ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author tries to find faces in the audience but it is difficult to see them individually in that great sea of half darkness. Some of the girls can be really nasty. Jealousy, really, for that's all are on the stage - a colored frame around a pure white dancing picture. The girls used to try and explain how the ballets worked and how the steps were performed and they'd get really angry because the men didn't seem to take them seriously. The management always asks Madame Lanner to get a vision scene in, a 'transformation', as the audience loves these. There'll be tinkly water music and the flimsy curtain at the back of the stage will be drawn back to reveal another tableaux, a 'transformed' picture within the picture of the stage. The 'male' characters are nearly always played by women; en travestie, they call it.
