Alan Hughes
Sternly-titled collections of scholarly essays seldom propel boisterous crowds of theatre historians to the bookshops. The fact that this one was published at all is a credit to the persuasive powers of L.W. Conolly and the enterprise of the Greenwood Press. Serious students of Canadian theatre history will be particularly grateful, since seven of the thirteen papers deal exclusively or in part with Canada. Some of the papers were given at a conference at the University of Toronto, held in conjunction with the 1979 meeting of the International Federation for Theatre Research. The rest were commissioned by Dr Conolly, and round out his chosen theme: 'the transition from a theatre of commerce to a theatre of art'. The order in which the essays appear stresses this development, without oversimplifying it. The first group deal with foreign tours and their effect upon indigenous theatre, while the remainder discuss the emergence of native 'free theatres' devoted to serious art. Dr Conolly has added an exceptionally useful and extensive annotated bibliography from his own great scholarship.
A collection of work by so many scholars inevitably strains its structure in fruitful ways; touring actors and commercial managements are not set up as cardboard Goliaths for patriotic, Stanislavskian Davids to knock over, but are examined sympathetically. Real flaws, however, are caused by the absence of any consensus on the nature of theatre history and the role of the scholar. While several papers express strong interpretive points of view, others lack unity and a few merely describe events.
One of the best is Mary Brown's fresh viewpoint on Ambrose Small, the robber baron of the Canadian circuit whose 'business was theatre as Molson's was ale'. Professor Brown describes the growth of his empire and the variety of his wares, from great European artists in Shakespeare to The Royal Midgets in Gulliver's Travels; but she argues that Small should be seen as an 'Inadvertent Patron' who built an audience and gave them vital theatre. And of course, there are clues to the mystery of his disappearance.
Helen Krich Chinoy tackles the real problem of finding how an 'oddly assorted crew' could unite to form the Group Theatre, and to turn their own obscure names into legends: Lee Strasberg, Harold Clurman, Franchot Tone, Stella Adler, Clifford Odets. Where ten theatrical Canadians gather, there you will find ten different opinions on how well the Stratford Festival has served our theatre. Most will disagree with Euan Ross Stewart; I disagree myself. But his paper, too, has a viewpoint and is therefore provocative. So is Ann Saddlemyer's attempt to illuminate Canadian theatre by challenging comparison with the Abbey; and if the challenge is less vivid than her evocation of the great Irish theatre, the principle is a sound one.
At the beginning of her essay, Dr Saddlemyer says: 'Canadian scholars are lamentably lacking in the nuts-and-bolts knowledge of the history of theatre and drama in their own country'. The point is well taken. Canadian theatre history is not much better off than the primitive kind of cartography that left vast tracts blank, aside from squirming tritons and putti, or a note: 'Here be dragons'. In such a context there is honest work for the plain surveyor who tells us what is where. He slays no dragons, but he helps crowd them off the map. In describing for monoglot anglophones the role of touring companies in the development of an indigenous Québec theatre, Jean-Cléo Godin performs an essential service. Andrew Parkin does a similar job for British Columbia, whose barrier mountains seem to possess an intellectual dimension. Both papers attempt too much, and are consequently a little uneven, but both offer compensations: Dr Parkin points the scholar at research resources, and gives an unexpectedly interesting account of the role of amateur theatre.
Parts of the United States still want surveying, too. By calling Margot Jones to the attention of students outside Texas, Don B. Wilmeth does a good turn for a comparatively neglected corner of American theatre. But it is difficult to see the point of Arnold Rood's dreary summary of Henry Irving's North American tours. A real story is hidden here; Irving's dealings with managers like Henry E. Abbey were a shocking education in American business ethics to the actor and to Brain Stoker. This would be of more use to us than itineraries, bills, reviews and profits, which could be abstracted from standard books by anyone who cared to take the time. This is not good history: a table would have done the job better.
Tables are provided by Dr Wilmeth, and by Douglas McDermott and Robert K. Sarlós in their piece on the 1902-03 season in Woodland, California. In each case, these save a deal of mind-numbing chatter. Woodland is offered as a particular example from which 'a few generalizations can be drawn about theatrical life in small-town America at the turn of the century'. Richard Moody attempts a similar method of narrowing the field by recalling the decade 1909-1919 in the United States, but is forced to adopt a stream-of-consciousness organization which quickly loses focus. His narrative only comes to life when he deals with the early years of the Provincetown Players under George Cram Cook.
Alan Woods' essay on the career of Thomas W. Keene works better because he attempts more than a chronicle. He assesses audience response to an actor of the 'old school' who survived into the 1890s, and draws some useful conclusions. In contrast, while Marvin Carlson's account of Ernesto Rossi's tours gains from a pleasant style and the need to rescue a comparatively obscure subject, the implicit question - why did Rossi flop where his compatriots Salvini and Ristori succeeded? - is not seriously addressed.
I have left one paper to the end. Robertson Davies' contribution is 'Mixed Grill: Touring Fare in Canada, 1920-1935'. The title is apt: this is a jumble of personal reminiscences and impressions which ought to be vile history, but isn't. Instead it is a goldmine of eyewitnessed greatness, tempting snapshots (oh to see a real Mutt and Jeff show!) and glimpses of the sources of World of Wonders. Professor Davies triumphs because his pellucid prose often transcends the Plain Style in flashes of Shavian lightning, but never falls below it, and because he rejoices in our history, with a joy that carries us with him. While the other qualities of a good historian can be acquired, these are conferred by Clio herself. The rest of us must do what we can, with what we have been given.
Dr Conolly and Donald Mullin's new journal, Essays in Theatre, has published on important article by R.W. Vince on 'Comparative Theatre Historiography'. We should all heed, discuss and respond to it. Theatre historians have learned research techniques, but too many of us are still unclear about our alms, and about the theory of our discipline. What is it for? How much raw data is really needed, and how should we use it? Should we ask 'how' and 'why', or only 'what', and should we attempt answers? We can learn a great deal from historians in other, more established disciplines. Perhaps it is time for another conference, this time on theatre historiography, with a few social, political, theoretical, military and art historians invited to help us.