The actors
all said the last act was so stupid that we should make a _fiasco_. I
at last hit upon an idea. We had, however, only a few hours to execute
it in. I changed the story: instead of the play ending happily, I made
the father kill his daughter accidentally, and then die of grief. All
the dialogue had to be improvised by the leading actress and myself.
I played the father, and Signora Piamonti the daughter. Such was the
success of our invention that the piece was played eight nights in
succession, and a rival actor, hearing of the triumph achieved by _The
Harp-Girl_, bought from the author for a handsome sum the privilege of
acting it in certain districts which were not included in my purchase
of the drama. Not being aware of the alterations we had made, and
performing it according to the letter of the text, he made _un fiasco
solenne_--a dead failure."
After the first performance of _Zaire_ I took the liberty of observing
to Salvini that a superb piece of "business" which marks his acting
in the last act was not to be found in the text. "Oh," he replied,
"I will tell you the origin of it. I was playing at Naples, and one
night, when I threw the body of my murdered wife upon the ottoman in
the last act, my burnouse fell off and fixed itself to my waist like
a tail. I saw at once that if I was not careful I should provoke
laughter, and instantly imagined that I would pretend to believe the
clinging drapery was the wounded Zaire grasping me behind.
Pages:
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216