Part 8 (1/2)

[Ill.u.s.tration: MAY HAINES AND ISA BOWMAN AS THE TWO PRINCES IN KING RICHARD III.]

The most remarkable and most successful of the Infant Phenomena of modern times in America have been the Bateman Children, the Marsh Juvenile Troupe, and the Boone and the Holman Children. On the 10th of December, 1849, E. A. Marshall, manager of the Broadway Theatre, introduced on the boards of that house, for the first time to New York audiences, Kate and Ellen Bateman, whose united ages were not ten years. Kate made her _debut_ as Richmond, and Ellen, the younger, as Richard, in scenes from Shakspere's _Richard III._ The announcement of the coming of the infantile Thespians was not favorably received by the regular attendants of the Broadway; the appearance of prodigies of any kind being a departure from the ways of that traditional home of the legitimate drama, and there was a prejudice formed against these young stars which nothing but the absolute cleverness of their performances was able to overcome. After Mr.

Hackett as Falstaff, and Miss Cushman as Lady Macbeth, it was scarcely natural that unknown children in the same and kindred parts should satisfy the critical audiences of the Old Broadway. The popularity of the Batemans, however, was quickly established; those who came to scoff on the first night returned to praise; the whole town, young and old, petted and applauded the children; while still the wonder grew, during the single week of their engagement, how the two small heads could carry all they knew. It seemed incredible that an infant of four years like Ellen Bateman could present anything approaching an embodiment of such characters as Shylock, Richard, or Lady Macbeth; or that a child of six, as was Kate at that time, should be able to play Richmond, Portia, or the Thane with the correctness of elocution, the spirit, and the proper comprehension of the language and the business which she displayed. The simple task of committing to memory the text of so many parts was in itself a marvellous effort for children of their tender age, but to be able to speak these lines as set down for them with correct emphasis and gesture, and with every appearance of a thorough conception of the character sustained, as the little Batemans are said to have done, certainly warranted all the praise that was bestowed upon them. Every fresh character they undertook was a surprise, and was considered more clever than any that had preceded it. Lady Macbeth was, perhaps, the most successful of Ellen's a.s.sumptions, while Kate read Portia with amazing skill and propriety; her delivery of the familiar lines was finished, and her carriage throughout was that of an experienced artist.

After appearing in Boston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and other American cities, the Bateman Children were taken to England by P. T. Barnum, in the summer of 1851, making their first appearance there at the St. James's Theatre, London, on the 23d August, as _The Young Couple_, and meeting with decided success. They returned to the Old Broadway November 15, 1852, and opened in a comedietta ent.i.tled _Her Royal Highness_, written expressly for them. They were quite as popular here as when they first appeared, and before they left New York Mayor Kingsland, ”on behalf of a committee of leading citizens,” presented to each of the children a tiny gold watch.

In 1856, no longer juveniles, though still most acute, voluble, and full of grace, they retired from the stage. Miss Kate Bateman returned to it, however, in a few years, a young lady, and an actress of more than ordinary merit. Even if she had not since then made for herself, both in this country and in England, a reputation as one of the strongest tragic and melodramatic artists on the English-speaking stage, the story of her early career as told here is worthy of a place in dramatic history because of the precocious excellence of her acting as a child, and of the wonderful success which she everywhere won. She was a Phenomenon among Phenomena in this respect, that she grew and advanced in her profession as she grew in stature and advanced in years--one of the very few of the infant prodigies who, in later life, became an ornament to the stage.

On the 10th of December, 1855, precisely six years after the first appearance of the Bateman Children at the Broadway Theatre, the Marsh Juvenile Troupe made their first appearance here at the same house, and made, also, a very favorable impression even upon critics not predisposed to be attracted by any exhibition of prodigies. In their acting was a perceptible absence of that familiar, parrot-like, mechanical repet.i.tion of unfamiliar words, and of those studied and artificial att.i.tudes so painfully marked in juvenile players generally. Their impersonations were spirited and exact, and evinced unusual mental apt.i.tude and training, their audiences being sometimes startled by the extraordinary precocity with which some of the leading parts were filled. Their initial performance consisted of _Beauty and the Beast_, Miss Louisa Marsh representing the Beast, while little Mary Marsh, as Beauty, pleasantly filled all of the personal and mental requirements of that _role_. _Beauty and the Beast_ was followed by _The Wandering Minstrel_, Master George H.

Marsh playing Jem Baggs, ”with the popular, doleful, pathetic, sympathetic, lamentable history of 'Villikins and his Dinah.'” These were supplemented later, during the Marshes' engagement, with _The Rivals_--Mr.

Blake as Sir Anthony, Madame Ponisi as Julia--or with _A Morning Call_, Madame Ponisi playing Mrs. Chillington, and Augustus A. Fenno Sir Edward; the Juveniles, although attractive, being scarcely successful in filling the house by their sole exertions.

The Marsh Children, although generally announced by that name on the bills, were not members of one family, nor were they Marshes. George and Mary, brother and sister, and both of them said to have been less than eight years of age when they came here first, were in private life Master and Miss Guerineau--while the other leading lady, Louisa Marsh, was properly Miss McLaughlin. The entire company was composed of children. As they died--and the mortality among them was remarkable--or as they grew too large for the troupe, their places were filled by other precocious infants, engaged by their clever manager in his strollings from town to town. Among the members of the company at different times were Miss Ada Webb, Miss f.a.n.n.y Berkley, Miss Ada and Miss Minnie Monk, and Louis Aldrich, all of whom, if not great, subsequently, in their profession, are still not unknown to fame. Unlike the Batemans, however, none of the Marsh Juveniles ever became stars of more than common magnitude, and none of them are s.h.i.+ning very brilliantly on the stage to-day. George Marsh, the low comedian, was very clever in his way, although not original in his impersonations. His powers of imitation were marvellous, and his Toodles, a miniature copy of Burton's Toodles, in which all of the business and many of the gags--even to the profanity at the mention of Thompson--were retained, was almost as funny in its uproariousness as was Burton's Toodles itself, and certainly better than many of the imitations that have been seen since Burton's day. Little Mary Marsh was an uncommonly attractive child, bright-eyed, graceful, fresh, and fair. The boy between eight and fifteen in her audiences who did not succ.u.mb to her loveliness was only fit for treason, stratagem, and spoils. Her name was to be found written in some copy-book, her face sketched in some drawing-book in the male department of every school in New York, and in the average schoolboy's mind she was a.s.sociated in some romantic way with all of the good and beautiful women of his history or his mythology; she inhabited all the salubrious and balmy isles in his geography; she was dreamed of in his philosophy; and one particular lad, who is now more than old enough to pay the school bills of boys of his own, when asked, in a chemistry cla.s.s, by the master, ”What is the symbol and equivalent of pota.s.sium?” answered, absently, but without hesitation, ”Mary Mars.h.!.+”

The pa.s.sion the child inspired in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of her adorers was a pure one, and, except in the neglect of a prosy lesson or two, it did no harm.

Her memory is still kept green in the hearts of many practical men of to-day, who unblus.h.i.+ngly confess to a filling of their boyish eyes and a quivering of their boyish lips when the sad story of her untimely and dreadful death was told here. While playing in one of the Southern cities, her dress took fire from the footlights and she was fatally burned, living but an hour or two after the accident occurred.

On the 3d of August, 1857, the Marshes played _Black-eyed Susan_ at Laura Keene's Theatre here, followed by _The Toodles_. From the bill of this, their opening night, the following casts are copied:

BLACK-EYED SUSAN.

William Miss Louisa Marsh.

Gnatbrain Master George H. Marsh.

Tom Bowling Master Alfred (Stewart).

Admiral Master Waldo (Todd).

Dolly Mayflower Miss Carrie (Todd).

Black-eyed Susan Miss Mary Marsh.

TOODLES.

Timothy Toodles Master George H. Marsh.

George Acorn Miss Louisa Marsh.

Tabitha Toodles Miss Mary Marsh.

This was probably the last season of the Marsh Juveniles in New York, and since their exit no startling troupe of Phenomena have appeared here. The Boone and the Holman Children were clever, but not so successful as the Marshes. The Worrell Sisters were popular, but, although young girls, they were in their teens, and scarcely came under the head of infant players.

They made their New York _debut_ at Wood's Theatre, 514 Broadway, afterwards the Theatre Comique, under the management of George Wood, in a burletta called _The Elves_, April 30, 1866, Miss Sophie Worrell, the eldest of the three sisters, being at that time fully eighteen years of age.

Among the occasional companies of children who have appeared in New York were ”The Mexican Juvenile Troupe.” They occupied Mr. Daly's Fifth Avenue Theatre during the summer season of 1875, remaining two weeks, and appearing at the Lyceum Theatre, on Fourteenth Street, from the 1st to the 13th of November in the same year. Their performances were conducted in the Spanish language, and their specialty was opera-bouffe. They were well trained in voice and action, but the music in their childish treble was weak; and, personally, the troupe ran to legs and arms and hands and feet, and the general angular and awkward undevelopment characteristic of their age and size. The bit of a _prima donna_ who sang La Grand d.u.c.h.esse and La Belle Helene in the t.i.tular parts, and who was known to fame as Signorina Carmen Unda y Moron, was made up carefully after Tostee, whom, in certain actions and gestures and expression of face, she much resembled. She displayed all of the vim and _abandon_ and _chic_ of the veteran actress, and tossed her head, and switched her train, and ogled and leered, and capered like the very Tostee herself, as seen through the reverse of an opera-gla.s.s. The child acted with spirit, or something that was like it, and seemed to have a morbid enjoyment and comprehension of the indelicate parts she played. The spectacle was far from being a pleasant one, and probably shocked more persons than it amused. Little Carmen was certainly not more than eight years old, and barely as tall as the table in her stage parlor, while none of the company reached in height the backs of the chairs of ordinary size with which, in strange incongruity, the stage of the Lyceum was always set.

During the past fifteen or twenty years there have appeared upon the New York stage, generally unheralded, several little actors and actresses who have shown decided ability for the profession, while claiming no phenomenal talent, and in whom certainly there seemed to be fair promise of a brilliant future. Among these have been little Minnie Maddern, who appeared at the French Theatre on Fourteenth Street, May 30, 1870, as Sibyl Carew, in Tom Taylor's _Sheep in Wolf's Clothing_, supporting Miss Carlotta Leclercq as Anne. Her knowledge of stage business, her general carriage, and the careful delivery of her lines throughout the play were remarkable for a child of her years; and hers was considered one of the most satisfactory representations in the piece. The pleasant reputation she made there was sustained at Booth's Theatre in the month of May, 1874, when she played Arthur in _King John_, with Junius Brutus Booth, Jr., in the t.i.tular part, Mrs. Agnes Booth as Constance, and John McCullough as the b.a.s.t.a.r.d--a good cast. A more pretentious Arthur--an older, not a better one--was that of Master Percy Roselle, who played it in one act of _King John_ at a _matinee_ benefit given to Miss Matilda Heron, January 17, 1872.

Miss Jennie Yeamans was _almost_ a Phenomenon, although, fortunately for herself, she was never subjected by her managers to the forcing process.