Part 60

Just as Edna May had bidden farewell to America in "The Catch of the Season," so she now bade farewell to the English stage in "Nelly Neil." She had become engaged to Oscar Lewisohn, who insisted on an early marriage. About this time Frohman and George Edwardes secured the English rights to "The Merry Widow." They both urged Miss May to postpone her marriage and appear in it. Miss May was now compelled to decide between matrimony and what would have been perhaps her greatest success, and she chose matrimony.

Her good-by appearance on the stage, May 1, 1907, was one of the most extraordinary events in the history of the English theater. This lovely, unassuming American girl had so completely endeared herself to the hearts of the London theater-goers that she was made the center of a tumultuous farewell. The day the seat-sale opened there was a queue several blocks long. During the opening performance Charles sat in his box alone. When some friends entered he was in tears. He had a genuine personal affection for Miss May, and her retirement touched him very deeply.

In connection with "Nelly Neil" there is a little story which illustrates Charles's attitude toward his productions. He had spent a fortune on "Nelly Neil," and it was not a financial success. After giving it every chance he instructed Lestocq to put up the two weeks' notice. Lestocq remarked that it was a shame to end such a magnificent presentation. Whereupon Frohman turned around quickly and said:

"Shut up, or I'll run it another month. You know, Lestocq, if I don't keep a hand on myself sometimes my sentiment will be the ruin of me."

* * *

By this time Frohman and James M. Barrie had become close friends. The manager had produced "Quality Street" at the Vaudeville Theater with great success. He now approached a Barrie production which gave him perhaps more pleasure than anything he did in his whole stage life. The advent of "Peter Pan" was at hand. The remarkable story of how Charles got the manuscript of "Peter Pan" has already been told in this biography.

The original title that Barrie gave the play was "The Great White Father," which Frohman liked. Just as soon as Barrie suggested that it be named after its principal character, Frohman fairly overflowed with enthusiasm. In preparing for "Peter Pan" in England, Charles was like a child with a toy. Money was spent lavishly; whole scenes were made and never used. He regarded it as a great and rollicking adventure.

The first production of the Barrie masterpiece on any stage took place at the Duke of York's Theater, London, on December 27, 1904. Frohman was then in America. At his country place up at White Plains, only his close friend, Paul Potter, with him, he eagerly awaited the verdict. It was a bitterly cold night, and a snow-storm was raging. Frohman's secretary in the office in New York had arranged to telephone the news of the play's reception which Lestocq was expected to cable from London. On account of the storm the message was delayed.

Frohman was nervous. He kept on saying, "Will it never come?" His heart was bound up in the fortunes of this beloved fairy play. While he waited with Potter, Frohman acted out the whole play, getting down on all-fours to illustrate the dog and crocodile. He told it as Wendy would have told it, for Wendy was one of his favorites. Finally at midnight the telephone-bell rang. Potter took down the receiver. Frohman jumped up from his chair, saying, eagerly, "What's the verdict?" Potter listened a moment, then turned, and with beaming face repeated Lestocq's cablegram:

Peter Pan all right. Looks like a big success.

This was one of the happiest nights in Frohman's life.

The first Peter in England was Nina Boucicault, who played the part with great wistfulness and charm. She was the first of a quartet which included Cissy Loftus, Pauline Chase, and Madge Titheradge.

Charles so adored "Peter Pan" that he produced it in Paris, June 1, 1909, at the Vaudeville Theater, with an all-English cast headed by Pauline Chase. Robb Harwood was Captain Hook, and Sibyl Carlisle played Mrs. Darling. It was produced under the direction of Dion Boucicault. The first presentation was a great hit, and the play ran for five weeks. On the opening night Barrie and Frohman each had a box. Frohman was overjoyed at its success, and Barrie, naturally, could not repress his delight. What pleased them most was the spectacle of row after row of little French kiddies, who, while not understanding a word of the narrative, seemed to be having the time of their lives.

From the date of its first production until his death, "Peter Pan" became a fixed annual event in the English life of Charles Frohman. He revived it every year at holiday-time. No occasion in his calendar was more important than the annual appearance of the fascinating boy who had twined himself about the American manager's heart.

* * *

Charles was now a conspicuous and prominent figure in English theatrical life. The great were his friends and his opinion was much quoted. In addition to his sole control of the Duke of York's, he had interests in a dozen other playhouses. He liked the English way of doing business. Yet, despite what many people believed to be a strong pro-British tendency, he was always deeply and patriotically American, and he lost several fortunes in pioneering the American play and the American actor in England.

To name the American plays that he produced in London would be to give almost a complete catalogue of American drama revealed to English eyes. Curiously enough, at least two plays, "The Lion and the Mouse" and "Paid in Full," that had made enormous successes in America, failed utterly in England under his direction. He gave England such typically American dramas as "The Great Divide," "Brewster's Millions," "Alias Jimmy Valentine," "Years of Discretion," "A Woman's Way," "On the Quiet," and "The Dictator."

In addition to Gillette he presented Billie Burke in "Love Watches," William Collier in "The Dictator" and "On the Quiet," and Ethel Barrymore in "Cynthia."

With his presentation of Collier he did one of his characteristic strokes of enterprise. Marie Tempest was playing at the Comedy in London. He had always been anxious to try Collier's unctuous American humor on the British, so the American comedian swapped engagements with Miss Tempest. She came over to the Criterion in New York to do "The Freedom of Suzanne," while Collier took her time at the Comedy in "The Dictator." He scored a great success and remained nearly a year.

* * *

The time was now ripe for the most brilliant of all the Charles Frohman achievements in England. Had he done nothing else than the Repertory Theater he would have left for himself an imperishable monument of artistic endeavor. The extraordinary feature of this undertaking was that it was left for an American to finance and promote in the very cradle of the British drama the highest and finest attempt yet made to encourage that drama. The Repertory Theater would have proclaimed any manager the open-handed patron of drama for drama's sake.

The National or Repertory Theater idea, which was the antidote for the long run, the agency for the production of plays that had no sustained box-office virtue, which took the speculative feature out of production, had been preached in England for some time. Granville Barker had tried it at the Court Theater, where the Shaw plays had been produced originally. The movement lagged; it needed energy and money.

Barrie had been a disciple of the Repertory Theater from the start. He knew that there was only one man in the world who could make the attempt in the right way. One day in 1909 he said to Frohman:

"Why don't you establish a Repertory Theater?"

Then he explained in a few words what he had in mind.

Without a moment's hesitation Frohman said, briskly:

"All right, I'll do it."

With these few words he committed himself to an enterprise that cost him a fortune. But it was an enterprise that revealed, perhaps as nothing in his career had revealed, the depths of his artistic nature.