SECRETS OF THEATRICAL MANAGEMENT

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1831, 10 April 1907, Page 25

SECRETS OF THEATRICAL MANAGEMENT

(By Albert Goldie in Melbourne “Punch.”)

GIN FRONT OF THE HOUSE.”

A theatrical manager—or, to give him hio prol'ettsional title, “the man in front of the house" —has nothing to do but wear evening dress and 101 l round the dresscircle entrance gazing approvingly at these people who enter the theatre and contemptuously at these who don’t. His chief pastime ie to give away passes—a pastime which becomes doubly pleasurable when the applicant happens to be the first cousin cm her father’s side of the woman who scrubs out the dreasing.room'd.*? There is nothing, however which causes him such a gentle glow of exhilaration as when the reporter of the "Cow Flat-Recorder" insists upon the privileges.;.of the Press upon a night when there isn’t a vacant ©cat in ; the house, and : threatens to refuse to give the show another 'notice if he -doesn’t get them. Professional people, whom a grateful publicioie permitting to “rest" for a while, are the particular friends of “the man in front. ’. He always keeps a pocketful of snjalt change for them, just to encourage; them to call again. Having nothing elee;;fo do but pay the bills of a benevoleht r ;tnetitution, it is not to be wondered if occasionally refreshes himself, but lie .would scorn to do so without the company... of as many members of the“restfraternity. as can be conveniently gatneredrtogether.There are two things which have always struck me about the. “man in front/ - ’ One is - that he always seems , to have changed - his shirt before the evening’s and the other that, he invariably has a graceful as well as. a reflective, manner of twirling his moustache. Nearly every successful manager has a handsome moustache. It is really the only qualification he needs to make his success in life, excepting the manner of twirling it. With, the ladies he is just the thing. He is politeness incarnate, and he always keeps an extra quantity of- this commodity in reserve for his landlady and her friends when they arrive after the curtain has risen, and would like him to show them to their seats. Occasionally when he feels in a sportive mood the “man in front" strolls down to another theatre and bets the rival manager- that he will guess the “state of the "house" within a fiver. Clairvoyanby isn’t in it with the theatrical manager’s facility for telling how much money had been/taken at the box office by a casual glance over a seated audience. Sometimes;" when there is nearly <£4oo in the house—l distinctly said “sometimes”—the guess will come almost a sovereign to the mark. A still more wonderful faculty of the craft is to predict how much money will enter the treasury before the doors are open. Edwin Geach will tell yon that if a manager cannot estimate the takings for the night before he goes to tea he doesn’t know his business. Julius Grant is fretting because on one occasion there was just Is more in the house ; than he had anticipated, , and he would - like to find that galleryito who prevented him hitting the bull’s eye right in the middle. George Tallis, who, though no* logger “in front," has had expedience dnovery branch of the business, explains i it. thtuS: ' - • ; “There is no psychic intelligence required to be able to judge the magnetic qualities- of a show after the first couple

•of nights, though until then there must necessarily be some uncertainty ws to how the piece will catch on. A first night is always expected to yield a full house, .and, however muoh the audience may seem to approve of the production on that occasion, its fate is not yet decided. There is the judgment, of the Press to be reckoned with, as well as an allowance of time to enable the firstnighters to tell their friends what they think of it. So that when a piece opens on Saturday it is to the Monday night audience that we look for our fate, though on some occasions we have had to wait till later in the week to be able to determine the degree of financial suce: :V3 we can expect. Once we gauge the drawing power of the play it is easy to predict our business ahead of time, even for a whole week, as we know by ‘experience the extent of the theatregoing public, while we are thoroughly familiar with our seating capacity. But what is a strange thing is Hi at, though we may b?. correct in our estimate m .a whole, it often happens that when we expect a good dress-circle we are disappointed, and, a; if by some unwritten law of compensation, the amount is made up by an unusually large gallery. Or it may ba the stalls which surprise is. Iu certain seasons it has been possible to estimate tile extent of a wh.lo week's business wr.M.u five pound, despite the fluctuations in the various parts of the theatre.”

When one “on the road” there is no such cast-iron certainty,' as E'liwin Grach will vouch. This “gay and debonair” .manager, sg I have heard him described, may also be dubbed the theatrical pathfinder cf the Southern Hemisphere. Ha is positively omnipresent. Before his friends in Coolgardie have missed him he is saying “Helli!” to others in Christchurch,* and ail the time he never seems to have left Melbourne. He never appear to work, yet he lias no superior in the Commonwealth as a showman,-and he is a compendium of shipping and railway intdiligence, information ' concerning the dimensions to a square inch of every theatre in Australia, journals and journalists, and the industrial conditions of every town as they are likely to affect the theatrical busimy-is. Judged by Edwin Geach, the man in front must be a human magnet, a dynamo of geniality and an encyclopaedia of special knowledge. He is also perpetual motion.

Julius Grant believes that the strenuous life was imported from the States free of duty for the special benefit of theatrical managers. “If you knew what it was to sit at one’s desk from early morn till late at night administering to the needs of several shows distributed over the Commonwealth and New Zealand, you would realise that the theatrical manager is the busiest man living,” he says. “People think that all we have to do is ho corue to the theatre at night, look affable and count the money. In the daytime wo are expected to go for a drive or to join a fishing excursion by friend® who are sympathetic to our supposed leisure. The theatre is regarded as an automatic machine. Do you see this stack of correspondence Unanswered. See this nlan? An invention for a new kind of thrill by a man who occupied two hours of my time "to-day while a dozen people were waiting to see me on urgent concerns. Look at this telegram. An accident to our company in the West—that arrived at a moment when I didn’t know which way to turn, and everything had to be put aside while it was attended to. Every anxiety of the theatre has to be shouldered by the manager.” And for an instant Julius Grant, ■ who is one of the bestnatured fellows alive, looked the picture of a much-wronged man.