Dana Lauds Rise In Soviet Theater

Moscow is the "mecca" of theater-lovers from all countries, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Dana told members of the John Reed Society last night. Emphasizing the "marvlous new audience" that now floods Russian theaters, he said that the choice of plays in the Soviet capital was larger than anywhere else in the world.

Dana remarked that the Russians recognized that English art and drama was part of the heritage the Red Army fought to preserve in the last war. "On the eve of the German invasion in 1941," he said, the main attraction in Moscow was "Midsummer Night's Dream."

Illustrating his talk with slides depicting Russian plays and moving-pictures, Dana stressed the work of young Soviet playwrights, who choose to show the "healthy joy of the common people instead of the introspection of Czarist novelists." He noted the freedom of expression as well as variety and genius of theatrical experiment that mark the current Moscow stage, and spoke at length on the work of Serge Eisenstein as an important fence in the cinema.