BRITISH DRAMA LEAGUE.

Press, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20496, 15 March 1932, Page 7

BRITISH DRAMA LEAGUE.

AN EMPIRE MOVEMENT. WORK IN NEW ZEALAND. (THOU OUR OWN, COBRESPONDENT.I LONDON, February 2. At a conference of the British Drama League in London yesterday, Miss Elizabeth Blake, of Wellington, made an appeal on behalf of community drama in New Zealand. A Dominions Drama Committee has lately been formed, including Lord Lytton (chairman), Sir Barry Jackson, Miss Elizabeth Blake, Mr John Bourne, Mr Lewis Casson, Miss Mary Kelly, and Mr Geoffrey WJiitvvorth; and this committee has issued a formal appeal to membets of the League in this country. "It would be manifestly iinpossiole to commence activities in every Dominion and Colony immediately," the committee states. "It has therefore been decided to initiate an intensive and partly experimental effort in New Zealand, the dramatic needs of which have been prominently brought to the notice of the committee. "We are therefore appealing for a sum of £6OO for two years. This will enable us to send out a thoroughly trained producer who will travel about the country lecturing on play production and staging, forming acting groups and taking rehearsals, etc. Miss Elizabeth Blake, who is returning to Now Zealand shortly, hopes to form a branch of the British Drama League on her arrival, and to start the work, ot organising a National Festival of Community Drama at onne. appeal for funds. will be issued at the same time. "Under normal conditions it would probably not be necessary to ask for financial help from England at all, but a young country with far smaller reserves feels an economic crisis even more severely than an old one, and in addition, IN T e\v Zealand has suffered from two severe earthquakes in the past four years, which have added greatly to her difficulties. . If the scheme is to succeed it must, of course, become self-supporting, but we do feel we are, justified, even in present circumstances, in appealing for your help. We realise this work will need helping in all parts of the Empire, and if funds are available, we contemplate an Empire tour on the part of the producer sent to New Zealand which, on his return journey, would embrace Australia and South Africa, and possiblv Ceylon-and Egypt. "A grant has been asked for from tho New York Carnegie Fund which helps such projects, and we are told that the matter is being given 'very careful consideration.' Miss Blake sails early in March, ' and if at all possible is very anxious to take a producer out with her to begin work at once. Will you help us to get the necessary money?" Greater Self-Expression. Miss Blake reinforced this appeal at the meeting yesterday. She described the, • conditions in the Dominions, and spoke of the drift to the towns, to counteract which there must be sufficient and yaricd recreation available in country districts. "All over the couutry, in the larger towns for some years, and more lately and widely in the country districts," she said, "people are waking to the nood for greater self-expression and the need to act. I'm not saying it's a new thing, but it's a much bigger and more

vital thing than before. New Zealand is full of potential actors and natural actors, just as England is, but in New Zealand we lack very largely the trained producer and the skilled stage technician. Of course, there are lots of amateur producers who have produced for years, but working on their own, often with no one whose knowledge is greater to help them. We need very badly just what the British Drama League and the "Village Drama Society are doing for Community Drama here. I am constantly getting letters from unknown people all over the country: 'Please help me. What is a good book on production? Can you tell me anything about lighting? Is it possible to get a book on Costume? What sort of rules do you advise for running an amateur society in the country,' and so on and so forth all the time. And, as I said beforcj, we suffer in New Zealand from the drift-to-the-towns-tendency, just as older countries do. Country life must be made more colourful with wider interests and greater choice of recreations.

"We all know what an extraordinary difference Women's Institutes have made to country life here; they are springing up all over New Zealand now, and their general secretary writes to me' and says there are many of them keen to do some acting, but she goes on to say: 'We don't know anything. We are waiting for you to help us!' So I come to ask you to help me to help them—that means two things: To start a branch of the British Drama League, which, in its turn, will organise a New Zealand Festiyal of Community Drama; and secondly but equally important, to send out a capable well-trained producer (preferably someone who isn't seasick) to travel about lecturing and producing ■ —not for the three or four big societies, they are fully competent to stand on 'their own feet, just as the big ones hare are—but to help all the small and young societies to begin on right lines. "Thing Worth Doing." "We need £SOO to take a producer out (it's very little really) for, say, two years, and to give him return passage, living expenses, and a small salary — indeed, it is a thing infinitely worth doing from every point of view, from the artistic,- the educational, the individual, and chiefly, from the point of view of a better and closer understanding among the different parts of the Empire. The Dominions Committee of the British Drama League feel very strongly their work will need to spreud throughout the whole Empire, and that New Zealand is the first step. It has been suggested that an Empire tour, explaining the work of Community Dratna in general and the British Drama League in particular, would be very valuable, and I'm sure you will agree it would be. South Africa, Canacta, Australia would all be visited, and by degrees, a clearing house for drama would be built up by the British Drama League for the whole Empire, where every country could present its own special problems and exchange the wisdoms of varied experiences, all cooperating in one great common ideal of understanding and expression. What a power, what a bond it could be!"