The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 26, 1927, Page 12

i ie oe a White Hope of American Drama By MICHAEL GOLD. AYBE I’m prejudiced, but I think the most interesting the- atre in New York is going to open its doors Wednesday, March 2, when John Howard Lawson’s “Loud Speak- er” will be ~ at the 52nd Street Theatre. I think every labor man, every revolutionist, everyone fascinated by the machine age, by the noise and hope of modern life will go to see this play. Lawson is the brilliant white hope of the American theatre. He knows labor and he knows the modern stage. He has a close affinity to the work of Maierhold and his revolutionary theatre in Moscow. More than any- one, Lawson has caught the spirit of industrial America. Most of our so- called “modern” writers, like Sher- wood Anderson and Waldo Frank, are frightened to death of industrial America. They seek refuge in the bible, in Dostoivesky, in the soul, in Greek tragedies and what-not. But Lawson moves freely among the sub- ways, skyscrapers, steel plants and proletarian hells of America. He is not trying to escape, but assimilate. His play, “Processional,” was the finest, and perhaps the only-~ real working-class play ever produced in America, It was the story of a West Virginia coal miners’ strike, done in a jazz technique. It established al- most tradition in American theatre art. The new play will create an- other such precedent, “Loud Speaker” is concerned with the humors and hypocrisies of a Babbitt who is running for Governor of the state, and who makes his cam- paign on the platform of the sacred- ness of ‘the home. At the same time he is messed up in the most awful domestic situation of his own. The play is a farcical cartoon, which punctures all the fake and hokum of our fat capitalist politicians. It is in the spirit of Robert Minor and Art Young, and if I were governor of the state of New York I would suppress it. The New Playwright’s Theatre, un- der whose auspices “Loud Speaker” is being produced, is a new organiza- tion. Most of our art theatres in * New York have become timid and bourgeois. They are afraid to ex- periment. They are afraid of guts and passion and revolutionary harsh- ness in the theatre. They like to produce dainty little costume trifles, and decadent European problem plays, and mystic highbrow morbidi- ties. The New Playwright’s Theatre is to get away from all this. It will try to break down the walls that separate the street from the theatre. It will be prejudiced against drawing room plays, and sophisticated cream- puff tragedies. It will try to get close to the earth, to the fields, fac- tories and mass-life of America. It will be afraid of nothing. In Lawson’s play New Yorkers will have the first chance to see a real constructivist set such as are now used in most of the revolution- ary theatres of Soviet Russia—in the Proleteult theatres, and the Maier- hold theatres. There will be two other plays in the two weeks following. One of them is a tragedy of Negro religious hysteria, called “Earth,” by Em Jo Basshe. This young writer edited a paper called “Facts” opposed to the war, and was active in the People’s Council and the old Socialist Party. It is his second play. The third play will be a comedy of the Mexican revolution, called “La Fiesta,” by myself. Maybe that’s awhy I am prejudiced in favor of this theatre, because it is possibly the only one in New York that will pro- duce plays of this kind, where revo- lutionary problems are thrashed out on the stage. The Mexican play opens about March 26. There are five playwrights direct- GEORGE BERNARD SHAW Author of the brilliant satirical comedy “Pygmalion,” now playing at the Guild Theatre. ing the theatre. They are Em Jo Basshe, Francis Edwards Faragoh, who used to be the dramatic critic of Pearson’s magazine when Frank Har- ris ran it, and whose play “Pinwheel” is being done at the Neighborhood Playhouse; John Dos Passos, who wrote the finest anti-war novel in America, and writes regularly in the New Masses; John Howard Lawson, and myself. We are trying hard to give radi- cals a theatre of their own in New York. It’s to be a hard-boiled thea- tre which is to get far away from that silly and decadent thing called art in bourgeois circles. We want to write and produce plays for the workers, who are the best audience. We don’t want bored dilletantes, or the idle rich and patronizing. We want our audience to have a good time in the theatre and not to be bored with all the fake problems of the intelligentsia. We are going to interpret modern America, as The DAILY WORKER and the New Masses interpret it, not as Vanity Fair does, or the American Mercury. The time is not yet ripe for a real workers’ theatre like the Proletcult in Moscow, but the New Playwright’s theatre is going to be the nearest thing to it in America. hat’s all one can promise just now. If this theatre can be a bridge to the real workers’ theatre that will come when we have a mass revolu- tionary movement in America, I, for one, will be satisfied. We are going to do our best to get all the young talent we can. If there are any Communist playwrights in America, this theatre will be the first to give them their chance, for next Season we are to put on eight more plays by young writers. Harbor Al- len is writing a play for us among others, and Alfred Kreymbork and E. E. Cummings. I can Ronestly say I believe this theatre deserves the sup- port and attention of every radical. There is so much of the fake, the arty, the conservative and downright trashy in the New York stage, that this theatre, whatever it does, de- serves support for its intentions. The theatre is located at 52nd street and 8th avenue, and there will be seats as low as 50 cents. We are going to arrange some kind of dis- counts, perhaps, for trade union groups. BROADWAY BRIEFS ——— ANEW PLAY by EM JO BASSRE : OPENING MAPRCHO CORNER 6 AVE. AND 14 ST, CIVIC REPERTORY NAS BV." 20> ARAGON J i JOHN HOWARD LAWSON: ennounces § EY Os wy OPENS eS MA NE ee HN HOWARD LAW CON “BAF TEL E PHONE WATKINS 7767, MATINEES WED. AND SAT, PRICES 50c, $1.10, $1.65. EVA LeGALLIENNE WEEK OF FER. 28 Mon, Eve., Feb 28..... “Cradle Song” Tues, Eve., Mar. 1...“Pwelfth Night” Wed. Mat., March 2, “John Gabriel Borkman” Wed, Eve., Mar. 2...... “Cradle Song’? Spec. Mt. Thurs., Mar. 3, “Cradle Song” Thurs, Eve., Mar. 3..“La Lacondiera” Fri. Eve., March 4....“Cradle Song” Sat. Mt., Mar. 5, “The Master Builder” Sat. Nve.,,Mar. 5, “The Three. Sisters” WINTHROP AMES’ GILBERT & SULLIVAN OPERA CO. | All performances exc. Thurs. Evgs. PIRATES of PENZANCE THURSDAY EVENINGS ONLY IOLANTHE PLYMOUTH West 45th maeet Evenings, Mats. Thurs. & Sat., 2:30. WEEK OF MARCH 7 Mon. Eve., March 7...... “Inheritors” Tues. Eve., March 8....“Cradle Song” Wed. Mat,, March 9...... “Inheritors” Wed. Eve., March 9....“Cradle Song” Thurs. Hve., Mar. 10, “Master Builder” Fri. Eve., March 11....“Cradle Song” Sat. Mat., March 12....“Three Sisters” Sat, Eve., March 12. cadiewes “Inheritors” A play you won’t forget THE LADDER By J. FRANK DAVIS Thea, 50th Street, WALDORF East of Broadway. Eve. 8:30. Mats. Wed, & Sat. A. H. WOOD PRESENTS CR IME A Melodrama of New York’s Underworld by Samuel Shipman & John Hymer, with JAMES RENNIE & CHESTER MORRIS and CAST OF 100 ELTINGE THEATRE, WEST 42nd STREET Matinees Wednesday and Saturday, Evenings 8:30, Matinees 2:30, OLN NER” The Best Comedy in Town! with ALLAN DINEHART & CLAIBORNE FOSTER KLAW Seats weeks in eight THEATRE, 45th St. W. of B’way. Eves. 8:30. Mats. Thurs. & Sat. 2:30 advance at box-office Neighborhood Playhouse 466 Grand St. Drydock 7516. Every bas eet PINWHEEL Mon.). An MERICAN ~» TH TRAGEDY fq MONTH Mts. Wed Longacre ¢ bi eis ee es Ase rene Civic Repertory {ef 6, Av 14 8t EVA LE GALLIENNE ee SONG” Saturday Matinee. “CRA LE SONG" Sat. Eve. “JOHN GABRIEL BORKMAN" “JOHN GABRIEL BORK MAN” — Se 3a" ae 8:30 ‘WHAT PRICE GLORY Mats, (exc. Sat.) 50c-$1. Eves. 60c-$2 ’ 149th Street, || Bronx Opera House 3)°¢) 5.4°3et Pop. Prices. Mat, Wed, & Sat, “LOOSE ANKL Beginning Monday “A WOMAN IN THE HOUSE” Wolff is casting “The Field God,” a play of North Carolina “poor whites,” and it is scheduled to go into re- hearsal next week under Wolff's di- CHANIN’S THEATRE MASQUE “PUPPETS OF PASSION” 45 St., West of B’way Zelephona: - Evenings 8:30. Mats. Wed. and Sat. WALLACK’S “4%; $e*..¢ St What Anne Brought Home A New Comedy Drama Thea., 48 St., W. of B'y. Eves. 8:30 Matinees WED. and SAT., 2:30 * BONNIC Musical Bon Bon with Dorothy Burgess, Louis Simon, Wm. Frawley, George Sweet, ce BAR Vanities CARROLL ¢, | Earl Carroll bate." th ae sth st, Week 999 beer rameen y THERA., W. 52 St. Evs. gt GUILD Mats. The ‘Thurs. & 8 & Sat. 2:16 ‘THE E SILVER R CORD Week Mar. 7—Ned MeCobb’s Daughter John Golden h.,58, R.of B’y [Circle Mts. Thu.&Sat.| 6678, Edwin Justus Mayer, who will be a/recalled by his first play, “The Fire- brand,” has taken enough time off from his scenario writing to finish a new play, “Jonathan Wild.” ‘ Paul Green, whose first play, “In |. rection, « , ___(Continued on page 7.) Abraham’s Bosom,” is now playing , 3 * et eaeirean ogni will soon Get Another Subscriber for ave the secon his dramas of " Carolina life on Broadway. Edwin Your DAILY WORKER,