at its
beginning possible. If, at the act's end, too much has been revealed,
the interest projected forward sags; if too little, the audience fails
to get the idea around which the story revolves, and so is not
pleasurably anxious for its continuance. If the antecedent conditions
have not clearly been made manifest, some omitted link may throw
confusion upon all that follows. On the other hand, if too much time has
been expended in setting forth the events that lead up to the story's
start on the stage, with the rise of the curtain, not enough time may be
left, within act limits, to hold the attention and fix interest so it
may sustain the entr'act break and fasten upon the next act.

Thus it will be seen that a successful opening act is a considerable
test of the dramatist's skill.

Another drawback complicates the matter. The playwright has at his
disposal in the first act from half to three-quarters of an hour in
which to effect his purpose. But he must lose from five to ten minutes
of this precious time allotment, at the best very short, because,
according to the detestable Anglo-Saxon convention, the audience is not
fairly seated when the play begins, and general attention therefore not
riveted upon the stage action. Under ideal conditions, and they have
never existed in all respects in any time or country, the audience will
be in place at the curtain's rise, alert to catch every word and
movement. As a matter of fact, this practically never occurs;
particularly in America, where the drama has never been taken so
seriously as an art as music; for some time now people have not been
allowed, in a hall devoted to that gentle sister art, to straggle in
during the performance of a composition, or the self-exploitation of a
singer, thereby disturbing the more enlightened hearers who have come on
time, and regard it, very properly, as part of their breeding to do so.
But in the theater, as we all know, the barbarous custom obtains of
admitting late comers, so that for the first few minutes of the
performance a steady insult is thus offered to the play, the players,
and the portion of the audience already in their seats. It may be hoped,
parenthetically, that as our theater gradually becomes civilized this
survival of the manners of bushmen may become purely historic. At
present, however, the practical playwright accepts the existing
conditions, as perforce he must, and writes his play accordingly. And so
the first few