The Theatre Magazine; an Analysis of Its Treatment of Selected Aspects of American Theatre
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This dissertation has been 63-3305 microfilmed exactly as received MEERSMAN, Roger Leon, 1931- THE THEATRE MAGAZINE; AN ANALYSIS OF ITS TREATMENT OF SELECTED ASPECTS OF AMERICAN THEATRE. University of Illinois, Ph.D., 1962 Speech-Theater University Microfilms, Inc.. Ann Arbor. Michigan aa*" *i Copyright by ROGER LEON MEERSMAN 1963 _ < -.-• J-1'.-. v» •>; I, THE THEATRE MAGAZINE: AN ANALYSIS OF ITS TREATMENT OF SELECTED ASPECTS OF AMERICAN THEATRE BY ROGER LEON MEERSMAN B.A., St. Ambrose College, 1952 M.A. , University of Illinois, 1959 THESIS Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Speech in the Graduate College of the University of Illinois, 1962 Urbana, Illinois UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS THE GRADUATE COLLEGE September 20, 1962 I HEREBY RECOMMEND THAT THE THESIS PREPARED UNDER MY SUPERVISION Ttv Roger Leon Meersman FNTTTT.PX> The Theatre Magazine: An Analysis of Its Treatment of Selected Aspects of American Theatre BE ACCEPTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE rw Doctor of Philosophy ./$<j^Y±4S~K Afc^r-Jfr (A<Vf>r In Charge of Thesis yrt rfnSSL•o-g^ . Head of Department Recommendation concurred inf Cw .MluJ^H, ^ya M< Committee ( WgJrAHJ- V'/]/eA}tx.rA on UP, ^A^k Final Examination! fl. ^L^^fcc^A f Required for doctor's degree but not for master's DS17 iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I sincerely wish to thank the members of my committee, Professors Karl Wallace, Wesley Swanson, Joseph Scott, Charles Shattuck and Marvin Herrick for establishing high standards of scholarship and for giving me valuable advice in the courses I took from them. To my wife, Delight, and my father goes my appreciation for their continued support and encouragement. But my largest debt of gratitude is due' Professor Barnard Hewitt for his patient and exacting guidance of this dissertation. The compliment once paid Sarah Bernhardt is applicable to Professor Hewitt: "La Domination d'une Ame qui se Laisse $tre Belle." TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS v INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER I THE ENDOWED THEATRE MOVEMENT 8 II THE ART AND LITTLE THEATRE MOVEMENT 45 III SCENERY. 88 IV DRAMA ,...,.. 134 V THE FOREIGN VISITORS 169 VI AMERICAN ACTING . 191 VII THE MOTION PICTURE 210 CONCLUSIONS 224 APPENDIX 234 BIBLIOGRAPHY 408 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE 1. Picture of the Sensational Train Effect in The Ninety and Nine (November 1902, p. 11). .... 89 2. Scenes from Viola Allen*s Production of Twelfth Night (December 1903, p. 292) 92 3. Scenes from Viola Allen*s Production of The Winter*s Tale (February 1905, p. 41) 94 4. Scenes of Livingston Piatt's settings for Margaret Anglin*s production of Sophocles* Electra (April 1918, p. 211) , 113 5. Pictures of Joseph Urban*s settings for Miss Springtime and Giselle (December 1917, p. 367) . 116 6. Pictures of Robert Edmond Jones and his settings for Till Eulenspiegel. The Fountain. Love for Love. Richard III, and The Man Who Married a-Dumb Wife (November 1915, p. 13) 122 \ 1 INTRODUCTION The purpose of this study is to analyze The Theatre magazine's attitude toward and treatment of selected aspects of American theatre between 1901 and 1931. Theatre historians and critics agree that the American theatre reached its maturity during these years. Early in the twentieth century, two major national magazines devoted to the best in drama and theatre appeared. The more famous of these was Theatre Arts founded in 1916. It is the subject of an extensive study by George Newton Gordon.-^ The other was The Theatre, published from May, 1901 through April, 1931.2 Glenn Hughes called the founding of The Theatre a significant event. He described it as "a venture which provided the, country with a lively and excellently illustrated monthly record of the legitimate theatre for a period of thirty years."3 Although Frank Luther Mott in his monumental History of American Magazines 1. George Newton Gordon, "Theatrical Movements in the Theatre Arts Magazine from 1916 to 1948. A Description and Analysis" (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, School of Education, New York University, 1957). 2. The Theatre's first issue was May* 1901 and listed as Vol. I, no. 3. The magazine incorporated in its first volume the-two issues of Our Players* Gallery. Oct-Nov, 1900, Vol. I, no, 1, and Jan-Feb, 1901, Vol. 2, no. 1. The Theatre is numbered Vol. I through Vol. 53, no. 4, but there is no consistency in numbering the volumes. Consequently, all of my references to the magazine give month, year and page number instead of volume number. The subtitle of the magazine underwent various changes and in August, 1917, The Theatre be came Theatre Magazine. For uniformity, The Theatre is used ex clusively in this dissertation, 3. Glenn Hughes, A History of the American Theatre 1700-1950 (New York: Samuel French, 1951), p. 321. 1 2 praised The Theatre as *quite the most ambitious attempt in American theatrical history to present adequate representation of the stage in a periodical," scholars and historians such 2 3 as Mott, Theodore Peterson, Algernon Tassin, and Frederick 4 Allen have tended to ignore The Theatre. No adequate study of The Theatre has been made. The first editor of The Theatre5. Arthur Hornblow, seems to have been largely responsible for the policies of the magazine. He appears to have been the dominating figure among the magazine's personnel, for he presided over its publication for - twenty-six years. Hornblow was born in Manchester, England in 1865 and studied literature and art in Paris where he be'came the foreign correspondent for American and English journals. After coming to America in 1889 he was a staff member of the Kansas City Globe and the Dramatic Mirror. From 1892 to 1894, he was an assistant play reader for A. M, Palmer and from 1894 to 1899 filled various positions in America and Europe for the 1. Frank Luther Mott, A History of American Magazines (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1957), IV, 1885- 1905, 261-262. The Dramatic Index called The Theatre "one of the most important periodicals devoted to the stage," but it only indexes the magazine starting in 1906. It is not indexed in the Readers* Guide to Periodical Literature. 2. Theodore Peterson, Magazines in the Twentieth Century (Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1956). 3. Algernon Tassin, The Magazine in America (New York: Dodd, Mead and Co., 1916). 4. Frederick Allen, American Magazines 1841-1941 (New York Public Library, 1941). 5. W, J, Thorold was editor of the two issues of Our Players' Gallery. 3 New York Herald. After leaving the Herald he became a staff member of the New York Times and remained there until he assumed the editorship of The Theatre in May, 1901. Upon re tiring from The Theatre in March, 1927, Hornblow became Dean of the John Murray Anderson-Robert Milton School of the Theatre. In addition to being an editor, he was a successful novelist. His first important work was The Lion and the Mouse (1906) a novelized version of Charles Klein*s exceptionally successful Broadway play. This novel was so popular that Hornblow was able to buy a country home in England with its profits. He collaborated with Klein in writing The End of the Game. The Profligate. The Third Degree and others. With Eugene Walter he wrote a novelized version of The Easiest Way, and with George Broadhurst he novelized Bought and Paid For and The Price. In addition to novels and plays, he also published Training for the Stage (1916) and A History of the Theatre in America (1919), Hornblow was succeeded as editor of The Theatre in March, 1927 by Perriton Maxwell, formerly editor of the Metropolitan magazine (1900 to 1906), Cosmopolitan (1906 to 1910), Hearst's Magazine (1913-1914), and ludee and Leslie's Weekly (1917 to " 1921). He had also written Masterpieces of Art and Nature (1895), American Art and Artists (1896), and A Third Life (1921). Stewart Beach replaced Maxwell in September, 1929 and re mained The Theatre's editor until it ceased publication in April, 1931. He had been a special lecturer on modern poetry and the short story at New York University from 1922 to 1924, editor of The Independent (1924 to 1928), and assistant editor of The Outlook and Independent (1929), Considering the purpose of this study, information for it is derived almost entirely from the fifty-three volumes of The Theatre. They contain over 5,000 editorials, articles, and unclassifiable items, plus over 2,000 play reviews. -For back ground material I have drawn upon the standard works on American theatre and drama. In the American theatre from 1900 to 1930 a number of important changes took place. The Theatre provides a fairly comprehensive record of these changes and much of the criticism of theatre customs and practices that attended the changes is to be found within the magazine's pages. Hornblow, in his History of the Theatre in America. described the American theatre at the time that The Theatre was founded: Beginning with the last decade of the Nineteenth century, the theatre in America already showed a marked and steady decline. The glorious nights of Wallack's, when the stock system was seen at the height of its prosperity, were now only a memory. Those managers of fine achievement, •ugustin Daly and A. M. Palmer, had seen their best days. Clyde Fitch, Augustus Thomas and other native playwrights of promise were rising, but even their genius could avail nothing in the face of the changed conditions. New men with new methods had come into the theatrical field.