A VARIED CAREER

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 17, 21 January 1936, Page 18

A VARIED CAREER

FINE FRENCH PRODUCER

MICHEL SAINT-DENIS

The post-war theatre in France has given ius many fine plays, courageous playwrights, and exceptionally intelligent producers. Exquisite results have been secured, writes Sydney W. Carroll in the "Daily Telegraph."

The theatre today, however, in Paris, and indeed all over France, is in a pitiable state economically. Normally the playgoers are drawn, at any rate in Paris, to the extent of 50 per cent, from the foreign visitors. And as that element has almost entirely disappeared, the revenues of the stage have suffered in consequence.

As for the French provincial theatre, I am assured upon no less authority than that of Michel Saint-Denis, of the Compagnie dcs Quinze, it has been almost obliterated. There are no more companies in the big French cities, and films have superseded the French touring companies, which appear to be growing less and less important. Few more all-round men of the theatre have had a more adventurous and varied career than Saint-Denis. He'speaks English well, and his abilities as a brilliant stager of plays, both in French and English, have long been recognised here by such experts as Bronson Albery, John Gielgud, Tyrone Guthrie, and others. A wave of nationalism is engulfing the world and sweeping it to the destruction of all our finer and civilised influences. The London theatre, however, remains the one truly international and cosmopolitan force. Foreign actresses, foreign producers, .foreign performers, and foreign plays receive the hospitality of this country with the same generosity and nobility of outlook as it has always shown. UNDER FORTY. Few of these visitors are more welcome or present greater possibilities of assistance to us than Michel SaintDenis. Still a young man well under 40, he learnt his job as theatrical director under the famous Copeau. He blossomed from secretary, general secretary, Press representative, to business manager of the company. He became in turns stage manager, assistant producer, and actor. He learnt to write plays, and tried his hand at it both, in /collaboration and on his own accounj!. Saim-Denis has formed the idea of establishing a school of acting in England. He has the support of many influential Englishmen. He wishes to see established from, that school a permanent troupe of players . accustomed to team work, who can and will play harmoniously together and acquire the knowledge of each other's idiosyncrasies. The terms for students will be very reasonable, and the application of such an original. and clearthinking brain as that of Saint-Denis to the project cannot fail to be a help to the English theatre. Saint-Denis is convinced that the most careful forethought and ample stage preparation beforehand are essential. He thinks and works out every detail beforehand. For him the producer is the most important man in the theatre. He must have something of his own to say. The spirit, the psychology, the poetry of the piece are dependent on him for exposition. SaintDenis will not begin to rehearse until every movement has been planned and each movement given its' due signification. He never consequently orders a gesture or a movement without explaining the reason for it. If the actor concerned does not feel himself in accord with the directions given him, he, as producer, is always quite ready to alter them. MADE DIFFICULT. He told me that he had found his work as a producer of English plays sometimes made a little difficult by his relative ignorance of English actors and actresses. He has to cast in the dark, as it were. He is inclined to think that English performers in too many cases become too easily and too quickly discouraged; they work themselves up to a high pitch of enthusiasm for .the first-night performance, and subsequent representations are frequently on a lower level. Their interest evaporates, and it takes time for them to grow once more really keen about their parts. There are, of course, exceptions to this rule, but that this variability exists is undeniable. Saint-Denis believes in rehearsing a play much longer than three weeks. He thinks that the rehearsal time should be never less than four weeks. A production of Shakespeare should receive at least two months. I pointed out to him that. with Equity's insistence on payment for rehearsals this would make the production of plays economically prohibitive. Of all his achievements, Saint-Denis is proudest of the first act in the "Bataille de la Marne," when his means of expression were limited to the simplest possible form. He believes he scored the finest possible interpretation of the text of the author.

Ife reminded me that his actors in France, unlike ourselves, are accustomed to express emotion rather than to repress it. and he believes that the success of the stars who make successes in this country comes probably from the fact that they are sometimes able to express , more clearly, more forcibly and dramatically than other members of the. company.