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Along with Forbes-Robertson's spiritual interpretation of Shakespeare goes pre-eminently, and doubtless as a contributive part of it, his imaginative revitalization of the great old lines lines worn like a highway with the passage of the generations. As a friend of mine graphically phrased it, "How he revives for us the splendour of the text!" The splendour of the text!
In fact, it is that quality which, chief among others, makes Forbes-Robertson's Hamlet the classical Hamlet of his time. Forbes-Robertson has of course played innumerable parts. Years before The Profligate, he had won distinction as the colleague of Irving and Mary Anderson. He may be said to have played everything under the sun.
One could hardly say more for one's sense of the reality of Forbes-Robertson's acting, as, naturally, one is not unaware that distressing experiments have been made to reproduce the Elizabethan theatre by actors who, on the other hand, were sadly in need of all that scenery, archaeology, or orchestra could do for them.
Many a sedate citizen's pulse will leap with Romeo's when Forbes-Robertson's eye first lights upon the Southern child "whose beauty hangs upon the cheek of night like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear." Many a fashionable maid, with an eye for an establishment, will shed tears when Mrs. Patrick Campbell, martyr to unchaffering love, makes her quietus with a bare dagger.
For composition we decided that the two Earth panels were among the most remarkable of all. With satisfaction I heard Brangwyn compared by the painter to a great stage manager. "When I look at these groupings, I am reminded of Forbes-Robertson's productions of plays."
In Forbes-Robertson's case, however, apart from our courteous taking the word of his management, we know that the news is sadly true.
We are for the play, the living soul of the play. Give us that, and your properties may be no more elaborate than those of a guignol in the Champs-Elysées. Forbes-Robertson's acting is so imaginative, creating the scene about him as he plays, that one almost resents any stage-settings for him at all, however learnedly accurate and beautifully painted.
James's Church, Sussex Gardens: "Fear I may not be able to reach you in time for ceremony don't wait." "Heaven!" said Oscar once, when the two were together at Forbes-Robertson's and a pert flash fell from the artist's lips. "I wish I had said that!" "Never mind, dear Oscar you will," retorted Whistler.
How different it is when Forbes-Robertson's Hamlet dies! All my life I seem to have been asking my friends, those I loved best, those who valued the dearest, the kindest, the greatest, and the strongest in our strange human life, to come with me and see Forbes-Robertson die in Hamlet.
That quality of other-worldliness which at once scared and fascinated the lodgers in The Passing of the Third Floor Back is present in all Forbes-Robertson's acting. It was that which strangely stirred us, that first night of The Profligate. We meet it again with the blind Dick Heldar in The Light That Failed, and of course we meet it supremely in Hamlet.
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