SHAKESPEARE

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 122, 25 May 1928, Page 2

SHAKESPEARE

♦ —— IN MODERN DRESS " THE CASE FOR TRADITION - PEOPOSAL CRITICISED Sir Barry Jackson .is a ."live ■wire" „ of the English theatre. 'He is always— ■ and at considerable cost to himself —experimenting; and asthere is nothing our Stage needs so much as men of courage and moans \vitli the experimental mind, wo must welcome, even with misgivings, his adventure of "Macbeth" in modern dress writes Sydney W. Carroll £n the '■'Daily Telegraph." i?or his. sincerity - ' and public spirit cannot bo questioned. Not one can suspect sucb a man of a "stunt." And when he applies himself and his resources to the absorbing problem of how to stage Shakespeare it behoves all students of the drama to observe his operations. With a certain . measure of success, particularly in the popular parts ofitho house, he staged at the Kings-way Theatre some time ago a production of "Hamlet" in modern dress, and secured for his idea a fairly ' favourable Press and a public run of some five or six '■ weeks. . He achieved also a partial success with a production ou similar Hues of ' '- All's Well that Ends Well." One critic waxed so enthusiastic over the 'modern-dressed Hanilet that he. boldly declared, that Shake- > speare's hojd over the future, if he was to hold the future at all, would be thro- ■ ugh a Danish Prince in a dinner jacket , and an Ophelia in a short frock. Shakespeare, for him, should .always be threat- * ed as a modern playwright. < . Now that this revolutionary; has been given an opportunity'of seeing Macbeth in khaki and,kilts andjiLady/Macbeth as an up-to-date flaxen "vamp" his heart is evidently filled with gratitude for the chance-that has been given to him of maintaining his" opinion. Mac- N both, ' absolutely ".'deprived, of supernatural values—its, main purpose—is the idea to be sought .for, evidently. WHAT THE PLAYS LOSE. .Shakespeare .is no;t..onTy : a playwright, but is .the greatest,.imaginative poet the world has-known., $o;,throw his poetry . overb.oar.fl.;for tKe"sake of' an ' effect that the cheapest melodrama can reproduce far- more /effectively is, to my way of ..thinking,-, ani.^unpardonable aesthetic offence. .What.playgoer .with a sensitive ear, a. just-appreciation of modulation,- variety;- and Emphasis, a lovo, of English.-puro-,-and- undented, 'could'-list'in to Mr.-Malurin's prince of .■mpdevn.dra^i'ng-roo'm.^.rillains exploding audvsplutteriTig-^iiicphel^ntly over those exquisite soliloquies of -Macbeth, which contain some of the finest poetical passages known to' tlie-" English language, without' feeling . jarred and. rebellious to the profpundest depths •of his soul? : '..■."■:"■"' Sir Barry Jackson-.must blame the West-end, tailors. They, ,ha*e lost the .. knack of. Cutting coataiso. that people can easily; and in conformlift their hands above- their, heads..-'-iEou^cannot play Macbeth from :■' tner ;waist downways, with your a'rins"hangirig/by."your sides Or extended only, from * the, elbow; nor with only two expressions on your face, • as with our moderns.. . ■ ' " On the debit side there is-thc loss of pootry, of dignity,, of • psychology, of subtlety, a proper sense of exact time, period and place, of atmosphere, the link with the past agey the historic, the sentimental' and the supernatural. All those priceless assets'of Shakespearean tradition aro obliterated, ■ ruthlessly swept; awajv 'In'itheir place we aro given champagne, short skirts, cigar-' eties, silk dressing-gowns,' whisky and soda,-gramophoiies, electric lights, toothbrush moustaches, doses of aspirin, misplaced empfiasis, melodrama-more crude than any produced at the Elephant and Castle. ■ -.■,'._. - . ■ ' It is true that, -we permit. Beethoven, Wagner, and Chopin to be translated .into'rag-time;,that ..we convert Schubert to the- usea of comic" opera? that the word "classic" to'some-so-called critical minds is as dead as Queen Elizabeth; that the time may soon arrive when the> Song of Songs will be sung to the accompanimant of black-bottom frenzies and the Book of Job bo rewritten as a farce—but let the vandals leave . our Shakespeare . untouched. He has stood the test for hundreds, of years. They still play him, in "Germany, hot in modern dress,, to crpwded.houscs. ARGUMENTS IN FAVOUR. Here are some of the principal arguments in. favour, ""'of."the -innovation^ which have been put forward by its advocates. Shakespeare is a convention and there is no reason, once we agree upon tho manner in which : that convention shall be offered,'why it should not take the form of modern" dress. If the text is to be garbled and gabbled " as well as garbed in the modern manner, weaknesses should not and cannot be justly attributed to the idea itself. There is a freshness and novelty about t*he notion of Shakespeare in a top' hat that should attract the multitude. It compels the actor to apply himself very closely to the senst of the words and less to their sound. In the case of scenes played by the actors clearly, naturally, and forcefully; where the dialogue" is well spoken,.-and '. particularly in those scenes where prose has been adopted by Shakespeare as his own medium, the peculiar , advantage supplied by modern costume consists in tho restraint and negativing ..and lessening of the mind's attention flipon unimportant details such as costume and appurtenances and concentrating it completely upon the scene .and the action of' tho drama. If we can accept painted drop-cloths, stago lighting, ordinary drop-curtains, why, should we reject, the convention of modern clothes? Surely they make just such another convention? Think of the advantages of speed, vitality, and naturalness in up-to-date drama. Was not Macbeth played by the great Garrick himself in knee-breeches and laco cuffs?. Are not anachronisms as frequent in Shakespeare 'as raisjns in a .plum pudding? Shakespeare . mado clocks strike in the night of Caesar and cannon boom in tho day of Hamlet when as a fact, neither clocks nor cannon were Itnown. What do external details . matter? One must concern onesolf not with what Hamlot wore but with what ho said and did. ' ■ ' » This is, as I understand it, the case for the plaintiff. Let us put him on his defence. Let us direct-against him a just and, patient cross-examination sucli as may help us to elucidate the truth. The real fact of the matter I suspect to bo the deplorable shortage, of genuine Shakespearean actors. If is not dress that constitutes the Shakespearan difficulty, but lack of the real ability to act him, and by that I mean the entiro art of the actor, not merely a capacity for appearing natural, and being alive and convincing, but the genius of being ■m. the picture all1 the time, .having the facility of capturing .the . rhythm of verse, of being musical, poetical, and artistically satisfying from every standpoint. ■ -,;->•