Why the Chimes Rang | Page 9

it is not possible to have the screens made to order, ordinary Japanese
screens may be borrowed or rented, and made to serve as front curtain,
and framework for scenery.
Those indicated in the plan as A A and B B serve as the front curtains,
the center sections (marked B B) being drawn aside by persons
stationed behind them to show the interior of the hut when the play
begins. The four screens marked C D and E E form the walls of the hut.
In using screens it will be necessary to do without the window and the
actual door unless the person in charge of the scenery is clever enough
to paint in a window on one panel of the screen and make a door in
another. If not, turn the end panel of the screen marked C to run at right
angles with the other part, giving the impression of a passage with an
imagined door at the unseen end, and wherever in the business of the
parts, the children are said to look out of the window, let them instead
look down this passage, as though they were looking through the open
doorway.
On the right side of the room in the screen marked D, a fire-place may
be constructed by cutting away a portion of the screen to suggest the
line of the fire-place, putting back of this opening a box painted black
inside to represent the blackened chimney, and finishing with a rough
mantel stained brown to match the wall tint. Of course if the screens are
borrowed the fire-place will have to be dispensed with.
At the moment when the vision of the cathedral is to appear, the
screens marked E E are parted and folded back disclosing the chancel.
Perhaps some church nearby has stored in its basement an old stained

glass window, which may be borrowed and used as background for the
church scene. Such a window was used in a performance of "Much
Ado About Nothing" given some years ago at one of the Eastern
colleges. It was dimly lit from behind by electric globes and proved
very successful in creating a churchly atmosphere. If this can not be
done, cover two of the tallest possible screens with any rich sombre
colored drapery and stand them against the back wall. In the Los
Angeles production, the chancel was represented by a curtain of black
velvet, flanked by two silver pillars, between them the altar. Black
makes an exceedingly rich and effective foil for bright colored
costumes. Whatever is used for backing in the chancel can be masked if
unsatisfactory by Christmas greens, which should be arranged in long
vertical lines that carry the eye up as high as possible and give a sense
of dignity, or in the Gothic curves suggestive of church architecture.
Against this background, and in the center of the space, place the altar.
This can be made of a packing box painted gold or covered with
suitable hangings. In one performance of this play a sectional bookcase
which stood in the room was hung with purple cheese cloth and served
as an altar. Should the stage space be deep enough broad steps before
the shrine will give an added height to the priest and the angel.
If it is possible to have real scenery the most illusive method of
revealing and hiding the chancel is to have the back of the hut painted
on a gauze drop, which is backed by a black curtain. At the cue for
showing the chancel the lights in front of the gauze go out leaving the
stage dark, then the black opaque curtain is rolled up or drawn aside
and as the light is slowly turned on the chancel, the vision begins to
take form through the gauze, the latter becoming invisible and
transparent when there is no light in front of it. The gauze prevents
Holger from actually placing the pennies in the priest's hand but if the
two approach the gauze as though it were not there, and stretch out
their hands so that they seem to touch, the priest being provided with
additional pennies which he holds up at the altar, no one in the
audience would guess that the coins had not been given him by the
child.
Very few halls ostensibly built to house amateur play-giving are
adequate for the purpose.--Often the stage is merely a shallow platform
without curtains to separate the actors from the audience, and the

ceiling and walls surrounding the stage are so finished that the
necessary screws for hanging curtains, may not be driven into them.
The amateur manager reaches the depths of despair when he finds that
even the floor of the shallow platform offered him, is of polished
hardwood