The cultivation of this
habit ought to be, and I believe is in some cases, a safeguard against
theatricality.
* * * * *
[Footnote 1: Sardou wrote careful and detailed scenarios, Dumas _fils_
held it a waste of time to do so. Pailleron wrote "enormous" scenarios,
Meilhac very brief ones, or none at all. Mr. Galsworthy, rather to my
surprise, disdains, and even condemns, the scenario, holding that a
theme becomes lifeless when you put down its skeleton on paper. Sir
Arthur Pinero says: "Before beginning to write a play, I always make
sure, by means of a definite scheme, that there is _a_ way of doing it;
but whether I ultimately follow that way is a totally different matter."
Mr. Alfred Sutro practically confesses to a scenario. He says: "Before I
start writing the dialogue of a play, I make sure that I shall have an
absolutely free hand over the entrances and exits: in other words, that
there is ample and legitimate reason for each character appearing in any
particular scene, and ample motive for his leaving it.
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