Friday, May t, loss

By BRUCE MCCONACHIE

' Last Tuesday night, Denys Hay, pro-
tessor of medieval history at Edinburgh
University spoke on the subject, “Re-
naissance: Period or Problem," Profes-

mor Hay was witty and urbane and his
peech‘vasms entertaining asg't was in-
iormatlve. “ '

According to Hay, the term Renaise
finance is used by American schol-
ars to denote a period of historical
time. This is not the case, however, in
European scholarship. The tendency in

’Europe is to diyide European history
Into medieval and modern. Renaissance,
for them, is a term which covers only
a group of problems.

This division into two, instead of three
or four historical periods creates many
difficulties. In an American university,

Hornet/3' 'Dream Play' Called

By BRUCE MCCONACHIE

The Dream Play belongs to August
Strindberg's later period of dramatic
Writing. While his earlier works, The
Father, Miss Julie, and other, are pre-
dominately in the naturalistic style, The
Ghost Sonata, To Damascus and The
Dreun Play are forerunners of expres-
nionism. Robert Brustein, in an essay on
Strindberg, relates some of the charac<
teristics of these later plays: “Location!
are vague; space is relative; and the
characters possess names like the Strang-
er, the Student, the Poet, the Hunter and
the Dreamer.”

It is evident that this type of play lies
outside the mainstream of American
drama, Consequently, The Dream Play
15 quite diiticult to produce for an A-
merican‘audience. Although I am unac-
quainted with its production history, I
doubt that “The Dream Play" has ever
been professionally produced in America.

Thus I was surprised when Howio
llarned told me he was going to produce
an adaptation of the play at Grinnell.
His production last Wednesday night was
predictably confusing for the audience,
They were unsure how to take the play
and many of them left Arena Theatre
perplexed

Must oi the problem, I believe, lies in
the choice oi‘the play, Yet there were
some faults in the production which, if
remedied, might have led to a more en.
joyable night at the theatre. In spite of
a iew interesting and moderately suc-
cessful attempts at abstract theatricality,
the style of the production was too real-
lstic,

Howie’s set was appropriate and his
experiments in lighting sometimes suc-
ceeded in evoking the mood of the play.

Service ﬂ”?

SCARLET AND BLACK

Edinburgh Historian Hay Probes

Hay would probably be part of the
Renaissance and Reformation section of
the history department. At Edinburgh, he
is in the medieval division. But, as he
joked, “it’s not just that chaps like
Hay can't get jobs." Such rigid pet-iod-
ization often obscures historical re-
search Thus, scholars working in early
modern history are sometimes “fantasti-
cally ignorant" of what occurred only
a short time before.

These problems, thinks Hay, may be
traced back to the reception given Jacob
_Burkhardt’s book The Civilization of
The Renalssance In Italy, published in
1860, Eurlthardt treated Renaissance
Italy as a cultural whole. Among other
things, he discussed its politics, its phi-
losophy, its festivals and its art.

The book was a “flop” at first, but

There were other times, though, when
the lighting was insufficient to see what
was happening. This was particularly
true of the scene between the two coal
miners. The costumes of a few of the
characters and the Lawyer'l make up
were legitimately theatrical and effec-
tivc.

But the style of the acting, with few
exceptions, did not match the theatri-
callty of some of the other aspects of the
productions, Nor, for that matter, did I
feel that the acting style suited the play.
Most of the actors underpiayed their
parts and de—emphasiwd the climaxes
in each scene. The result, while perhaps
“realistic,” was often tedious and un-
dramatic. In the scene between the Law-
yer and the Daughter, the climax of the
Lawyer's lecture on duty was delivered
while he was walking ott stage.

The scene between the Pensioner and
the Officer was the most successful in
the production precisely because Dale
Dreyfus and Rick Roehlk pushed their
characterizations to absurb extremes.
Dale's portrayal of the Pensioner was
perhaps the most outstanding acting job
in the production. Rick gave a humorous
interpretation of a cocky little man, but
I talked to one girl after the perform-
ance who was surprised to learn that he
had played the part of the Officer.

The Daughter, the main character in
Strindberg's drama, was portrayed by
Tanya Hovanessian. Goodness, beattty
and compassion is difficult dramatic ma-
terial, but Tanya handled it well. Her
performance, however, was hampered by
her costume — a white dress which
looked more like a nightie,

Several of the actors in the minor roles
were effective. Among the faculty, Paul
Jones was funny as the Professor of
Philosophy. Bonny Tinker gave a good
characterization of the Doorkceper. Max

soon people began writing histories about
cultural Renaissances in England and
France as well. Despite Burkhardt’s cons
corn with the Whole civilization, includ-
ings politics, these later “Renais-
sance" historians centered their atten-
tion on the cultural - artistic aspect:
of the Renaissance in this or that coun-
try, and their inquiry was not limited
to any specific span oi time. Consequent-
ly the term Renaissance came to denote
any cultural period which exhibited a
flowering of talent. It became a problem
in cultural history, not a period of his-
torical time.

Hay pointed out that the present sep-
aration of medieval and modern is based
on the notion of political change. If it
could be shown that the fourteenth, fif-
teenth and sixteenth centuries saw us

Too Realistic

Helfgott, as the Poet. was appropriately
cool and smooth I was confused, though,
as to whether we were supposed to like
him. Perhaps Strindberg intended his

play to end ambiguously. That was how
it affected me.

An entirely successful production of
The Dream Play would have been an
amazing accomplishment. Howie’s pro-
duction was successful in parts but was
marred, i think. by his concern with pros
sentlng characters realistically.

Page Fiv-

enaissance

nique political, as well as cultural
changes, then this age might come to
be considered as a distant period. But
Hay sees little hope in this view. The
princes of the sixteenth wanted esen-
tially the same things for the same rea—
sons as their predecessors. Nor could one
consider this‘a separatOper'iod hgauso‘h
of a social change. Some his rlans
have tried to demonstrate that the mid-
dle class was rising during this time,
but as Hay said, other historians have
shown that just as many members of
the middle class were falling.

2 Nevertheless, Hay believes (hat one
can justify treating the Renaissance as a
separate period, A change in the “moral
climate" of the culture distinguishes it
[mm the medieval period, said Hay. He
cited Hans Baron’s thesis that Floren-
tine scholars demonstrated in the doc-
ades around 1400 that "you could be up to
your neck in business," and still be vir-
{unusi This‘wos a new ldea.‘ During the
middle ages, the attitude that virtue only
came to those who turned their backs
on the world had predominated.

Evidence of a change can be seen in
the different attitudes toward various
classical individuals. The Middle Ages
had turned Cicero into a monk, but the
Renaissance viewed him both as “a
thinker and a man of action." Attitudes
toward poverty, politics and trade
changed as well. In the Renaissance,
laid Hay, “the merchant could look his
parish priest in the eye and not feel
guilty."

Donahoe Explains Direction of ‘Milkwood';
Calls Technical Approach ‘Anii-Meihod'

By ANN KIRSCHNER

The main consideration in staging
Under Mllkwood, u play for voices, was
properly interpreting Dylan Thomas'
purpose. This was the view of Ned Dona-
hce (speech and theatre), director of
last week’s performance and of the first
staged production In this country. “Tho-
mas was smiling at the characters, not
harpooning them. It is not in the spirit
of the play to make fun of them,” he
said.

Another problem Donahoe cited was
"making the whole thing blend into
something which flowed without having
a staccato beat," He specified the im-
portance of the actors with only one line
coming on in character and blending out
in the same way, not just walking off
after having delivered the one line. To
make this easier, most of the one-liners
were staged in the side areas.

Donahue said that the set had two
main purposes. One was as a centering
device surrounded by neutral space, as
old as the medieval stage. The other
was as a symbol of the “down-at-the-

 

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heel Welsh fishing village." The set
could be worked on, under, and around
with a great deal ofrfreedom matching
that of the stage itself in Roberts.” ex-
pluined Donahue.

“This is not the kind of play that
calls for depth in character, They are
almost caricatures. We do not need to
know Why Eli Jenkins is a broken—down
minister in the town, but only that he
is, and we must accept him for it. it
would kill the lilt of the play if we
knew too much. Our job here is not
to psychoanalyze each character," said
D 0 na h o e, He admitted that this was
“anti—method,” the method being the in-
tensified identification of the actor with
all aspects of the character, including
his emotional reactions to situations out-
side the scope of the play. He gave as
an example the character of Polly Gar-
ter, saying that it would be wrong to
portray her as the “town whore.” a
judgment that Thomas did not make.
but rather as a "warm Woman."

Donahoe cut the script back for his
production according to the original
script he received from Thomas him»
self at Bennington College, where the
production was first staged. “It had to
be the right length to see their dreams,
see the people in the town, see the
town in action, reveal the characters
and get it down to dusk again,” said
Donahoc.

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