A Book of Burlesque: Sketches of English Stage Travestie and Parody

Scott's "Lady of the Lake" gave Mr. Reece the idea for a burlesque performed at the Royalty in 1866. In the same year Andrew Halliday brought out at the Adelphi a comic piece, happily entitled "The Mountain Dhu, or the Knight, the Lady, and the Lake." Mr. Toole was the impersonator of the Mountain Dhu, Paul Bedford the Douglas, Miss Hughes the Malcolm Graeme, Miss Woolgar (Mrs. Mellon) the Fitzjames, and Miss Furtado the Lady of the Lake. "The Lady of the Lane" was the title given by H. J. Byron to the travestie from his pen which saw the light at the Strand in 1872. In this case Mr. Edward Terry was the Roderick and Miss Kate Bishop the Ellen, Mrs. Raymond making a great hit as the demented Blanche.

Our present Laureate provoked in 1870 the satiric powers of Mr. W. S. Gilbert, whose "Princess," played at the Olympic, was described by the author as "a whimsical allegory," as well as "a respectful perversion of Mr. Tennyson's poem."⁵⁴ In this production Mr. Gilbert wrote his lyrics to the melodies of popular airs, after the manner of the time. The major portion of the travestie is familiar to present-day audiences as having formed, in the main, the text of "Princess Ida," for which Sir Arthur Sullivan composed such charming music. Nevertheless, I cannot refrain from quoting, as a happy specimen of Mr. Gilbert's later manner in burlesque,⁵⁵ the speech addressed by the Princess to her disciples – a speech marked by agreeable naïvétè and happy mock-heroics: —

 
In mathematics Woman leads the way!
The narrow-minded pedant still believes
That two and two make four! Why, we can prove —
We women, household drudges as we are —
That two and two make five – or three – or seven —
Or five-and-twenty, as the case demands!..
Diplomacy? The wily diplomate
Is absolutely helpless in our hands:
He wheedles monarchs – Woman wheedles him!
Logic? Why, tyrant man himself admits
It's waste of time to argue with a woman!
Then we excel in social qualities —
Though man professes that he holds our sex
In utter scorn, I'll undertake to say
If you could read the secrets of his heart,
He'd rather be alone with one of you
Than with five hundred of his fellow-men!
In all things we excel. Believing this,
Five hundred maidens here have sworn to place
Their foot upon his neck. If we succeed,
We'll treat him better than he treated us;
But if we fail – oh, then let hope fail too!
Let no one care one penny how she looks!
Let red be worn with yellow – blue with green,
Crimson with scarlet – violet with blue!
Let all your things misfit, and you yourselves
At inconvenient moments come undone!
Let hair-pins lose their virtue; let the hook
Disdain the fascination of the eye, —
The bashful button modestly evade
The soft embraces of the buttonhole!
Let old associations all dissolve,
Let Swan secede from Edgar – Grant from Gask,
Sewell from Cross – Lewis from Allenby —
In other words, let Chaos come again!
 

Into the region of the Ballad the comic playwrights have made comparatively few incursions. "The Babes in the Wood," "Lord Bateman," "Billy Taylor," "Villikins and his Dinah," and "Lord Lovel," – these are the stories which have been most in favour with burlesque purveyors. R. J. Byron took up the first-named subject in 1859, when the company at the Adelphi (where the piece was produced) included Miss Woolgar (Sir Rowland Macassar), Mr. Toole and Miss Kate Kelly (the Babes), Paul Bedford (the First Ruffian), and Mrs. Billington (the Lady Macassar). Then, in 1877, there came a provincial version by Messrs. G. L. Gordon and G. W. Anson; and, next, in 1884, at Toole's Theatre, the "Babes" of Mr. Harry Paulton, in which Mr. Edouin and Miss Atherton were the central figures. The first travestie of "Lord Bateman" was made by Charles Selby at the Strand in 1839; then there was the production by R. B. Brough in 1854 at the Adelphi; and, still later, there was the piece by H. J. Byron, at the Globe (1869). Passing over the "Billy Taylor" of Buckstone (1829), we arrive at "The Military Billy Taylor" of Mr. Burnand, which came out forty years later. It is to Mr. Burnand, also, that we owe "Villikins and his Dinah," played by amateurs at Cambridge, as well as "Lord Lovel and the Lady Nancy Bell," which he wrote for the same place and performers.

X
THE NEW BURLESQUE

With the year 1885 there dawned a new epoch for stage travestie in England. The old Gaiety company had broken up, Miss Farren alone remaining; and with the accession of fresh blood there came fresh methods. The manager who had succeeded Mr. Hollingshead recognised the tendencies of the times; and with "Little Jack Sheppard" – a travestie by Messrs. Stephens and Yardley of the well-known story, familiar both in fiction and in drama – a novel departure was made.

In the "palmy" days, burlesque had not, as a rule, formed the whole of an evening's entertainment. The one-act travestie had grown on occasion into two and even three acts; but, until recent years, the one act (in several scenes) had usually been deemed sufficient, the remainder of the programme being devoted to comedy or drama. The musical part of the performance had generally been made up of adaptations or reproductions of popular airs of the day – either comic songs or operatic melodies: very rarely had the music been special and original. The scenery had never been particularly remarkable; nor, save during the various régimes of Vestris, had there been any special splendour in the dresses. For the most part, the old school of burlesque did not rely upon a brilliant mise-en-scène. In the prologue to his "Alcestis," produced just forty-one years ago, we find Talfourd expressly drawing attention to the simplicity of the stage show. Speaking of the productions at the houses of serious drama, he said: —

 
Plays of the greatest and the least pretence
Are mounted so regardless of expense
That fifty nights is scarce a run accounted —
Run! They should gallop, being so well mounted
 

But with "Alcestis" it was to be different: —

 
What you enjoy must be all "on the quiet."
No horse will pull our play up if it drag,
No banners when our wit is on the flag;
No great effects or new-imported dance
The drooping eye will waken and entrance; …
But an old story from a classic clime,
Done for the period into modern rhyme.
 

A very different policy was to characterise the New Burlesque. The pieces, having now become the staple of the night's amusement, were to be placed upon the boards with all possible splendour. Money was to be spent lavishly on scenery, properties and costumes. Dancing was to be a prominent feature – not the good old-fashioned "breakdowns" and the like, but choreographic interludes of real grace and ingenuity. The music was to be written specially for the productions, and pains were to be taken to secure artists who could really sing. Something had already been done in each of these directions. So long ago as 1865 Mr. Burnand's "Windsor Forest" had been fitted with wholly new music; and at the Gaiety, under Mr. Hollingshead, burlesque had grown in elaborateness year by year. Not, however, till the production of "Little Jack Sheppard," in 1885, had the elaboration been so marked and complete in all departments.

Meanwhile, how were the librettists to be affected? Clearly, they would have to give more opportunities than usual for musical and saltatory illustration; and accordingly we find the book of "Little Jack Sheppard" full of lyrics – solos, duets, quartets and choruses, all of them set to new airs by competent composers. At the same time, the authors took care not to omit the element of punning dialogue. In this respect the old traditions were to be maintained. Byron, for instance, might very well have written the lines which follow, in which the interlocutors strive to outdo one another in the recklessness of their jeux de mots: —

 
Thames Darrell. Wild and Uncle Roland trapped me,
They caught this poor kid napping, and kidnapped me;
Put me on board a ship in half a crack.
 
 
Winifred. A ship! Oh, what a blow!
 
 
Thames. It was – a smack!
When out at sea the crew set me, Thames Darrell,
Afloat upon the waves within a barrel.
 
 
Win. In hopes the barrel would turn out your bier.
 
 
Thames. But I'm stout-hearted and I didn't fear.
I nearly died of thirst.
 
 
Win. Poor boy! Alas!
 
 
Thames. Until I caught a fish —
 
 
Win. What sort?
 
 
Thames. A bass.
Then came the worst, which nearly proved my ruin —
A storm, a thing I can't a-bear, a brewin'.
 
 
Win. It makes me pale.
 
 
Thames. It made me pale and ail.
When nearly coopered I descried a sail;
They did not hear me, though I loudly whooped;
Within the barrel I was inned and cooped.
All's up, I thought, when round they quickly brought her;
That ship to me of safety was the porter.
 

"Little Jack Sheppard" – which had for its chief exponents Miss Farren, Mr. Fred Leslie (a brilliant recruit from the comic opera stage), Mr. David James (who had returned for a time to his old love), Mr. Odell, Miss Harriet Coveney, and Miss Marion Hood (who had graduated in Gilbert-Sullivan opera) – was followed at the Gaiety by "Monte Cristo Junior," in which Messrs. "Richard Henry" presented a bright and vivacious travestie of Dumas' famous fiction, greatly aided by the chic of Miss Farren as the hero, and the inexhaustible humorous resource of Mr. Leslie as Noirtier. Here, for example, is a bit of the scene between these two characters in the Château d'If: —

 
(Noirtier, disguised as Faria, pokes his head through the hole in the
prison wall. He wears a long grey beard, and is clad in rags.)
 
 
Dantès (startled). This is the rummiest go I e'er heard tell on!
 
 
Noirtier. Pray pardon my intrusion, brother felon —
I'm Seventy-Seven.
 
 
Dantès. You look it – and the rest!
 
 
Noirtier (with senile chuckle). Ah! youth will always have its little jest.
My number's Seventy-seven: my age is more!
In point of fact, I've lately turned five score:
Time travels on with step that's swift, though stealthy.
 
 
Dantès (aside). A hundred years of age! This prison's healthy,
To judge by this old joker. (aloud) What's your name, sir?
To which I'd add – and what's your little game, sir?
 
 
Noirtier. My name is Faria – I'm a ruined Abbé —
All through my country's conduct, which was shabby.
They've kept me here since I was three years old,
Because I wouldn't tell of untold gold —
Of countless coin and gems and heaps of treasure
Which I'd discovered in my baby leisure —
(chuckles) But we will foil their schemes, and that ere long.
 
 
Dantès (aside, touching forehead significantly). The reverend
gentleman has gone quite wrong.
 
 
Noirtier (clutching Dantès wildly). But, ah, they starve me!
Hence thy strange misgiving —
For what's a parson, boy, without his living?
Hast e'er a bone to give an old man squalid?
 
 
Dantès. Not me! They never give us nothing solid;
They seem to think an appetite's unlawful:
In fact, their bill of fare is fairly awful.
 
 
Noirtier. But now to business! You must know, fair youth,
Though I in prison lie, I love the truth.
Therefore – But stay (glancing suspiciously around) – are we alone?
 
 
Dantès. Of course we are, old guy fox! (business).
Noirtier. Then now I will confess my little game.
 

(Removes wig, beard, rags, etc., and appears in convict dress, with [77] conspicuously marked on breast.)

 
And so, behold!
 
 
Dantès. What! Noirtier?
 
 
Noirtier.The same!
 

Here, again, is the duet sung by the same characters in the course of the same scene: —

I

 
Dantès. Here in this gloomy old Château d'If
We don't get beer, and we don't get beef.
 
 
Noirtier. They never give us mutton or veal or pork,
On which to exercise knife and fork.
 
 
Dantès. No nice spring chicken, or boiled or roast —
No ham-and-eggs, and no snipe-on-toast!
 
 
Noirtier. So no wonder we're rapidly growing lean
On the grub served up from the prison cuisine.
 

(With treadmill business.)

 
Both. Poor prisoners we! Poor prisoners we!
With skilly for breakfast and dinner and tea,
And such dismal diet does not agree
 
 
Noirtier. With Seventy-seven!
 
 
Dantès. And Ninety-three!
 

(Grotesque pas de deux.)

II

 
Dantès. Our wardrobe has long since run to seed,
For ci-devant swells we are sights indeed!
 
 
Noirtier. I shiver and shake, and the creeps I've got —
I'd give the world for a "whiskey hot!"
 
 
Dantès. And as in my lonely cell I lie,
I think of her and the by-and-by.
 
 
Noirtier. Don't buy or sell, or you'll come to grief,
And never get out of the Chateau d'If!
 
 
Both. Poor prisoners we! etc.(Dance as before.)
 

After "Monte Cristo Junior" there came, at the same theatre and from the pens of the same writers, a travestie of "Frankenstein," produced in 1887, with Miss Farren as the hero, and Mr. Leslie as the Monster that he fashions. Here much ingenuity was shown in the management of the pseudo-supernatural business connected with the Monster. Previous to the vivifying of the figure, Frankenstein thus soliloquised: —

 
Frankenstein. At last I am alone – now let me scan
My wondrous figure fashioned like a man.
All is now ready – every joint complete,
And now to oil the works – and then —toute suite!
O Science! likewise Magic! lend a hand
To aid the awful project I have planned.
(Sings) I've invented a figure
Of wonderful vigour,
A gentleman-help, so to speak;
A chap automatic
Who'll ne'er be erratic,
Who'll live upon nothing a week
It will fetch and will carry,
And won't want to marry,
Or try on the wage-raising plan;
It will do all my bidding
Without any kidding —
My Patent Mechanical Man.
Now to my cell I'll post with due cell-erity,
And do a deed that shall astound post-erity.
But thrills of horror now run through my veins.
What if I fail in spite of all my pains?
A nameless dread doth in my bosom lurk.
My scheme is good – but what if it won't work?
 

The Monster's first utterances were as follows: —

 
Monster. Where am I? also what – or which – or who?
What is this feeling that is running through
My springs – or, rather, joints? – I seem to be
A comprehensive (feeling joints) joint-stock companee;
My Veins – that's if they are veins – seem to glow —
I've muscles – yea – in quarts – I move them – so!
 

(Creaks horribly all over: fiddle business in orchestra.)

 
Horror! I've broken something, I'm afraid!
What's this material of which I'm made?
It seems to be a sort of clay – combined
With bits of flesh and wax – I'm well designed —
To see, to move, to speak I can contrive —
I wonder if I really am alive!
 
 
(Sings) If my efforts are vain and I can't speak plain,
Don't laugh my attempts to scorn!
For, as will be seen, I am but a machine
Who doesn't yet know if he's born.
I can move my feet in a style rather neat,
And to waggle my jaws I contrive;
I can open my mouth from north to south,
I – I – wonder if I'm a-live, a-live!
I wonder if I'm a-live!
 

In 1888 Mr. G. R. Sims and Mr. Henry Pettitt joined forces in burlesque, and the result was seen in a piece happily entitled "Faust up to Date." In this version Marguerite (Miss Florence St. John) figures first as a barmaid at an Exhibition. She is a young lady of some astuteness, though she insists upon her general ingenuousness: —

 
I'm a simple little maid,
Of the swells I am afraid,
I tell them when they're forward they must mind what they're about.
 
 
I never go to balls,
Or to plays or music-halls,
And my venerated mother always knows when I am out.
When I leave my work at night,
I never think it right
To talk to any gentleman I haven't seen before.
But I take a 'bus or tram,
Like the modest girl I am,
For I know that my big brother will be waiting at the door.
 

Martha introduces herself thus: —

 
I'm Martha, and my husband's never seen;
Though fifty, my complexion's seventeen.
In all the versions I've one rôle to play,
To mind Miss Marguerite while her frère's away.
You ask me why she don't live with her mother,
And I reply by asking you another —
Where is my husband? I oft wonder if
The public know he left me in a tiff,
And not a single word from him I've heerd
Since Marguerite's mother also disappeared.
Not that I draw conclusions – oh dear, no!
The gents who wrote the opera made them go.
And Goethe lets a gentleman in red
Inform me briefly my old man is dead.
These details show my character's not shady —
I am a widow and a perfect lady.
 

When Valentine returns home and hears the scandal about his sister, he breaks out into the following terrific curse: —

 
When to the drawing-room you have to go,
With arms all bare and neck extremely low,
For four long hours in biting wind and snow,
May you the joys of England's springtime know!
Whene'er you ride, or drive a prancing pair,
May the steam roller meet you everywhere!
When thro' the Park you wend your homeward way,
Oh, may it be a Home Rule gala day!
When for a concert you have paid your gold,
May Mr. Sims Reeves have a dreadful cold!
May you live where, through lath-and-plaster walls,
Come loud and clear the next-door baby's squalls!
Your husband's mother, when you are a wife,
Bring all her cats, and stay with you for life!
 

At the end, when Mephistopheles (Mr. E. J. Lonnen) comes to claim Faust, it turns out that Faust and Marguerite have been duly married, but have been obliged to conceal the fact because Marguerite was a ward in Chancery. Moreover, Old Faust reappears, and insists that, as it was he who signed the bond, it is he and not young Faust who ought to suffer for it.

"Faust up to Date" includes some clever songs and some excruciating puns, of which these are perhaps the most excruciating: —

 
Marg. These sapphires are the finest I have seen.
 
 
Faust. Ah! what I've sapphired for your sake, my queen!
 
 
Marg. An opal ring, they say, bad luck will be;
This one I opal not do that for me.
 

Again: —

 
Mephis. Along the Riviera, dudes her praises sing.
 
 
Val. Oh, did you Riviera such a thing?
 

"Atalanta," the travestie by Mr. G. P. Hawtrey brought out at the Strand in 1888, was fitted with prose dialogue, much of which was very smart and amusing. The songs were numerous and well-turned, and certain details of the travestie were ingenious. Hippomenes, the hero, wins the race he runs with Atalanta, by placing in her path a brand-new "costume," of modern cut and material, which she finds it impossible not to stop for. For the rest, while possessing a decidedly "classical" flavour, "Atalanta" was, in essence, a racing burlesque, abounding in the phraseology of the turf, and introducing in the last scene counterfeit presentments of a number of well-known sportsmen.

An agreeable cynicism ran through both the talk and the lyrics, from one of which – a duet between King Schœneus and his High Chamberlain, Lysimachus – I extract the following satire on turf morale: —

 
Lys. There's a time to win and a time to lose.
Sch.Of course, of course, of course.
Lys. You can make 'em safe whenever you choose —
Sch. By force, by force, by force.
Lys. Then doesn't it seem a sin and a shame
To stop such a pleasant and easy game?
If a horse doesn't win, why, who is to blame?
Sch. The horse, the horse, the horse.
 
 
Lys. If it's cleverly managed, I always think —
Sch. Proceed, proceed, proceed —
Lys. At a neat little swindle it's proper to wink.
Sch. Indeed, indeed, indeed!
I don't understand what it's all about;
But a man must be punished, I have no doubt,
If he's such a fool as to get found out.
Lys. Agreed, agreed, agreed.
Lys. It's all because jockeys have played such tricks —
Sch.They go too far, too far.
Lys. That the stewards are down like a thousand of bricks —
Sch. They are, they are, they are.
For a season or two, you'll observe with pain,
They'll hunt out abuses with might and main;
Then the good old times will come back again.
Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah!
 

Elsewhere, there is a diverting bit of parody suggested by the extreme cautiousness and bad grammar of some newspaper racing prophecies. Hippomenes and Atalanta are the sole competitors in the race, and the local "tipster" thus discusses their prospects: —

I have from time to time gone through the chances of the several competitors, so that to repeat what I have written is to go over very well-worn ground. Although the race is reduced to a match, it has lost none of its interest in the eyes of the public. It is a difficult race to meddle with, but the plunge must be made; I shall, therefore, give my vote to Atalanta, which, if beaten, it may be by Hippomenes.

Of "Joan of Arc," the "operatic burlesque" written by Messrs. J. L. Shine and "Adrian Ross" to music by Mr. Osmond Carr (Opéra Comique, 1891), the distinguishing feature – apart from the fact that the music is all original and all the work of one composer – is the neatness of the lyric writing, with which special pains appear to have been taken. Of Joan herself her father is made to sing as follows: —

 
Oh, there's nobody adepter
Than our Joan, Joan, Joan!
She is born to hold a sceptre
On a throne, throne, throne;
She's the head of all her classes,
And in fervour she surpasses
All the Hallelujah lasses,
As they own, own, own!
 
 
Don't call her preaching dull, for
It is not, not, not!
She can do Salvation sulphur
Hot and hot, hot, hot!
She can play the drum and cymbal,
With her fingers she is nimble,
And the pea beneath the thimble
She can spot, spot, spot.
 
 
She can tell you by your faces
What you'll do, do, do;
She can give you tips for races
Good and new, new, new!
She can cut a martial swagger,
She's a dab at sword and dagger,
And will fight without a stagger
Till all's blue, blue, blue!
 

Of all the songs in the piece, however, perhaps the most vivacious is that in which De Richemont (Mr. Arthur Roberts) describes how he "went to find Emin": —

 
Oh, I went to find Emin Pasha, and started away for fun,
With a box of weeds and a bag of beads, some tracts and a Maxim gun;
My friends all said I should come back dead, but I didn't care a pin,
So I ran up a bill and I made my will, and I went to find Emin!
I went to find Emin, I did, I looked for him far and wide,
I found him right, I found him tight, and a lot of folks beside;
Away through Darkest Africa, though it cost me lots of tin,
For without a doubt I'd find him out, when I went to find Emin!
 
 
Then I turned my face to a savage place, that is called Boulogne-sur-Mer,
Where the natives go on petits chevaux and the gay chemin de fer;
And the girls of the tribe I won't describe, for I'm rather a modest man.
They are poor, I suppose, for they're short of clothes, when they take what they call les bains!
And they said to me, "Oh, sapristi!" and the men remarked, "Sacré!"
And vive la guerre aux pommes de terre, and vingt minutes d'arrêt!
Voulez-vous du bœuf? j'ai huit! j'ai neuf! till they deafened me with their din,
So I parlez'd bon soir and said au revoir, for I had to find Emin!
 
 
And at last I found Emin, poor chap, in the midst of the nigger bands
Who daily prowl, with horrible howl, along the Margate sands;
I heard the tones of the rattling bones, and I hurried down to the beach —
Full well I know that they will not go till you give them sixpence each!
Said they, "Uncle Ned, oh! he berry dead, and de banjo out ob tune!
Oh! doodah, day! hear Massa play de song of de Whistling Coon!
If you ain't a snob, you'll give us a bob for blacking our blooming skin" —
But I took that band to the edge of the sand, and there I dropped 'Emin!
 

I have not thought it necessary, in the preceding pages, to offer any apology for stage burlesque. One must regret that it sometimes lacks refinement in word and action, and that in the matter of costume it is not invariably decorous; but that we shall always have it with us, in some form or other, may be accepted as incontrovertible. So long as there is anything extravagant in literature or manners – in the way either of simplicity or of any other quality – so long will travestie find both food and scope. That is the raison d'être of theatrical burlesque – that it shall satirise the exaggerated and the extreme. It does not wage war against the judicious and the moderate. As H. J. Byron once wrote of his own craft: —

 
Though some may scout it, …
Burlesque is like the winnowing machine:
It simply blows away the husks, you know —
The goodly corn is not moved by the blow.
What arrant rubbish of the clap-trap school
Has vanished – thanks to pungent ridicule!
What stock stage-customs, nigh to bursting goaded,
With so much "blowing up" have been exploded!
Had our light writers done no more than this,
Their doggrel efforts scarce had been amiss.
 

In this defence of his calling, Byron had been anticipated by Planché, who, in one of his occasional pieces, introduced the following passage, in which Mr. and Mrs. Wigan and the representatives of Tragedy and Burlesque all figured. When Burlesque entered, Tragedy cried out —

 
Avaunt, and quit my sight! let the earth hide thee.
Unreal mockery, hence! I can't abide thee!
 
 
Burlesque. Because I fling your follies in your face,
And call back all the false starts of your race,
Show up your shows, affect your affectation,
And by such homœopathic aggravation,
Would cleanse your bosom of that perilous stuff
Which weighs upon our art – bombast and puff.
 
 
Mr. Wigan. Have you so good a purpose, then, in hand?
 
 
Burlesque. Else wherefore breathe I in dramatic land?
 
 
Mrs. Wigan. I thought your aim was but to make us laugh.
 
 
Burlesque. Those who think so but understand me half.
Did not my thrice-renownèd Thomas Thumb,
That mighty mite, make mouthing Fustian dumb?
Is Tilburina's madness void of matter?
Did great Bombastes strike no nonsense flatter?
When in his words he's not one to the wise,
When his fool's bolt spares folly as it flies,
When in his chaff there's not a grain to seize on,
When in his rhyme there's not a grain of reason,
His slang but slang, no point beyond the pun,
Burlesque may walk, for he will cease to run.
 

FINIS