The Pit was entered by cellar steps, and through a
half-lighted, subterranean passage. Decorative art, as we see it now
in the full bloom of the Madison Square auditorium and Mr. Daly's
lobby, had not even given a hint of its coming."
In _The Galaxy_ for February, 1868, Bunce ventures to survey "Some
of Our Actors" from the standpoint of deploring the pre-Raphaelite
realism of the modern school. He scored the attempted "truth" and
"fidelity" of Matilda Heron, and, in considering Maggie Mitchell's
_Fanchon,_ he bespoke the cause of ideality, as necessary in _Fanchon_
as in _Juliet._ "Modern comedy acting," he declares, "is usually a
bright, brisk touch-and-go affair, suited to modern plays; but to the
mellow and artistic style of a former generation, it is as the light
claret wines, now so much in use, to crusty old port."
Except in the instances of our comedians, like Murdoch, with his
"lightness of manner, that grace, which I have described elsewhere as
snuffing a candle in a way to make you feel that snuffing candles is
the poetry of life;" Harry Placide, with whose retirement went the
retirement of _Sir Peter Teazle_ and _Sir Harcourt Courtley_, ("When
Placide and Gilbert are gone," he writes, "Sheridan will have to be
shelved"); Holland, with his intense fun in eccentric bits; Brougham,
without whom "The Rivals" is difficult to endure--apart from these the
stage of the time, to Bunce, was not all it should be.
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