Category Archives: Reprints

Reprints

Recollections of Dirty Snow, 1916

3 Comments

The following little gem comes from Recollections of a Scene Painter, by E. T. Harvey, published in 1916:

Stage snow can now be bought by the barrel, and is made by cutting paper into small discs. In the old days it was quite a laborious task for the property man. He and his assistants would have to work for days with shears to get a supply, and it accordingly was carefully preserved. One night when the “Angel of Midnight” was being played, Barras, who watched everything pretty closely, told the property boy as he went up in the “flies” with the snow box, “to let it down in a perfect avalanche” when he gave the signal. The snowstorm in “Way Down East,” for instance, is done by pulling backward and forward a folded, perforated piece of cloth that sifts the snow down on the stage, and an electric fan dashes it mixed with coarse salt against the window pane and into the open door as “Hannah Moore” is driven out into the storm.

But in the days of fifty years ago the property boys usually just scattered it by the handful from up in the gridiron. When Barras gave the signal for the “avalanche,” Bill Sullivan, the property boy, took the hat box and turned it upside down, emptying the contents upon poor Captain Satan (Leffingwell) lying on his back on the stage, and Sallie St. Clair bending over him. In the box were nails, screws, and all the trash that had been swept up from time to time. Barras had several troubles during that engagement.

Recollections of a Scene Painter, by E. T. Harvey, pp 26-7. Princeton University, 1916.

Reprints

Friday Funnies

1 Comment

Here are some whimsical tales to tickle your funny bone on this Friday.

When Macready opened in “Lear” at the Nottingham Theatre the “property man” received his plot for the play in the unsual manner, a map being required among the many articles–(map highly necessary for Lear to divide his Kingdom.) The property-man, being illiterate, read mop for map. At night the tragedy commences; Macready, in full stage on his throne, calls for his map; a supernumerary “noble,” kneeling, presents the aged King a white curly mop. The astounded actor rushed off the stage, dragging the unfortunate nobleman and his mop with him, actors and audience wild with delight.

-The New York Times. February 6, 1881

Imagine King Lear being handed a mop! Priceless! This next chestnut is quite a gem as well.

The other night the critical scene in “Iris,” in which Oscar Asche “breaks up housekeeping,” was almost spoiled by a property man. To avenge a fancied wrong the man glued down the vases on the mantle which Mr. Asche breaks first. When that trying scene came Mr. Asche turned Iris into the streets as usual, and turned to the vases. With a sweep of his hand he struck them. They were so firmly glued, however, that only the tops were broken by the blow–and Mr. Asche’s hand incidentally bruised. A property man is now looking for a new job.

-The New York Times. November 2, 1902

Oh that wacky property man! This final anecdote takes place at one of the first theatres I worked at professionally.

Another story which has to do with edibles on the stage used to be told by Joseph Jefferson, who described the incident as happening in the early days of the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia. “Camille” was the piece that was being played and all was going beautifully. Then came a scene between Camille and Armand, in the course of which a a servant was to enter with lights. “In those days,” said Mr. Jefferson, “Sea Island cotton was stage ice cream, just as molasses and water was stage wine.”

Armand and Camille were seated at the table and the crowded house was rapturuously following their scene. Then in came the maidservant with the wobbliest sort of a candelabrum, but the scene was so tense that nobody seemed to notice her. However, as she set down her burden between the lovers one of the candles toppled over and set fire to the ice cream. That was more than the audience could stand and the curtain was rung down.

-The New York Times. June 5, 1910

Sounds like that show was “on fire” that night! I hope these quirky little tales leave you smiling for the weekend.

Reprints

The Agonies of a Stage Manager, 1914

1 Comment

The following was written by Arthur Fitzgerald and originally printed in the New York Times, November 22, 1914. It included the following bio of the author:

Mr. Fitzgerald is the stage manager of “The Law of the Land,” the grisly melodrama by George Broadhurst, which has been running all Fall at the Forty-eighth Street Theatre, with Julia Dean in the role of the woman who kills her husband, to the great delight of many audiences.

Enjoy!

Fine productions are seen in New York. Certainly nothing finer exists than the American housing of plays. Contrary to an all to general opinion, the staging of plays in America is not reckless. Lavish, yes, in the outlay of money, but painstaking always. The producers are not “satisfied with anything.” I have known one man to replace a single chair seven times because it did not blend with the room.

In our play, “The Law of the Land,” this exactness has been instilled into every one “back stage,” so that our stage machinery works like a perfect clock. The curtain rises punctually, the necessary properties are checked and rechecked and are always in their places. When a telephone bell on stage is to ring “in the middle of a word,” as we say, the man off stage who pushes the button does it just as carefully and just as seriously as if he were playing his part in full view of the audience. There is an extra gown at the door in case something unforeseen should happen to the one which the butler ordinarily carries in for that funny situation in the last act. The property man has instructions to taste the near-whisky used in the first act. Imagine an experience of mine in the north of England. The hero was about to drink a toast to the heroine. He took a mouthful of the drink—it was varnish! In our second act grapefruit is actually eaten. Grapefruit is puckery. Miss Dean has a most demanding role, and the grapefruit does not help much. I spend my leisure hours at the grocer’s finding the finest fruit.

The moon shines through a window onto the body of the dead man, and our producer and Mr. Broadhurst were not satisfied with the light during the first week of rehearsals. I went to an artist friend’s studio for three nights, during which where was no moon, but on the fourth night the moon shone and I got the effect. Next night at rehearsal we tried it at the theatre and Mr. Broadhurst asked, “Is that moon coming in through the top of the theatre?”

The finger print charts are not faked, but are genuine, and the method used in taking them and in their use has been approved by Inspector Faurot of Detective Headquarters.

Lawyers’ papers and documents, pencils for the stenographer, vichy, a waste basket, a bit of crumpled paper, an amber trimmed jet tassel, a dog collar, a dog whip, a revolver—these so-called “necessary props” are tripled and must each be in its place. The slightest change is a most dangerous proceeding.

In Dublin, once, a statue of the Virgin Mary was necessary to the play. In the hurry it was left to the property man. When the statue was undraped a moment before the curtain went up it was found to be the statue of Venus de Milo. The actor who referred to it in his part had a splendid presence of mind and read his line, “She is as chaste as the Virgin Mary and has a figure like the Venus de Milo.”

Originally printed in the New York Times, November 22, 1914.

Reprints

In the Boston Museum’s Prop Room, 1903

The following is from a newspaper column entitled, “Some Odds and Ends from Stageland’s Daily Gossip”, first published in 1903.

Some idea of the varied collection of objects which accumulate in the property room of a theatre is to be obtained from a description of the contents of the old Boston Museum property room, which will soon be scattered to the four winds. In a general way the public has learned to know that the “property man” of a theatre is one who looks after such details of the productions as concern chairs and tables, the bottles that the people pour their liquor from, and the pen and ink used by the heroine to indite her loving messages.

The master of properties must still be a resourceful person, but in the old days, where the frequent changes of bills necessitated additional “props” every week or so, the ingenuity of this functionary was often taxed to the utmost. The property room of the Museum is thus described in The Boston Globe:

“The apothecary’s shop in ‘Romeo and Juliet’ wasn’t a circumstance to the old property-manufacturing shop in the cellar of the Museum, where may be seen skulls and crossbones, stuffed animals of both wild and domestic species, wings for witches, angels, and decils, and other curious things that can’t be enumerated in a column. The animals, both real and of papier maché, repose on shelves all around the walls, a weird, grinning, motley troupe of once indispensable stage characters that would have brought their possessor to the stake in witchcraft days, and all destined for the dirt heap within a few days.

“There are the wolves’ heads, with gleaming teeth, fangs, and eyes, that were wont to be thrust beneath the door of the log cabin which the stout arm of Frank Mayo held in place in the thrilling honeymoon scene in ‘Davy Crockett.’ The big bellows with which Tilly Slowboy once blew the fire in ‘The Cricket on the Hearth’ hangs upon the wall, and the cradle in which she rocked the baby lies in a corner. In another corner are stacked old rusty muskets, including some flintlocks that defended the breastworks in Dr. Jones’s centennial drama, ‘The Battle of Bunker Hill’ twenty-eight years ago.

“From the centre of the ceiling, suspended by strings, hang three mangy looking stuffed animals that were once features in conveying the moral lessons taught by the waxwork tableaus, sold more that a decade ago. For sixty years these animals, a domestic cat, a dog, and a monkey, have been comrades, but they must now go the way of all else identified with the Museum.

“The cat and dog, now half hairless and showing repulsively their dried-up gums and loosened teeth, used to be pictures of ease and contentment when representing the sole objects of the affection of the old maid and the old bach in a wax tableau.

“The monkey had his mission to fill also, but what it was is now forgotten. Of late years he has hung by a movable string before the door of the property room in such a way that he would drop with a dull thud on the breast of any one entering the door, a startling experience for an unsuspecting stranger, which has contributed to the enjoyment of the property man’s life, however.

“In another part of the cellar is stored a raft of stage furniture of every kind. There are the seats of Caesar and Brutus from the Senate house, the royal chairs of Macbeth and his restless helpmeet, the big, glittering chair in which John Wilkes Booth was crowned as Richard III., and the gracefully formed mediaeval chairs in which Hamlet has oft pondered the proposition, ‘To be, or not to be.’

“There are stacks of spears and halberds and Roman standards, and a pathetic souvenir in the shape of a rude human effigy of burlap stuffed with excelsior, which is recognized as the dummy used in the burial of Ophelia, over which the Queen strews flowers and weeps and says, ‘Sweets to the sweet, fair maid.'”

From The New York Times. May 17, 1903.

Reprints

Property Resources, 1916

The following comes from a book written in 1916 by Arthur Edwin Krows, called “Play production in America.” It’s short, but provides a rare example from this time period on how props were acquired, rather than built.

Confessedly, it is not a simple matter to provide pertinent items for a stage scene, either those adapted to actual use in the action, or those merely for atmosphere. Consequently, most producers are found covertly making collections of articles they are likely to need. Belasco has an amazing amount of such things stored away. It is said, too, that every time he goes out of town to open a new production, a certain ” second-hand” man will ship a carload of “antiques” on ahead, open a store in the town, and contrive to have the distinguished manager informed of the opportunity for bargains.

When they wanted furniture in the old days, they frequently manufactured the unused, purely decorative pieces of papier-mache, when they didn’t paint them on the scenery; but all that is gone by now. Fannie Brice once told me how in the early days of her career, she used to borrow the window curtain of her hotel room to help dress the set. The efficient property man maintains a list of sources where he may procure any and all of the manifold portable objects in any scene. In Winthrop Ames’s production of “Children of Earth,” in New York, chairs were gathered from old houses in New Jersey and Connecticut, and from old curiosity shops, the pewter from an old New England farmhouse through a dealer, a saw, saw-buck, and some rainbarrels from Mr. Ames’s farm in Massachusetts, and so on through a long list of objects quite as imposing as that of art miscellany in “The High Road.”

The property room at the New York Hippodrome, 1916
The property room at the New York Hippodrome, 1916