Page:Once a Clown, Always a Clown.djvu/86

ONCE A CLOWN, ALWAYS A CLOWN lies in the fact that the actor has almost no opportunity of seeing other plays.

The Shuberts had revived "The Mikado" in 1910 with such success that they were about to try "Pinafore" for a short summer run when I returned to New York from a 25,000-mile tour in "The Matinee Idol." They offered me the role of Dick Deadeye, but I was worn out and looking forward to a summer's rest. The salary offered and the promise that the run would be for four weeks only led me to accept. Instead "Pinafore" ran most of the summer and all of the next season. Deadeye is the least interesting to play of all the Gilbert and Sullivan comedy roles, but since then I have sung in all their operas save three, "The Gondoliers", "Princess Ida" and "The Grand Duke."

Gilbert and Sullivan are immortal because each was a genius with an infinite appreciation of the other. W. S. Gilbert was the greatest comic poet of the language. Arthur Sullivan was an accomplished composer in any company—in his particular field, without compare—and together they rose to heights that neither could have attained singly. Here is the perfect union of sense and sound. Sullivan's music matches wit for wit, whimsey for whimsey and