PLAYERS’ SALARIES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18953, 29 August 1923, Page 8

PLAYERS’ SALARIES.

COMPARED WITH PARLIAMENTARY PAY. . Sir William Joynson-llicks made a hit in the English House of Commons with his discovery that one film star has just been offered a salary equivalent to that earned by seven Secretaries of State (writes a correspondent of the Manchester Guar dian). Actually this is not the first time that people in high official employ have glanced with some consternation at the gains of actors. A Duke of Grafton when Lord Chain be rlain was approached by a deputation of actors headed by Garrick praying redress for certain grievances. Grafton proceeded to ask Garrick what his salary was, and, being told that it was £SOO a year, lilted up his hands in amazement. "And this you think too little; whilst I have a son, who is heir to my title and estate, venturing his life daily for his King and country at much less than half that sum?” Five hundred a year may sound little enough for a Garrick, and yet it is not quite certain that the stars of the acting profession earned sucstantally less in the past than now. Actors and actresses in the distant days had fewer expenses. It was not necessary that they should bo “seen’’ at expensive and fashionable resorts. There were no photographers and fewer retailers of what passes for fashionable intelligence. But the managers of a Dublin theatre in the eighteenth century offered (and in vain) £IOOO to Mossop> for a single season.

Michael Kelly, the actor and singer, found the Income Tax Commissioners very sceptical when he returned £SOO as his annual income from his profession, and ' about 140 years ago an unknown singer got £BOO for a first season at the opera. Macready cleared more than £SOOO by his first tour in America, and h© and others obtained very largo salaries for special appearances. No doubt there are extravagant salaries paid hero and there nowadays, but it is quite possible that a careful examination of the whole subject, taking into account the different value of money and the difference in the scale of expenditure of theatrical stars at different periods, would show that the successful actors are not substantially much better off now than they were in the past—except that they do not have to work so hard.