Mr. Gillette's Cigar
Mr. Gillette's Cigar is an article published in The Inter Ocean on 9 december 1900.
About the play Sherlock Holmes at Powers' Theater, Chicago, USA.
Mr. Gillette's Cigar
Exciting Incident It Offers in "Sherlock Holmes."
TRICKS OF THE STAGE
Gillette's Individuality Impressed on Members of Company.
Marquis of Steyne and His Garter in "Becky Sharp" — Detail in Plays is Carefully Noticed by Public.
A long trail of tobacco smoke has followed the Gillette drama almost from its inception. Augustus Billings, the talented prevaricator of "Too Much Johnson." smoked, as he lied, with entire seriousness, and so, too, did the spy-hero of "Secret Service" feed largely on cigars. It was, therefore, natural when Mr. Gillette decided to transfer Sherlock Holmes to the stage, that he should appreciate that strange gentleman's liking for tobacco. In Sherlock Holmes Mr. Gillette is found smoking the deadly cigarette, the baneful cigar, and the soothing pipe. But it is the cigar that gives him his main melodramatic situation — a situation causing the usually unemotional and venerable gentleman in the parquet to thrill equally with the staring-eyed youth in the gallery. For the secret of success with Mr. Gillette is that he appeals alike to the man in front of him and the boy hanging over his head, and his accomplishment is, after all, simple, since the first step he always takes is to interest them in the story he has, to tell. After that he amazes with stage witchcraft and tricks. He is the Kellar of the playwrights.
Nor could Kellar devise anything more novel than this cigar scene, with its unexpected culmination. In this scene-it is the gloomy underground gas chamber — Sherlock Holmes faces a danger that is made to appear more actual than the several dangers preceding it. The room contains only a table with a lamp on it, some chairs, and a few boxes. It may be remarked that it is a "real lamp," but that by a brass-tube arrangement the oil does not spill when it is smashed. It is also, possibly, of interest to know that Mr. Gillette smashes a new lamp every night, that he buys these by the hundred, and that they cost him a little less than $1 each. The room has one door at the left of the stage, another at the rear-leading into a closet — and a window at the right. The window has been barred, but the detective is supposed not to know this, so the only way of escape is through the door. At the critical mor moment, then, we find Sherlock Holmes and the night-wandering Miss Faulkner surrounded by some five men, who are determined to kill him. They stand around him a semi-circle, cutting off escape through the door and make a concerted movement toward him. Just here Sherlock Holmes picks up a chair and smashes the lamp, leaving the stage in utter darkness. All that can be seen is the glowing red end of the cigar he is smoking. "Track him by the cigar," shouts the chief criminal. The cigar end glows out in the darkness as the man apparently dodges about in the effort to elude his pursuers. Then it moves over to the window and stops, and there is a crash of glass. The lights go up. Sherlock Holmes and the gentle heroine are standing by the door, ready to escape.
"You will find that cigar stuck in a crevice in the window," observes Sherlock Holmes politely to the brigands assembled around it in silent astonishment, and so he withdraws in safety, closing the door as he goes out and bolting it.
It was, of course, a mighty convenient crevice that Mr. Holmes found while groping about in the darkness, and the cigar that continued to burn red after he had laid it away, was also something of a curiosity, but these things are "mere detail," and if the light came in reality from small electric bulb that was in the window at all times, covered by something that Mr. Holmes removed, this is a matter of stage business with which we are not supposed to concern ourselves. There are some moving excitements in that Stepney gas chamber, and that is the principal thing.
Characters in "Sherlock Holmes."
The heroine of "Sherlock Holmes" is a rather interesting person herself, when you consider that she wins the great detective, and that they surely live happy ever a after the lights fade out on the pretty picture that finds her clinging to him with one soft hand on his coat collar. Dr. Doyle killed Mr. Holmes — presumably — by dashing him over a precipice, but Mr. Gillette reserves him for a kindlier fate and Alice Faulkner. Like all tractable melodramatic heroines Alice carries "the papers" about with her, and "the papers" make the stage story possible. When, in the first act, Mr. Holmes comes to the home of the Larrabees, to find where Miss Faulkner has hidden this packet, he is baffled by her downright refusal to surrender it, nor is he enabled to discover its hiding place. He gives a signal by pounding a chair on the floor and the cry of "Fire!" is raised by some one without. Alice starts over toward an upholstered arm chair. Holmes, who has previously arranged this trick, intercepts her, tears away the lining, and "the papers" are his. Whereupon Alice upbraids him, and he returns the packet. Of course, in the end she gives it up of her own sweet will, and forgoes the revenge she had intended.
The young woman who plays Alice is said to be the youngest leading woman now supporting a star of prominence. She is Miss Maude Fealy, who last season played the slave girl in the McVicker's production of "Quo Vadis," celebrating the event as the only feminine in the cast who acted like a human being. In all the absurd theatricalism of the original production Miss Fealy is still recalled for that was entirely natural and always sympathetic. Her cruldities at that time were those of gesture, but these seem to have been lost in the transition from the Roman melodrama to the more finished modern melodrama furnished by Mr. Gillette, and while Alice Faulkner is not a character that demands the presence of genius, it is one that must win its way, and quickly, into the good graces of the audience. It is apparent that Miss Fealy's somewhat deeper than the "always-sweet and ever-graceful" heroine of "Sherlock Holmes," but even in this rather colorless character she makes her gift of personality felt, and it is not too much to look forward to some noteworthy accomplishment from her.
Reuben Fax, who was one of the Svengalis during the "Trilby" rage, comes into prominence through this detective drama. As John Forman, an assistant of Holmes', he is found as a servant in the first act, and so striking are his methods that a delightful sense of mystery is aroused over this strange butler of the Larrabee household, from the moment he enters the room and gives the daily paper to the adventuress and then retires, opening and shutting the door, but not going out. Instead, he watches the woman read the paper. Here, and within two minutes after the curtain has risen, Mr. Gillette contrives one of his incidents of suspense, and throughout the act the servant is followed curiously and every movement watched. It is not until the scene in Sherlock Holmes' apartments arrives that Forman's true relation to the detective is made known. Mr. Fax plays this character with a great deal of discretion and gives it a fascination somewhat peculiar. The Gillette spirit prevails everywhere in "Sherlock Holmes," and no doubt the excellent results that are attained are due to long and persistent drilling. How much of Miss Fealy's Alice or Mr. Fax's Forman or Mr. Wessells' Professor Moriarty are theirs by inspiration or Mr. Gillette's by instruction would be interesting to know. He has certainly impressed his own individuallty generally throughout the company.
Detail in Plays.
Small and large affairs appear to interest the "Becky Sharp" auditors equally. One correspondent writes The Inter Ocean: "Will those that follow things dramatic pardon suburbanite and tell, if they can, why it is that the most noble, the Marquis of Steyne, appears in Becky Sharp's parlor with his royal gift, the priceless garter, on his right, which happens to be the wrong, leg?"
In the otherwise careful detail of this performance this point seems, indeed, to have been overlooked, the proper place for the garter, according to the the best authority, being on the left leg, a little below the knee. Yet it has been worn on the right leg by both players essaying the Marquis of Steyne in Mrs. Fiske's company. The authority of the costumers is given by the producer of the play for this departure but it would seem that he is in error, and that the Marquis of Steyne is nightly committing a most serious breach of decorative etiquette.
Another correspondent declares that because the Marquis of Steyne wore the garter on the wrong leg he was robbed of much of his enjoyment — from which conclusion it is fair to believe that those who overlook these little matters of detail are far more fortunate in their views of theatrical performances. A viewing "Arizona" in this city last season, was sensitively shocked because the cowboys wore their bandanna handkerchiefs with the knots tied under their chins. "Real cowboys make a loop of their handkerchiefs," he explained, "with the soft end hanging in front and and the knot at the back. This is because they often press the handkerchief to their lips or rub the dust from their faces with it." This detail so preyed upon the spectator's mind that he called the attention of the playwright to it, and his view was borne out by no less an authority than Frederic Remington. Consequently Mr. Thomas heeded the complaint, and the bandannas are now worn according to Western custom.
