The San Francisco Call and Post from San Francisco, California • Page 31

EDITORIAL DRAMATIC SOCIETY VOLUME 44. Bessie Barriscale in transit to Starship SENORITA," said he, love you." And he took her in his arms and gazed into her eyes. "Don't look at me so," she murmured so softly that I hardly heard her, while she struggled not too vlolently, but rather, it seemed to me, somewhat gently. From somewhere out of the dark' ness of a corner of the large room who had invaded the tender scene unobserved, heard an angry, protesting Vo i ce husband's yoti may imagine reproaches. The lover, well scared, released his pretty burden and dumb and guilty; but didn't seem to mind at all, but behaved very much like the heroine of many a story that you and I have read in the newspapers of suddenly interrupted scenes of reprehensible romance, and was quite unmoved and all the world as though she had done nothing at all to merit anybody's censure or reproaches.

But, unlike usual stories of surprised tenderness, all of the blame in this case was heaped upon the shoulders of the "Not at all like it," said the Interrupting voice. The shamed individual felt himself wheeled around by a strong hand and unceremoniously ordered to do it all over again. "You do not behave at all as though you it. When you say 'I love you, say it with more feeling, and for heaven's sake don't forget to kiss er." And they pay actors lots of money to be leading men, 1 thought, ruefully v.atching the scene. It was done a better the second time, it seemed to me, though I flattered myself that I or any one of a thousand other ardent Alcazarites could have accomplished the greeting with much more fervor.

Still, it Is only honorable to admit that Lee Wlllard much to offer in extenuation. He Lasn't sat innumerable times a to the charming coquetry of Bessie Barriscale nor seen her witcheries in a hundred dainty manifestations; and, besides, "Willard isn't a regular Alcazarite, but only a hired one and rri't, of course, exhibit the authentic of a volunteer, bese leading men are mere Hes- Eians in love, anyway. However, and It gives me pleasure to tell you, nroke up the rehearsal so far as our returned ingenue, Miss Barriscale concerned, and we were provided with chairs In a far corner of the Alcazar stage while the second act proceeded without the presence of the fair rose of the rancho. Mr. Butler reassured me about Lee.

It was his first rehearsal. How many times Miss Barriscale has played the I peppery, wayward and coquettish seno' rita in the darkened creative gloom of rehearsal or the lighted stage of public performance neither she nor Stage Director Butler knows. Wlllard was a stranger on the rancho where Miss F-arriscale made a home for herself six years ago. Besides, it must be hard to enact scenes' of fervor before fifty more or less individuals, whose chief concern is deep in their "sides" watching to find their cues to action. IF ever an actress has had cause for rejoicirfg and an adequate temptation to display those unpleasant characteristics usually uncovered in a rapid flight to starship, Bessie Barriscale Is she.

That she rejoices greatly, is a fact. And it is a fact that a multitude of friends rejoice with her; but that there is any evidence of trouble with the fit of her headgear is not a fact. She occasion demands that she cover her own pretty ac sized wig, as she did during the Qarwe seasons of her Ingenue impersonations at the Alcazar, and when she played her little while In vaudeville. In our chat on the busy stage where Richard Walton Tully's pJay "The BOM of the Rancho" was being given Its first treatment to fit it for public dtlon. Miss Barriscale let me into nfl secret of her steady poise and her well deserved honors.

For you must by this time, if you read anyiiys; at all about the drama in our that Bessie Barriscale formerly Ingenue of the Belasco and Meyer forces, is en roufre to Chicago, a head the No. 1 company which sjr Tully's now spectacular drama Bird of Paradise." with which lmt she will Invade New season and do not -a great personage on ay, to which goal she has been headed for some time. Her stay at the Alcazar is thus a homecoming and a leave atking. It is like a graduate's sojourn under the family rooftree before striking out to new and big endeavors and responsibilities. She doesn't even know whether she will be permitted to ceme west in the piece of which she 4s to be the star.

In that connection she told me that plans were yet indefinite. stay ln Chicago." she said, "dejjjK-ls on how well they like play, It'may remain there a season, in which case a 'No. company will be organized to go west." Of course, we would get the "No. 1" company I "After the Chicago engagement 'The Bird of will be taken to New York and placed on view in Broadway." I didn't say anything for a few seconds. A person shouldn't in the pres-i ence of one who is contemplating the realization of an IS year old the vision of Broadway fame! We all know how, a few years ago Miss Bessie Barriscale went east, hoping to ally herself with one of the big producers and prove what was obvious to us who had watched her grow that she was made of the sparks that blaze into stars.

Fate is as no doubt you've noticed, and she came back again to prove to Alcazar folk what eastern folk hadn't been given the opportunity to discover, that I she could shine with a Blllle Burke I brightness in Blllle Burkes own comedy, "My Wife." Just how much of i disappointment there was in this first failure to gain the which alone she required to leap into light, I Bessie Barriscale never told me nor anybody else, I suppose, but she went back to work again, confident that one those accidents, upon which most famed players have first acquired tlce would happen ln her case. And again fate is seen to be acting peculiarly, for it was no accident at all that gave Miss Barriscale the chance ito shine as a "two dollar star." She owes the advancement entirely to the earned advantage which merit think in the end secures. And that is the secret of Miss Barris; cale's humble attitude toward the success she has achieved. She has won jit by a career that began in New York "Little Eva," IS years ago. The fellow that has $15,000 by the I favor of the goddess luck and the right number on his ticket, or who gets it in an unearned lump when his father is the superior and uncomfortable person: not the man who goes out and acquires it by brains and en- I ergy and ability.

SINGULARLY enough, If any element of luck enters into Miss Barrlscale's acquisition of starship, it arises frcfm the genius of a Richard Walton Tully. And this debt Mist Barriscale hastened to acknowledge. If Dick or his charming wife, Eleanor Gates, could have heard what Bessie Barriscale said about them their ears would have burned while their eyes would have grown tender. You see, it was this way. Richard Walton Tully wrote "The Rose of the Rancho." It is true that David Belasco had much to do with it and put "lots" of atmosphere and THE San Francisco CALL SAN FRANCISCO, SUNDAY, JULY 14, 1912.

Walter Anthony things into the pretty play of early California life, but do not ever forget that the plan of the Tully's. He wrote It. Belasco rewrote it under Tully's anxious eyes and with his competent help. Well, it was Tully's play that first attracted eastern attention to Bessie Barriscale. David Belasco himself camo west and saw the Alcazar ingenue In the role of Juanita.

Afterward he told me others, no Miss Bessie Barriscale had a great future. He also picked with his discerning eye another member of the Alcazar cast for special praise. That was Ernest Glendlnning. Both have done Belasco the honor of proving the infallibility of his jJrophetlc utterances. On the occasion of three revivals of "The Rose of the Rancho" at the Alcazar Bessie Barriscale demonstrated her ability to assume a star's role with a star's brilliant power, and those who were competent to compare her work with that of Frances Starr, who originated the role in the east, said that Miss Bessie was every bit as brilliant as Miss Starr.

Tully saw her many times, and was one of us who predicted that when she went away two years ago with Virginia Harned after supporting that actress in her stock starring engagement at the Alcazar, that she would never return to the Alcazar save in the role of a star herself. But fate, as I have remarked at least twice before, is peculiar, and Miss Barriscale did come back, because eastern managers had nothing just then to offer, and idleness and a capacity for inaction are not cnaracterlstcis of Bessie. So she came back to the Alcazar and took up again the work of stock playing, bided her time, resumed her charm over Alcazar patrons, and worked and studied. "I am just as it happened that way," said Miss Barriscale, "because my husband and I have determined under no circumstances to be separated in our professional work. That's one reason why we tried the vaudeville experiment I felt that I had done as much stock work as was, perhaps, good for me, and Howard felt that way, too.

But I guess I was pretty bad in the sketches he wrote for the two of us." That was an assertion that I could not deny with an ray might, in view of an uncertain recollection of what I had or had not written about Howard Hickman's sketches and appearances with his charming wife at the Orpheum two seasons ago. I did say this truthfully, however, that neither she nor her husband could be poor In anything. At any rate. Miss Barriscale assured me that we were in agreement as to their lack of enjoyment of vaudeville work. "Besides," said she," we both have ambitions to do something big before we retire in old age or seek vaudeville's big pay.

Meanwhile the something big was being arranged by Richard Walton Tulty. He was writing "The Bird of Paradise," with one eye on Bessie Barriscale, to whom he dedicated in advance, and, without her knowing it, the leading role of Luana, the Hawaiian chieftain's daughter. Their brief vaudeville tour took them to Los Angeles, where Miss Barriscale became leading woman at Morosco's theater, and where later "The Bird of Paradise" was to unfold its tropical feathers. SPEAKING of her experience in Los Angeles as leading woman, however, suggested a digression to Miss Barriscale which I shall follow: "It may sound strange," said she, "but the Los Angeles theater goers were greatly surprised when I first appeared in a regular ingenue role. They were accustomed to see me in the woes of the usual heroine, and it was with an effort that I made them accept me In the only kind of parts which Alcazar goers, accustomed to see me as a fluffy, girlish thing, would accept.

"I played Glad in 'The Dawn of Ethel Barrymore's role of Sunday in the play of that name, and I enacted Helen Ware's big role of Mrs. Jeffries in Klein's 'Third After these serious things the Los Angeles theater patron opened his eyes wide to discover that I could ploy Ingenue parts. Isn't that strange? Patrons of stockhousea are peculiar in their devotion to the Individual, whom if they like they insist on seeing in one sort of parts. Oh, how sick I used to get of the everlasting 'Ain't she comments. Between you and me I always have had the ambition to play serious characterizations.

My Los Angeles experience helped me in this a great deal and gave me an opportunity to broaden my sphere of effectiveness, I think. I used to be criticised for my lack of vocal expressiveness. Some critic said of it that I had only two notes in my voice. Well, I think I have remedied that defect, too, as I hope you'll see." (It wasn't reader; believe me, it wasn't.) "Stock playing is likely to be a disadvantage to one who becomes identified with a single line of impersonations, although I wouldn't sell for any sum the result of my experiences under Mr. Butler and the training I received here." And she looked around the stage with a glance of affection one bestows on a family circle around a family hearth.

TO resume the story. Tully finished 'The Bird of Paradise," and Oliver Morosco staged it ln Los Angeles, with Tully, the la the house and Bessie Barriseale EDITORIAL DRAMATIC SOCIETY PAGES 27 TO 36. in leading: TOle. The pIAT was a big success, and Morosco went to New Tork with the manuscript under his arm and determination in his heart. He made arrangements for Iti Broadway production.

But not with Bessie Barriscale in the leading role. It was hard enough, said they of the New York management, to "put over" a new play. But to "put over" a new star at the same time was more than fate and the provincialism of New York criticism was deemed catholic enough to allow. Besides, Morosco had no other leading woman to put in Miss Barriscale's Los Angeles shoes, and so the Broadway production was made with an established New York favorite and the piece was pronounced a of the few big hits of last year's otherwise somewhat disastrous season, But Miss Barriscale was still in Tully's mind the Ideal Luana. He knew what he was talking about, too, for Luana was his child and he had seen Miss Barriscale bring her to vivid realization in Los Angeles.

Oliver Morosco had seen the materialization, too, and thousands of playgoers Viad besides. The success of the New York production being assured and the doubts of the men who have to put up the money against the verdicts of a fickle and not always Just publio being assuaged, Miss Barriscale was elected to introduce Luana this season, and at the head of the original New York cast. Including Guy Bates Post, to the Chicago playgoers, and afterward to take it to Broadway, there to challenge, I do not doubt successfully, the comparisons which must inevitably be drawn between her impersonation and that of Laurette Taylor, who first shone in the plumage of the bird in Broadway's gilded cage. SUCH, in brief (or has It seemed long to Is the story as Bessie Barriscale told it to me of her achievement of starship. The complimentary reflections, of course, are all mine, and the story as set down here doesn't begin to inform you of the foundation for success that Bessie Barriscale has laid securely under her little feet of the constant work of 18 years since her father's death placed the necessity of an immediate debut before her; of her baby triumph as Little Eva ln "Uncle Tom's Cabin" In New York, where she.was born; of her Mary, the orphan child of James A.

Heme's "Shore Acres," when she was only 6 years old: of the three years she spent under his fatherly care; of her engagement by Belasco to play Lovey Mary in "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch," with which she journeyed to London; of her work as member of Louis James' and E. H. Sothern's companies, nor of her arduous seasons in stock. Neither does this story tell you much about the most regrettable circumstance of her husband's (Howard Hickman) illness that preventsTiim from joining in the ovation which is due to the homecoming of the two favorites, nor of the pleasure that Bessie Barriscale expressed at the opportunity once more to kiss her pretty finger tips to her old friends, the Alcazarltes, over the footlights that rim the stage of her old home.

In fact, you see, this story tells you very little, after aIL.