, no play should be adapted by the manager so as to give
greater prominence than the text invites to any single role.

Fifthly, the scenic embellishment should be simple and inexpensive,
and should be subordinated to the dramatic interest.

There is no novelty in these principles. The majority of them were
accepted unhesitatingly in the past by Betterton, Garrick, Edmund
Kean, the Kembles, and notably by Phelps. They are recognised
principles to-day in the leading theatres of France and Germany. But
by some vagary of fate or public taste they have been reckoned in
London, for a generation at any rate, to be out of date.

In the interest of the manager, the actor, and the student, a return
to the discarded methods has become, in the opinion of an influential
section of the educated public, imperative. Mr Benson is the only
manager of recent date to inscribe boldly and continuously on his
banner the old watchwords: "Shakespeare and the National Drama,"
"Short Runs," "No Stars," "All-round Competence," and "Unostentatious
Setting." What better title could be offered to the support and
encouragement of the intelligent playgoer?

II

A constant change of programme, such as the old methods of the stage
require, causes the present generation of London playgoers, to whom it
is unfamiliar, a good deal of perplexity. Londoners have grown
accustomed to estimate the merits of a play by the number of
performances which are given of it in uninterrupted succession. They
have forgotten how mechanical an exercise of the lungs and limbs
acting easily becomes; how frequent repetition of poetic speeches,
even in the most competent mouths, robs the lines of their poetic
temper.

Numbness of intellect, rigidity of tone, artificiality of expression,
are fatal alike to the enunciation of Shakespearean language and to
the interpretation of Shakespearean character. The system of short
runs, of the nightly alterations of the play, such as Mr Benson has
revived, is the only sure preservative against maladies so fatal.

Hardly less important is Mr Benson's new-old principle of "casting" a
play of Shakespeare. Not only in the leading roles of Shakespeare's
masterpieces, but in subordinate parts throughout the range of his
work, the highest abilities of the actor can find some scope for
employment. A competent knowledge of the poet's complete work is
needed to bring this saving truth home to those who are engaged in
presenting Shakespearea