IRON CURTAIN OPERA

New Zealand Listener, Volume 37, Issue 942, 30 August 1957, Page 11

IRON CURTAIN OPERA

Sir,-I wonder if the American State Department made any cash contribution to the New Zealand Players or to the New Zealand Opera Company for the production of Menotti’s musical drama, The Consul, staged in Wellington. My wonder is occasioned by the fact that in the New Zealand Listener (organ of the New Zealand Broadcasting Service) dated August 9, under the heading "Menotti’s Iron Curtain Opera," the New Zealand Players’ producer Richard Campion, speaking on the use made of music, acting, singing, lighting, and so on, to persuade the audience of the reality of the situation, goes on to say: "Not that they would need much persuasion. After Hungary, especially, people know that the situation is true and that- the same situation confronts people wherever there is a tyrannical government." One would expect such an utterance from members of the "Free Europe" movement, whose headquarters are in New York, and who from Western Germany despatch their gas-filled balloons to drop leaflets over Hungary, Poland, Rumania, urging these peoples to revolt against their Government. As a New Zealand watersider, I can tell Mr Campion he has no need to go as far as Hungary to find what he is pleased to call a tyrannical ‘government. As a watersider, a workmate and friend of the late Charlie Fox, who bequeathed £6000 to the New Zealand Players, I have no hesitation in saying, and can find strong backing for it, that Charlie Fox never intended that any part of his money should be used to attack socialism or any country moving towards that goal. Charlie Fox was a Socialist, a friend of the Soviet Union and the "People’s Democracies." He bequeathed £6000 to the New Zealand Players. It would be, an insult to his memory to fail to make some protest at what he would himself regard as a flagrant misusage of his gift. BILL O'REILLY (Wellington). (This letter was shown to Mr Richard Camon, who replied as follows: "First the facts. he Consul is being put on by the New Zealand Opera Company. The New Zealand Players are co-operating with the assistance of their officers, scenery, and workshops. As to principle, it is hardly necessary to say that the Trust Board of trol is not subject to any ‘money’ pressure-apart from making ends meet. Even the Government, our great benefactor, has no direct voice, so your corr dent can rest assured that donations will not be used either to promote or veto any particular production."’-Ed. )