Foreign News: Ushers

Monday, Feb. 21, 1927

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He, if he be not boor, who enters a European theatre must tip the usher. At Parisian music halls the ushers, vociferously rampant, will, if not tipped, stand at one's elbow and cry: "Service! Service! SERVICE!" almost indefinitely.* Last week the publicity agent of the Parisian Usher's Association issued an explanatory bit of propaganda: 1) The ushers are not paid to usher. 2) Instead they pay 50 centimes (2¢) a night to the management for each seat assigned tp them. 3) Therefore they must figure on a minimum tip of one franc (4¢) from each person whom they usher into a seat, in order to earn even 25 francs ($1) per night.

^{*At the Concert Mayol, most rapacious of Parisian revue
halls, Mr. Freddy Bate (with whom Edward of Wales sometimes stops in
Paris) once elected to give no tip, and sat for seven minutes and forty
seconds by his watch, until the usher finally ceased to cry out,
wilted. Melting, Mr. Bate, originally of Chicago, now a fashionable
expatriate, rushed after the usher and gave her 100 francs ($4).}