III
"CLASSICAL" BURLESQUE

Planché was not only the founder of modern burlesque: he was the originator, in particular, of that form of travestie which is commonly described as "classical" – which deals with the characteristics and adventures of the gods and goddesses, heroes and heroines, of the Greek and Latin mythology and fable. It is true that comic pieces on classical subjects had been played in England before Planché brought out, at the Olympic, his "Olympic Revels"⁶ (January 1831). But these pieces were not burlesques in the present-century sense of the word. Take, for example, the "Midas" of Kane O'Hara, which, produced in 1762, remained popular for so many years, and will always be remembered as including the once famous ditty: —

 
Pray, goody, please to moderate the rancour of your tongue:
Why flash those sparks of fury from your eyes?
Remember, where the judgment's weak the prejudice is strong,
A stranger why will you despise?
 

The gods and goddesses are presented in "Midas" in a light more or less ludicrous, and the dialogue, songs, and choruses are flavoured with contemporary allusion, more or less humorous. But the form given to the work is that of the old-fashioned burletta. Indeed, the chief merit of "Midas," from a historical point of view, lies in the fact that it was its successful revival, with Mme. Vestris as Apollo, which, coupled with the publication of Colman junior's story, "The Sun-Poker," suggested to Planché the composition of his first "classical" burlesque. This had for subject the story of Prometheus and Pandora, and was remarkable, not only for the smooth flow of its versification and the general refinement of its tone, but also for the accuracy and consistency of the costumes, which were throughout "classical," and therefore in strong contrast to the haphazard, incongruous attire in which "classical" characters had hitherto been exhibited on the comic boards.

Prometheus and Pandora, I may note, figured later – in 1865 – as the leading personages in Mr. Reece's "Prometheus, or the Man on the Rock,"⁷ in which the writer differed from his predecessor in admitting into his dialogue a large infusion of the punning element. In this direction Mr. Reece has always been proficient. Here are a few specimens of his work, picked out at random: —

 
"Those steeds of yours will burn my house some day.
Fine animals."
 
 
"That leader came from Sestos;
Stands fire well, and so he counts as best 'os."
 
 
"What! don't you think me handsome?"
 
 
"Not very.
You've got red hair!"
 
 
"Well, that's hair-red-itary."
 
 
"Why, darn your impudence!"
 
 
"There, stop your clatter.
With all your darning you'll not mend the matter."
 
 
"A couch that's made 'midst buttercups, he's shy on;
The verdant sward how could a dandy lie on?"
 
 
"You jeer at Pallas 'cos she's strict and staid.
With all your railing you'll need Pallas' aid!"
 

Planché's "Olympic Revels" proved so brilliantly successful that he was encouraged to follow it up, at the end of the year, with a companion composition – "Olympic Devils, or Orpheus and Eurydice." In this work, James Bland, the son of the lady who "created" Planché's Coquetinda, made his first appearance in burlesque, and among the female Bacchantes who took part in the groupings was a clever young girl, named Leonora Pincott, who was destined one day to be a great public favourite as "Mrs. Alfred Wigan." In "Olympic Devils" Planché's style is seen to excellent effect. Note, as an instance, the remarks addressed by Minos, Lord Low Chancellor, to the Fates: —

 
I vow you Fates are most industrious spinsters!
Miss Clotho there – man's destiny beginning —
Life's thread at tea, like a tee-totum spinning.
And then Miss Lachesis that same thread measures,
Taking great pains, but giving little pleasures.
Last comes Miss Atropos, her part fulfilling,
And cuts poor mortals off without a shilling.
The saddest sister of the fatal three,
Daughter, indeed, of shear necessity!
Plying her awful task with due decorum,
A never-ceasing game of "snip-snap-snorum"!
For help, alas! man pleads to her in vain —
Her motto's "Cut and never come again."
 

Elsewhere Orpheus says to Eurydice: —

 
I am a lunatic for lack of thee!
Mad as a March hare – oh, ma chère amie!
 

But Planché had a higher wit than that of punning. His satire and sarcasm have an agreeable, because not too pungent, cynicism – as in such little scraps of song as this (following upon the scene in which Orpheus, hearing that his wife is flirting with Pluto, cannot resist looking back at her and thus consigning her again to Pluto's tender mercies): —

 
Orpheus. I have looked back – in your snare I am caught, sir —
Pluto, thou'st cut a fond pair to the core!
Oh, have I come all this way to be taught, sir,
That folks who would thrive must keep looking before?
 
 
Euryd. You have looked back – in the snare you are caught, sir —
They who cheat him, faith, have none to cheat more!
A man of the world – have you yet to be taught, sir,
When your wife flirts behind you, to look straight before?
 

In after years H. J. Byron wrote two burlesques on the legend of Orpheus and his wife, both of them produced at the Strand Theatre,⁸ and it is notable that when Planché made, in 1865, at the Haymarket, his last appearance as a writer of extravaganza, it fell to his lot to treat once more of Orpheus and his surroundings.⁹

Planché's third classical burlesque was "The Paphian Bower, or Venus and Adonis," in which Benjamin Webster was seen for the first time in this class of histrionic work. Mme. Vestris, of course, was Venus, and in the course of the piece had to sing this eminently clever parody of "Sally in our Alley": —

 
Of all the swains that are so smart,
I dearly love Adonis;
And pit-a-pat will go my heart,
Till he bone of my bone is.
No buckskin'd beau of Melton Mow-
bray rides so capitàlly.
Oh, he's the darling of my heart,
And he hunts in our valley!
 
 
Jupiter and the neighbours all
Make game of me and Doney;
But, notwithstanding, I with him
Contemplate matrimony.
For he can play on the cornet,
And sing most musically;
And not a Duke in all the land
Can beat him at "Aunt Sally."
 

Venus and Adonis have always been great favourites with the producers of travestie. Among those who have made them the central figures of burlesque are Mr. Burnand, whose work was brought out in 1864, and Mr. Edward Rose, whose "Venus," written in collaboration with the Mr. Augustus Harris, and first performed at the Royalty in 1879 (with Miss Nelly Bromley as the heroine), was re-written for revival, and finally taken as the foundation of a third production in 1880.

In "The Deep, Deep Sea," brought out in 1833, Planché selected as the basis of his work the story of Perseus and Andromeda. He treated it with his usual reverence for the original legend. He represented Juno and the Nereids as being angry with King Cepheus, and sending the sea-serpent to devastate his shores. James Vining played the Serpent, and his approach was announced to the monarch in the following strain: —

 
Mighty monarch, stir your stumps as if Old Nick were following:
A serpent with an awful twist has landed on your shore;
Our gallant soldiers, guns and all, by regiments he's swallowing;
And munching up musicians and composers by the score!
 
 
Of counsel learned in the law but brief work he is making —
Apothecaries just as they were pills, sir, he is taking;
He snaps the parson right in two, as well as his oration;
And ere the beadle bolts the door, he bolts the congregation!
 
 
Mighty monarch, stir your stumps, for court and caravansary
Are emptied of inhabitants all crazy with affright;
The monster he is longer far than any suit in Chancery,
And beats the Court of Aldermen, by chalks, for appetite!
 

The Serpent, when he arrives, introduces himself to the king in an engaging fashion: —

 
All bones but yours will rattle when I say
I am the sea serpent from America.
Mayhap you've heard that I've been round the world;
I guess I'm round it now, mister, twice curled…
Of all the monsters through the deep that splash,
I'm "number one" to all immortal smash.
When I lie down, and would my length unroll,
There ar'n't half room enough 'twixt pole and pole.
In short, I grow so long that I've a notion
I must be measured soon for a new ocean.
 

The exaggeration which is so characteristic of American humour is here happily satirised. In another passage, Perseus, addressing himself to Andromeda, sings a neatly turned parody of "We met – 'twas in a Crowd": —

 
We met! 'twas at the ball,
Upon last Easter Monday;
I press'd you to be mine,
And you said, "Perhaps, one day."
I danced with you the whole
Of that night, and you only;
Ah, ne'er "cavalier seul"
Felt more wretched and lonely.
For when I squeezed your hand,
As we turned one another,
You frown'd and said, "Have done!
Or I'll speak to my mother!"
 
 
They called the Spanish dance,
And we flew through it fleetly —
'Twas o'er – I could not breathe,
For you'd blown me completely.
I led you to a seat
Far away from the dancers;
Quadrilles again began,
They were playing "the Lancers";
Again I squeezed your hand,
And my anguish to smother
You smiled, and said, "Dear Sir,
You may speak to my mother."
 

In 1861 Perseus and Andromeda reappeared upon the comic stage at the instance of William Brough, who made them the hero and heroine of a burlesque at the St. James's.

The story of Telemachus was the subject which engaged the attention of Planché immediately after he had done with Perseus. Fénelon's tale had become extremely familiar to the British schoolboy, who at that time was not thought to have "grounded" himself sufficiently in French until he had read the narrative in the original. Hence Planché's "Telemachus, or the Island of Calypso,"¹⁰ concerning which the author took credit to himself once more for having "preserved the well-known plot with the most reverential fidelity." Ten years later the same subject was treated in the "Telemachus" of Stirling Coyne, played at the Adelphi with Miss Woolgar in the title-part, Wright as Calypso (a ballet-dancer!) and Paul Bedford as the hero's Mentor or "tor-Mentor." In 1863 the story of the parents of Telemachus proved attractive to Mr. Burnand, whose "Patient Penelope" made her curtsey at the Strand, to be followed at the St. James's, two years later, by the same writer's "Ulysses."

Still tracing the course of Planché's labours in burlesque, we come next to the production, at the Haymarket in 1845, of "The Golden Fleece" – perhaps, on the whole, the most delightful of the series. In this ingenious and brilliant piece, the two parts of which were entitled respectively "Jason in Colchis" and "Medea in Corinth," Planché had taken the narrative of Apollonius Rhodius and the tragedy of Euripides, and had built upon them a composition in which he sought less to cast ridicule upon the legends selected than to travestie what he called "the modus operandi of the classical period, which really illustrates the old proverbial observation that there is but one step from the sublime to the ridiculous." He brought again upon the stage the ancient Chorus, incarnated in a single person, who explained the action of the piece as it went on, not hesitating even to interrupt it when the humorous opportunity occurred. Charles Mathews undertook the part, heralded by a jocose announcement on the "bills" to the effect that "The lessee has, regardless of expense, engaged Mr. Charles Mathews to represent the whole body of the chorus, rendering at least fifty-nine male voices entirely unnecessary." In the opening scene, the Chorus thus described his functions: —

 
Friends, countrymen, lovers, first listen to me:
I'm the Chorus; whatever you hear or you see
That you don't understand, I shall rise to explain —
It's a famous old fashion that's come up again,
And will be of great service to many fine plays
That nobody can understand nowadays;
And think what a blessing if found intervening,
When the author himself scarcely knows his own meaning.
You may reap from it, too, an advantage still further:
When an actor is bent upon marriage or murther,
To the Chorus his scheme he in confidence mentions,
'Stead of telling the pit all his secret intentions;
A wondrous improvement you all will admit,
And the secret is just as well heard by the pit.
Verbum sat.– To the wise I'll not put one more word in,
Or instead of a Chorus, they'll think me a burden.
 

Later in the piece, announcing the approach of King Æetes (Bland), the Chorus interposed with: —

 
Æetes comes, looking as black as thunder,
And when you hear the cause you'll say "No wonder";
For Jason, aided by Medea's spell,
Has done the trick, and done the King as well.
You'll think, perhaps, you should have seen him do it,
But 't isn't classical – you'll hear, not view it.
Whatever taxed their talents or their means,
These sly old Grecians did behind the scenes;
So, fired with their example, boldly we
Beg you'll suppose whate'er you wish to see.
 

Elsewhere occurred this famous bit of badinage between King and Chorus: —

 
Chorus. Be calm, great King – 'tis destiny's decree.
 
 
Æetes. How dare you talk of destiny to me!
What right have you with such advice to bore us?
 
 
Chorus. Sir, I'm the Chorus.
 
 
Æetes.Sir, you're indecorous.
 

In the course of the piece Mathews sang, among other things, an excellent ditty, to the tune of "The Tight Little Island": —

 
'Twas very ungrateful, you'll say, sir,
But, alas! of the world it's the way, sir,
When all a friend can, you have done for a man,
He'll cut you quite dead the next day, sir.
 

But perhaps the most successful parody in "The Golden Fleece" was that on "The Fine Old English Gentleman," assigned to Mme. Vestris as Medea. This is worth quoting in full: —

 
I'll tell you a sad tale of the life I've been led of late,
By the false Bœotian Boatswain, of whom I am the mate:
Who quite forgets the time when I pitied his hard fate
And he swore eternal constancy by all his gods so great;
Like a fine young Grecian gentleman,
One of the classic time!
 
 
Now he lives in a fine lodging, in the palace over there,
Whilst I and his poor children are poked in a back two-pair;
And though he knows I've scarcely got a second gown to wear,
He squanders on another woman every farthing he's got to spare,
Like a false young Grecian gentleman,
One of the classic time.
 
 
He leaves me to darn his stockings, and mope in the house all day,
Whilst he treats her to see "Antigone," with a box at the Grecian play,
Then goes off to sup with Corinthian Tom, or whoever he meets by the way,
And staggers home in a state of beer, like (I'm quite ashamed to say)
A fine young Grecian gentleman,
One of the classic time.
 
 
Then his head aches all the next day, and he calls the children a plague and a curse,
And makes a jest of my misery, and says, "I took him for better or worse";
And if I venture to grumble, he talks, as a matter of course,
Of going to Modern Athens, and getting a Scotch divorce!
Like a base young Grecian gentleman,
One of the classic time.
 

"Medea," it will be remembered, was the title and subject of a burlesque by Robert Brough, brought out at the Olympic in 1856, with Robson in the title-part, Emery as Creon (King of Corinth), and Julia St. George as Jason. Medea ("the best of mothers, with a brute of a husband," as the sub-title has it) was one of Robson's most impressive rôles, being charged at more than one point (notably in the closing scene, which was played by all the characters in serious fashion) with real tragic intensity. In the lighter vein were such episodes as the duet with Jason (to the air of "Robinson Crusoe"), which I quote as illustrative of the neatness and humour with which Brough constructed such trifles: —

 
Medea. I have done for this man
All that tenderness can,
I have followed him half the world through, sir;
I've not seen him this year,
And the first thing I hear
Is "he's going to marry Creusa."
Going to marry Creusa,
Going to marry Creusa,
Ting a ting ting!
Ting a ting ting!
All I can say, sir, is, do, sir.
 
 
Jason. If you'll take my advice,
You'll pack up in a trice,
Nor of time to pack off be a loser;
For the popular wrath
Will be likely to froth
'Gainst a foe to myself or Creusa.
I am going to marry Creusa,
And, believe me, the best thing for you's a
Fast ship to bespeak,
And some desert isle seek,
Like a sort of she Robinson Cruiser.