The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1931-11-24
1000 UNEMPLOYED MARCH ON CITY HAIL. 1000 DEMAND RELIEF
"Steel" at Times So.
Shows Real Feeling
for Mill Struggles

When you see the bourgeois critic S
hammer knocking John Wexley's
steel" now playing at Times Square,
just remember that what he doesn't
like is probably all right This is a
most surprising play to find on
Broadway with q real working class
point Of view, in spite of numerous
scales and rusted spots of literary
hysteria.
To take up some of its faults first.
The play has streak of that Sher-
wood Anderson type of railing at the
damned dirty unloyely mills and at
the industrial system because it in
terferes with green grass and birds
and butterflies. One suspects that
Wexley started to write a poem
against industrialisn, then went and
found out what it was all about, and
flooded his poem with lot of red
hot class hatred toward the steel
barons, stool pigeons, state troopers
and scabS. Or, maybe, he knew all
the time, and had to put the other
angle in to get it by in New York.
The play may be criticized because
it deals with a situation in which the
mass struggle of the steel workers is
the key, but which is cut down to
the reactions to this struggle of
few petty individuals. But that is
just one Of the limitations of the
modern stage, barring such expensive
productions as Reinhardt can put on,
or such as can be staged by the mas
ters Of industry, the capitalists here
or the workers of the Soviet Union.
In spite of such limitations, Wexley
has done lot. He has gathered up
many important types in steel
town. There is the American skilled
labor type, who howls against the
'Bolshevik Hunkies." One of these
home guard types is the father of a
youngster who has poetic ambitions,
hopes to get educated and leave the
mills. There are lots like him. Most
ly they turn shyster lawyer, and
company politician, but some of them
as this one, Joe Raldny (acted by
Paul GuilfoyleJ, become strike organ
izers. There is the ordinary good
fellow, proud of his strength, who
becomes company sucker, and goes
from step to step to scabbery and
stool pigeon activities. There are the
"Hunkies" themselves, who turn out
on close inspection to be the sanest
of the lot, class conscious and stub
born. There are the women, intent
on getting their men safe and sound
out of the mess, and that's about all.
1t is not complete picture, for there
are in reality rebel women too, but
the types like Melania and Betty in
the play also exist.
Daniel Raldny, the father, dies of
apoplexy brought on by high blood
pressure gained in the rolling mill.
The part is acted by the old star of
Civic Repertoire, Egon Breecher. The
kid, Joe Raldny, gets into difficulty
(most of them dob and never leaves
the mills, stays In them and becomes
rebel. He is seen calling a meeting
in private house, of men he knows
from each department (his tactics
are correct) and starting to organize.
He doesn't know anything about
Communism, the word is only men
toned once, like this: "The Commu-
nists get their heads broke" But he
knows that the A. F. L. is run by
crooks and there are no hopes in the
Socialists or the Wobblies.
1t is a primitive type of union he
organizes, in fact, it is hardly more
than group, but we're in that stage
in lot of industries. Joe has sense
enough to look around for help, and
that big organizer from Chicago
who appears in town might be some
one of our Metal Workers Industrial
League men, for all you can tell in
the play.
The simple plot goes on, truthfully
Joe's brother-in-law, Steve Carton
McLane) becomes a straw boss, and
when the strike starts against speed
up and naturalization, Steve becomes
a scab. He doesn't have nerve enough
TO go with the others when his boss
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