Belasco believes that soon after his appearance with Murphy, in “Help,” he was associated with the Chapman Sisters, but he is again mistaken. Murphy was at the Metropolitan in July, 1872. There is no record of an appearance of the Chapman Sisters there between that time and March 5, 1873, on which latter date a “Grand Re-Opening of the Metropolitan Theatre” occurred, under the direction of John Woodard. That “re-opening” was announced thus:

Belasco was a member of the Metropolitan Company at that time, having appeared five days earlier, in a performance by way of “A Grand Complimentary Benefit to Marian Mordaunt,” with, among others, Alice Harrison, D. C. Anderson, Owen Marlowe, James C. Williamson, Henry Edwards, Henry Courtaine, John Woodard, and Charles E. Allen,—those players having been assembled from several companies. The bill included “A Morning Call,” “The Colleen Bawn,” and the First and Second acts of “Darling.” Belasco, on the occasion

of that benefit, played Peter Bowbells, in “The Illustrious Stranger.” In the opening bill of the Chapman Sisters, “Little Don Giovanni,” Belasco acted the First Policeman. Other plays in which the Chapmans appeared during that engagement were “Checkmate,” March 21; “Schermerhorn’s Boy,” April 2; “The Wonderful Scamp; or, Aladdin No. 2,” and “The Statue Lover,” April 3; “Pluto,” April 15; and “The Beauty and the Brigands.” In those plays Belasco acted, respectively, Strale, Reuben, the Genius of the Ring, Peter True, the First Fury, and Mateo, the Landlord. “A Kiss in the Dark” and “A Happy Pair” were also played at the Metropolitan at this time, and probably he appeared in them, but I have not found specification of his doing so. The Chapman Sisters, Blanche and Ella, were daughters of an English actor, Henry Chapman (1822-1865), and were handsome and proficient players of burlesque. One of their most successful vehicles was “The Gold Demon.” Belasco appeared in it with them (March 18, 1873), as Prince Saucilita, and made up and played in imitation of a local eccentricity, known as “Emperor” Norton. His performance, practically a caricature, was considered clever and it elicited considerable commendation. “The Figaro” critic wrote of him: “D. Belasco took the house by storm with his make-up for ’Emperor’ Norton, which was quite a feature of the piece.” Actors have often exhibited theatrical travesties of anomalous individuals: Samuel Foote (1720-1777), on the old English Stage, frequently did so: sometimes such exhibitions have proved attractive to the public and largely remunerative: generally they are trivial and contemptible. Thomas D. Rice (1808-1860), the actor who carried Joseph Jefferson, as a child, upon the stage, in 1833,—the first time he was ever seen there,—gained wealth and popularity by copying the grotesque behavior of an old negro named “Jim” Crow, who had been a slave and who was well known to residents of Louisville, Kentucky, about 1828-’29. Edwin Booth, in his novitiate, made a “hit” in San Francisco, about 1852-’53, by imitating a local notoriety named Plume. It did not, however, in his case, lead on to fortune,—nor did it in that of young Belasco as “Emperor” Norton. His remuneration was, for a long time, extremely small. While employed at the Metropolitan Theatre he earned six dollars a week, extra, by copying sets of the “parts” of plays, for the use of actors,—work done after the performance at night. “I wrote a beautiful hand in those days,” he told me; “almost like engraved script,—though perhaps you won’t believe it now.”