[Transcriber's note: Unfortunately high quality illustrations weren't available for this html version.]

[Illustration: Clara Morris (1883)]

STAGE CONFIDENCES

TALKS ABOUT PLAYERS AND PLAY ACTING

BY

CLARA MORRIS

AUTHOR OF

"LIFE ON THE STAGE,""THE PASTEBOARD CROWN," ETC.

ILLUSTRATED

LONDONCHARLES H. KELLY

1902

To

MARY ANDERSON

"THE FAIR
THE CHASTE
THE UNEXPRESSIVE SHE"

GREETING

To those dear girls who honour me with their liking and theirconfidences, greetings first, then a statement and a proposition.

Now I have the advantage over you of years, but you have the advantageover me of numbers. You can ask more questions in an hour than I cananswer in a week. You can fly into a hundred "tiffs" of angrydisappointment with me while I am struggling to utter the soft answerthat turneth away the wrath of one.

Now, you eager, impatient young damsels, your name is Legion, and youraddresses are scattered freely between the two oceans. Some of you aregrave, some gay, some well-off, some very poor, some wise, some very,very foolish,—yet you are all moved by the same desire, you all ask,very nearly, the same questions. No actress can answer all the girls whowrite to her,—no more can I, and that disturbs me, because I likegirls and I hate to disappoint them.

But now for my proposition. Why not become a lovely composite girl, myfriend, Miss Hope Legion, and let me try to speak to her my word ofwarning, of advice, of remonstrance? If she doubts, let me prove myassertions by incident, and if she grows vexed, let me try to win her tolaughter with the absurdities,—that are so funny in their telling,though so painful in their happening.

Clara Morris.

CONTENTS

I. A WORD OF WARNING

II. THE STAGE AND REAL LIFE

III. IN CONNECTION WITH "DIVORCE" AND DALY'S

IV. "MISS MULTON" AT THE UNION SQUARE

V. THE "NEW MAGDALEN" AT THE UNION SQUARE

VI. "ODETTE" IN THE WEST. A CHILD'S FIRST PLAY

VII. A CASE OF "TRYING IT ON A DOG"

VIII. THE CAT IN "CAMILLE"

IX. "ALIXE." THE TRAGEDY OF THE GOOSE GREASE

X. J.E. OWENS'S "WANDERING BOYS." "A HOLE IN THE WALL" INCIDENT

XI. STAGE CHILDREN. MY "LITTLE BREECHES" IN "MISS MULTON"

XII. THE STAGE AS AN OCCUPATION F