Tales from a Scenic Artist and Scholar. Part 1066 – P. Dodd Ackerman, 1920

Copyright © 2020 by Wendy Waszut-Barrett

The scenic art world was small in 1920. Then, just as now, personalities circled around one another as if dancers at a ball, occasionally changing partners along the way. Today’s post is about P. Dodd Ackerman, a friend and colleague of Thomas G. Moses who made the papers in 1920. The next few posts will explore the life and career of P. D. Ackerman and his brother E. A. Ackerman.

On Feb. 29, 1920, Ackerman was featured in a “New York Tribune” the newspaper article. The headline for the article announced, “Work of the Scenic Artist Has Advanced Materially Says P. Dodd Ackerman” (New York Tribune, 29 Feb 1920, page 34). The most interesting section of the article for me was the section: “Theatrical managers are now accepting designs from men who do not make the scenery. Ackerman does not believe in this and has come to be one of the pioneers in coming out against the practice. He believes that the man who is the artist, who is practical, who understands stagecraft and has education can do the type of work now required in the theater, although he has been a member of the old school of stage design.” Times were changing and the scenic world was turning upside down with the appearance of designers without a full understanding of stagecraft.”Here is the article in its entirety, as it provides an interesting perspective of the scenic art world in 1920, viewed from a member of the “old school”:

“J. E. Dodson, the English character actor in the late Charles Frohman’s companies, liked stage interiors to match the socks he wore. When P. Dodd Ackerman and Ed Unitt, the scenic artists with the producer, were at work on scenery for a new play he would come up, show them his socks and say:‘Boys, be sure to get the right shade for these.’“Now Ackerman has a very different problem. He is trying to design a room which will be the setting for the three acts of Max Marcin’s new play, ‘Three Live Ghosts.” It must not be ornate, it must not be highly furnished and yet it must hold the interest of the audience throughout the play.‘Sounds very simple, doesn’t it?’ he asked in the office of his studio opposite of the Metropolitan Opera House. ‘Yet I have been going about for ten days trying to dream of just the right room.’In these two instances there is summed up the advance in scenic art, an advance which has come in the last six or eight years, starting in Europe. When Dodson was acting and even years after his retirement, stage decorations were supposed to be reproductions of nature or of a locality or room. They were copied line for line, and the element of imagination, although present, did not enter into the designing of the scenery. Simplicity and suggestion are the keynotes of modern stage designing. Imagination is called upon, both the imagination of the artist and the imagination of the audience, and much is only hinted at, sometimes very faintly. Big, blank wall spaces are being used and are believed to be more decorative than the highly ornate hangings of a few years ago.Scene painters until four or five years ago, designed, created and made the scenery themselves Theatrical managers are now accepting designs from men who do not make the scenery. Ackerman does not believe in this and has come to be one of the pioneers in coming out against the practice. He believes that the man who is the artist, who is practical, who understands stagecraft and has education can do the type of work now required in the theater, although he has been a member of the old school of stage design.‘Many studios have allowed managers to hand them so-called designs and have made them possible through their efforts,’ he said. ‘The man who did only the very primitive part of the work got all the credit and the studios were never heard of. But it meant an income to them and they were satisfied. I have consistently refused work with any except of my own designs, and I have had a hard battle to convince managers that a man with an established reputation in the old school can change the order of things and do the new. How many theatergoers who laugh at the situations and admire the acting give even a moment’s consideration to the thought, the time and the expense of the stage decorations which often help make or ruins a production? It is doubtful of the ratio is more than one in ten.Briefly Mr. Ackerman, who has designed and built scenery for many Winter Garden productions, for ‘The Magic Melody’ and ‘The Passions Flower,’ now current on Broadway; for ‘Le Coq d’Or,’ at the Metropolitan and many other plays, described the steps leading from the manuscript to the completion of the scenery and its erection of the stage.The manuscript is turned over to the scenic artist, and frequently the playwright confers with him and suggests what he desires to bring out in various scenes. After reading the manuscript and noting the locale or setting, the artist designs the scenes in colored studies. These are submitted to a manager and at a conference at which the author, the stage director and the artist are present, they are discussed and either accepted or rejected.‘Sometimes it is necessary to make a great many studies before one is accepted. It is just like writing a play or a story. You might hit it at the first attempt, or you might have to wrote and rewrite until you are successful,’Models, drawn to scale and planned as carefully as houses, are made from the sketches and are also submitted. When they are passed, working drawings for the builders are made, and they are charged with determining the mechanical details of the work. For example, every piece of scenery must be no more than five feet ten inches in width in order to make railway transportation of the sets possible. The scenes are usually all fitted up before the painters start on them, and when completed are set up in the theater by the mechanic who built them from the plans, usually not until the day of the dress rehearsal.‘Lighting is a very important element,’ Mr. Ackerman said, ‘and I stipulate in every contract that I make that it must be under my supervision. I know the play, and working with the stage director it is possible to bring out the desired effects. Stage lighting, I find, is largely a matter of patience and experiment. In costume plays, it is necessary to have the actors on the stage during the experiments to see the effect of the lights on their costumes.The average time necessary to design and build the scenery for a play is from six to eight weeks, but seldom is enough time given.‘It is necessary then to think quickly and have a great source of knowledge at the tips of one’s fingers,’ Mr. Ackerman continued.To prepare for his work, Mr. Ackerman studied at the Art Students League, at Cooper Union, and Beaux Arts in Paris. He has also traveled and read extensively. Ed Unitt and he were the artists for the late Charles Frohman, and this, he says, was the best job he ever had.Through the lofty-ceilinged studio he led the way. Huge canvases, many colored, were stretched out on frames, waiting for the artist’s brush. Yet no scaffolds or ladders were visible. Simply by pulling a rope, which adjusts a system of weights, it is possible for one man to place the gigantic easel in any position he desires.‘Scenery,’ he concluded, ‘must be a background. When it gets beyond a background, then it is stage scenery. It should never intrude so much that the audience overlooks the play, the costumes or the people on the stage.”

To place Ackerman within the context of the Thomas G. Moses story, both Moses and Ackerman partnered with the same artist – L. L. Graham. In 1882, Thomas G. Moses left the Sosman & Landis Studio for the first time. He partnered with Lemuel L. Graham for just over a year. Graham later partnered with P. Dodd Ackerman in Brooklyn, New York. Their studio building was at 1576 to 1580 Bushwick Ave, New York. They purchased the Brooklyn lot in August 1902. By this time, Moses was also working in New York and had partnered with William F. Hamilton, forming Hamilton & Moses.I will continue to explore the life and career of Ackerman in tomorrow’s post.To be continued…