On Returning to the Spoken Drama

The Escape of An Actress from the Land of Shadows

ELSIE FERGUSON

AFTER three years of absence, having never once in all this time felt the floor of the MM. theatre stage beneath my feet, I walked out to the centre of the dimly lit stage and stood perfectly still! The ecstasy which surged through me impeded my breath. How long I stood there looking out at the rows and rows of empty seats I shall never know.

Those rows of ghostly figures awaiting the audience, the lights and the music, held me entranced. The profound hush in the dark spaces, the gleaming brass rail around the gallery and the faint light which crept in through the closed doors were -all a part of the realization of my longings.

Back again! Home on the stage!

I closed my eyes to shut out the vision of the motion picture studio which has been my obsession for two years. The peace and quiet of the theatre, after the constant din, crashing and banging of the movie studio, was like a rest-cure for shattered nerves. Paradoxical, as it may seem, it was a relief to escape the turmoil of the silent drama and to find peace on the spoken stage!

Space, unlimited breadths and lengths of it! Voices, human voices all around me! Quiet, ineffable quiet! And human hands to applaud. It is like the end of a weary journey when one pushes open the gate and sinks down on the doorstep with a sigh of relief—home!

HOWEVER, I do not regret my studio work; it was very interesting and instructive, too. I created eighteen characters, of widely varied types, and on each of these, eighteen occasions I was permitted to see myself as the audience saw me, and to view my mistakes with my own eyes. When Robert Burns wrote those quaint lines, "Oh wad some power the gif tie gie us to see ourselves as others see us," he had never heard of motion pictures and the power they possess to give us shocks and thrills when we see ourselves!

An audience is not so critical as the camera, which registers everything with merciless accuracy. An awkward gesture or unpleasant facial expression is triumphantly caught by the lens, to be repeated again and again, many thousands of times, all over the world, before millions of persons! It is not so necessary to keep watch of these details in the spoken drama, because the eyes of the audience are not as quick as the inexorable eye of the camera.

The space afforded on the dramatic stage seems so overwhelmingly vast to one who has grown familiar with the limited range allowed by the camera, that it is quite confusing! I always feel that I am walking out of the picture—or getting out of focus—and it is very difficult to accustom myself to the freedom of uncramped surroundings.

Then, too, the luxury of being permitted to turn my back and to be at liberty to look everywhere, without feeling the forbidding hand of motion picture technique raised in horror at such an action, is a joy to the heart of an ex-cinema star. In the making of my first film production, "Barbary Sheep," during an emotional scene I quite naturally turned away, as one would do under stress. I was told that I must not turn my face from the camera, because every emotion must be carefully portrayed and registered in an obvious, overexaggerated, face-on close-up. Now I am permitted to enjoy my emotions even at a fortyfive degree angle, or suggest them only by the visible shrug of my shoulders. It is comforting, also, to know that my tears may enjoy the privacy of my handkerchief, and not have to be registered one by one as they fall from my eyes to my cheeks.

And to be able to talk again! Was there ever a woman who would not welcome back this privilege after having kept silent for two years? Not only the privilege of being allowed to speak, but to be given intelligent, thoughtful lines to express is indeed a pleasure not to be underestimated.

Though it may sound rather strange to the readers, especially the feminine portion, for a woman to assert that it is a positive relief not to be obliged to go shopping every day, it is quite true. I am tired of the incessant search for costumes and the innumerable fittings and the worry over delays that must inevitably attend the production of each successive picture. For the average photoplay requires so many changes of costumes, hats and shoes, and allows so little time to plan, that one is continually kept in a state approaching nervous collapse. It is an indescribable relief to know that I will not have to appear in a different set of costumes at each performance, and that my gowns will be ready for me whenever I enter the dressing room.

IN one respect, the motion picture work afforded me more personal liberty than the spoken drama. To be obliged to dine early and give up one's evenings is a bit annoying after having enjoyed the freedom of going to the opera, plays and dinner parties.

This, however, is not an all-important consideration. In fact, I am more than willing to sacrifice any advantages which I have enjoyed while in the movies, if only because I am so anxious to get back to the certainty and smoothness and regularity of the drama. After a play has comfortably settled down on Broadway, it stays put and gives no future worry during its run. But the pictures! There is never a moment when one is quite sure that the road ahead is a smooth one. If a set is delayed in construction, or a gown does not arrive on time, or it rains on the day one had planned to do outside scenes, or the lights do not work properly, then the whole machinery is thrown out of gear and hours and even days are lost waiting around for things to be smoothed out. There is a feeling of surety about the drama which arouses no fears. The weather cannot ruffle its serenity, the sets are always ready, the costumes are always awaiting the players, and the lights, music and other appurtenances are ready at the exact moment when the curtain is due to rise.

From my point of view, the strongest evidence of the great transition from pictures to the spoken drama is the consciousness that I am actually in contact with my audience. The magnetic current which I feel from a human audience is more inspiring to me now than it was before I went into motion pictures, for I can appreciate the actual human response which comes across the footlights as contrasted with the amount of response which I received from the unsympathetic lens of the camera. Of course, I can go to the moving picture theatres where my films are being shown and sit among the audience and attempt to determine their opinion of my performance; but it is small satisfaction.

In "Sacred and Profane Love" — Arnold Bennett's comedy which has already been produced successfully in England—I believe that I have found the play for which I have been seeking during my two years of experience in the silent drama; and I feel that I have reached the enchanted land at the end of a long, long journey.