STORIES OF THE STAGE

Greymouth Evening Star, 14 January 1929, Page 8

STORIES OF THE STAGE

ELLALINE TERRISS’ MEMOIRS.

/“‘Are you really eighty, Mr Howe?’ asked the late Fred Leslie, of Mr Henry Howe, the veteran actor. “I am,’ said Mr. Howe. ‘How many years have you been on the stage ?’ Leslie inquired. ‘Over sixty,’ said the old gentleman. ‘Good heavens, everything yon have said to you must sound like a cue.’ ’’ This story told by Ellaline Terriss, 'is also applicable to the author. Her autobiography is a mine of anecdotes, for every name she. mentions is the “cue” for a string of happy merories. The Stage seems to sharpen the wit of all who come in contact with it. Most of the stories are of adroit retorts or humorous replies, by actors or authors. AV. S. .Gilbert was famed for his satire- He was present on one occasion at a first night, when Rutland Barrington was singing. “Someone in his box turned to him and remarked, ‘lsn’t Barrington excellent? He’s singing in tune.’ ‘Don’t worry about that,’ said Mr Gilbert. ‘lt’s only first-night nervousness.” “I soon found out that there was no dissembling about Mr Gilbert,” writer Miss Terriss. “What he thought he said, and it was a very stupid person who tried to cross swords with him. There is a- story of a well-known actor who had been taken back and back again by him at rehearsal. At last he lost his temper and said : ‘Look here, Mr Gilbert, I’m not the best tempered, of men.’ ‘No,’ said Mr Gilbert, ‘neither am I.’ ‘I stand six feet three in my stockinged feet,’ said the actor. ‘I stand six feet four,’ said Gilbert. ‘And,’, said the actor, ‘I aril a very strong '■ man.’. ‘So am I,’ said the author of ‘Bab Ballads,’ ‘but,’ he continued, ‘lf you want to know the difference between us, I’m an extremely clever man.’ ”

One of the most pungent satirists was Mr Arthur Wimperis, the actor, “ . . when someone said that a highsalaried low comedian was as funny as a bag of nails, and he at once added, ‘Yes, without the points.’ This surely was as quick as his reply to a great music-hall impressario who, asking him how he had enjoyed the performance, received this witty answer: ‘How did I enjoy if! Oh, immensely ! I wouldn’t have left a turn unstoned.’ ”

About the famous actor Sir Charles Wyndham, Miss Terriss writes: “It was Henry Hamilton who said to Charles Wyndham, on seeing him sitting in David Garrick’s chair at a famous club (the great light comedian was playing David Garrick that season), ‘Ah! Charles, more like GarI rick every day and less like him every night.’ Those who heard the remark laughed heartily. It was an expensive sally, for I think it cost Hamilton SilCharles Wyndram’s friendship.” Richard Harding Davis, the American author, once showed Miss Terris’ party round New York, “One Sunday night, I remember, he took us to a concert, the principal feature of which was a grand selection of old negro songs and all kinds of Southern musicSeated next us at the end of our row was a long-haired man, who, after listening to the orchestra intently, suddenly buried his face in his hands arid moaned loudly. The manager of the hall, who was standing near by thinking to be kindly, leant over him and said sympathetically, “Ah! sir, I see you are a Southerner.’ The man looked up at him' with wild eyes qnd said, ‘Gosh, no; I’m a musician.’”

SELLING THE SEA. Mr Harry Preston, of Brighton, told Miss. Terriss a very amusing yarn about a .Cockney visiting the town for the first time. “The man got out at the station, and looking at the sea was dumbfounded, as he had never seen it before. The tide was up, and thinking that the boatmen who,j®ere shouting to the visitors had a proprietary right in it, he went up to one of them and asked him if they sold the sea water by the bucket. ’Oh! yes,’ said the sailor, ‘as much- as you like at threepence pei‘ quart. ‘Right, ’ said the visitor, ‘l’ll have four quarts, I’m going for a drive, but I’ll come back in a couple of hours and fetch it.’ And he did so- By this time the tide had gone out and he was so bewildered to see the dry sand that all he said was : ‘My word, you do do a trade here!’ ” .Off stage Miss Terriss is known as . Mrs Seymour Hicks, much to- the disgust of children, who looked on her as a sort of fairy. While acting as Cinderella, “one little boy fell in love with me from the front of the house and persuaded his mother to bring him round to see me. ‘There, darling,’ she said, ‘shake hands with Mrs Hicks.’ The little boy burst out crying, and said, ‘Oh, mother! Not HICKS! ! .!’ ” Miss Terriss generally travelled with her husband, about whom she tells many good stories. While dining one day at Lady, de Bathe’s house, at Newmarket: “Someone, noticing that dhe was talking a good deal to him about people they had • both met, said, ‘Oh ! Mr Hicks, you seem to have known our hostess a long time.’ ‘I should think I have,’ said Seymour, gaily. ‘l’m proud to say she . nursed me on \ her knee:’ There was a sudden silence, and Mrs Langtry said, ‘Really, Seymour, really,’ and in his .endeavour to coverup his lack of chivalry he made matters worse by adding, ‘Ah!. but how often have I returned the compliment.’ Laughter and the fish followed. Seymour’s first remark was perfectly ti'ue, as his mother and beautiful aunt, Mrs Wane, were Lily le Breton’s friends and contemporaries when she was a girl.” ‘ Miss Terriss quotas a very humorous tale which was told her by George Giddens. An acquaintance had asked a Cockney friend to come and spend a few days with him in the country. “Ope morning, the host’s solicitor's arrived and he, having important business matters . to. transact, was obliged to neglect his friend from London. However, not wishing him to be dull, he-said: ‘I know you’ll excuse me till lunch time, won’t you? You’ll find plenty to do about the place without me. Here is a gun and a couple of dogs. Go out and have a bit of sport. ’ This the Cockney friend did, but he returned in half-an-hour and said: ‘Have you got any more dogs?” As she-looks back on all the really great actors she has met Miss Terriss remarks how simple and absorbed they have all been in their calling. “No greater illustration: can be given of the real actor’s ruling passion,” she says, “than the story of the two old players 'who, broken down and weary, i walking, to another town to fulfil an

engagement, were passed by a magnificent carriage wifli ‘Dives’ inside and a footman- next the coachman on the box-: ‘Look,’ said one,.‘a carriage and- a pair, two men dm the: box; and the occupants with everything they w.ant in the world- Isn’t if wonderful? Wouldn’t you like. to change places with them ?’ < .‘No; I<. wouldn’t;’: -replied the other;' they can’t actl” ’