r the evening performance.

No messages, calls, telegrams or information of any character from
outside is permitted to enter the theatre for any actor or actress who
is inside and hence secluded from all outside contact and purely in
the realm of the playhouse. This and absolute exclusion of all
interlopers is one of the strictest rules of the theatre, and woe to
him who attempts its violations, or to the doorkeeper who permits it.
Any messages received are given to the artist after the performance.
No person who is not a member of the company should ever be permitted
to visit a dressing room during a performance, only afterwards; such a
contact takes the mind of the artist off her or his work.

Men who have obtained wrong ideas about members of the theatrical
profession and have boldly sought to force their presence onto the
stage have been summarily dealt with before now--and in some cases I
have helped in the good work myself. Sometimes, after the performance,
relatives, friends or escorts are permitted to enter the stage door
and there await the street-clad and departing performers. But
strangers and would-be "stage-door Johnnies" are always barred out.

There is no "green room" in the modern American theatre. We have all
read about a meeting place in the rear of the stage that went by this
title in the old English novels and biographies. They may exist still
in some foreign theatres, I am not sure--but I doubt it. What I am
sure of is that the American stage is sacred to its artists,
principals and subordinates alike, and to its stage manager and the
stage hands who keep things moving behind the curtain line.

It is a business and not a game. A theatrical life is taken seriously
by all who wish to succeed in it. No triflers need apply nowadays.

After every performance the stage is cleared of all obstacles, scenery
and everything else. The last member of the company out of each
dressing room is required to put the light out, lock the dressing-room
door and leave the key to the room with the stage door tender who is
held responsible for the contents of the rooms. The act curtain and
the asbestos curtain are raised. A single electric bulb or pilot light
on a portable iron stand about three feet high is placed centre of the
stage near the footlights, and casts its beam across the stage and
throughout the auditorium. The show is over and the fire-laws are
obeyed.

[Illustration: MARILYN MILLER]

MAKING A