The possibility of giving subtle and original treatment to familiar phases of life, together with the attendant possibility of revealing human nature in the theater, hold forth the chief promise along this line. Clever twisting and turning will make a new incident from an old one, as is best demonstrated in what Beaumont and Fletcher did with Lope de Vega when they adapted "Sancho Ortez" into "The Custom of the Country", and playwrights are learning to turn little things to vital account in the construction of their plays. A glance at a photograph now-a-days is made to convey all what was indicated in a five-minutes talk between butler and maid twenty years ago.
As to the matter of heart interest, that, after all, is the thing that counts most, and that is eternal and inexhaustible. Charles Klein, author of "The Music Master", put this to me neatly not long ago in an attempt to prove the advantage of the realistic drama over the romantic. "Supposing a man comes to you", he remarked, "and says that his wife has just fallen out of a balloon. You're not sorry, because you can't understand why his wife should have gone up in a balloon. Let the same man say to you, however, that he is out of a position and that his family is starving, and see how quickly the tears will come into your eyes. So far as modern audiences are concerned, the old duel-fighting, hose-wearing romantic heroes are up in a balloon. We want sorrows and joys we can comprehend."
It is this creed that makes the new dramatist an entity worth seeking. If it proves difficult to discover him among the thousands who write plays, it at least is worth while to cultivate him when he is found among those who write promising plays. "By their works ye shall know them" is particularly applicable to the men who will some day succeed Barrie and Pinero. They will bear watching. If I were a producing manager I should keep in touch with the men whose first pieces indicate the possession of ability. I would set them at work, not at tailoring plays to fit personalities, but at realizing their ideas and their ideals. Certainly this great country is full of material waiting for dramatization, and it must be equally true that it is full of authors capable of accomplishing the task. They will not be the illiterate glory-hunters who deluge theatrical offices with their manuscripts, nor will they be the celebrities whose brains have been pressed dry. It were wise to look for them among the people whose professions draw them into close touch with the real world and the theater; among the newspaper men and the enthusiastic play-lovers; among those whose first and second efforts are now the financial failures on Broadway.