Dramatic Club Becomes 100 Productions Old

At 7 p.m. tonight the lights in Sanders Theatre will begin to dim and, as a bell in the distance tolls midnight, a wary guard will glance upward and demand sharply, "Who's There?" And with these two words, the 100th production of the Harvard Dramatic Club will have begun.

For more than six months now, the HDC has been preparing for its production of Hamlet. The Club seems to have agreed on just what sort of a show--and what sort of an impression--it wants to give on this occasion.

But the HDC has not always held these same views on what to produce. Indeed, its history has been one of shifting emphases and overturned policies to produce only original plays written at the University. Eleven years later, it changed its mind, deciding foreign drama was really more interesting. Then, after another five years, it came to the conclusion that any play, foreign or American, original or well-worn, should be produced if worthwhile and challenging.

Despite these changes, the HDC has always tried to find a place, sometimes large, sometimes small, for the original play. In this as in certain other respects, it has remained true to some of the basic principles of the founders of the Club.

Something New

The Club came into existence on a dreary tenth of March, 1908, when eight undergraduates, dissatisfied with college dramatics as they knew them, met in the Union to map out something new. They decided to compensate for their tardiness in organizing, in comparison with other college drama groups, by making this organization unique: they would produce only original plays written by Harvard undergraduates. Students of Professor George P. Baker's English 47 Playwriting Course, they longed to see the plays they wrote turned into life on the stage, and with Baker's blessing, they dedicated the Harvard Dramatic Club to this cause.

Succeeding generations of HDC directors have thought original productions less important, but the desire to see original work on the stage has never left the group. Baker founded the 47 Workshop 1913, producing original plays for a small audience. This group catered to creative drama for seven years after the HDC had abandoned it, but then Baker accepted a position at Yale. After World War II, the HDC did form a Reading Theater which presented about six undergraduate plays a year in the large lecture room in Fogg. But this group did not prosper, and in 1953 the HDC made another attempt.

Training Ground

Members then founded the New Theatre Workshop, the original purpose of which was to present one-act plays written by Harvard authors. A dearth or original creations sent its original purpose to an early grave, but the Workshop has since become a training ground for actors, producers, and directors. It is a sort of preparatory school for major HDC productions. At present, however, Robert H. Chapman, associate professor of English, is helping the organization to return to its original purpose. He has given the members five original plays written in his English Ya playwriting course which they will consider for production in the spring, and has been helping the group with their work.

There are two other policies, adopted at the HDC's first meeting in 1908 which have been kept constant throughout the Club's history. One of these was the decision to have women play women's roles. This caused "distinct opposition at the outset and wavering in the fold," Baker remarked several years later, but the members have always stuck to the original decision. H. V. Kaltenborn '09, a charter member and the first treasurer of the Club, remembered that at the time "I was very happy they decided to be sensible" and adopt this policy. "There was a very snobbish attitude toward Radcliffe then," he confided. "It wasn't considered quite the thing to do to go out with a Radcliffe girl."

The other policy which has generally been followed was the original decision to have professional direction of all HDC plays. This was first interpreted as hiring directors who had worked on Broadway, such as Wilfrid North, director of the first production. Later, recent graduates who had had either professional or amateur experience were hired, and in succeeding years, capable undergraduates directed the shows.

The first ancestor of Hamlet was "a serious play of modern life" by Allan Davis '07 entitled The Promised Land. Produced on December 15, 1908, it dealt with the efforts of a Jewish European diplomat to lead his co-religionists back to Palestine.

Baker hmself was highly pleased with The Promised Land and succeeding productions, two of which, The Scarecrow and Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater were performed on Broadway, the first by a professional company, the second by the HDC itself. The initial guiding light of the Club wrote in 1917 that the group's achievement was "remarkable." He asserted that the production of original plays had not hampered the organization, as some had first thought it would, but "from the beginning the Harvard Dramatic Club has shown clearly . . . that college undergraduates can give original plays to a mixed audience and with real usefulness to their authors involved."

'Filling the Gap'

Baker's disappointment must have been great when the HDC, reorganized after a year's recess following World War I, decided to abandon the production of undergraduate plays. They gave as their reason their opinion that these plays had proved too confining, and that the need for "filling the gap between the younger playwrights and Broadway" was being met by the 47 Workshop. The Club's new administration thus decided to produce works which had not previously been given in the United States. For seven years they concentrated on foreign works, but in 1924 it decided that "the trouble with the American theater is that it is not American," and began to make Harvard theater more American by producing "Pedro the King," written by a resident of Cambridge.

Baker Goes to Yale

After the original policy was rejected, Baker's influence began to wane. For years Baker had striven for the construction of a theater in which to house the productions of his Workshop and the HDC, but in vain. Plans had been drawn up in 1914 for a theater of advanced design, but this, despite the Harvard Alumni Bulletin's warning that "the need is pressing; the opportunity is unique," never amounted to anything. In 1924, Yale offered Baker the theater he wanted and the opportunity to teach nothing but playwriting--which he could not do at Harvard--and in that year the man with "a passion for the theater" left Cambridge forever.

The departure of Baker did not reduce the stature of the HDC, and it continued to add to its laurels. The year after he left the group produced The Moon Is a Gong, by John Dos Passos '16, who had written nothing worthy of production during his years as an undergraduate. In 1934 it put on Jean Cocteau's The Infernal Machine, the same year it presented the American premiere of A Bride for the Unicorn, by Denis Johnston, a noisy and risque comedy putting the story of the Golden Fleece in modern setting.

Censorship Troubles

The production of A Bride for the Unicorn was one of the few instances where the HDC was troubled by censorship. Theoretically, all the plays which it produced, until a few years ago, had to be approved by the group's faculty advisory committee. Normally this committee would decide which of a number of plays to produce. But in 1934, President Conant requested to read A Bride for the Unicorn and decide whether or not it was too risque to produce. The play squeaked through the committee, 3 to 2, but President Ada of to appear in it. Undaunted, the Dramatic club found willing actresses outside the University, and the production, given a month later than planned, was hailed by the CRIMSON as indicative "of the vitality of the drama at Harvard."

Decade of Apathy

The censorship clause in the Club's constitution was completely removed shortly after World War II, at about the time when the Club was at the lowest ebb in its history. The decade of university apathy set had started the early '40's, and with the founding of a rival veterans' theater group--which later became the Harvard Theater Group--after the war, the Dramatic Club found itself unable to recover until the rival organization closed down in 1953 and turned its resources over to the HDC. Neil Smith, a former member of the Theater Group, became the president of the HDC, and gave the Club, which the previous year had produced only one play--Othello--a new vitality. In 1953-54 it produced four major shows, of which the biggest was T. S. Eliot's Murder in the Cathedral.

Back to Originals

At the same time as the HDC is putting on a big show with Hamlet, it is interesting to note that the Club is also returning--in a small way still to be sure--to another of the founders' major objectives, namely the production of original scripts. Chapman's interest in this has played no small part in the movement, although at present it is restricted to the Workshop level. While it is nice to bring plays to Harvard which have been done at the St. James or the Globe, it is equally, if not more, valuable and exciting to produce original works. The HDC is realizing this at the Workshop level; someday it may accept it once again at the major production level as well, if enough good material turns up.ROBERT H. CHAPMAN

Decade of Apathy

The censorship clause in the Club's constitution was completely removed shortly after World War II, at about the time when the Club was at the lowest ebb in its history. The decade of university apathy set had started the early '40's, and with the founding of a rival veterans' theater group--which later became the Harvard Theater Group--after the war, the Dramatic Club found itself unable to recover until the rival organization closed down in 1953 and turned its resources over to the HDC. Neil Smith, a former member of the Theater Group, became the president of the HDC, and gave the Club, which the previous year had produced only one play--Othello--a new vitality. In 1953-54 it produced four major shows, of which the biggest was T. S. Eliot's Murder in the Cathedral.

Back to Originals

At the same time as the HDC is putting on a big show with Hamlet, it is interesting to note that the Club is also returning--in a small way still to be sure--to another of the founders' major objectives, namely the production of original scripts. Chapman's interest in this has played no small part in the movement, although at present it is restricted to the Workshop level. While it is nice to bring plays to Harvard which have been done at the St. James or the Globe, it is equally, if not more, valuable and exciting to produce original works. The HDC is realizing this at the Workshop level; someday it may accept it once again at the major production level as well, if enough good material turns up.ROBERT H. CHAPMAN