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Right - Programme detail for the Palace Theatre of Varieties being run at the time by Alfred Butt - 27th May 1910. With Margaret Cooper, Anna Pavlova and Michael Mordkin. The greatest of all novelties which Alfred Butt gave us - to earn our eternal gratitude - was Anna Pavlova. In one night she revolutionized our ideas of dancing. In one night she conquered London. She is a cherished legend today, a beloved one. Butt's finest epitaph would be that he gave us Anna Pavlova. No man could desire more. There was another sensation, too when she slapped the face of her dancing partner when he dropped her. She did this in full view of the audience - and England rang with the news.
Above Left - Auditorium view from the balcony 2004. M.L. Return To Front Page of Palace Theatre Feature
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Another
of Butt's captures was Margaret Cooper, a very distinguishedlooking
artist of great refinement who sang very charming songs at the piano
very well. She was first-rate. She swept languidly on to the stage,
surveyed her audience with some hauteur, vouchsafed them the slightest
movement of her upper lip by way of a smile, removed her long gloves
very leisurely and put them on the piano. Removed her handsome and
expensive furs very leisurely, and put them on the piano. Removed
her many and flashing rings very leisurely-and put them on the piano.
Then she sat down at the piano herself-and she charmed us all. There
was a dispute between Miss Cooper and Alfred Butt which occasioned
speeches and the ringing up and down of the curtain, but Butt won.
He usually did.
This
partner was Michael Mordkin. He was a magnificent-looking man and
a good enough dancer, but he was not in the Pavlova class. But then,
who was? The applause and the cheers which greeted their dancing went
to his head. He thought he earned as much of it as she. So he got
troublesome, he got a swollen head. He complained of everything, of
the way in which he was billed, of his dressing-room - he ran the
whole gamut of theatrical temperament. On that eventful night, he
may have dropped her on purpose, or he may not. Anyway, it was he
who got slapped and Anna who got the sympathy. Even when, after the
curtain was lowered, he rushed on to the stage to 'say his piece'
they blacked out on him and turned on the 'Bioscope,' with the orchestra
going full blast, and all the audience saw was his excited figure
bobbing about until he retired, hurt in every sense. But as he was
in the habit of wearing a top hat, frock coat and brown boots, he
got little sympathy from the Edwardians and he did not appear again.
But who would have been cross with Pavlova in London?
