This play was originally produced by the Birmingham Repertory Theatre
last year, and it had a great success in Birmingham. But if its
author had not happened to be the artistic director of the Birmingham
Repertory Theatre the play might never have been produced there.
The rumour of the provincial success reached London, with the usual
result--that London managers magnificently ignored it. I have myself
spoken with a very well-known London actor-manager who admitted to me
that he had refused the play.

When Nigel Playfair, in conjunction with myself as a sort of
Chancellor of the Exchequer, started the Hammersmith Playhouse (for
the presentation of the best plays that could be got) we at once
began to inquire into the case of Abraham Lincoln. Nigel Playfair was
absolutely determined to have the play and the Birmingham company to
act it. I read the play and greatly admired it. We secured both
the play and the company. The first Hammersmith performance was a
tremendous success, both for the author of the play and for William J.
Rea, the Irish actor who in the rôle of Lincoln was merely great. The
audience cried.

I should have cried myself, but for my iron resolve not to stain a
well-earned reputation for callousness. As I returned home that night
from what are known as "the wilds of Hammersmith" (Hammersmith is a
suburb of London) I said to myself: "This play is bound to succeed"
The next moment I said to myself: "This play cannot possibly succeed.
It has no love interest. It is a political play. Its theme is the
threatened separation of the Southern States from the Northern States.
Nobody ever heard of a play with such an absurd theme reaching