i a iirrrirwIMMfr -" - JJAa--f- -- -""' 3"1 aL; igpniiMTiiiTTraCTSmWIWW iF '-AvVV(-'-wk'tt(aV' ,f UEs&fej- -Amusement Section, Saturday, October 30, 1915 jmn-jPsvKft BURLESQUE BY f AN EX-BUELESQUER THE MOVIES' MASTER-LEAP THE PHOTOPLAY SPENDTHRIFT George Sidney, Translated The Legitimate, Talks on Early Art Struggles to Millions in Money and Energy Spent to Bring All the World to Your Feet Today the name of George Sidney means Just one thins to Philadelphlans "Busy Izzy." It means burlesque Tuesday morning, when the town has seen his work in "The Show Shop," It will mean something very dif ferent. At any rate that was the ex perience of New York when Mr. Sid ney suddenly blos somed into Broad way fame as the perfect portrayer of the typical thca trical manager last year. "When Mr. Sidney made his hit he told some curious GEORGE SITNEr ... ,w auiacij) si ni ne or what he thinks made burlesque a great school for him and for others. Here is what he said: -fn',UCfn ,augh if J"00 want to, but I IrSund u' somelh!ne whl,e Plains v . burlesque companies that proved to me that the big ciUes are going ,P.dUt? the Ereatest the world rations! W,U,ln the nXt few eel" .Tt1'11 teU u why," he continued Its because these cities aren't melting pots and never were and never will be theyYe open markets for the world. They're the one common meeting ground or all races and all nationalities, and they come there and keep up to concert pitch partly for commercial reasons and partly lor sentimental ones, and end by producing the very best that all races are capable of. "If you ask me what all this has got to do with burlesque. I'll tell you that you Can lenrn nratt. vto-i.. .,.! ma little burlesque company, staying to- ,, "' ana year out, made up of all sorts of people, and being acted on by pretty nearly all sorts of outside con ditions. A burlesque company is the world In a nutshell. "You see I'm a Jew, and I began by playing a caricature of a Jew Busy Izzy. I was young and pretty frisky, and I stood in danger or overplaying Izzy-mak-lng him a noisy .burlesque of himself. Two thingshcld me back. The first was that I didn't want to offend my own people, I was afraid they would stay away from the theatre and I'd be a failure. And the second reason is a little more credit able to me. though it's Just as true I had a reeling that I didn't wanl to mis represent my people to all the others that might be in my audience. It was a sort or race pride. "Mind you, in those flibbertigibbc young days 1 didn't say all these things out I just felt 'em. But I felt 'em so strong ly that I kept lzzy within bounds and, better still, I got into the habit of re straining myself. "Well, after my second year Vith my own company. I noticed that I was get- ting the best steady work' in my comrany from a young Irish boy that wore green whiskers. He had to have the green whiskers, he said, because they expected them of him; but he was Just the quietest little comedian you ever saw One day we were both sitting out in the property room, and I asked him how he felt about the whole business of acting those cari cature things we did, and he said " T don't think much of it, if you must know; but I do all I can to make my seir as Inoffensive as I can and still get by.' "It kind of made me Jump. 'What do you mean by that?' I asked him. " T mean that it's no picnic to get out there and make an Irishman what they call funny. I'm an Irishman myseir, and 3 don't like it And there are a lot of other Irishmen out there In those audi ences, and I'll bet a hat they don't like It, either. It seems like a low-lived trick So I Just keep toning down and toning down and trying not to slander my coun try every time I open i head.' ' "Well, we sat there an hour. I reckon. In the property room, chinning over our troubles. We Anally concluded that for the sake of our own people we'd put on the soft pedal and Just let come what might That was when wc were both still young nough to think that we were sacrificing our 'art. Yes, sir, there -we oat, solemnly renouncing the really great careers we thought we might have had, out of loyalty and sentiment, and all that, when what we were actually doing was making the one resolve that gave us any hope at all as actors. I've heard people eay that no art is great except the kind that has great limita tions. That probably means a good deal more than that Irishman and I meant, but we meant to accept those curbs our selves, anyway. "We stuck to them, too, through thick and thin. We wouldn't make zanies out of our own people. We were not willing to belittle ourselves, and we were not willing tohow ourselves up to each other. "What was the result? That after 12 years I could come out or burlesque and go Into legitimate comedy without alter ing a fraction of my comedy method. I may never be a great actor, but at least I wls good enough for that "That principle works all through the (fib! EaBlEiXHir TC Ti' ii "RWh s ix, zA X5Wb. ,.A &mmsm "Carmen" has acquired a new ending at least, the "Carmen" of Theda Bara. It sends Don Jose to suicide over the highest cliff that a movie star has ever leapt -without the aid of a dummy. Horse and rider took this 83-foot plunge at Au Sable Chasm, Fort Kent, in the Adirondacks, turning two loops. The horse escaped uninjured. The man broke his leg on the rocks in the bottom of the pool. big cities all through America. We as semble here from the four corners of the globe, and we are not willing to bur lesque ourselves and libel ourselves be cause of all the strangers that are looking on. We put the kibosh on our exaggera tions In sheer self-defense. And that's all that saves us, most of us, anyhow. And It's what makes great actors more than anything else. "Just give America time and not too much time, either and we'll be the nation of great Interpreters, great playwrights and great actors." The wild chase of motion-plctuie di rectors for local color and atmospheric detail. If trailed by the average layman, would be the source within a few months of a wider education than the average Cook's tourist gleans in a year of con stant travel. Trailing the atmospheric detail and local color to their lair con stitutes a formidable effort on the part of the men who stage the big movie dramas one sees upon entering the Bijou Dream, Idle Hour and Nickelodeon. Any one who saw "Trilby" must have wondered how the night scenes ol Paris were faked. If they solved the problem at all, they were wrong, for the Equitable Company sent a camera man to I'aris with credentials from the State Department that secured him and his camera permission to focus the princi pal boulevards during their busy hours. The street and Interior scenes in this same picture, wherein Trilbv and Sven- j gall arc supposedly in Huamnia, were taken on the plains of Statcn Island, v. lth real denizens of Bleecker, Delan cex and Mulberry streets as the princi pal decorative elements. In "The Fisher Girl," In which the Equitable Corporation is offering Muriel Ostriche, two location experts went to Block Island, where they spent two weeks prevailing upon the local fisher folks to take active part In the production. They did so at $10 per participation, which in cluded the uie of their families, huts and fishing paraphernalia. Webster Culllson, one of the Equitablo's producing geniuses, Is at Martinique, In the French West Indies, where, on the very edge of Mont l'elee, he will stage many scenes in "The Labyrinth," in which rugged coast lines, jagged rocks and abysmal mountain pits are to blend in with Gail Kane's romantic acting. Charles Scay is In Washington taking scenes in the halls of Congress, the Cap itol. White House grounds, Federal, Treasury and other buildings. These scenes are backgrounds for "The Sen ator," with Charles Ross playing the title role, and which Triumph Films will release early in December. It was neces sary for Equitable to send a man, re ferred to by the office as "fixer," to Washington m advance to arrange de tails and secure permits. When "The Senator" is finally seen on the screen residents of Boise. Idaho; Valdosta. Ga.. I and other distant towns can take a per sonally conducted tour ol Hie nations capital and see a modern drama for the j one price of admission. When Thomas A. Wise selected Tau' Armstrong' "Blue Grass" for his ap pearance on the screen, and half the pic ture was complete, the quandary of se curing prup.T nice track detail confronted the director. The big summer meet was on at Saiatoga Springs, and thither went Wise and his thirty supporting players. After due process of "setting in good," a race was run one morning at sunrise, the usual clocking hour, and Blue Grass, the movie hor.se, beat out some of the fore most thoroughbreds at the track. Result, a perfectly good punch was gotten with real race track atmosphere and truc-to-life types of touts, jockes, exercising bos and owners. Eighteen prlnclpils and fifty -xtra plajers, all in evening dress, wended their way to Biysidc. L I., several weeks ago, and on the lawn of the palatial residence of Alfred A. Aarons, on Wright avenue, a lawn fete was staged The entire lawn, covering half a blOLk, was hung and fes tooned with vari-colorcd lanterns. Gorge ously dres-Md women flitted from table to table serving crippled soldiers num berless privates and olliccrs from Fort Totten It was a big rcene in a picture that will b- --leased soon. It required four days oi work by 15 builders to put the lawn In proper shape, yet the scene is shown on the scieen hut an inttnnt. In "Tho Fisher Girl." Charles Scay bought, dynamited and fccuttled a, fishing schooner that had lain in the harbor of Block Island for two j cars. It was past Us usefulness and was more a nuisance than a benefit to the colon.. Yet when Geay tried to rid the harbor of It. the former owner suddenly discovered that ho was going to use it again and demanded payment In the sum of $100 before he would permit of its destruction. Waltfr McNamam, wlio staged "Human Cargoes." engaged IS tough looking char acters from the cast side for a mob scene, and before he reached the scene where the big fight was to lu staged, the gang had fallen out over a game of cards and half the ganj- had chased the other half off. A train of nine cars and an engine was icccntly engaged lor four hours from the New York Central to be used In a sen sational railroad scene. John Ince, who directed the fcccne, m.ido the arrange ments himself with the railroad company. Tho total bill read: Nine private cars at $00 I"iO.0O 45 miles at 13c per mile each C0.75 Victualing one diner 17.C0 Add to this several hundred dummies or supernumeraries nt S3 per day. 13 principals, ranging from 10 to 50 a day, and the star, at perhaps J15W a week, and an Idea may be had of the expense in volved In only one scene. In -in11Mn r-fr-f f-rr
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers