Take the case of _Jack Point_. From the moment he enters the audience should know the manner of man that he is and he must win their sympathy immediately. He is a poor strolling player who has been dragged from pillar to post. Footsore and weary though he is, _Jack Point_ is anxious to please the crowd who have roughly chased him and _Elsie Maynard_ in, for if he fails them have they not threatened to duck him in the nearest pond? _Jack_ and _Elsie_ are no ordinary players. In Elizabethan times the street dancer was a familiar character. The Merry-man and his maid, however, tell us that they can sing _and_ dance too, a wonderful accomplishment. All this and more is made clear on their first entry. It should be the same in the interpretation of all the other parts.
When the _Duke of Plaza-Toro_ arrives, he must at once impress the audience that, although impecunious, he still expects the deference due to birth and breeding. _Ko-Ko_, on the other hand, is a cheap tailor suddenly exalted to the rank of Lord High Executioner, and from _his_ first entrance it is obvious that he was never brought up in the dignified ways of a Court. He tells the gentlemen of Japan that he is "much touched by this reception." Somehow one feels that that speech was written out for him when he received his appointment, that he has since recited it forty times a day, and that now the upstart is trying to make believe it is entirely extempore! Then there is _Sir Joseph Porter_. Whenever I play this rôle I do my best to cultivate a sense of immense self-importance. I do this, of course, whilst waiting my cue, but the effect of it should be seen on the stage. _Bunthorne_'s first appearance should be done in such a way as to stamp him definitely for what he is--an affected "poseur." The exaggeration may be relaxed a little afterwards--but it _must_ be there at the beginning.
So long as one has studied one's part beforehand, particularly in regard to the nature of the first entry, the memorisation of the words becomes more or less easy. And amateurs ought to realise what a tremendous help to them it would be to practice their own facial "make-up." Generally they leave that to an expert, but if they practised it themselves, they would find it a very fascinating, and certainly an important, branch of the actor's profession. Many and many a time have I taken my pencils and colours, retired to some quiet room at home, and spent an afternoon experimenting in make-up. Notwithstanding that I have never played any Shakespearian characters, I have made up privately for dozens of them, and the practice has helped me in innumerable ways.