The play was a great success but the audience was a disaster.

The play was a great success but the audience was a disaster.

But as for all the rest,
There's hardly one (I may say none) who stands the Artist's test.
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But as for all the rest,
There's hardly one (I may say none) who stands the Artist's test.
The Artist is a rare, rare breed. There were but two, forsooth,
In all me time (the stage's prime!) and The Other One was Booth.

A good actor must never be in love with anyone but himself.

A good actor must never be in love with anyone but himself.

It's very hard! Oh, Dick, my boy,
It's very hard one can't enjoy
A little private spouting;
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It's very hard! Oh, Dick, my boy,
It's very hard one can't enjoy
A little private spouting;
But sure as Lear or Hamlet lives,
Up comes our master, Bounce! and gives
The tragic Muse a routing.

Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks;
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's read more

Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks;
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's you: the table is the place:
The carvers we: the prologue is the grace.
Each act, a course, each scene, a different dish,
Though we're in Lent, I doubt you're still for flesh.
Satire's the sauce, high-season'd, sharp and rough.
Kind masks and beaux, I hope you're pepperproof?
Wit is the wine; but 'tis so scarce the true
Poets, like vintners, balderdash and brew.
Your surly scenes, where rant and bloodshed join.
Are butcher's meat, a battle's sirloin:
Your scenes of love, so flowing, soft and chaste,
Are water-gruel without salt or taste.

Acting is a question of absorbing other people's personalities and adding some of your own experience.

Acting is a question of absorbing other people's personalities and adding some of your own experience.

The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give.
For we that live to please, must please to live.

The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give.
For we that live to please, must please to live.

Acting is happy agony.

Acting is happy agony.

There still remains to mortify a wit
The many-headed monster of the pit.

There still remains to mortify a wit
The many-headed monster of the pit.