The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-07-20
and
CLOSE-UPS
By LENS

HAVE you attended a performance
IL of the Portable Theatre Of the
Works Division Of the Department
Of Welfare of the city of New York;
Why not? It's free, you know.
with the compliments Of your
Mayor and your Commissioner Of
Welfare. Show your appreciation
for what our great City Admins
tration is trying to do for you. Take
the wife. Take the kiddies. The
DRAMA brought to your very door
step, folks.
7 HAVE sat through a few of the
1 performances given in broad day
light by these portable stages. In
thickly populated working-cl
neighborhoods these huge stages
mounted on trucks are set up be-
fore a bewildered audience of men,
women and children. Into these
foul and unwholesome canyons of
proletarian misery the city brings
its circuses.
At a performance in Corlears
Park on the lower East Side an
Irish worker exclaimed while watch
ing the idiotic Mr.. Cox and Mr..
Box" mot the play by the same
name once produced by the Work
erS' Laboratory Theatre, heaven
forbidD: why don't them bastards
feed us unemployed instead of
spending dough on this"
THE most repulsive brand Of vari-
ETY. and kitschy swill is dished
out on these truck-stages. Skits in
which Negroes are ridiculed, Jews
and Italians slandered in So-called
dialect" pieces. Embarrassing but
terfly dances. Before these sicken-
ing exhibitions are half over the
audience leaves in disgust and only
a handful of curious kids remain to
gaze upon these weird spectacles
which are palmed off on workers
under the guise of city government
tai patronage Of the drama, culture,
ETC., for the "peepul."
AT Battery Park a few days ago a
n crowd composed of several hun
dred unemployed were drowsily
watching children's dance entitled
Dance of JOY" The sound of the
dilapidated piano was drowned out
internationally by traffic noises and
harbor whistles. The pathetic farce
of the whole thing had never been
more obvious to me.
Suddenly, at least dozen be-
draggled and emaciated men dashed
out of their seats and fell upon a
big brown bag which someone had
purpoSely deposited against the
iron fence of the park. In less
time than it takes to wink, the con-
tents of the bag, stale bread and
mouldy swiss cheese, had been
picked to pieces and distributed
among these walking ghosts, hun
cry as wolves.
How perfectly this little incident
symbolized the monstrous hypocrisy
involved in the attempts of La
Guardia's administration to bring
music, the dance and the theatre
to hungry masses.
My dear Mr.. Mayor, you are add
ing insult to injury when you at
tempt to turn the stomachs Of
working class audiences. Remember,
those stomachs are empty.
VARIETY reports that the agita-
' ton carried on by the Film and
Photo League against IS. A. Mann
Brand" has succeeded in causing
the patronage of the Yorkville The
atre to dwindle to such a point that |
the joint Is now practically on the
rocks. Here, read and rejoice:
Theatre did fairly well for
while, in fact it began rolling up
slight profits. Then along came
IS. A. Mann Brand purely Nazi
propaganda picture and one
which no other theatre in the
U. s. wanted to see. But this
Jewish proprietor Of film house
booked it and played it I. I. some
one (the Film and Photo League,
my dear Variety editor.-Lens)
had lot of handbills printed up
pointing out that the exhibitor OF
the pro-Nazi picture is a Jew.
These handbills were distributed
widely to all prospective Yorkville
customers. Result was that Jew
ish and Iiberal-minded patrons
were through with the theatre be-
cause Of showing the film
THE THEATRE HAS LOST
WHAT LITTLE BUSINESS 1T
HAD. my emphasis-L.) On the
night of the 10th, third day of the
films date in New York, with
10000 avowed Nazi syrnpathizers
in New York and environs, there
were only 81 people in the the
atre. 1t was a cool evening, too.
Admission is rs cents. -"
And now you tell me, does it pay
to fight! And how!