Francess G. Halpenny
A 'companion' this work certainly is. It will be of interest and value to researchers, students, teachers, librarians and archivists, theatre practitioners, and to any member of the general public who follows the stage. The volume amply fulfils the obvious purpose of a reference book with its 703 entries, 'covering several centuries of theatrical history in Canada,' on theatres and theatre companies, dramatists, plays, actors, managers and directors, critics, genres, types of presentation, organizations, and associated subjects such as censorship. Unlike other Oxford Companions, this one has many illustrations, an asset with a visual art. It is novel too in its full index, a necessity for the user given the enormous number of references to plays, theatres, companies and individuals that do not have entries in the text proper (one hopes the Oxford press will consider this index a precedent). Canadians are receiving today much better reference service for their artistic past and present; witness The Oxford Companion to Canadian Literature and the Encyclopedia of Canadian Music, which concentrate on their respective fields, as well as the component from the arts in such many-volumed publications as the Canadian Encyclopedia, the Dictionnaire des œuvres littéraires du Québec, and the Dictionary of Canadian Biography. Perhaps William Toye of Oxford can be persuaded not to weary in his expert and informed editorial guidance but to carry it on with a 'Companion to Canadian Art.'
Like any good companion or dictionary, however, this volume has much more to offer than a quick answer to a quick question. It is good reading, a book in its own right, such an achievement having been possible because of the scope given to contributors, and taken up by many, to comment and to speak in their own voices. This reviewer prowled the pages with enjoyment, gathering intriguing vignettes of the past, reminders of the fifty-odd years I've been participating in, watching, or studying Canadian theatre, much new information, and new comprehension and perspective. Any interested reader will have a similar experience. This is a book for study as well. Providing continuity, pattern, and context are the long, packed, rewarding articles on 'Drama,' the development of theatrical activities in each province and the territories, little theatre and amateur theatre, summer stock and touring, drama carried by radio and television, acting and directing, publishing, alternate and collective and feminist theatre, professional organizations, Amerindian and Inuit theatre and multicultural theatre. Useful and commendable are the extensions of the term 'theatre' to take in articles on burlesque, cabaret and café-theatre, vaudeville, and puppets, a broad interpretation fundamental also to the current work of the Records of Early English Drama project.
From the general articles, and the host of individual entries, a student can build up a picture of the early fits-and-starts, the years of touring, the influences of British, French, and American writers, techniques and players, the significance of little theatre, early professional companies, and the explosion of activity from the 1950s. There is, inevitably, overlapping and repetition between general article and individual entry but they can be accepted in the interests of the richness of the tapestry. Important is the large extent of the coverage of events in French mainly by francophone contributors: from it one gains an excellent impression of the dynamism of this theatrical tradition in Canada, its close relation to its audience and its political and social context. It is good to see also that over the whole story an even-handed, though certainly not bland, approach has been maintained; too often, for example, the activities of little theatre, amateur theatre, and early professional companies have been dismissed by present practitioners or commentators as irrelevant, even a hindrance; here there is due balance, a reflection of mature willingness to accept past as prologue. One enjoys, over-all, a sense of period, a sense of formative influences and of significant individuals. There is food for much further exploration and analysis.
This Oxford Companion could not have been compiled without the research already undertaken by a growing body of theatre historians in Canada. Theatre history has in Canada been recognized rather recently as a scholarly discipline, one which acquired cohesion, visibility, and respect with the gathering together of hitherto isolated researchers in the Association for Canadian Theatre History/Association d'histoire du théâtre au Canada, founded in 1976 and in the Société d'histoire du théâtre du Québec, founded in the same year. Journals have been important in encouraging the exploration and publication that must lie behind an effort like the Companion: Canadian Theatre Review (1974), Les cahiers de théâtre Jeu (1976), Canadian Drama/L'Art dramatique canadien (1974), Theatre History in Canada/Histoire du théâtre au Canada (1979), L'Annuaire théâtral (1985). Unhappily, there is no entry 'Journals' in the Companion and no account of their founding figures. The Companion also rests on essential bibliographies already in existence, notably the Bibliography of Canadian Theatre History edited by John Ball and Richard Plant, and The Brock Bibliography of Published Canadian Plays in English 1766-1978, edited by Anton Wagner, for which Patrick B. O'Neill provided a supplement.
It would be extraordinary if there were not errors, omissions, and contradictions in the first edition of a pioneering reference work. There are, but this reviewer will not indulge in a list. I am too familiar with the challenges a volume of this kind brings. Desired entries may misfire because there is not enough documented information or no informed contributor, or because an assignment did not meet even an extended deadline. The editors themselves note in their introduction some gaps they could not fill. I mention only a few oddities. David Prosser was twice a winner of the Nathan Cohen Award (p 38) but does not appear in 'Critics and Criticism.' Martin Hunter, nowhere mentioned, was director at Hart House Theatre 1972-79; in his seasons he presented revivals of two Canadian plays discussed on other pages: Leaven of Malice (October 1973), using Davies' own script rather than what appeared, and failed, in 1960 on Broadway as Love and Libel; and Reaney's The Killdeer (October 1974). For years amateur and professional companies had to seek performing rights from the personification of Samuel French (Canada), Mona Coxwell, a redoubtable negotiator and presence, who would merit an entry. As for publishing, attention should be given to the fact that it was the multilith, then the photocopier and offset printing from camera-ready copy that made it possible from the 1960s to circulate Canadian plays in quantity and rapidly. Before that, many new Canadian plays existed in a very limited number of carbon copies which moved about in peril of being lost: this physical handicap was a real deterrent to the mounting of plays around the country, to revivals, and to study and teaching. Malabar, costumier to the nation for better or worse, is not mentioned. Enough.
A new edition will, one hopes, consider filling out coverage. Designers are featured, but stagecraft, including much more than design, is underrepresented. The account in 'Education and Training' is weak on the French component, and confusing in structure and emphasis, giving little clear impression of aims or accomplishments. University theatre programs, for instance, have several purposes: to prepare some students for advanced graduate work, others for eventual teaching of theatre arts in high schools; some will use this study background as preparation for theatre management, production, performance, or criticism. One must question too the suggestion that 'distinguished academic research' is lacking. Better coverage of education should include the theatre arts programs in the high schools, begun formally in Ontario in the 1960s and later elsewhere, which have encouraged future practitioners and helped to build audiences. The Ontario high school drama festivals, now past their fortieth anniversary, have given hundreds of students an experience of theatre and, as well, a chance to try out their writing (Ken Watts, long the impresario of these festivals, was the first winner of the Maggie Bassett Award - he appears in the Companion simply as one of its list).
'Audience' as a possible topic for a general article becomes more and more insistent upon the reader. One has been given only tantalizing hints, yet it is clear that all forms of theatrical activity, at all times, as described by the Companion were determined by the size, the make-up, and the tastes of the people who bought tickets. Who were they? Why were they? What were their standards of judgement? Not an easy entry to write, admittedly, but worth attempting. In this connection, I pick up one of many possible points. The formation of tastes and standards in audiences was certainly affected by the varying conditions of exposure to live theatre, at all periods. The live theatre Canadians saw, as the Companion makes clear, came first in large part from elsewhere through touring of low and high degree. But even when Canadians themselves were dominant as producers, some of their audience (as well as performers and directors) were still exposed to theatre as played elsewhere; travel to Great Britain and New York from the twenties onward has included a kind of ritual attendance at plays. Commentators routinely label these interactions as signs of 'colonial' dependence. Is it not possible, however, to see the exposure in a positive light, as an opportunity, however one may deplore the superciliousness toward 'Canadian' that may have accompanied it?
One cannot ignore the fact that Canada, in its theatre as in other arts, has been the recipient of work from elsewhere. The index of the Companion bears witness in its entries and the size of the entries. It shows how in plays themselves 'Canadian theatre' has meant 'Theatre for Canadians,' 'Theatre by Canadians.' We've played the classics of Racine, Molière, Shakespeare, the Restoration, Sheridan, Rostand, Chekhov, Ibsen; we've offered the popular fare of Barrie, Coward, Duras, Feydeau, Heilman, Molnar, Maugham, Rattigan, Priestley, Simon, Shaffer, but also the internationally influential Albee, Anouilh, Beckett, Brecht, Cocteau, Eliot, Genet, Giraudoux, Ionesco, Lorca, Mauriac, O'Neill, Pirandello. This access in Canada has made matters difficult for Canadian writers, no question, but the variety of our fare in English and French theatrical works is a constant, as it is with our literature or music. What stamp did Canadian producers put upon them? Should not the Companion face this fact and offer an article on 'Repertoire'?
The importance of 'management' bears down upon the reader as page succeeds page, and I would have welcomed an attempt to move beyond the constant incidental references in accounts of companies and directors to what management has entailed in Canada: the balancing of arts and finance; repertoire in relation to audiences; relations with performers and boards; the effect of the size, adaptability, and convenience of playing and work space; the interaction of number of seats, runs, and revenue; coping with a huge country; the increase in shared productions at present; the role of private sponsorships. A most curious, and surely crucial, omission is that of dedicated entries for the funding agencies, particularly the Canada Council but also the provincial councils or ministries. The history of theatre management, as for other arts in Canada, would have been radically different without these agencies, however one evaluates each or all of their interventions. The Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters and Sciences (whose title is not in the index), which lay behind so many developments now taken for granted, also deserves an entry on its own.
When one lays the Companion aside, one begins to speculate about the question of quality. Many entries face it, but not as much as one would like. It is so difficult to be sure when the productions vanish and cannot be retrieved, when newspaper accounts may not be reliable for many reasons including the effect of their often being written on first nights. One welcomes the announcement that Anton Wagner has been awarded a major grant for 'a Canada-wide study of English language theatre criticism from the late 1700s to the present.' It will surely help to add more evaluation to the chronicle we are at last able to contemplate in detail. The Companion has assured its place.