NATIONAL THEATRE

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 113, 16 May 1938, Page 11

NATIONAL THEATRE

DEEDS FOR SITE

RECEIVED BY G. B. SHAW

The deeds of the site of England's National Theatre were handed to the trustees on the eve of the 374 th anniversary of Shakespeare's birthday on the excavated site opposite the Victoria and Albert Museum, Sovith Kensington, states the "Daily Telegraph. Sir Robert Vansittart handed the deeds to Mr, Bernard Shaw, together with a piece of earth and a twig, symbols of possession. The ceremony, broadcast to the United States, was attended lay the United States Ambassador, Mr. Kennedy, representatives of public life here and in the 'Empire, and leading personalities of the theatre and art world. In handing over the deeds Sir Robert used the .traditional wfcrds, "You shall: now take seisin from me of this land." Mr. Shaw, who passed the deeds to the trustees, expressed satisfaction that England was so far on the road to a national theatre as to possess the deeds of the land on which it was to stand. He begged Sir Edwin Lutyens, the associate architect, to provide something original and of our own times. The English people did not "want a national theatre any more than they wanted a British Museum or the National Gallery, he said. But once those institutions were there the British people approved of them and felt that the place would be bare without them.

"In the same way," he said, "if we make a beginning with the National Theatre it'will become an institution and the Government will have to say: 'Here is something which, for some reason or other, we have got to keep going."' . ' • tOET LAUREATE'S LETTER. At a reception in the Hotel Rembrandt after the ceremony Lord.Snell, who presided, read a letter from the Poet Laureate, Mr. John Masefleld. Mr. Masefleld welcomed the approach of the day when there would be a theatre where fine and beautiful playp could be performed without the necessity of commercial success. Dame Edith Lyttelton said that, in addition to the theatre building, a large endowment was needed to remove the fear, of financial failure of artistically valuable plays. Another project was that of sending touring companies into the county towns, the Dominions, and such foreign countries as were interested in first-class British dramatic art, Dame Sybil Thorndike said that the stage would see in the National Theatre the only really satisfactory memorial to Shakespeare. Further, the stage saw. in the National Theatre recognition by the country of the value of its work, just as painters felt that their work was recognised by th e institution of the National Gallery. Mr. Geoffrey Whitworth, hon. secretary of the National Theatre, in a review of the financial position, said the fund was started by Sir Carl Meyer in 1909 with a donation of £70,000, and that, by last year, the total had reached £150,000. Of this £75,000 had been paid for the site. The additional amount needed now was £100,000. Eventually it was hoped to raise £200,000..