of many acts seen at one sitting, there might be given an amazing
list of beautiful little entertainments that have failed because
of the transportation cost of the scenery they required.

When a producer is approached with a request to read a vaudeville
act he invariably asks, "What scenery?" His problem is in two
parts:

1. He must decide whether the merits of the act, itself, justify
him in investing his money in scenery on the gamble that the act
will be a success.

2. If the act proves a success, can the scenery be transported
from town to town at so low a cost that the added price he can get
for the act will allow a gross profit large enough to repay the
original cost of the scenery and leave a net profit?

An experience of my own in producing a very small act--small enough
to be in the primary class--may be as amusing as it is typical.
My partners and I decided to put out a quartet. We engaged four
good singers, two of them men, and two women. I wrote the little
story that introduced them in a humorous way and we set to work
rehearsing. At the same time the scenic artist hung three nice
big canvases on his paint frames and laid out a charming street-scene
in the Italian Quarter of Anywhere, the interior of a squalid
tenement and the throne room of a palace.

The first drop was designed to be hung behind the Olio--for the
act opened in One--and when the Olio went up, after the act's name
was hung out, the lights dimmed to the blue and soft green of