April 1, 1959
Theatre Letter
Going to the theatre this season has been rather like turning unfamiliar corners and coming on familiar scenes. It is not that there has been an absence of surprises, but […]
April 1, 1958
Theatre Letter II
A few years ago Walter Kerr expounded the view that the dramatist’s concern with speaking out was the curse of the modern theatre; he contends that Ibsen and his heirs […]
April 1, 1958
Theatre Letter I
Once again, there is a slightly second-hand look about the New York theatrical scene. At least, most of the plays that have drawn me to the theater this year are […]
January 1, 1956
Theatre Letter
In Cat on a Tin Roof, “living a lie” means accepting various dull things for form’s sake, but mainly a marriage with someone who repels you. There are three levels […]
April 1, 1955
Theatre Letter
Broadway plays are getting to be more and more wildly varied, demonstrating the general confusion in this city of eclectic tastes and mores. The audience is also divided; the suburbanites […]
July 1, 1954
Theatre Letter
Most genres of British and American poetic drama are written to be performed once or twice before select audiences, and then categorized in libraries under “Poetry.” T. S. Eliot has […]
April 1, 1953
Theatre Letter
Aristotle, as we know him, has interfered with my enjoyment of the theatre this half-season. I can’t help taking an extensive scholarly and critical apparatus to the theatre with me, […]
July 1, 1952
Theatre Letter
Dramatists who write with Broadway in mind have more and more abandoned the traditional forms of realistic drama in favor of plays that, whatever their ostensible subject, are full of […]
July 1, 1951
Theatre Letter
Even a fairly satisfactory Broadway season produces few original American plays worth any consideration. In examining this season’s list, we can safely eliminate most of the plays winnowed away by […]
April 1, 1950
Theatre Letter
We often hear that our age discourages heroism. Joseph Wood Krutch, in The Modern Temper, has gauged our loss of the heroic idea; in A Century of Hero-Worship, Eric Bentley […]
July 1, 1949
Theatre Letter
Whenever the weakness of the American theatre in our time is deplored, the grasping commercialism of the Broadway producer is always cited as the final and ultimate cause of our […]
July 1, 1947
Theatre Letter
Perhaps it is time to hand O’Neill over to the sociologists, along with Dreiser and Farrell. A concern with our generic weakness is proper to their discipline, and the critic […]