The daily worker., 1934-02-09
The Influence of the
Crisis on Broadway
Emphasis in the Bourgeois Theatre Clearly Toward
Reaction. Saws '|DaiIy'' Critic S

and there VIII be more ike it's 70
give one the impression that the past
was simpler, more cheerful and gen
orally saner than the present This
is done BY giving the audience not
a portrait Of the past as it Was sensed
and lived by the author when the
past" was present for him, but BIZ
writing about the Ideals and hopes
Of the "old days without any Of the
impulses and passions out of which
those ideals and hopes sprshg. The
result consequently is & sentimental
chrome without Hfe. But it pleases
the harrassed bourgeoisie to indulge
themselves IN such memories because
it relieves them Of the need Of facing
the facts Of today. This Is the ps9-
chology Of the old man who wants
10 live out his remaining time on
earth with az little disturbance rs
possible
And now. one step further along
the path Of reaction, come the Cath
olic plays, ONeill's DAYS without
End" and Philip Bsrfy's The JOY
Gus Season" The fact that these
playw1ights rather than two IN
knowns should have begun this pro-
cession backward is significant. Just
because they are earnest people ard
sincere they were amongst the first
to feel obliged to choose. But their
choice Is the negative one towards
mother church"-back TO the begin
ming and the protective wombl What
is more significant still, however, is
that for men such as ONeill and
Barry this chain cannot be made
without the atrophy of their creative
capacities. falling of Of their early
strength. ONein was never a
thinker" but he had passion and O
sense Of teerning life; his growth
urged him to question his environ
ment, to probe beneath the surfaces
Of our specifically placid rural life
and all cur tsken-for- granted indus
trial activity Bafry's gifts were
never much more than slight: his
plays always had in them the quality
Of sweetbreads for frail intellectuals
Of the -Bostoniafls tyne but they
had a wit and a sensitiJity OF the
finger-tips which made him aware Of
a little more than many OF his fels1
low playwrights. But now that they
have surrendered their positive seek
ing sides everything which distin-
guished them has disappeared.
In the days OF CatholioiSn's ma
turity, leading philosophers and
artists came out OF the Church =
CThomas Aquinas, Daute)y but in
this country when an artist ATTEMPTS
to relate his own problems and living
impulses to the Church, he fnds
himself in q eonlpleJe vacuum. The
Church as creative fovce has never
existed In this coyntryAeertainly not
eince the Civil War-and artists who
want to find Sustenancea in it are
either forced TO behave like foreign
tourists in ancient places CThornto1
Wilder) or revert to q faith so sim
PIE that it is silly; like O'Neill whose
religion as voiced In Days without
End" is that of the most ignorant
parish priest, or like Barry in "The
Joyous Season" whose Catholicism is
q vogue, Sigary, timfct acoulescence
to anything mama ssSs!' There is
very little in either OF these plays to
indicate that their authors once were
promising. Their reactionery faith
has laid them low.
THIS, however, is not yet the final
stage Of reaction though it leads
to it. The final stage is the point at
which the artist comes cut directly
and uneoUiVOca1lv in dafe4sSn ~ tho
existing society aS against q new or
der emerging from 4 revolution of
the working class. II the ONeifis
and Barrys who write these, naive re-
ligicas plays were to realize that this
is the course they will have to follow
in the future, would they finch or
would they face it? II they could an
swer the question, they would know
little more Of what they are talk
iOp akptit fCdaV