The Groaning Boards

The Executive Committee of the Harvard Dramatic Club voted two weeks ago to increase the number of plays performed on the Loeb main stage next year from eight to twelve. The Committee argued that this would permit more undergraduates to use the main stage facilities as actors, technicians, and directors. The Loeb has too long intimidated undergraduates, they said; most view it as the handsome plaything of a few near-professionals and theatrical geniuses. They insisted that directors and technicians who worked only on House productions should be given a chance to experiment with the main stage.

The goal of involving more undergraduates in the Loeb is a worthy one; the main stage, which has increasingly excluded undergraduates, was conceived as a student, rather than professional, activity. But no matter how well-intentioned the current proposal is, the Harvard drama community does not have the resources to put it into practice.

There are simply not enough skilled technicians, actors, and directors to put on twelve main stage productions next year. Even this year, directors have been hard-pressed to find casts and crews. Few of the actors in Loeb plays this spring came from the University; many were semi-pros from the Boston Conservatory, B.U., and the community at large. Technical personnel have been especially scarce, for the main stage demands a familiarity with staging and equipment which cannot be acquired in the Adams House Dining Room.

Only a certain number of undergraduates have the dogged theatrical ambition to hang around the Loeb long enough to master its technical demands. The peculiar virtue of the Loeb is that it is equipped to stage large-scale, technically polished, professional-style productions. But only a hard core of theater lovers has been willing to spend week after week on production after production to qualify to use the Loeb's resources. If the Loeb staff wants to fill its huge stage, and large seating capacity, it must rely on devotees like these.

House drama and the Experimental Theater, on the other hand, provide excellent opportunities for less ambitious, less complex, or less conventional productions. Dining room audiences are more willing to suspend disbelief than Loeb audiences, to exercise the quality of mercy. House plays do not require the polish that Loeb audiences expect. The Loeb, on the other hand, magnifies errors of inexperience.

Furthermore all main stage productions would suffer from the HDC plan, not just misplaced House productions, because all plays would have lower budgets. Increasing the number of shows would entail cutting the budget for each from $2500 to $1700. This is supposed to encourage experimentation and improvisation of sets, props, and costumes. But this kind of corner-cutting is more appropriate to House drama than to the main stage.

Under a curtailed budget the Loeb would never again be able to underwrite anything as elaborate as last Fall's The Tempest or Utopia Limited the year before. A show requiring several complicated sets or expensive costuming could not be produced for $1700. This year, only the revived Leverett House operas were staged at the Loeb for less than that amount; in that instance money was saved because flats and costumes from the House production were used on the main stage.

The HDC Executive Committee will begin meeting next week to choose next year's main stage directors. The HDC's bylaws require main stage directors to have directed two plays already. Many of the applicants will have had experience only in the Houses or the Experimental Theater, and these should be given generous consideration. But the committee should not authorize an increased number of undergraduate-directed plays if it can do so only by lowering the quality of Loeb productions. The Committee should discard its earlier plan: twelve main stage shows could be everybody's loss and nobody's gain.