" Old Blumenfield
beamed over his shoulder.
"Don't you like it, darling?"
"It gives me a pain."
"You're dead right."
"You want something zippy there. Something with a bit of jazz to it!"
"Quite right, my boy. I'll make a note of it. All right. Go on!"
I turned to George, who was muttering to himself in rather an
overwrought way.
"I say, George, old man, who the dickens is that kid?"
Old George groaned a bit hollowly, as if things were a trifle thick.
"I didn't know he had crawled in! It's Blumenfield's son. Now we're
going to have a Hades of a time!"
"Does he always run things like this?"
"Always!"
"But why does old Blumenfield listen to him?"
"Nobody seems to know. It may be pure fatherly love, or he may regard
him as a mascot. My own idea is that he thinks the kid has exactly the
amount of intelligence of the average member of the audience, and that
what makes a hit with him will please the general public. While,
conversely, what he doesn't like will be too rotten for anyone. The kid
is a pest, a wart, and a pot of poison, and should be strangled!"
The rehearsal went on. The hero got off his line. There was a slight
outburst of frightfulness between the stage-manager and a Voice named
Bill that came from somewhere near the roof, the subject under
discussion being where the devil Bill's "ambers" were at that
particular juncture.
Pages:
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106