At this juncture, when unfortunately he was impecunious, indignant, and excited, he received a visit from Maguire’s nephew, Mr. Frank L. Goodwin, with whom he had already negotiated relative to “La Belle Russe,” and whom he now supposed to have come to him as Wallack’s representative. To this person he imprudently made known his quarrel with Maguire, and hastily inquired, “What will you give me for the play?” “Fifteen hundred dollars, cash,” Goodwin answered, and then, observing that he hesitated, “and a return ticket to San Francisco, and $100 more for your expenses.” “How soon can I have the money?” Belasco rejoined. “In half an hour.” “Then I’ll take it”--and he did, selling his play, outright, not, as he supposed, to Wallack, but to Goodwin, for $1,600 cash and a railroad ticket home! He received the money the same afternoon and left that night for San Francisco. When the play was produced at Wallack’s it was announced as “By arrangement with Mr. F. L. Goodwin, the production of a new and powerful drama by David Belasco, Esq.” Wallack paid Goodwin a high price for the play, which, since then, has been successfully acted throughout the English-speaking world, and, later, when told of the facts of the sale, expressed his profound regret and dissatisfaction that Belasco had not dealt directly with him. Fifty times the amount of money that Belasco received for “La Belle Russe” would have been more like a fair payment for it than the sum he actually received. “I did not particularly care what Maguire might do,” Belasco told me, “when he heard about the matter. I felt that I could get along much better without him than he could without me (I always did for Maguire far more than ever I got paid for!), but he cooled off after he got home, and I resumed work, for a little while, at the Baldwin.”
AN OPINION BY BRONSON HOWARD.--WALLACK IN THE THIRTIETH STREET HOUSE.
Belasco’s published recollections of the circumstances of Wallack’s removal from the Thirteenth Street house and of the importance to that manager of his presentation of “La Belle Russe” require revision to make them accurate. He says:
“The stage history of ’La Belle Russe’ is interesting. Wallack had opened his theatre with ’Money,’ which had been followed by a play by Pinero. He had met with failure all along the road, and his heart began to question whether he was right in forsaking his old ground on Thirteenth Street and in moving so far up-town. ’La Belle Russe,’ put on hurriedly, as a last forlorn hope, retrieved his fortunes. It called a spade a spade and did not show any reticence, the papers declared, and they flayed it as hard as ever they could. There was one exception, and that was Edward A. Dithmar, of ’The New York Times.’ He said it was a new era among plays, and, although he was not a prophet, he put his finger on the elements that achieved success, and this was long before the day of ’The Second Mrs. Tanqueray.’ Bronson Howard, at the height of his success, declared, in a public lecture, that it was a model of construction, and confessed that he had already seen it seventeen times, each evening discovering some new technical excellence in it. I do not want to appear boastful; the facts of the theatre are no longer personal after they have been made known to the public.”