New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1912-03-24
THE PLAYCOER
The Trick of "The Terrible
Meek"

THE Terrible Meek:
Before the curtain rises. bell from some
distant place of worship tolls the hour.
Nine brazen notes, far off, out OF tune.
Then q heavy peal OF thunder, ana tne
sharp, cracking strike OF a bolt; YET
above all, one other sound, more piercing
a strange unearthly Cry: There follows a
mighty bowling of wind, blended with a
confused clamor Of voices and the hurrS Sie5
away, when the Curtain rises upon lhh'
darkness. -
A sudden rush. The silence deepens.
There Is a sense OF moorlands and desolate
Far off a cow lows in her stall Some
lost sheep down in the valley bleats uls-
mally Silence again.
IT is broken by the Voice Of Woman,
weeping bitterly. A Peasant Woman.
1t is not easy to say how, in such a
moment and in 1nky darkness" any
stagecraft can convey 10 an audience q
sense Of moorlands and desolate places. "
But 1t would have been easy enough to
carry out the rest Of these instructions.
They were, however, blandly or other
wise, ignored on the stage Of The Little
Theatre last Tuesday afternoon. There
were no sounds of bell, no peal Of thun-
der, no sharp, cracking strike Of bolt,
no strange, unearthly cry, no mighty
bowling Of wind, no clamOr of voices, no
hurrying of feet, no sound Of COW or
sheep. There was silence, there was
darkness. there was a puzzling wait
No one in the audience knew whether the
curtain had risen or was still lowered.
The audience became restless. There
was graveyard gloom. Somebody whs-
tied TO keep up his courage. Somebody
else giggled Another laughed outright.
A man in the rear seats lighted match.
Then most of the audience laughed.
Negligence and delay had got them into
the wrong mood for what was to follow.
The delay had stretched the intermlssion
after the first piece from the advertised
fifteen minutes to more than half an
hour. The negligence had ignored the
stage directions which. II obeyed, would
have prepared the audience for the con-
tinuance of the 'inky darkness and the
solemnity of the play" that was about
TO begin. Mr.. Kennedy had the right
idea in his stage directions. The stage
management had the wrong idea in dis
carding them. The puzzled and irritated
audience supposed that something had
gone wrong with the lights that the
curtain had "hitched." that any one Of
a dozen other mischances had fallen to
the lot of the new adventure There
was good deal Of fidgeting
The first words heard from the stage.
and in the "inky darkness" were:
stand IT,"
Then the audience Uttered. Proba bly,
few among them had read the play or
kne in advance what it was about
The adventure seemed in some danger
And presently when the cockney Soldier
said to his Captain still in the darkness.
Its not eXackly the place ter spend 4
pleasant AFTERNOON, is it, sir?' another
litter ran over the house.
This unfortunate beginning. with its
misunderstanding, would have been
avoided had the stage directions been
followed. and followed Immediately upon
the eXtinguishing of the lights. And the
programme should have contained an ex-
planatory note, if only the stage direc-
tions above quoted. The line from the
title page at least might have been copied
there: ITO Be. Played in Darkness" 1t
is unwise to take an audience unawares.
The audience at Tuesdays matinee did
not know that it was expected to sit
through three-quarters Of an hour of
darkness and listen to talk about the
smell of death" and distressful tales Of
injustice and killing.
Dam creepy, ] call it," sad the Sol
der. And the audience agreed.
Apart from that it was theatrical
trick, this darkness in which you heard
the play; effective, but none the less a
trick. Presented in the light The Ter
rible Meek" would have been a travesty
and the audience would not have sat II
out. The Roman Centurion speaking
like a twentieth century English officer
who had suddenly become a socialist and
a deserter; the Roman Legionary talk
ing like Tommy Atkins in the Boer War;
the Mother Of Christ talking like an
English farmhands wife-would have
offended that portion Of the audience
which they did not bore had the scene
been given in the light. 1t was like a
dark seance, with the usual excuse. Up
go the lights at the end of the piece, and
you behold not a British officer and
Tommy Atkins and an Englishwoman,
but Mary and the Romans and Christ
Crucifed between the two crucified
thieves! In the light the presentation
D.,
mans from Piccadilly and Bethnal Green,
the Eastern Mother from the English
countryside. Perhaps we lack magma
ton. Or perhaps Mr.. Kennedy has too
much.
1t is with the theatrical, OF the re-
ligious. aspect Of the matter that the
present chronicier concerns himself.
Other persons will emit an abundance
of words on the religious side of the case.
They will do well TO remember that plays
in the long ago had intimate relation
with religion and with ecclesiastical
ceremonies They will be unable to show
that Mr. Kennedy has written his play,
or that the actors present it, in other
than a high and reverent spirit. But as
a play this Playgoer likes it not, nor can
he rid himself of the conviction that its
best impression depends upon the trick
of placing the auditorium and the stage
in darkness. This means that the audi
ence is fooled. Without this trckery
Mr.. Kennedy's characters of A. d. 33
could not deliver their versions Of mod
ern thought. A good deal has been
heard about sincerity" in dramatic art.
But Mr.. Kennedy's art does not in this