SENSE AND THE CENSOR

When numerous authors and producers including representatives of several well known dramatic associations, unite to form a Joint Committee Opposed to Poltical Censorship of the theatre; and advocate voluntary juries of impartial but intelligent citizens to pass on doubtful plays, we begin to wonder if some of the attacks on the New York theatres may not have been founded on fact; the Actors Equity and the others in the movement must know what they are trying to eradicate. Granting, then, that all is not as it should be on the stage, the problem of remedy inevitably arises; and it is that which is stirring New York at present.

The ideal and idealistic remedy, of course, is a reform among the managers themselves which would result in the production of only decent plays. But apparently such a reform is out of the question, if only for the reason that the indecent plays make money on the free advertising gained from the controversies about them. Such, at least, has been the history of one play still holding the boards in New York.

The alternative is censorship of some sort; which naturally falls into two classes--political and voluntary. Political censorship is out of the question entirely; the fate of Rabelais at the hands of the Government is sufficient to prove this point. Or, if more argument be needed, we can only suggest that money, of which the theatre managers have an abundance, is still a persuasive force. Voluntary censorship by the public is almost equally dangerous and certainly more paradoxical. To make the public its own censor is shown to be no remedy by the very existence of the so-called need for censors!

Censorship may be for a while a power for good, but it is fully as apt eventually to become a power for evil, so far as the future of the American drama is concerned. We have here now a new school of playwrights turning out work of a distinctive type which bids fair to increase in depth and vigour; should a board of censors whatever its motives, be turned loose in this field, who can foretell the result? It has been shown here in our own Workshop that it takes many years to train an audience to be intelligently critical; what would happen if a group of persons, untrained, and fired with a peculiar zeal, were set down before the footlights with the injunction: "Pick out for us what is salacious, and discard it; being careful not to disturb that which is true art and literature, even though it deal with subjects that are immoral"? As we might cite the criticism that fell upon the head of W. L. George, author of "Caliban".

No, censorship of any species must of necessity be artificial--an oxygen-stimulant at best. The theatre, if it is to recover, must do so through itself, rather than through any extrinsic influences. And, after all, New York may grow disgusted with its iniquities. The Restoration period went through something of the same career, we believe. Familiarity is said to breed contempt.