efore every ounce of value has been wrung out of preceding events. If
the screen scene in _The School for Scandal_ be studied with this
principle in mind, the student will have as good an object lesson as
English drama can show of skilled leading up to a climax by so many
little steps of carefully calculated effect that the final fall of the
screen remains one of the great moments in the theater, despite the
mundane nature of the theme and the limited appeal to the deeper
qualities of human nature. Within its limitations (and theater art, as
any other, is to be judged by success under accepted conditions)
Sheridan's work in this place and play is a permanent master-stroke of
brilliant technic, as well as one explanation of the persistence of that
delightful eighteenth century comedy.

But the dramatist, as I have said, may also err in delaying so long in
his preparation and growth, that the audience, being ready for the
climax before it arrives, will be cold when it comes, and so the effect
will hang fire. It is safe to say that in a three-act play, where the
first act has consumed thirty-five to forty minutes, and the climax is
to occur at the fall of the second curtain, it is well if the
intermediate act does not last much above the same length of time. Of
course, the nature of the story and the demands it makes will modify the
statement; but it applies broadly to the observed phenomena. The first
act, for reasons already explained, is apt to be the longest of the
three, as the last act is the shortest, other things being equal. If the
first act, therefore, run fifty minutes, forty to forty-five, or even
thirty-five, would be shapely for act two; which, with twenty to
twenty-five minutes given to the final act, would allot to the entire
play about two hours and ten minutes, which is close to an ideal playing
time for a drama under modern conditions. This time allowance, with the
added fraction of minutes given to the entr'acts thrown in, would, for a
play which began at 8:15, drop the final curtain at about 10:30.

In case the climax, as has been assumed of a three-act play, be placed
at the end of the second act, the third act will obviously be shorter.
Should, however, the growth be projected into the third act, and the
climax be sprung at a point within this act--beyond the middle, let us
say--then the final act is lengthened and act two shortened in
proportion. The principle is that, with the main interest over, i