Chapter I: Preface

Looking back on the method of production of this book, it seems to me not to have been so much a matter of toil as a natural growth. It seems to have produced itself, for my earliest photographs were taken as records of the different characters that I played. These studies, as they were published from time to time in the _Sketch_, _Tatler_, _Playgoer_ and other papers, aroused a certain amount of interest.

Frequent requests from brother actors for me to help them with their make-ups convinced me that my instruction was desired.

As the material accumulated, I constantly heard the suggestion reiterated, "Make a book of it."

A profound interest in psychology, physiognomy, or characterisation, the art of the stage, and photography, has enabled me to study the subject from different standpoints, and to gain an entirely individual impression of it.

Many years spent on the stage in, among others, Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree's, Mr. Forbes Robertson's, and Sir Charles Wyndham's companies, the privilege of watching Sir Henry Irving, Sir Herbert, Charles Warner, Franklin McLeay, and M. de Max making up, and, in some instances, hearing their methods of work explained, has supplemented the knowledge gained by my own experience.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I. THE ART OF THE STAGE 1

II. ON DESIGNING THE CHARACTER 4

III. THE ILLUSTRATIONS 8

IV. THE MATERIAL 12

V. ON APPLYING THE MATERIAL 16

VI. FORM 19

VII. PREPARING TO MAKE UP 22

VIII. ON REMOVING THE MAKE-UP 26

IX. IN CONCLUSION 28

ILLUSTRATIONS (_For list see page_ ix) 30

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

The Author _Frontispiece_

PAGE

KING LEAR 35

KING LEAR (progressive pictures) 38

DON QUIXOTE 41

_Don Quixote_ (progressive pictures) 44

FALSTAFF 47

FALSTAFF (progressive pictures) 50

SHYLOCK 53

SHYLOCK (progressive pictures) 56

HAMLET 60

HAMLET 61

IAGO 66

OTHELLO 67

BOTTOM THE WEAVER 77

PIERROT 80

ROMEO 83

THE APOTHECARY IN "ROMEO AND JULIET" 89

THE APOTHECARY (head study) 92

THE THREE WITCHES IN "MACBETH" 95

UNCLE TOM 98

ST. DUNSTAN 101

FLEURY 104

THE PROFESSOR 109

THE SOUL STRUGGLE 112

SIR THOMAS MORE (Holbein picture) 118

SIR THOMAS MORE 119

SIR THOMAS MORE IN HIS GARDEN AT CHELSE 124

SIR THOMAS MORE BIDDING FAREWELL TO HIS FAVOURITE
DAUGHTER 125

NAPOLEON 129

FALSE BEARDS (twelve progressive pictures) 132, 133, and 136