THE THEATRE TO-DAY

Hokitika Guardian, 24 June 1931, Page 2

THE THEATRE TO-DAY

MR ALLAN WILKIE NOT 1 DESPONDENT. ! f STANDARDISATION OF LIFE ( AND AMUSEMENT. i ! Tiie Allan Wilkie Shakespearean Coni | puny is disbanded to all parts ot AusI tralia and England ; its scenery and el* 1 leets lie in store at Melbourne •, and 1 the founder, producer, and principal oi | the company now tours alone with his | wile, giving dramatic-recitals front the ! P la 3’ s - . i \ | Yet Mr Allan Wilkie is by no means 4 despondent, either of the present or of ithe future.- His cherished project wili thrive again". ‘.‘Personally, L find that l am able tc . do-artistically very much better work,” > he said in an "interview at Christchurch I “It is a great thing to have the respon- | sibility of a company off one’s shouldJ cfsi There ard.no big rehearsals now. j none of the producer’s worries. And I I am able to give much more attention j to Iny own performances.’ > ; Since last September, when the co-m- ---| any, disbanded, he and Mrs' Wilkie jj ( who' plays under her maiden name cf | Miss Hunter-Watts) have been touring | Australia, and latterly the North I Inn i of New Zealand, with a series of dranfatic performances of excerpts from *tKcvShakespearean plays. Sfe i • .COSTS IMPOSSIBLY HIGH. “Under the present economic conditions it is not advisable to form the '-‘"CWinpnny again, and our present undertaking is satisfactory. You must realiiiffik that, outwardly at least, vour coun'm? is prosperity itself compared with §£ Australia. lam certainly not feel- ? nig despondent. It was simply econ- §@ omic conditions which forced us to dis- “ hand. The expense of a theatrical %s-> enterprise is to-day as great as ever jj 'j it was, while the takings have decreased enormously, I would go so far as r

to say that a big thrcatrical undertaking is to-day almost impossible.” As for his dramatic performances, Mr Wilkie concentrates on the essence of Shapespoare, varying his programmes

ith scenes from “The School for Scandal,” “She Stoops to Conquer” and “The Rivals.” For people who are not Shakespearean enthusiasts, he feels, a recital in such a form is even more entertaining than a whole play. The programmes are judiciously varied between the tragic and the comic—and that remark brings Air Wilkie to an interesting topic.

COMEDY BEFORE TRAGEDY. “People don’t want too much traged;now. In the old days it was different 1 remember when J. was playing Shakespeare in the North of England; wused to play five nigh st otdygrea , used to play five nights of tragedy to one night of comedy. Now it is rather five nights of eomfedy to one of tragi d,\ 1. have heard it said that a people which is strong and virile prefers tragedy to comedy; and 1 think that is perhap: true. This is a / frivolous age, am sometimes f feel that people are losing the capacity to think. For one thing, our life is too complicated ; we have to many ready-made amusements. Where people would once gather to talk alone they now must turn on the wireless or play cards.

“I detest standardisation. I can remember a time when one used to meet strong personalities, vivid people. Now our system of education, the types fff entertainment which we attend, ud. if I may say so, the Press, all tend to. standardise our lives and our personalities. They have taken all the colour from life. Our amusements are all ma-chine-made—talking pictims. the wireless, the gramophone and all the rest. Jam sneaking broadly, of course; and I tbfnk there is no doubt tint. ; n gone--al, these influences of all tend towards more and more standardisation. THE- THEATRE AS EDUCATOR. “The English-speaking Governni mis do little to help. In times of distress such as the present, one can hardiv complain; but even in good times the

whole of their energies arc concentrated on the social and material welfare of the people, instead of their spiritual and cultural welfare. The theatre is probably the greatest potential factor for education that exists. It reaches more people, and it reaches them more quickly and more effectively, through their emotions. Eentertaimnent, I hold, should be only incidentally affiliation al, hut that incidental side is of great importance. People like, George lernard Shaw, who have used the stage o exploit propaganda, have done great lamage to the theatre. Shaw, in paricular, has been followed by many >thor playwrights who have not his gifts until the stage has become merely a iiscussion centre for social problems. The primary purpose of the theatre is to entertain.

“HUNDRED YEARS BEHIND.” “Put there is another trouble besides die prevalent type of play,” continued Mr Wilkie. “the theatre proprietors nave made no attempt to Keep pace vv'th the improvements which have been made in the picture shows. Speaking generally, the theatres are one hundred

years behind the times. The picture theatres you find in the centre of the city, if they are sometimes decorated with a bit of Spanish, a bit cf Moorish a bit of Mexican, and a hit i.f Heaven knows what, until they rear themselves like great monstrosities, they are at least always warm and comfortable, “But what of the theatre? Yoll find it clown some sitle-stroet, uninviting to see, and uninviting to sit in. Under such conditions'it is difficult for a play to- succeed. If the surroundings are uncomfortable, a greater strain is put on audience and players alike. The picture theatre, is a new and recent industry, not- hound down by tradition The theatre is still living a hundred years ago. A TEMPORARY ECLIPSE, “I have a theory that provided the talking picture does not utterly destroy the public taste, it may ultimately react to tho advantage of the tlioai'e. The silent picture was, 1 feel, a greater enemy of the stage; for there was the

danger that people would accustom themselves -to visualise instead of to hear, to lose the capacity for think’ng in terms of the spoken word. For the moment the talking picture may have 'clipsod the stage; lint the eclipse is oniv temporary, perhaps only momentary. - I can well remember previous eclipses, at- the coining of the musichalls, then the silent pictures, then the wireless. One hundred years ago the. London Press was lamenting the death of the theatre because of the arrival of Italian opera at Drury Lane! This time', the theatre lias had to face two factors at once—the talkies and the depression. I am confident that it will survive both, -and flourish.”,

Mr and Mrs AY ilkie will tour Otago and Southland before returning to g : ve a series of recitals nt the Radiant FT-11, Christchurch, towards iho end of July.