necessary for him to have assistance in performing this task, and remembering the success of Miss Bates in his Japanese tragedy of “Madame Butterfly” he altered his purpose and determined to base on the old Italian tale a romance of Japan, and he proposed to John Luther Long,—well versed in Japanese customs,—that he should help him in the work. This proposal was accepted; the manuscript of “The Carbineer” was turned over to Long, and, about February, 1902, the collaborators began their work on the play which afterward became famous under the name of “The Darling of the Gods.” That play is practically a new one, not an adaptation: the labor of writing it was finished in June, and it was produced for the first time anywhere, November 17, 1902, at the New National Theatre, Washington, D. C.: on December 3, following, it was acted for the first time in New York, at the Belasco Theatre, where it succeeded “Du Barry,” which had been acted there for the last time on November 29. This was the original cast of “The Darling of the Gods”:

Prince Saigon Charles Walcot.
Zakkuri, Minister of War George Arliss.
Kara Robert T. Haines.
Tonda-Tanji Albert Bruning.
Sir Yuke-Yume James W. Shaw.
Lord Chi-Chi Edward Talford.
Admiral Tano Cooper Leonard.
Hassebe Soyemon Warren Milford.
Kato J. Harry Benrimo.
Shusshoo F. Andrews.
Inu, a Corean Giant Harrison Armstrong.
Yoban Carleton Webster.
Crier of the Night Hours Charles Ingram.
Kugo Maurice Pike.
Shiba E. P. Wilks.
Migaku The seven spies Rankin Duvall.
Kojin of Zakkuri Arthur Garnell.
Ato Joseph Tuohy.
Tcho Winthrop Chamberlain.
Taro John Dunton.
Man in the Lantern Westropp Saunders.
The Imperial Messenger F. A. Thomson.
First Secretary Legrand Howland.
Second Secretary A. D. Richards.
Banza Gaston Mervale.
Nagoya Albert Bruning.
Tori Fred’k A. Thomson.
Korin Rankin Duvall.
Bento Kara’s “Two-sword J. Harry Benrimo.
Kosa Men” Richard Warner.
Takoro John Dunton.
Kaye Arthur Garnell.
Nagoji A. D. Richards.
Jutso Dexter Smith.

Photograph by Byron. Belasco’s Collection.

A SCENE FROM “THE DARLING OF THE GODS”