Punch (85.1883)

240

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[November 17, 1883„

OUR WEALTHY DRAMATISTS.

There may be poor Actors nowadays, but no poor Dramatic
Authors. Not to be behind the fashion of the present time, when
everybody craves to know what everybody else is doing-, when he is
doing it, and how it’s being done, we are grateful to an unknown
Correspondent, who signs himself an “ Occasional Pall Mall Gazetteer
Paragraphist,” for the following interesting details, and the public
will agree with us that Dramatic Authorship is at the present time
a highly remunerative profession:—

Mr. W. G. Wills is a Millionnaire, having made his money entirely
out of Charles the First, while the poor Actor of that important role
only received three pounds a night for the entire run ! This is no
fault of Mr. Wills’s. But clearly some “redistribution” is
required here. Mr. W. G. Wills lives in several castles in the
North of England; keeps five steam yachts, and two or three packs
of hounds. For his new piece at the Princess’s he receives fifty
thousand pounds down before a line is written ; and Mr. Wilson
Barrett binds himself over to him to serve him as a slave, to work
his farms, do boot-cleaning, or go out to the Colonies for him, or
anything, if he should fail in producing the exact sum by twelve
o’clock next Friday.

Mr. W. S. Gilbert, as a Dramatist, made five hundred thousand
pounds by one piece at the Olympic, some years ago, which sum having
been advantageously invested in Botany Yarns (on which he is
founding his Burglar's Tale), still brings him in the handsome sum
of one hundred thousand pounds a-year. His income as a Librettist
would amount to fifteen hundred thousand a year, but for the
necessity of sharing it with Sir Arthur Sullivax, who insists
upon receiving his “ pound of flesh,” or, rather, his two-thirds,
or ten hundred thousand pounds of flesh, paid quarterly. Finding
his present house too small, Mr. Gilbert is in treaty for Bucking-
ham Palace. He stipulates for the sentry-boxes remaining with
sentries in them. Sir Arthur Sullivax, who is to have a wing
of the building—for, as his Librettist gracefully says, he couldn’t,
indulge in such high flights but for Sir Arthur’s wing,—insists
upon these sentinels having been through a campaign at the Royal
College of Music and being skilled vocalists. This proviso has
for the present brought negotiations to a standstill, but it is said
that the brilliant Librettist and gifted Composer, on agreement with
the Buckingham Palace Authorities, will refer the matter to a mutual
friend who,—•

In spite of all temptations,

Will accept their invitations,

And remain an Engel-ishman,

—and who will probably be accommodated with a room in the Palace
(near the Critics’ Banqueting Hall) all to himself, fitted up with
the latest-invented telephonic apparatus, communicating with the
Librettist’s and Composer’s apartments, so that at any instant, he
may be informed of every wonderful rhyme or extraordinary musical
phrase that may occur to either of the talented partners.

Messrs. Hermaxx and Johes have only recently started in busi-
ness, but they have already achieved a fortune which will make the
entire Rothschild family envious. It is variously stated at from
sixteen to fifty millions. Messrs. Hermaxx and Jones are insepar-
able. Their equipages are familiar to all Londoners frequenting the
Park, where they both drive a collaborating team of eight horses.
Their benefactions to their countrymen are well known.

Mr. G. R. Sims is in receipt of one hundred and fifty thousand
pounds per annum from his Lights of London, in the Metropolis
alone. From the representations in China, Japan, Persia, and
one or two other places (where the drama is localised and sharpened
up with topics of the day), he has realised the magnificent sum of
£275,008,005 19s. life/., with which he furnished his present man-
sion. As the Librettist of the Merry Duchess, he shared with Mr.
Frederic Clay the Composer, a couple of millions; and this would
have been more, but for the unfortunate result of the Derby, which,
it is an open secret, hit these two talented gentlemen rather hard.

Mr. Gilbert a Beckett by one piece at the German Reeds’ made
over a hundred and sixty thousand pounds. His hunting-lodge in
the Midland Counties is a model of perfect taste. It is open house
with him all the year round ; and though hunting five days a-week
(except in the summer, and it’s difficult to prevent him even then),
he yet finds time to write the libretti of French and German Seven-
Act Operas. Of these he speaks, in his light and airy way, as “ mere
trifies thrown off before breakfast.” But it is well known that
these trifles represent two hundred thousand pounds each. His forth-
coming Opera, Savonarola, has been purchased by a syndicate com-
posed of the Emperor of Germany, Emperor of Austria, the King
of Holland, and the French House of Rothschilde, for upwards of
three millions sterling, one quarter of which has been already sub-
scribed, and the remainder guaranteed. If the guarantee is not
i made good,. the instalment will be forfeited, and Mr. Gilbert a
I Beckett will be at liberty to sell it over again.

Mr. Hermann Merivale’s new mansion cost him a hundred

thousand pounds. The drawing-room is inlaid with precious stones,
and the mantelpiece (constructed by the Author) is one blaze of
diamonds. He will not live in it, but will only go and look at it now
and then, as he prefers the residence he has occupied now for some
years, and which he lately furnished lavishly out of his receipts from
the Cynic. He made just on half a million hv the play he wrote
for Miss Genevieve Ward, who, of course, such is the irony of Fate,
was but little benefited pecuniarily by the successful work. Mr.
Hermann Merivale spends about ten thousand a year in fishing-
rods, and is endeared to all mariners on the more dangerous parts
of our English coast by his patented invention for saving life at sea,
and safety nets for the herring fishery.

Mr. F. C. Burnand, as a Dramatist, makes fifty millions a year.
He is largely interested in Electric Lights, and has bought up most
of the' patents. By a piece called Unlimited Cash, a few years
ago, at the Gaiety, which only ran a few nights, as the expenses
were so enormous (one may buy gold too dear), he realised a quarter
of a million, after granting Mr. John IIollingshead a splendid
annuity. His last new coat cost him over five hundred pounds, and
his hatter, haberdasher, shoemaker, and tailor divide about sixty
thousand a year between them. His shooting-box and moors,
arranged on the most luxurious and expensive plan, cost him a hundred
thousand pounds to keep up. He is a great benefactor to the various
lines of rail which meet at the junction station near his place, as he
is always sending vans laden with game all over the world. His
pieces played in America (where there is no copyright or dramatic
right) produce—by the courtesy of the Managers, who feel themselves
in honesty bound to make him some acknowledgment—an income of
about from seventy to ninety thousand pounds a year. As a Librettist,
he would have made another couple of millions out of Cox and Box
[after sharing with Mr. Maddison Morton) but for Sir Arthur,
then Mr. Arthur, Sullivan’s claim for a hundred thousand, which
Mr. Burnand at once doubled, as a token of his esteem and friend-
ship.

Mr. H. J. Byron has never made les3 than a million a-year. He
has several times tried to do so, but without success. He has houses
and gardens all over England. He always travels by private
engines, with saloon-carriage attached, having early in life taken a
dislike to Horses. Mounted outriders precede him at a galop, with
flags to warn the approaching Dawdlers. He spends the winter in
India, tiger-hunting, and writes most of his pieces in the cool of the
morning, when in his palanquin on the back of an elephant. He
returns for the season to London, and his Western Palace—as it may
indeed be termed—is the rendezvous from morning till night, or
rather from morning till morning [as it never closes], of Tout ce qu'il
y a de plus gai, de plus brilliant, de plus savant, in all London.
A great amateur of music, he has ten magnificent private bands,
and three Composers at five thousand a-year each. He says he can’t
understand Mr. W. S. Gilbert being content with Buckingham
Palace as a residence (if he gets it), as, for his part, he likes a place
he can move about in. His Elephant Saloon in his second London
house, which he only uses when he is “passing through,]’ can be
seen during November, from twelve to two, by anyone obtaining an
introduction from the Home Secretary, backed by the Prime
Minister and Archbishop of Canterbury. He realised sixty millions
by Our Boys, and has pensioned off Messrs. James and Thorne with
a handsome competency per annum as a recognition of their past
services.

[In the foregoing information we shall be happy to make whatever correc-
tions may be necessary, on hearing from any one of the Dramatists named, in
order to bring it into strict accordance with his own private and confidential
statement made to the.Commissioners of Income-tax.—Ed.]

Food v. Cram.

The suggestion that destitute children obliged to attend Board
Schools should be supplied at school with penny dinners seems good,
and feasible. Less than a pennyworth of oatmeal a head would
afford a fairly filling mess of porridge, and not cost much. Nor
would that small expense necessitate any great addition to the rates.
Might it not readily be met by a reasonable reduction of the sums
now expended in attempts at putting sciences and literature into the
heads of children destined to become plough-boys, errand-boys, shop-
boys, and servant-girls ?

There was a paragraph last week in the Times headed, “ The
Status of Solicitors.” Mrs. Ramsbotham read it without her glasses,
and then putting down the paper, exclaimed, “Well, I do not see
why Solicitors should have Statues.”

Unfounded Rumour.—There is no truth in the report that'the
Dean of Bangor, on account of his anti-tea sentiments, is about to
be raised to the episcopal bench as the Bishop of Soda and Bran.