Member, Actors' Equity

My father was an actor on Broadway, for a minute.  I will add to this post when I gather more materials together.  Shouldn't be difficult to do, he kept a leather scrapbook with his name embossed in big gold letters.

More "Notes"

Below is the Bibliography typed at the end of William J. O'Neill's 1932 acting notes, the subject of my previous post. Hyperlinks in many cases are to entire texts online, courtesy of Google—likely at least in part because these books from the 1930s and earlier have slipped into the public domain:

The Art of Play Production -- Dolman
The Technique of Dramatic Art -- Bosworth
Acting and Play Production -- Andrews and Weirick
Producing in Little Theatres -- Stratton
Modern Acting -- Chalmers
Practical Stage Direction for Amateurs -- Taylor
The Book of Play Production - Smith
Play Production for the Country Theatre -- Dolman
Problems of an Actor -- Calvert

(Enough hyperlinking…. You are welcome to search for the rest yourself….)

The Art of Pantomime -- Aubert
One Hundred Hints for Amateurs -- Benson
The Technique of Pantomime -- Lutz
Drama and Dramatics -- Fish
Effective Gesture -- Mosher
Speech Crafts -- Craig
The Technique of the One-Act-Play – Gannon, S.J.
Dramatics for School and Community -- Wise
How to Produce Amateur Plays -- Clarke
The Practical Theatre -- Shay
Acting -- Crafton and Roger
Psychology -- M. Maher, S.J.
Essentials of Effective Speaking -- Orr
Better Speech – Woolbert and Weaver

"Contingent Beings"

In 1932 someone named William J. O’Neill gave my father a loose leaf book of typed acting notes. I assume they are a copy, but they’re a copy which is typed-out manually—Forty-seven pages of notes, single-spaced.

The preface:

“These personal notes on acting are offered with the intention that the aspiring actor will find them helpful in perfecting his body, intellect and will. The body will be trained though the practice of the principles herein contained. The intellect will be exercised in the fulfillment of all the principles, but particularly, in the analysis of character, not only in the play at hand, but in the world itself. The will receives training by compelling the actor to do the matter required to make the play successful, and by strengthening personally the actor against the pit-falls of erroneous motives. As no contingent being is an end in itself, so acting is a means to an end, the perfection of our natures.”