25. 1903: APRIL

 

For comprehensive background on Brooklyn’s pre-20^th-century theatre history please see my book, Brooklyn Takes the Stage: Nineteenth-Century Theater in the City of Churches (McFarland: 2024) and my blog, “Annals of the Brooklyn Stage.” The latter is a week by week description of theatre activity in Brooklyn; obviously, it will expand rather slowly because so much must be described and the present blog will be occupying my attention until live theatre in Brooklyn begins to fade over the early decades of the 20^th century, dying out by the 1930s.

The entries in this blog began as annual ones, for 1898 and 1899. Because of the large amount of memory used, which made editing them problematic, subsequent entries were shortened so they covered only several months at a time, but these too needed to be shortened. Thus, beginning with 1901: September, all entries cover a single month. The quickest way to find any of these entries is probably to click on the following link, where links to everything prior to its date are provided: 1901: DECEMBER 

For months in 1902 click here.

JANUARY 1903

FEBRUARY 1903

MARCH 1903

While it was not a subject specifically concerning Brooklyn, the borough’s theatrical press continued to be preoccupied by a national theatre; the idea of one funded by the government, however, had by now largely acceded to the need for one endowed by one or more wealthy capitalists. The man widely considered to be the best qualified to serve as artistic director was not an American, though. He was a German named Heinrich Conried, the head of Manhattan’s intimate Irving Place Theatre, where he staged German-language operas and musicals. This month he gave a widely reported, allegedly engrossing lecture about an endowed theatre at Brooklyn’s Civitas Club, a women’s organization. The following clipping from the April 18 issue of Brooklyn Life sums up his talk:

Brooklyn’s theatres were in their final weeks of the season, with reports of imminent closings by most—apart from the vaudeville and burlesque houses—in May. But there was much of interest on those April stages. Notable stars were present, like Stuart Robson doing Shakespearean comedy, character woman Marie Wainwright playing the lead in Camille, Brooklyn boy-become-star Robert Edeson returning as the dashing hero of Soldiers of Fortune, and box-office gold actress Viola Allen with her hit drama by Hall Caine, The Eternal City. Especially interesting was the four-performance gig of the greatest vaudeville comic team of the day, Lew Weber and Joe Fields, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. 

They went toe-to-toe as an independent engagement with the Theatrical Syndicate’s prime offerings of the Empire Stock Company’s The Unforeseen, with Margaret Anglin and Charles Richman, at the Montauk, and A Chinese Honeymoon, with such popular players as Willie Collier and Fay Templeton, at the Amphion. Equally interesting is that the latter show was backed by syndicate bigwigs Nixon and Zimmerman in partnership with young Sam S. Shubert, whose brothers would one day be their nemesis.

Also on show business minds was the forthcoming debut as a star of Cecil Spooner, of Brooklyn’s Spooner Stock Company, set to begin her tour of Lady Peggy Goes to Town in Newark, NJ, on April 27, before bringing it to Broadway. ‘Way Down East visited Brooklyn yet again, racking up its 650^th performance in Greater New York, but Creston Clarke, nephew of Edwin Booth, who we met last month, had to cancel his engagement to play Richelieu at the Columbia because of heart trouble, his slot taken by a touring version of The Christian with Julia Stuart.

And, in the background to all this Brooklyn activity was the imminent opening of Luna Park, the most spectacular enterprise yet to vie for the moolah spent so freely by the masses increasingly swarming to the beachside pleasures of Coney Island. Like the other summertime entertainments offered at Brooklyn’s famous beaches, Bergen, Brighton, and Manhattan, it will have to be bypassed in these entries, which have their eyes on the plays and playhouses of the borough’s northern precincts.

1.      April 6-11, 1903

Amphion: Soldiers of Fortune, with Robert Edeson

Bijou: (Spooner Stock Company) Moths

Columbia: (Greenwall Stock Company) Camille, with Marie Wainwright. Sidney Toler

Folly: The Old Homestead, with Denman Thompson

Gotham: (Gotham Elite Stock Company) Don Caesar de Bazan

Grand Opera House: McFadden’s Row of Flats

Montauk: The Comedy of Errors, with Stuart Robson

Novelty: Gypsy Jack

Park: East Lynne, with Laura Bigger

Payton’s Fulton Street: (Payton Fulton Street Stock Company) Hazel Kirke, with Etta Reed Payton

Payton’s Lee Avenue: (Payton Lee Avenue Stock Company) The Rivals, with Corse Payton

Phillips’ Lyceum: (Lyceum Stock Company) Ten Nights in a Barroom

Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Star, Gayety, Unique, Orpheum

2.      April 13-18, 1903

Amphion: ‘Way Down East

Bijou: (Spooner Stock Company) A Bunch of Keys

Columbia: (Greenwall Stock Company) Nathan Hale, with Howard Kyle, Florence Smythe

Folly: McFadden’s Row of Flats

Gotham: (Gotham Elite Stock Company) Blue Jeans

Grand Opera House: Foxy Grandpa

Montauk: The Eternal City, with Viola Allen

Novelty: Her Marriage Vow

Park: A Little Outcast

Payton’s Fulton Street: (Payton Fulton Street Stock Company) Romeo and Juliet, with Etta Reed Payton

Payton’s Lee Avenue: (Payton Lee Avenue Stock Company) Miles Aroon, with Corse Payton

Phillips’ Lyceum: (Lyceum Stock Company) Lost in the Desert

Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Star, Gayety, Unique, Orpheum

3.      April 20-25, 1903

 

Amphion: Alice of Old Vincennes, with Gertrude Coghlan

Bijou: (Spooner Stock Company) Toll Gate Inn

Columbia: (Greenwall Stock Company) The Christian, with Julia Stuart

Folly: Foxy Grandpa

Gotham: (Gotham Elite Stock Company) My Old New Hampshire Home

Grand Opera House: Sherlock Holmes, with Herbert Kelcey, Effie Shannon

Montauk: Miss Simplicity, with Frank Daniels

Novelty: The Convict’s Daughter

Park: The Village Parson

Payton’s Fulton Street: (Payton Fulton Street Stock Company) Peg Woffington, with Etta Reed Payton

Payton’s Lee Avenue: (Payton Lee Avenue Stock Company) Thelma

Phillips’ Lyceum: (Lyceum Stock Company) Leah

Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Star, Gayety, Unique, Orpheum

4.      April 27-May 2, 1903

Amphion: A Chinese Honeymoon, with Thomas Q. Seabrooke, Annie Yeamans

Bijou: (Spooner Stock Company) The Ironmaster

Brooklyn Academy of Music: Twirly Whirly, The Big Little Princess, with Weber and Fields stock company, Willie Collier, Fay Templeton (three evening performances, one matinee)

Columbia: (Greenwall Stock Company) More than Queen, with Roselle Knott

Folly: Primrose and Dockstader Big Minstrels

Gotham: (Gotham Elite Stock Company) The Romany Rye

Grand Opera House: Sis Hopkins, with Rose Melville

Montauk: The Unforeseen, with Charles Frohman Empire Theatre Company, Margaret Anglin, Charles Richman

Novelty: The Struggle for Life

Park: One of the Bravest, with Charles McCarthy

Payton’s Fulton Street: (Payton Fulton Street Stock Company) Called Back, with Etta Reed Payton

Payton’s Lee Avenue: (Payton Lee Avenue Stock Company) The Sultan’s Daughter

Phillips’ Lyceum: (Lyceum Stock Company) For Love and Honor

Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Star, Gayety, Unique, Orpheum