Charles Frohman: Manager and ManMarcosson, Isaac Frederick
General
Charles Frohman: Manager and Man
Marcosson, Isaac Frederick
Frohman, Charles, 1860-1915; Theater -- United States
"Like a great painter with a few stray significant lines of drawing,
Frohman revealed the spirit and the idea. In this respect he resembled
Augustin Daly, who could furnish much dramatic intuition by a grunt and
a thumb-joint. Both men used similar methods and possessed equal
keenness of intelligence and sense of humor, except that Frohman was
rarely sarcastic. Daly usually was. Frohman's demeanor and relationship
to his actors was kindly and considerate. Rules, and all strictly
enforced, were in Daly's policy of theater management. Frohman did not
resort to rules. He regulated his theaters on broad principles, but with
firm decision when necessary. In Daly's theater there was obedience; in
Frohman's theater there was a willing co-operation. The chief interest
of both managers was comedy--comedy of two opposite kinds. Daly's jest
was the artificial German farce and Shakespearian refinement. Frohman's
tastes ranged between the French school--Sardou's 'Diplomacy' and the
modern realities--and the pure sentiments of Barrie's 'The Little
Minister.' Frohman was never traditional in an artificial sense, though
careful to retain the fundamental original treatment of imported foreign
plays.
"The verities, the humanities, the joys of life always existed and grew
with him as with a good landscape architect who keeps in nature's ways.
His departures into the classicism of Stephen Phillips, the romanticism
of Shakespeare, or the exotic French society drama were never as
valuable and delightful as his treatment of modern sentiment and
comedy."
In this respect a comparison with the workmanship of another genius of
the American theater, David Belasco, is inevitable. Belasco, the great
designer and painter of theatrical pictures, holds quite a different
point of view and possesses different abilities from those of Charles
Frohman. Belasco revels in the technique of the actor. Frohman's
_metier_ was the essentials. The two men were in many ways complements
of each other and per force admirers of each other and friends. In
brief, Belasco is the technicist; Frohman was the humanitarian.
Charles usually left details of scenery, lighting, and minor matters to
his stage-manager. "Look after the little things," he would say, in
business as in art, for he himself was interested only in the larger
themes. The lesser people of the play, the early rehearsing of involved
business, was shaped by his subordinates. The smaller faults and the
mannerisms of the actor did not trouble him, provided the main thought
and feeling were there. He would merely laugh at a suggestion to
straighten out the legs and walk, to lengthen the drawl, or to heighten
the cockney accent of a prominent member of his company, saying:
"The public likes him for these natural things."
Frohman's ear was musically sensitive. The intonations, inflections, the
tone colors of voice, orchestral and incidental music, found him an
exacting critic.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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