Читать книгу Black Cats & April Fools - Origins of Old Wives Tales and Superstitions in Our Daily Lives - Harry Oliver - Страница 7
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Break a leg!
It is considered unlucky to wish an actor ‘good luck’ before a performance; instead, it is customary to tell him or her to ‘break a leg’. The origins and precise meaning of this expression are unclear, and over the years many different experts on superstitions have developed theories as to how it came about. One explanation suggests that, since ‘leg’ is a euphemism for ‘rope’ (a taboo word in the theatre as it is on board ships), to tell somebody to ‘break a leg’ would be equivalent to telling him or her to break the rope holding up the curtain. A particularly good performance, then, would call for the curtain to be opened many times in a row for the actor to re-emerge in front of the applauding audience, putting it at a risk of breaking.
Another explanation for the expression links it back to Ancient Greece, where audiences stamped their feet instead of clapping their hands at the end of a good performance. To tell an actor to ‘break a leg’ would thus not be referring to the actor’s leg but to that of his or her viewers who would have to stamp their feet so much watching their performance. This explanation seems unconvincing, however, since the expression seems to exist only in English and not in other Greek-inflected languages.
Eating and drinking food made with lemon or milk before a performance
To eat or drink food made with lemon or milk is considered very unlucky before a performance. The explanation for this superstition is quite simple: eating both substances affects saliva production, which hinders an actor’s voice and makes a performance weaker.
Macbeth is the unluckiest of plays
Shakespeare’s tragedy Macbeth is considered the unluckiest of all plays to put on stage, forecasting disaster for the company performing it and bringing misfortune to those performing in it. The records show that it is the play during which the largest number of accidents, fires and deaths have occurred, and many famous actors who performed the play are said to have had terrible misadventures following its staging. It is considered very unlucky to say the word ‘Macbeth’ anywhere in the theatre, but especially in the dressing rooms. The play is supposed to be referred to instead as ‘that Scottish play’, and there are various rituals that actors have to abide by if they accidentally say the ‘M’ word. According to one tradition, whoever says the forbidden word in the dressing room is to leave the dressing room, turn in a circle three times, break wind or spit and then only come back after knocking and asking permission to re-enter. Another commonly cited remedy is to say ‘Angels and ministers of grace defend us!’, a line spoken in Act I, sc. iv of Hamlet right after the appearance of the Ghost.
The play is generally considered to be unlucky on account of the appearances of the witches and the occult content of many of the scenes. At the time when Macbeth was first being performed, belief in witchcraft was still widespread and actors may have been afraid of accidentally unleashing demonic forces or conjuring up evil spirits – which is why the line from Hamlet would be spoken in protection against any such visitation. Some sources point to a more practical origin for the superstition, however. In Victorian times, theatre managers would close unsuccessful plays and replace them with Macbeth, as it was usually a great success due to its violent and bloody scenes and the fact that it could be learned faster than other Shakespeare pieces since it is his shortest tragedy. To hear the word ‘Macbeth’ spoken in the dressing room would thus be an omen of very bad luck for actors who risked finding themselves out of work very soon. It is also possible that the bad statistics for the performance of the play may be explained precisely because it was used so often as a replacement and filler in theatre seasons.
Whistling during a performance brings bad luck
It is considered very unlucky to whistle anywhere near the stage during a performance as this is supposed to curse it and bring doom upon it. One simple explanation for this is that theatre technicians would sometimes be given the signal to raise a prop or send down a backdrop using some form of whistling code. Whistling backstage could inadvertently send the wrong signal and seriously ruin a play.
To see the ghost of Drury Lane
It is a stroke of good fortune for an actor to see the ghost of Drury Lane before a performance as it announces a long and brilliant career. The ghost, known as ‘the man in grey’ (because of the long grey overcoat it is seen wearing), apparently haunts the Theatre Royal on Drury Lane, in London. The ghost is usually seen in the daytime in the auditorium of the theatre, the oldest in London after the reconstructed Globe Theatre. The man in grey also wears a powdered wig, a tricorne hat and carries a sword. Some say the apparition is the ghost of a man murdered in the theatre whose skeleton was found in 1840 in a walled-in room backstage, with a dagger stuck in its ribcage.
There are many other ghost stories surrounding theatres, and Monday night was traditionally considered ‘ghost night’, a time when ghosts were thought to come out to perform their own plays. Apparently, this old belief lies behind the practice, still common today, of not having performances on Monday. The term ‘ghost light’ is also linked to superstitious beliefs about ghosts. Besides helping people find their bearings backstage and avoiding terrible accidents, this kind of backstage lighting that was originally provided by candles was there to scare off the ghosts of past performances thought to haunt the stage and interfere with existing performances.
Never speak a play’s last line during rehearsals
In acting circles it is considered very unlucky to say the last line of a play out loud before the night of the performance, as it tempts fate and may expose the play to evil forces. The play, in fact, is not considered ‘finished’ until it is performed. This superstition resembles the superstition warning a bride against wearing the completed wedding gown before her wedding day, and may be a form of protection against evil spirits or the Devil – they cannot start attacking the wedding or the performance until it is officially ‘ready’ and under way.
Wearing green, yellow or blue at the theatre
These colours are believed to be unlucky when worn at the theatre. The bad luck associated with wearing the colour blue is apparently neutralised if silver is worn with it. The explanation for this superstition lies in the cost of producing blue textiles during the early days of theatre. Back in a time before synthetic dyes were common, the dye that was used to produce blue cloth was extremely expensive: if a company used blue costumes they could be assumed to be going over budget and endangering their finances. If silver was added to the costume, however, this was a clear sign that the theatre company had a very wealthy patron.
The superstitions around wearing green and yellow at the theatre have various interpretations. Some sources say that during Elizabethan times yellow and green were considered the colours of the Devil due to the destructive forces of fire and the savage forces of the forest. These same sources point out that green was also the colour of the fairies and thus a dangerous colour to wear. In fact, there is little evidence of any dislike of the colour green in Elizabethan plays and other texts, and it doesn’t seem to be deemed unlucky until the seventeenth century. Other sources have argued more pragmatically that green and yellow were considered unlucky at the theatre because the lighting that used to be common in the past would make those colours virtually invisible on stage and thus an actor’s performance would be hindered by his or her near invisibility.
