PLAY WITH BALLET

New Zealand Listener, Volume 8, Issue 195, 19 March 1943, Page 9

PLAY WITH BALLET

HANS ANDERSEN. A Biographical Play with Ballet by Owen Fletcher. Coulls, Somerville, Wilkie Ltd. Plays suitable for acting by amateur societies are always in demand, and in certain respects this biographical sketch by Owen Fletcher ,will meet this demand. But from the production aspect it must present great difficulties, if only because the cast is so large-28 actors, for example; and an undefined number of ballet dancers to dance the three ballets based on the famous fairy tales. Biography does not often lend itself to dramatic treatment. It is apt to become, like the historical novel, history with permanent waves. Perhaps it is to lighten the plain biographical facts that the. author introduces the element of unreality and fantasy provided by the ballet. Perhaps, too, it is this that leads him on to depart so far from historical fact as to arrange a charming and fanciful scene between the Princess Alexandra and Hans Andersen just a year before this same princess was born. Andersen’s charm and the success of his fairy tales depend very largely on the keenness of his wit, the irony with which his most fanciful tales expose the weakness of human nature, It is a pity not to show this wise and witty side of the dreamer, since one of the objects of the author must have been to bring the Hans Andersen of legend to life. On the other hand, the play shows a freshness which will be welcomed by those who like to escape to the fairy tale world which Andersen himself loved. It not only does that, but it opens the door to possibilities that writers of plays have so far not often exploited. How far Mr. Fletcher himself will go it is for the years to reveal, but even if he fades out, he has blazed a path that others may follow. Meanwhile, it is a pity that his publishers left his name off the title page and put his portrait on the cover to at the artist’s design.