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GRANVILLE BARKERTALKS ON DRAMAGives Views on the Theatre Tells WhyHe Likes theProfessionIt took me two or three years before I could make up my mind that the Theatre was a work worthy of respect and one which might be followed to the end of one’s life. TheTheatre is a social service and fills a real demand of the people, for onemust notice that there is a hungerfor spiritual stimulus and particularlyfor that sort of stimulus which the theatre will give| We have made the discovery that man does not live by bread alone—we find that a great empire cannot exist by riches alone —it cannot be run by sheer knowledge alone, for knowledge has gotten too much to mean a mere accumulation of facts. *I take up the morning newspaper and find many problems which I cannot cope with, with my knowledge; my only resort is the imagination. This is really the reason why I came to believe that the theatre could mean a great deal to modern civilization. It is the thing which cultivates and fits the imagination of the people at the sensitive point of their lives—for, taking the average theatre audience, the ages will range from seventeen to thirty-four years, and this is the age when people wont listen to others and is the time when the art of the theatre appeals most vitally to the young person.We know the story of the painter Turner. An old lady told him once, after looking at one of his pictures “But I have never seen the sky look like that.” And Turner replied. “No madam, but don’t you wish you had?” This is the same with the art of the theatre. A really vital drama can get our minds and feelings in such a state of sensitiveness that we can apply the theme as a real test to all the facts of life about us. There is somehing fundamentally dramatic in us and we know everything to be true or false by the test of our imagination.Another thing which makes me feel that the theatre is one of the arts of modern life is that the theatre is pre-eminently the art of selection. The whole art of the drama of life is to know what to take and what to leave. Isn’t the whole drama of life the same selection? We have to make up our minds what to take and what to leave. This is where the drama can +each us the art of di . rimi“ation. and the drama reflects much of the present day in a way that other arts do not. It is vivid; it is instantaneous; it is complex; and it is an exceedingly jolly form of amusement.Having said why this theatre is worth while, let me tell you for a moment what I think, and what I feel the theatre ought to be and can be. I feel that the theatre can be something more than an entertainment, although I never want it to be less. I feel that it can be more than a collection of expert people, that it can be the mouthpiece of a community expressing itself.It is vitaly important that a community should learn to express itself. I think the theatre, to a great ex-ten'. can furnish the highest type of the expression of a community’s feelings. The theatre should come from the community, and not from the experts of the communinty. The Greek drama began that way. It began by a concourse of people coming together and singing and dancing and giving expression to their natural feeilngs. In time, as individual poets arose, they began to formulate and elaborate and to reduce to words and more artistic forms the feeling of the people, and ultimately you have the things which we nowknow as Greek tragedy.The theatre, it seems to me, is a thing in which all people should be a little more trained. To know a little bit about the art of acting is the best way to appreciate the art of the theatre. After all the art of acting is only the art of good and graceful behavior. We want a race of people who will walk beautifully, speak beautifully and be sensitive to beautiful things. This is not idealism, but common sense. This is the world in which you would choose first to live.And finally, we need, as a nation, to learn how to express ourselves and our national feelings. We must be able to say to ourselves what it is as nations that we stand for, especially at this time. We can say it in no better way than by that mediumwhich is common to all our nations, the dramatic medium, the medium which most expertly expresses itself in the theatre. This is pre-eminently the mission of the stage.My hope of the theatre is that in it we may find the real vital expression of the things we do stand for, and of the things we do hope to stand for before the world, and of the things we mean the nation to be. It is by that that our children will best learn their destiny in the world.MUSIC NOTESThe Program at the Metropolitan for the next week is as follows: This afternoon, La Tosca will be given with Farrar, Martinelli, Scotti and Rossi and Polacco conducting. “The Magic Flute” will be this evening’s cnera and Desstin, Hempel, Witherspoon and Goritz will have the leading roles with Herz conducing. The Sunday concert will be given by Alma Gluck, Herbert Witherspoon, Margaret Ober and the entire orchestra. “Boheme” will be given on Monday night with Alda., Schumann, Bot-ta, Amato and Sergurola. The orchestra will be under the leadership of Polacco. Polacco will also conduct Wednesday’s performance of “Butterfly” and the cast will be made up of Farrar, Fornia, Martinelli, Tegani and Bada. Toscannini will have the revival of “Iris” on Thursday night and Bori, Scotti and Didur will have the chief roles. A special matinee of “Parsifal” will be given on Good ! Friday with Kurt, Sembach, Braun, Whitehill and Goritz. Herz will conduct. A double bill will make up the Friday night’s performance. “L’Ora-caldo” and “Pagliacci” being given under the direction of Polaco.The next Philharmonic concert will take place tonight at Carnegie Hall and Efrem Zimbalist will be the soloist. The program will consist of Weber’s overture “Oberon,” Dvorak’s Symphony, “The New World,” Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody, number 2 and Tchaikovsky’s Concerto in D MajorSongs in French, Italian, German and English will be sung by Clara Gabrilowitsch, contralto, at her recital in the Little Theatre Monday afternoon, March 20^n. Ossip Gabrilowitsch will play his wife’s accompaniments. The program will be made up of works by Shubert, Schumann, Faure, Scarlatti, Gluck and Grainger.On Thursday, April 8th, Miss Henrietta Michelson, pianist will give a recital at Aeolian Hall. This is her first reappearance in New York for almost two years and her program is exceptionally interesting. It will consist of Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in C Minor; Mozart’s Sonata in F Major, Beethoven’s Sonata in C .Minor three Preludes by Debussy, three pieces by Ravel and the Shubert-Liszt “Erlking.”
Newspaper Details
New York Columbia Spectator
New York, New York, US
Sat, Mar 27, 1915
Page 1
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GB 20 Dec 2018
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