The Mask & Wig Club of the University of Pennsylvania A Survey of the First 50 Years (1889-1939): The Relationship between the Club and the Non-Club By Alexander S. Distell and the SYG Class of 2008
Contents
1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………….p. 3 2. In the Beginning………………………………………………………………..p. 4 3. The 1890’s……………………………………………………………………...p. 6 4. October 10th — 17 17th 1899………………………………………………………..p. 9 5. The Early 20th Century……………………………… Century…………………………………………....... …………........................p. .................p. 11 6. The Roaring ‘20’s and Onwards……………………………………………….p. 13 7. The 1930’s and 1940’s………………………………………………………....p. 16 8. The Undergraduate Club Today……………………………………………….. p. 17 9. The Clubbies…………………………………………………………………....p. 20 10. Conclusion……………………………………………………………………... p. 21
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§ 1. Introduction For well over a century, the Mask and Wig Club of the University of Pennsylvania has carried on a vibrant tradition of all-male burlesque and cabaret style dramatics and antics at the University of Pennsylvania. Currently, the Club remains the focus of student extra-curricular life and enjoys its reputation as the nation’s oldest all male musical comedy troupe. Mask and Wig draws the largest audiences after men’s basketball and football, and succeeds in disseminating a sense of belonging within the university community amongst those who wend their way down to the historic Clubhouse for the annual spring production. Today the Club comprises a company of roughly 45 men, all of various backgrounds and experiences whose integration of diversity brings to Mask and Wig an originality and richness that stands as a testament to the strength of the Club as an institution.
Besides its strong ties with the university community,
undergraduate members enjoy the ongoing support and involvement of a dedicated and enthusiastic Graduate Club of alumni. For the last 118 years, the dynamic between the Graduate Club and the Undergraduate Club has undergone little though some change. Of greater interest remain the considerable transformations endured over the years by undergraduates regarding their status as club members of Mask and Wig.
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The modern titles conferred upon undergraduate constituents to distinguish their respective roles within the company are the Non-Club and the Club.
Non-clubbies
consist in those men not yet nominated for membership in the Club, whereas clubbies refers to undergraduates elected for membership. The preceding terms will be utilized throughout the rest of this discussion regarding undergraduate membership though evidence does not exist suggesting that Mask and Wig employed these terms during its early history. The following will attempt to acquire an understanding of the relationship between the Club and Non-Club in reference to the undergraduate company during the Mask and Wig Club’s first 50 years.
Evidently, the earlier structure of the Club’s
hierarchy resulted in a company inherently competitive and less unified than today. Currently, the Mask and Wig Club finds itself more of a fraternity-like organization that imbues equally as much stress on social activities and fraternal bonds as on the theatrical productions that constitute its raison d’être.
§ 2. In the Beginning… The Mask and Wig Club emerged as an organization at a time during which the United States of America found itself upon a seat of increasing global power, surfing the rapids of the new Industrial Revolution towards a golden age of culture and an economic boon. It was therefore only natural that Philadelphia’s more prominent and privileged sons should attempt crafting a society whose nature resonated with and exemplified the then current state of the nation. In 1888 theater arts did not provide much of an outlet for students at Pennsylvania. Restless given the dearth of opportunities, four young men led by Clayton
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Fotterall McMichael began staging their own productions at the 40th Street Grand Opera House in West Philadelphia.1 The other three men included W.I. Forbes, F.B. Nielson, and
Charles
original
Camac
auditions that resides upon the
Clubhouse wall to this day.
Speculation has it that on April
24th 1888, official plans for a
theater troupe were laid out.
After the call notice was
posted in the basement of
College
photo
inlay),
regular
ensued. Among the original
names
considered
organization
Harlequin”, “The Footlights”
Hall
notice
whose names appear on the
for
and
call
N.B.
(see
were
“The
“The
Pierrot.”2
According
to
meetings for
1941
the
Club
Historian William A. Werdersheimer, Charles Camac came up with “The Mask and Wig Association”, though its members soon officially christened it “The Mask and Wig Club of the University of Pennsylvania.” Inspired by a burlesque production by the London Gaiety Troupe prompted the Club’s very first production, “Lurline” or “The Knight and the Naiads,” which proved a
total social and financial success at the Chestnut Street Opera House on June 4th, 1889. This owed itself much to the work of the founder’s mothers who encouraged their friends, society’s elite, in spreading the word and officially serving as patronesses.
3
Some of the nation’s most well-regarded families attended, including the Lippincotts and
Biddles. For a newborn organization at such an institution as Penn, the seal of approval stamped by those listed in the Social Register proved essential to the Club’s early continued existence.
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The production consisted in a small cast and larger chorus. The founders granted themselves leading roles while others had made the cut through audition. In that respect it may be said that the founders were the original clubbies, for they did not yet have any higher authority to which they needed answer besides themselves, and they maintained absolute control in running the company independent of the university. The original charter of October 17th 1892 states that the officers of the corporation include a president, secretary, treasurer, business manager, stage director and an executive committee.4 These positions were occupied by the original members of the Club: Neilson, Steel, Merrick, Coulston, McMichael, Kendrick, Brooks, and Gates (surprisingly, neither Forbes nor Camac appear on this list though later they would). They therefore comprised the original Graduate Club membership; indeed, all of these men had moved on from their undergraduate careers with the exception of Murdoch Kendrick ’93 who was a senior, and Edward Brooks Jr. a law student of the class of ‘93
who had received his bachelor’s degree from Yale in 1890.5 This seminal step, in which two members had not yet graduated, marks the undergraduate club’s unofficial genesis as a distinct though as of this time tenuous and dependent entity. We will see shortly how throughout the 1890’s the nature of undergraduate membership and university affiliation
was challenged in light of the Club’s escalating achievements.
§ 3. The 1890’s During this decade of substantial growth, Mask and Wig enjoyed success both financially and in terms of its popularity with the wider public. In 1891, only three years after its founding, the Club initiated a continuous tradition known today as Tour. The
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first Mask and Wig Tour brought that year’s show, “Miss Columbia” to New York and Washington, D.C., though the show was only a “modest success.”6 Nevertheless, at home in Philadelphia, the Club was on a role. In 1892, the Club played Easter week, the “first time in the country a college dramatic organization had ever attempted, and with marked success, such a lengthy run in a metropolitan city,” and “from this time till 1936 with ‘Red Rhumba’, Easter week and Mask and Wig in Philadelphia became a permanent 7
fixture.” With the money pocketed from its annual production, the Club purchased a
property at 310 S. Quince Street only a few blocks away from the Chestnut Street Opera House located between 11th and 12th streets. Built in 1834, what became the Mask and Wig Clubhouse served as St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, followed by a dissecting lab for Jefferson Medical College students and finally a horse stable before Mask and Wig purchased it in December of 1893 from John B. Ellison, “a member of a well known and distinguished Philadelphia family.”8 The
Clubhouse provided Wiggers with a physical object that harnessed the previously freeroaming and burgeoning institution. In effect, it accomplished an important feat in unifying Club members with something all families require — a home. The Executive Committee commissioned the young Wilson Eyre, an unknown Philadelphia architect later famous for his grand estates on the Main Line, to rebuild the stables into something befitting of a gentlemen’s dramatic club.
Eyre designed an
auditorium with a stage on the second floor while creating a comfortable and welcoming Grille Room on the first floor. The atmosphere was redolent of many of the nation’s clubs and organizations that also had their origins or became much more popular around the same time as Mask and Wig such as the Union League, Freemasons and the Knights
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of Columbus, not to mention the many university clubs particular to other Ivy League schools.
The
young
Maxfield Parrish, who would
later become an artistic icon
of his generation, received his
first professional commission
in decorating the Clubhouse.9
His famous Old King Cole
portrait*
generated the warmth and
merrymaking atmosphere of the
above
the
bar
Grille Room as did his humorous caricatures of club members with which the Grille Room walls are pregnant. Parrish also painted a remarkable and striking design above and around the auditorium stage. 1893 was a significant year in other respects as well. The sentiments brewing during this time, which “came to a head” in 1899 had a direct effect on the future of the
undergraduate company and the rules governing undergraduate membership in the Club. 1893 marked the first year that the original members including McMichael were no longer students yet they endeavored to participate in that year’s production, “The Yankee League.”
Many factors contributed to the developing discontentment, though it was
mainly, as Werdersheimer points out, “constant success coupled with a normal amount of
egotism [which] accounted for a real division in opinion among the members as to the future of the Club.”10 Not much evidence exists to document the ensuing drama of that
decade, though one can easily imagine that a perpetual struggle existed between the undergraduate performers and the Graduate Club members regarding the production of the shows and the organization and carrying out of Club affairs. These sentiments had
*
The original was sold in 1996 for auction at Christie’s in New York for $662,500 by an anonymous bidder.
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particular significance for occasionally Graduate members would reprise lead roles in addition to already steering the helm of writing, stage production et al.
§ 4. October 10 th — 17th 1899 Arrogant from ten year’s success and thus still riding the thrilling high of achievement, the original member’s frustration boiled over. Many, including founding
father Clayton Fotterall McMichael, stood firmly of the opinion that the Club should cut itself off from the University of Pennsylvania, establishing a professional dramatic association
free
students.11
of
Probably, they
felt a reasonable degree of
jealousy. Having graduated
from
no
longer enjoyed not only their
apparent youth but their
glory as the lead roles in the
productions of a Club they
had
create.
Understandably,
they resented leaving the
central and most important
component of their lives in
college,
they
worked so
hard
to
the hands of strangers. On the night of October 10th, 1899 a meeting was held during which these issues were adamantly debated. Such a serious issue required more time to discuss and so a final decision had to wait another week.
The culmination of the
deliberations on October 17th, 1899 secured the fate of Mask and Wig as it stands today and formally initiated what we now know as the Undergraduate Club. That evening, McMichael gave a speech in which he reversed his decision entirely, mustering up the courage necessary to set aside his ego and with clarity consider the future of his organization. According to Werdersheimer:
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Openly and without reservation the justification for the continued existence of the Mask and Wig as part and parcel of the University was clearly and firmly established. At the same time, undergraduates, by amendment of the By-laws, were for the first time given recognition in the executive affairs of the Club.12 Undoubtedly, some of the original opposition remained at least indifferent if not, and most probably, still angered by this arrangement. But because the governing body had not yet elected any undergraduates to contest the graduates’ disagreement beforehand, the contentions probably existed only between individual Graduate Club members to which the undergraduate performers must have remained almost entirely unaware. But this dynamic would change forever now that college students could be elected to membership. They even received seats upon the Executive Committee, which was later renamed the Board of Governors. Perhaps once involved with the official process of production, the old tensions of the previous decade resurfaced as older men and younger students, separated by a clear generational divide, must surely have held differing views on the correct way of doing things. The specific rules governing student membership planted a seed of competition that would lastingly change the nature of the relationships within the undergraduate body. The By-laws as of 1909, which are the earliest available copy, state in Article IV Section 3 the following regarding student membership: Student members of the Club may be elected from time to time at the discretion of the Executive committee, from the bona fide students of the University of Pennsylvania (who shall have been members of the cast or chorus of a regular production of the Club) and who shall have successfully completed one full year at the University, providing always that a three-fourths vote of the Executive Committee shall be necessary to secure such election.13
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This method of selection caused undergraduate students to vie for club membership based on the talents, abilities, dedication and personal character of those hoping to become clubbies.
As the Club’s fame and success increased during the early 20th century,
competition became evermore intense.
§ 5. The Early 20 th Century Admission into the Club early one was highly selective, with only 249 of the thousands of men who had performed in shows gaining admission to the Graduate Club by 1941.14 And those elected to membership needed to have served as undergraduate Club members first. Only those who had received speaking parts as undergraduates were even eligible for membership.15
Yet the passion and desire for inclusion in this
organization helped its overall success and sustained its vibrant life. In 1901, not all of that year’s senior class had become clubbies: “Although the
Easter show is the thing for which the Club exists, there is another side, the Club itself. Several of our classmen — Davis, Hare, Miller, Stratton, Taylor, Donaldson, Warthman — were elected undergraduate members of the Club.”16 Certainly the Wig class of 1901
revered those who they had willingly nominated for membership, probably lauding their talents and achievements; although, the statement above remains relatively neutral, probably not to offend the rest who had failed to be elected. That membership was competitive is not to say that it was unhealthily fierce though many men likely took it very seriously and perhaps felt bitter for their own shortcomings that had precluded them from becoming clubbies. To further illustrate the difficulty of gaining membership, it should be noted that none of the men of the class of 1902 or the class of 1903 was elected
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to membership as made clear in the class yearbooks from those years as well.17 This should not surprise anyone aware of Article IV Section 3’s proviso that undergraduate members be elected only “from time to time.” And considering that election required a three fourth’s vote by the executive committee, resentments may have stirred amongst
undergraduate performers in light of the reality that many of them mostly likely “schmoozed” the Grad Club and boasted particular talents that others lacked.
Sadly, Clayton Fotterall McMichael passed away in 1907, an untimely death. At the time of his death, McMichael had expected to step into the throes of the office to which he had been recently elected — secretary of the university, a testament to his prominence and service to the university community through his involvement with the Mask and Wig Club. In 1908 the Club, which was “awash in philanthropic good will, not to
cash,”18 erected its
mention
own dormitory in
the
Quadrangle
in
memory
McMichael.
To
this day the hall
name
Mask and Wig, and
members
regulate its activity
to a certain extent
within the limits of
university policy.
Housed within the McMichael dormitory, the Mask and Wig
bears Club
the
University of
Clubroom provides a center of Club activity, used primarily and almost exclusively by undergraduate members. This crucial step of affording undergraduates their own space signified to the clubbies, even if only nominally, their importance and necessity to the organization as a whole.
It also provided a further means of segregating the non-
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clubbies, or in other words, those non-members whose names were not even listed as company members† save their inclusion in the cast and chorus list if they had been lucky enough to win a role in that particular year’s production. In 2006, clubbies use the Clubroom for Sunday meetings during the fall and elections in the spring. The Mask and Wig Band utilizes the space to rehearse for its annual fall Kick Off
Bash and Spring Fling
performances.
Naturally,
clubbies possess keys
to the space and non-
clubbies
granted
must
be
permission to borrow
said
only
special keys
and
subsequently gain access. Also in modern times, the one dorm room attached to the Clubroom still resides within the Club’s control whereas the other rooms in the hall fall
under university regulation. Each year the Club selects who shall inhabit this room — cheaper and larger than most Quad rooms — and the occupant is almost always a member of the undergraduate company though not necessarily a clubbie.
§ 6. The Roaring ‘20’s and Onwards Certainly by the 20’s, if not earlier, the annual schedule of performances and the
process of audition, selection, and rehearsal had established itself rather firmly. The fall earned its infamy with the traditional Smokers that took place in Houston Hall. There consisted three separate Smoker performances attended by Graduate Club members, friends, family, and students. In essence, the Smoker served as a trial run for potential †
Today, the Mask and Wig Club website (www.maskandwig.com) lists non-clubbies as members of the company. Further information regarding the current hierarchy of the Club’s infrastructure will be explained below.
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performers during which comedic ideas were fleshed out, and singing and dancing skills put to the test. It also provided a nice outlet for men not as likely suitable for principle roles or even chorus parts in the Easter production, which was later changed to Thanksgiving: “…offering an opportunity to the individual to demonstrate the particular
talent, be it musical or otherwise, with which he was endowed or thought himself possessed.”19 Such an atmosphere was conducive to experienced stage men coming back
the following year to intimidate the new guys who might think themselves big enough to challenge them. That which transpired throughout the three day extravaganza likely set the competitive tone for the rest of the year. This environment affected more so the students vying for membership rather than those who had already secured clubbie status with roles already reserved for them in the year’s production, though they would still need to audition for specific parts. Outside of Mask and Wig, America had entered upon a decade of decadent debauchery. While Mask and Wig gained popularity and money on its home turf, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Princeton ’17, began producing short stories and novels that codified the
party-loving lifestyle of society’s socio-economic elite, terming the decade the “Jazz Age,” as well as defining the stereoty pe of Ivy League pretension in “This Side of Paradise” (1924). In “Paradise,” Fitzgerald’s autobiographical main character Amory
Blaine writes and performs with Princeton’s Triangle Club, implanting in the nation’s consciousness notions of elite society, selective and exclusive schools, as well as all-male collegiate musical comedy troupes. That such a premier work of literature included something of such a sort is a testament to the popularity of the medium, and reflects Mask and Wig’s golden age of glory.
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In 1926, a key event happened in the history of the undergraduate company. Consistent with tradition at the time, submissions by undergraduates and graduates for the Easter production constituted a good-natured contest for the best written show. In this year and undergraduate by the name of Albert G. Miller won out with his script for “A Sale and a Sailor .” This received positive attention in a newspaper clipping from The Pennsylvanian that year:
Although we must reserve judgment on the merits of this year’s Mask and Wig production, it is a good omen that the Club has found a playwright within its own membership. There were some misgivings when the Club burned its bridges behind it two years ago and resolved to depend upon its own undergraduates for its productions. Last year’s musical comedy, in which several students collaborated, proved to be one of the most successful of the Club’s annual offerings. The Club has undoubtedly taken the right method to stimulate undergraduate talent. Such publicity stirred and simmered a more competitive environment amongst undergraduates and encouraged their relative autonomy as a whole from the alumni. Though it is uncertain wither Miller was a clubbie at the time of his submission, it is likely that if he wasn’t, such a feat as this production would surely have made him highly
eligible for membership.
And so naturally, book submissions provided another
opportunity outside of auditions for undergraduate members to challenge each other’s abilities in striving for one of the rare and coveted red and blue rosettes of a clubbie as well as earning his name a position in the history of the production lime light. During this era, the Club temporarily experimented with professional coaches to work with the cast and chorus. This did not “fit in with the Mask and Wig system,”20 and the company soon returned to direction from within its own membership. Despite the Great Depression, the Club continued through toward the end of the decade. The state of the economy at the time did affect sales at the box office though and to cut costs, the
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Club ceased its contract with a professional publisher for its programs and advertising in 1931; instead, “a number of old members for several years procured all the advertisements for the program.” 21
The Club continues with this method currently,
though “old members” have gotten lazy and subsequently they have delegated the
responsibility to the undergraduate Business Staff.
§ 7. The 1930’s and 1940’s Pulling out of a recession requires dedication and hard work. At the time, the Club had to cope with two major issues: one was that the university had expressed threatening concern regarding student academic time detracted by going on tour and working on a show at the end of term. Second were the real financial concerns due to a decreasing popularity with theater-going in the Easter season. To rectify the situation, Mask and Wig made a difficult decision by exchanging its Easter week timeslot for Thanksgiving instead. The year of this change was 1936 and so there happened to be two “big” productions: the Easter production “Red Rhumba” followed immediately in the fall by “The Mad Whirl.”22 Thanks to this change in scheduling, the Club regained its former
financial standing and success by 1941.23 However, with the change to Thanksgiving, there also came a change to rules governing undergraduate participation in the production. Freshman could no longer participate in the annual production. To solve this problem, undergraduate club members received the opportunity to write, stage, and direct their very own production completely autonomous from Graduate Club interference, to be given each spring in Irvine Auditorium and referred to as the “Freshman Show.”
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This way, talented freshman
would have the chance to prove themselves worthy of consideration for roles in next year’s big production. Meanwhile, the Club’s fame spread throughout the nation with the advent of swing and the Jitterbug in the late 30’s into the 40’s. Big Bands across the nation sought
Mask and Wig music, much of it written by Club member Charles Gilpin but most noticeably, a Club member by the name of Bobby Troupe. Troupe is responsible for a number of Mask and Wig favorites including “Hey Daddy” and “Route 66.” Frank Sinatra popularized “Route 66” and a number of a cappella groups covered “Hey Daddy.”
Other luminaries responsible for spreading the sounds of Mask and Wig include Ella Fitzgerald, Les Brown, Benny Goodman, and Tommy Dorsey. These people constituted the nation’s musical celebrities at the time. This kind of attention bears the responsibility
of inducing men attending auditions by the throngs every year, ensuring that Mask and Wig selected its performers and Club members from the cream of the crop of youthful male performing artists. Joining the Mask and Wig Club throughout this first 50 years of its existence was essential to the complete Penn experience.
§ 8. The Undergraduate Club Today With the advent of television and the popularization of cinema, not to mention the decline in numbers of the theater-going audience, Mask and Wig’s glory days diminished during the fifties.
To accommodate smaller audiences, shows changed from the
grandiose burlesques at the major theaters to smaller cabaret style shows held in the Clubhouse auditorium. Sadly, funding continues to decline in general each year given the high costs of production, tour and Clubhouse maintenance.
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Today, while election to membership in the Club is not a surefire bet, it has integrated itself more fully as a built-in part of the process that transpires every year, and has become fairly formalized. The “Freshman Show” now happens in the fall but rather
than a show for freshman to perform in, it serves as a show for them to see during New Student Orientation in hopes of attracting potential members of the company. Indeed, the Club does not enjoy as widely publicized a reputation as in the old days.
Heavy
recruitment in the first week of the fall semester is necessary to ensuring a talented and able freshman class.
And while their admittance back into the company for their
sophomore year is not technically guaranteed, a year of fraternal bonding, arduous rehearsals and long performance schedules holds the odds heavily in their favor. Such as it is, nearly every New Guy class, as they are called, returns the next year in its entirety with the rare exception of every few years when one or two members showed almost no promise the year before and therefore suffer a most unfortunate expulsion from the company. The New Guy year is also a year of subservience to clubbies, with a Captain Cleanup designated the night of initiation, forever responsible for the remainder of the school year in rallying his class to cleanup duty after company events. But New Guys do not have it as badly as one might initially think. They enjoy a free ride with little to no responsibility whatsoever. Any “mistreatment” from the older members is actually a
disguised form of jealousy that the freshmen still have three more years ahead of them, not to mention the virgin awe and amazement derived from the surprise experienced throughout the year during the Club’s plethora o f traditions.
Sophomores re-audition as stated above in the fall. Having established strong friendships with the upperclassmen, as well as possessing an operating knowledge of the
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group’s functioning as an entity, usually makes it difficult to get turned away. In this
sense, the company in modern times reflects a rather self-contained unit with little to no competition year after year for a role. It should also thus be mentioned that entry into the company is not restricted solely to cast members (the chorus consists in the freshman and sophomores, though they oftentimes do have a few speaking roles), but is open to those interested in a fulltime commitment with either the stage crew, band, or business staff. Also, auditions for freshmen and sophomores do not consist in merely a role or orchestra chair for one show but instead offer membership in the company for the entire year of events. Sophomores, known as SYG’s or Second Year Guys, and the New Guys form the Non-Club. In this sense, SYG’s are also below the clubbies in the stratified hierarchy of the Club and owe them respect and a degree of obedience. At the end of the Spring Show towards the end of the year, the SYG class is “tapped” or nominated for membership in the Undergraduate Club. During the ensuing
three to four weeks, the sophomores work hard to prove their dedication to the Club, learning what it takes to be a clubbie though a very educational process, as well as learning to work together as a class to accomplish certain goals in a way that they have not yet been subjected to during their first two years. At the end of term, if they have proved themselves worthy over the past two years during their time spent in the company, the junior and senior clubbies elect them members of the Club. This process functions very differently today than in the past. In the earlier history as detailed above, membership required nomination and a three fourths vote by the Graduate Club. This form of entry into the Club derived from the competitive nature
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of membership rather than the rites-of-passage-fraternity-esque manner in which members are selected today.
The 2005-2006 company putting on a floor show downstairs after performing the spring production, “Not Another Divine Comedy: Yahweh or the Highway”
§ 9. The Clubbies
The junior clubbies and the SYG’s share an interesting relationship. After all,
only a year before both were in the Non-Club, but now the dynamic of their relationship has changed. Though still friends as all members should be, the juniors necessarily take on a more authoritative
role and are privy to
secret
information
cannot
clubbie exchange
that
they
with
their former non-clubbie
brethren. This change in
the relationship reflects
a natural and accepted
component
to
the
evolution of status as a company member. Junior clubbies receive their first opportunity for leadership at this time, with the possibility of being elected to any position with the - 20 -
exception of chairman and the various section heads. As with the seniors, junior clubbies most always exhibit remarkable devotion and loyalty to the organization, working very hard to see that the tradition and spirit of Mask and Wig continues. They deserve more recognition than they receive for their efforts, sometimes though not always residing in the shadow of the seniors. Senior clubbies reprise their status for their final year with a demand for somewhat more respect, and a fatherly cornucopia of wisdom, stories, advice and leadership — they are the grand masters. authoritative
Their relationship to the Non-Club is
and
sometimes less personal
than with that of the
juniors
sophomores
as far as the sophomores
are
because
concerned,
the
seniors
been clubbies and have
to
have
the
always
not had the opportunity
to share the bond of membership within one division of the Club at the same time. However, the degree to which seniors and non-clubbies commingle depends on the individual, and this applies to the juniors as well. Most seniors are willing to pass on their knowledge, enthusiastically encouraging and fostering a love for and loyalty to Mask and Wig, not to mention making new friends no matter how “unworthy” they may be. They along with the juniors have one goal in mind for the non-clubbies after all the hard work that goes into production — fun.
§ 10. Conclusion
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A self-selective organization, Mask and Wig maintains its strong sense of fraternity, a condition not present in earlier generations, particularly during the first fifty years of the Club’s history. The change from a competitive non-fraternal environment to
the current tight knit brotherhood of dramatics replete with endless traditions owes itself to the external affairs of the entertainment industry at large. When movies and television took over as the preeminent form of entertainment, all-male musical comedy troupes declined in popularity. Though Mask and Wig shows continue to sell out and remain popular on campus, the Club does not enjoy the national publicity it once did. Recruitment is necessary to retain membership, contrary to the old days when throngs of hundreds would show up to the Clubhouse or Houston Hall. The fraternity-like nature of the Club today is required such that a sense of urgency and necessity is instilled amongst its members, propelling onwards the existence of the Mask and Wig Club. At the end of the day, members of the Club, often feeling overwhelmed by this remarkable organization, are compelled to ask, “Why is there only one Mask and Wig Club of the University of Pennsylvania?” Because there’s only room for one There’s only room for one So here’s a swig of a toast so big Straight from the hearts of Mask and Wig There’s only room for one There’s only room for one We’d drink to you with a toast for two But there’s only room for one! Hey!
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NOTES
1
Werdersheimer, William A., 2 nd, Some Fifty Odd Years of The Mask and Wig Club 1888-1941. University of Pennsylvania Archives, p. 12 2 Werdersheimer, p.11-12 3 Werdersheimer, p. 14 4 P. 3-4 of the Year Book of the Mask and Wig Club of the University of Pennsylvania 1908-1909. Van Pelt Library collection. 5 Membership list of Wig Year Book 1908-1909 6 Werdersheimer, p. 16 7 Werdersheimer, p. 16 8 Werdersheimer, p. 20 9 Werdersheimer, p. 21 10 Werdersheimer, p. 26 11 Werdersheimer, p. 26 12 Werdersheimer, p. 27 13 MW Year Book 1908-1909, p. 16 14 Werdersheimer, p. 26 15 Werdersheimer, p. 26 16 The Record of the Class of 1901, University archives. p. 181 17 In The Record of the Class of 1902 and The Record of the Class of 1903, no mention of clubbie election is made, only that the men enjoyed acting in the choruses and returning for auditions each year, which implicitly admits their failure to make clubbie status. 18 th From “The Mask and Wig Club History” in the pl ay bill of the 117 annual production, “Birth of a Notion: Karl Seconds that Emotion!” 19 Werdersheimer, p. 22 20 Werdersheimer, p. 16 21 Werdersheimer, p. 17 22 Werdersheimer, p. 17 23 Werdersheimer, p. 18
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