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THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA-

SESOUICENTENNIAL PUBLICATIONS

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THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH

SESQUICENTENNIAL PUBLICATIO&^j

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

Printed in the U.S.A. by

THE ORANGE PRINTSHOP

Chapel Hill

Foreword

ARCHIBALD HENDERSON

VER a period o somewhat more than a quarter of a century, an
organization for the furtherance of the arts of the drama and the
theatre, known as The Carolina Playmakers, has flourished here
under the leadership of its founder, the late Frederick Henry
Koch. During this period, 1919-1945, upwards of four thousand students
have joined the organization and participated in its activities 5 and hundreds
of thousands of people have attended the indoor and outdoor productions
and listened in on the radio broadcasts, of plays, original and classic, light
and serious, farce, comedy, tragedy, tragi-comedy, pageants, and historical
dramas. The stimulating influence of this preoccupation with the drama and
the theatre, which rapidly pervaded North Carolina and the Southeastern
area, eventually spread throughout the entire country and into Canada, and
focused attention upon Chapel Hill as a radiating center of inspiration and
as a beacon light to the younger generation.

Pioneering a People's Theatre has appeared as Vol. XVII, No. 1, of The
Carolina Play-Book. It is singularly appropriate that a volume which
serves both as a memorial to Koch and as a survey, summary, and appraisal
of the labors and accomplishments of The Carolina Playmakers, should ap-
pear during the culminating year of the Sesquicentennial Celebration of the
University of North Carolina and be included in the Sesquicentennial Pub-
lications of the University. It follows soon upon the passing of that vivid
and perennially youthful spirit reminiscent of Milton's friend drowned
in 1637:

For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.

This volume, without pretension to be either formal history or complete
record, presents a cross section of the life and growth of The Carolina Play-
makers. Here are highlights, actors, interpreters, scenery, background
the essentials of a true drama in the educational history of the Nation. Koch
presents the ideology of folk playmakingj Selden, the able new leader, of-

A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

* ^ :.. .."'"'"'V

f eTns a thoughtful appraisal and lucid estimate, both of Koch the personality,

player, 4n4*^wer of dreams, and of the place of dramatic arts in the Univer-
sity curriculum. In vivid strokes are portrayed the original and authentically
American contributions of Koch to the American drama and theatre: the
meaning and inspiration of the "f olkplay" and the democratic technic of
critically moulding the creative product. In his inimitable individual way,
Paul Green, the most notable playwright to emerge from this aura, describes
the birthpangs of dramatic creation j and George Raleigh Coffman, head of
the English Department, sanely reviews the past and constructively outlines
a promising course for the future. In ample detail is described by Kai Hei-
berg-Jurgensen the remarkable spread of popular interest in the drama fos-
tered through extension activities j and practical plans for a dramatic art
building are clearly drawn by Selden. Especial gratitude for highly compe-
tent cooperation is tendered the members of the editorial staff: Samuel
Selden, for comprehensive contributions and wise criticism; Marion Fitz-
Simons, for a series of vivid vignettes of the staff} Virginia Spencer, for
painstaking help in making the records available.

Chanel Hill, N. C> A. HL

February 6 } 1945.

vi Jgi

CONTENTS

FOREWORD . . , v

FREDERICK H. KOCH THE MAN AND His WORK 1

Samuel Selden, Associate Professor of Dramatic Art
TWENTY-SIX YEARS OF THE CAROLINA PLAYMAKERS 6

Samuel Selden
DRAMA IN THE SOUTH 7

Frederick H. Koch, Kenan Professor of Dramatic Art
SCHOLIUM SCRIBENDI 20

Archibald Henderson, Kenan Professor of Mathematics
FIRST STAGE AND FIRST THEATRE 28

Frederick H. Koch
FROM SCRIPT TO STAGE 33

Edward Muschamp, Journalist
DRAMATIC ART IN A UNIVERSITY PROGRAM 40,

Samuel Selden
THE LYRIC LAZY SOUTH 50

Paul Green, Professor of Dramatic Art
DRAMA IN EXTENSION 54

Kai Heiberg-Jurgensen, Visiting Lecturer in Dramatic Art
PRESENCE BY THE RIVER 63

Paul Green
A DRAMATIC ART BUILDING 67

Samuel Selden
MIRACLE AT MANTEO 73

Marion Fita-Simons, Former Instructor in English, Woman's

College of the University of North Carolina
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 75

George R. Coffman, Kenan Professor of English
THE STAFF OF THE CAROLINA PLAYMAKERS 78

Marion Fitz-Simons
PLAYS PRODUCED BY THE CAROLINA PLAYMAKERS, 1918-44 ... 87

Virginia Page Spencer, Assistant in Dramatic Art
CAROLINA FOLK PLAYS PUBLISHED IN BOOKS 1 03

Virginia Page Spencer

~"4 vii &

Frederick Henry Koch

Kenan Professor of Dramatic Art, founder of The Carolina Play makers,
father of folk drama in America; teacher of Paul Green, Tom Wolfe,
Jonathan Daniels, Howard Richardson, George Denny and other creative
minds. Insprer of flays expressing the lives of tenant farmers, industrial
workers, Negroes, "people of the mountain coves, the Piedmont, the fine
barrens and the tide waters f lays of all the people. He was the champion
of the democratic sprit and of the free and noble imagination. He instilled
in all the eternal quest of the human sprit for a freer and better world. The
man became an idea, the idea became a movement, and the movement be-
came a national institution the folk drama of America.

We shall miss him, his pipe, his dog and his jaunty step down the village
streets, his constant enthusiasm as fresh as the first morning of his great
hopes, now and forever a part of the life, service and traditions of the Uni-
versity of North Carolina. We bow our heads in sorrow and appreciation
for the great loss which has come to his wife and sons, and to the University
and the Nation. We lift our hearts in exceeding joy for the noble life-work
of Frederick Henry Koch immortal in the flays of the p&ople to be carried
on in his name at the University of the 'people in the village he loved.

To the reverent care of all who love him we now entrust Ms blessed com-
memoration in the halls, walks and forests of Chapel Hill. He livs on in
the creative sprit of youth, walking their ways, writing their 'plays and
keeping lighted his fires from generation unto generation,

Frank P. Graham.

Frederick Henry Koch

C/Vfan and His Work
SAMUEL SELDEN

IN the concluding part of his commemorative tribute to Professor
Frederick H. Koch on the occasion of the Twenty-First Anni-
i versary of The Carolina Playmakers, Archibald Henderson read
some verses of Vachel Lindsay's describing John Chapman, famil-
iarly known as "Johnny Appleseed," and then remarked on the similarities
between two personalities. The resemblance is striking.

The Johnny Appleseed of a century ago moved as a young man from his
home in the East to the new land along the western frontier and there began
a unique life work. He raised young apple trees for the pleasure and benefit
of other people. Keeping ever a little in advance of civilization, he used to
clear a place in the forest, plant his precious seeds, fence in the patch, and
wait for the settlers to establish themselves around him. Then he would
dispose of the shoots for a "fippenny bit" apiece, or give them away for
nothing, and move on to prepare another nursery. Before his death he had
dotted the countryside with his fruit trees.

"Johnny Appleseed" has been described as a bright-eyed, kindly, simple-
hearted little man who loved children, animals and all growing things 5 who
took delight in the woods through which he walked endlessly 5 and who was
fond of expounding to everyone who would listen to him his philosophy of
goodness.

In this century, Mr. Koch reversed the pilgrimage of his prototype by
"moving from the West to the East. He too was a man with a kindly phil-
osophy of human goodness who found a passionate pleasure in the beauty of
the woods, in animals and flowers, but particularly in children, and in those
grown people who still possess the hearts of children. He too carried with
him a bag of magical seeds which he planted in many fertile places.

Frederick Henry Koch was born at Covington, Kentucky, on September
12, 1877. He was graduated from Ohio Wesleyan University in 1900,

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

and received his Master's degree from Harvard in 1909. In 1905 he ac-
cepted an appointment as instructor in English at the University of North
Dakota. Here he began his long career of pioneering for an American
people's theatre.

Starting at a time when any kind of scholastic theatre was generally
frowned upon by university authorities, on a campus which did not boast a
theatre building or even a formal stage, Frederick Koch immediately went
to work to organize the interest and participation of the Dakota students.
During the thirteen strenuous years he spent at that university he produced
classical plays, both ancient and modern, conducted experiments in com-
munal playwriting, and initiated the composition by students of original
one-act dramas drawn from native prairie materials. He founded The Da-
kota Playmakers, and directed their productions of new plays both at home
and on tours around the state.

When the experiments in original playmaking in the West attracted the
attention of Dr. Edwin Greenlaw and Frederick Koch was persuaded through
him in 1918 to come to the University of North Carolina, he extended his
pioneering to the South. He organized his now famous course in playwrit-
ing, founded The Carolina Playmakers, established the Bureau of Com-
munity Drama, set up a circulating library, helped to organize a statewide
Carolina Dramatic Association, and took the student plays of the Playmakers
on tour to scores of big and little communities in the surrounding regions.

At the same time Professor Koch stimulated groups in various parts of
North Carolina into starting experimental work in communal drama $ and
he lectured in all sections of the country on his favorite theme, A People's
Theatre. His summer lecture and playwriting classes at Columbia, New
York and Northwestern Universities and the Universities of California,
Southern California, Colorado, Toledo, and Alberta and Manitoba, Canada,
stirred into creative action individuals and groups far beyond the borders of
the home state.

Throughout his career at North Dakota and North Carolina and in the
many other centers he touched in this country and in Canada, Frederick Koch
was, like the former Johnny Appleseed, a persistent planter. He took a
boyish delight in each opportunity to journey to some spot where he had
never been before. Always he carried with him his precious seed, and never
did he return without sowing some of it. "Preaching the Gospel," he
called his labors.

2 )>-

FREDERICK HENRY KOCH

III

The historian who wishes to arrive at an understanding of Professor Koch's
working philosophy must recognize four motive forces which gave vitality
to everything he did. The first was his dynamic faith in young people.
Himself the embodiment of youth with all its enthusiastic optimism and its
love of fresh adventure, he was drawn inevitably to the company of those
who view life constantly with the eyes of hope. In the alert, unwearied,
ever-searching faces of young people, Professor Koch saw, with never a
shadow of doubt, the future of America.

The second force lay in his belief that every man alive possesses some-
where within him the creative spark, and that this needs only a little tending
to be made into a flame. This faith moved through all his work with his
students, especially those laboring to compose plays. More than anything
he imparted to them by way of technical advice, it led them to accomplish-
ments which were often surprising even to them. Proof to support Mr.
Koch's belief in the natural talents of men and women lies in the eleven vol-
umes of folk plays which represent the work in most part of people who had
never attempted to write even short passages of dialogue before they had
come into contact with their teacher. It lies also in the more mature work of
such writers as Tom Wolfe, Paul Green, Jonathan Daniels, Betty Smith,
Bernice Kelly Harris, Josephina Niggli, Noel Houston, and others.

The third drive in Professor Koch's work may be found in his conviction
that the most dramatic things in life are usually those which may be asso-
ciated with common experience. Out of this belief developed his long pre-
occupation with subject matter he termed "folk." ^ Every man, he observed,
is a product of his environment. Every young writer, therefore, works most
successfully with materials which he sees, not afar off, out of range of his
personal every-day feeling, but near at hand those which touch him most
intimately at every turn of his existence. Since nearly all young Americans
are by training first regional in outlook rather than cosmopolitan, they are
wise when they focus their beginning writing frankly on regional models.
Out of a faithful study of individuals in their home communities the authors
gradually acquire an understanding of men and women everywhere. ^ "A.
knowledge of the universal," Professor Koch remarked f requently^ "springs
from an investigation of the specific." He had little patience with smart
young dramatists who persist in trying to make plays about such glamorous
but misty subjects as the court of Eighteenth Century Spain, or the super-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

sophisticated manners of a much-imagined but never experienced Park
Avenue.

The fourth spur in Professor Koch's life was his love of the dramatic.
When he was a boy, he wanted very much to be an actor. Because his emi-
nently respectable parents were horrified at that idea, Mr. Koch became a
teacher. But, although he clothed himself wjth the gown of academic dig-
nity, he actually had his way; for the position he made and the organization
he built around himself were designed and maintained with showmanship
to the end. His life was motivated ever by a desire to shape his particular
part of the world into a beautiful play a play full of laughing young people
among whom he would have his role of the grand old man with his pipe and
his dog.

As a wise showman, Professor Koch saw clearly that fine plays are not
made out of false-faces and tinseled gadgets, but out of simple materials
viewed with love and modeled with imagination into living forms of action.
And so he devoted his energy and enthusiasm to promoting "folk" subject
matter. Many of the young people in his classes disagreed with him* But
in the end they knew he was right. Later they told him so, and then he was
happy.

As a typical pioneer, Frederick Koch was an explorer, a breaker of new
ground, a planter of seed; only to a limited extent was he a husbandman.
Much of the practical cultivation of the orchards he started he left to other
hands. His colleagues worked out the details of academic curricula, drafted
the yearly calendar of The Carolina Playmakers, managed the routine of
Experimental Productions, and handled the development of Extension ac-
tivities. They also served as guides and consultants in the planning of new
projects. Although he was all his life a vigorous initiator of creative work,
Mr. Koch was not himself primarily a creator. However, he had an enor-
mous power. This sprang from two great gifts. First, his ability to inspire.
His words were magnetic. They were compelling. No one in his presence
ever went to sleep. Possessed of boundless energy, Professor Koch stirred
the people about him into activity through the sheer force of his propinquity.

His second great gift was his ability to dramatize. Throughout his life
he was essentially an actor, a trouper, a showman, a natural publicist. Every-
thing he touched was interesting to him and he made it a point to see that
everyone around him should know about it and be stirred up about it. In this

FREDERICK HENRY KOCH

he was emineatly successful. Without Mr. Koch's talent for dramatizing
and publicizing, The Carolina Playmakers and the other projects he initiated
might, quite conceivably, have lapsed into plodding activities, pedestrian and
conventional. He sang to his work and about it, and his song made it dance
with life.

Friend and champion of youth, apostle of drama in the lives of simple men
and women, actor, showman and prophet and ever Johnny Appleseed
Frederick Henry Koch was a unique figure in the theatre and in the literary
and educational world of America. His influence is already incalculable. It
will doubtless increase as the years go on.

Twenty-Six Years Of The
Carolina Playmakers

1905-1918.
1918-1919.

1919 (March 14, 15).

1919 (July 31).

1920 (Oct. 18-20),

1921 (May 7-14).
1922.

1925 (Nov. 23).

1926 (Fall).

1927 (Fall).

1928 (March).
1928 (April 4, 5).

1933 (Feb. 3-5).

1934 (Feb.2-3).

1934 (April 29-May 2)
1936 (Spring),

1937-1941.

1939 (April 1-6).
1939 (Fall).
1939-1940.

1941 (Qct-Dec.)

1943 (May 19).

1943 (Dec. 10).

1944 (Aug. 16).
1944 (Dec. 12).

Professor Koch taught at University of North Dakota. Initiated work in folk-
playwriting, and founded The Dakota Playmakers.

Professor Koch joined the faculty of Department of English at^ University^ of
North Carolina. Established his now famous course, English 31, in Playwriting,
and founded The Carolina Playmakers.
The Playmakers produced their first bill of Original Plays.
First Forest Theatre Production.

Professor Koch produced his pageant, Raleigh, the Shepherd of the Ocean, in con-
nection with Raleigh Tercentenary Celebration, at Raleigh, North Carolina.
The Carolina Playmakers made their first tour.
Publication of Carolina Folk Plays, First Series.

The Playmakers Theatre, present home of The Carolina Playmakers, dedicated by
President Harry Woodburn Chase.

Paul Green's play, In Abraham's Bosom, produced at the Provincetown Playhouse,
New York. Won Pulitzer Prize.

Samuel Selden joined faculty as Instructor in English and Technical Director of
The Carolina Playmakers.

First issue of The Carolina Play-Book published by The Carolina Playmakera,
Southern Regional Conference on the Drama held in Playmakers Theatre.
Shaw-Henderson Festival held in Playmakers Theatre.

Playmakers produced their first operetta in collaboration with the Department of
Music.

Playmakers presented three plays at the first National Folk Festival in St. Louis.
Dramatic curriculum separated from English and set up in a new Department of Dra-
matic Art, headed by Professor Koch. A full graduate program developed.
Five summer productions of Paul Green's historical play with music, The Lost
Colony, staged and directed by Samuel Selden on Roanoke Island, North Carolina,
Presented by Roanoke Island Historical Association.
Drama in the South conference held in Playmakers Theatre.
Initiation of work in Radio Production under Earl Wynn.

Two fall productions of Paul Green's Scottish Historical Drama, The Highland
Call, directed by John W. Parker for the Cape Fear Valley Scottish Festival at
Fayetteville, North Carolina.

Tour of the Repertory Company of The Carolina Playmakers, presenting Paul
Green's The House of Connelly, directed by Samuel Selden and managed by Harry
Davis.

The remodeled Forest Theatre dedicated by President Frank Porter Graham.
Professor Koch gave, in Memorial Hall, his 39th annual reading of Dickens* &
Christmas CaroL

Professor Koch died at Miami Beach, Florida.

The Playmakers presented the 100th performance in their Experimental Series of
New Plays.

Drama In The South

By" FREDERICK H. KOCH

ODAY The Playmakers of Carolina welcome you to our home
town of Chapel Hill, to our historic little theatre building, the
first state owned theatre in America to be dedicated to the making
of its own native drama. We are thinking today of the simple
beginnings of The Carolina Playmakers on the improvised stage in our vil-
lage high school auditorium twenty-one years ago. And the little homespun
plays that found an eager and lusty response. Before this, Barrett Clark
avers that North Carolina was regarded by Samuel French, leading publisher
of plays in the United States and England, as a "dead" state so lacking in
dramatic interest that the entire state had been stricken from their mailing list
as not being worth the price of postage to carry their catalogues ! The imme-
diate success of the first little CAROLINA FOLK PLAYS suggested to us here the
hope for a possible oasis in the South, dubbed by H. L. Mencken then, "The
Sahara of the Bozart."

DAKOTA FOLK PLAYS

And in thinking of our adventure in native playwriting in Chapel Hill,
now coming of age, we remember too the twelve years of pioneer experiment
at the frontier University of North Dakota before that time when the
Little Theatre movement was still to come. Maxwell Anderson, now dis-
tinguished American playwright, was one of the founders of our first dra-
matic society there and out of the group of which he was a charter member
came The Dakota Playmakers and the first PRAIRIE FOLK PLAYS. On re-
ceiving a playbill of the first original Dakota plays young Anderson wrote
from California, where he was then engaged in teaching: "If there is any-
thing that would bring me back to the old sod, it is a dramatic revival 5 and
honestly, it seems to me that if the interest and enthusiasm keep up we may yet
have one comparable to the recent flowering in Ireland. I would be willing to
walk all the way back to the Dakota prairie to get in on that. 55 And when
later he went to New York the first play he wrote, you remember, was White

fl An address delivered by Frederick H, Koch in The Playmakera Theatre at Chapel Hill, North Carolina,
on April 5, 1940, for the Southern Regional Theatre Festival commemorating: the founding of The Carolina
Playmakcrs in 1918-19*

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

Desert, a play of the vast winter plain of Dakota its loneliness a native
play of the prairie. He had made a beginning.

The plays of Dakota were often crude, but they were honest. Simple folk
plays, near to the good, strong, wind-swept soil plays telling of long, bitter
winters in the little sod shanty. But plays singing, too, of the prairie spring-
time, of unflected sunshine, of the wilderness gay with wild roses, of the
fenceless fields welling over with lark song. Plays of the travail and achieve-
ment of a pioneer people!

THE BEGINNINGS IN CAROLINA

The only male member of the first playwriting course at Chapel Hill in
the fall of 1918 was Thomas Wolfe, "Tom" to us, a lanky six-and-a-half -
foot tall mountain lad with burning eyes. The other twelve members of the
class were co-eds. After the meeting of the class that first day he said, by
way of apology, " TroflP, I don't want you to think that this Ladies Aid
Society represents Carolina. We have a lot of he-men seriously interested
in writing here, but they are all disguised in army uniforms now. I tried to
get into one myself but they didn't have one long enough for me."

His first play and his first published work The Return of Buck Gavin,
a tragedy of a mountain outlaw, included in the second volume of CAROLINA
FOLK PLAYS, was one of the plays in our initial production that first season,
We couldn't find anyone to play the part and I said to him, "I guess you'll
have to play it yourself, Tom. You may not know it, but you really wrote
that part for yourself! "

"But I can't act, Troff,' I've never acted."

"You're a born actor," I assured him, "and you are Buck Gavin."

I shall never forget his first performance. ' With free mountain stride, his
dark eyes blazing, he became the hunted outlaw of the Great Smokies. There
was something uncanny in his acting of the part something of the pent-up
fury of his highland forbears.

In his foreword to The Retwn of Suck Gavin Tom wrote for all beginners :
"It is the fallacy of the young writer to picture the dramatic as unusual and
remote. . . . The dramatic is not unusual. It is happening daily in our lives,"

Of his playwriting that first year he wrote: "I have written about people
I have known and concerning whom I feel qualified to write. They have sug-
gested a train of thought that intensely interests me, and is, I believe, of vital
importance to me. My writing, I feel sure, has been made easier and better
by their production.

r< 8

DRAMA IN THE SOUTH

a lf they have affected my writing to this extent if they have indirectly
caused an analysis of my work, and a determination of my future course
are they not worthwhile, even though they be but the amateurish productions
of a youngster?"

It is interesting to recall now the first efforts of the young writer. Like
Anderson, he wrote what he knew. Though crude, those who have followed
him through the years cannot fail to see in his first hastily written little plays
the indications of his later achievement in Look Homeward, Angel and Of
Time and the River.

THE CAROLINA FOLK PLAYS

As far as we have been able to determine, the first use of the term "folk
play" in the American theatre was The Carolina Haymakers' announcement:
CAROLINA FOLK PLAYS on the playbill of their initial production in Chapel
Hill twenty-one years ago. The first play presented was When Witches
Ride, about folk superstition in Northampton county, by Elizabeth Lay of
Beaufort, North Carolina (now Mrs. Paul Green), which we are reviving
with the original cast on Saturday evening. Now the term is not unfamiliar
in the expanding scene of our American theatre. Witness Paul Green's In
Abraham's Bosom, Lulu Vollmer's Sun-Uf, Dorothy and DuBose Hey-
ward's Porgy, Jack Kirkland's dramatization of Erskine Caldwell's Tobacco
Road, Lynn Riggs' Green Grow the Lilacs, Thornton Wilder's Our Town
and Robert Sherwood's Abe Lincoln in Illinois.

From the first our particular interest in North Carolina has been the use
of native materials and the making of fresh dramatic forms. We have found
that if the writer observes the locality with which he is most familiar and in-
terprets it faithfully, it may show him the way to the universal. If he can
see the interestingness of the lives of those about him with understanding and
imagination, with wonder, why may he not interpret that life in significant
images for others perhaps for all? It has been so in all lasting art.

Four volumes of CAROLINA FOLK PLAYS by different authors and a volume
of Paul Green's early plays, also written in the playwriting courses at the
University of North Carolina over a period of years, have been published
and widely produced in the United States and abroad. The materials were
drawn by each writer from scenes familiar and near, often from remembered
adventures of his youth, from folk tales and the common tradition, and from
present-day life in North Carolina. They are plays of native expressiveness,

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

of considerable range and variety, presenting scenes from the remote coves
of the Great Smoky Mountains to the dangerous shoals of Cape Hatteras.

Our recent volume, AMERICAN FOLK PLAYS, marks the extension of our
North Carolina idea of folk playmaking to other American states, to Canada
and to Mexico. It represents the work of twenty new playwrights, eighteen
from the United States all the way from California and the Rocky Moun-
tain regions to Florida and New England and one from Western Canada,
and one from beyond the Rio Grande in Mexico. The plays included were
selected from hundreds of scripts written and produced by students in play-
writing at Chapel Hill and in summer courses it has been my privilege to con-
duct in some of our leading universities: Columbia, New York, Northwest-
ern, Colorado, California (both Berkeley and Los Angeles), Southern Cali-
fornia, and Alberta, Canada.

In writing of this anthology (in The Saturday Review of Literature of
July 1, 1939) under the caption, "The Native Theatre," Stephen Vincent
Benet notes: "Each Playmaker has honestly tried to get to grips with some
one aspect of American life. It may be Davy Crockett or a farm woman of
the North Dakota prairies it may be a cowboy comedy or an Oklahoma
tragedy the same desire to work with native materials and make something
of them is obvious in them all. It is an interesting and, in many respects, a
remarkable achievement." And the English reviewer of the Literary Supple-
ment of The London Times wrote on September 9, 1939: "Those who are
tired of thrillers, drawing-room comedies and film fantasies will find these
tragedies, farces, and sketches from real life refreshing. ... It would be
worthwhile seeing whether similar c f olk j plays could not still be evoked from
our English scene and so bring to the drama a fertilizing influence."

FOLK DRAMA DEFINED

The term "folk," as we use it, has nothing to do with the folk play of
medieval times. But rather is it concerned with folk subject matter: with the
legends, superstitions, customs, environmental differences, and the ver-
nacular of the common people. For the most part they are realistic and hu-
man j sometimes they are imaginative and poetic.

The chief concern of the folk dramatist is man's conflict with the forces
of nature and his simple pleasure in being alive. The conflict may not be
apparent on the surface in the immediate action on the stage. But the ulti-
mate cause of all dramatic action we classify as "folk," whether it be phy-
sical or spiritual, may be found in man's desperate struggle for existence and

DRAMA IN THE SOUTH

in his enjoyment of the world of nature. The term "folk" with us applies
to that form of drama which is earth-rooted in the life of our common hu-
manity.

For many years our playwrights of the South indeed of all America
were imitative, content with reproducing the outlived formulas of the old
world. There was nothing really native about them. Whenever they did
write of American life, the treatment was superficial and innocuous.

THE NEGRO DRAMA

When Augustus Thomas wrote Alabama and In Mizzoura optimistic her-
alds announced the arrival of the "great American drama"} but the play-
wright barely skimmed the surfaces of these colorful states. His next play,
The Witching Hour y had something of the jessamine perfume of Kentucky
romance, but the ghost of the old well-made melodrama was lugged in to re-
solve the plot. Then there was Uncle Tom's Cabin, a grand old theatre piece,
but its treatment of the southern Negro, though sincere, was sentimental.
Four native North Carolinians have contributed authentic drama of the Sou-
thern scene to the contemporary theatre: Paul Green, a challenging tragedy
of the Negro race In Abraham^ Bosom, Lulu Vollmer and Hatcher Hughes,
dramas of the mountain people, Sim-U$ and Hell Bent for Heaven, and Ann
Preston Bridgers, domestic tragedy in a small-town, Coquette. Following
Paul Green came Dorothy and DuBose Heyward with Porgy, of a Negro
neighborhood in Charleston} and Roark Bradford's stories of the Green Pas-
tures from Louisiana, to go singing along for five years all over America.
And this week Randolph Edmonds, talented Negro playwright, brings to
our Festival stage a tragedy of his own people, Breeders, to be enacted by a
group of Negro players from Dillard University in New Orleans. The
Negro theatre has come a long way in twenty-one years. I recall Paul Green's
first Negro play written for the playwriting group at Chapel Hill, White
Dresses, of a lovely Mulatto girl, Mary McLean "a tragedy in black and
white," he calls it.

Paul said, "I have written that part for you, Elizabeth," referring to Eli-
zabeth Taylor who later played important roles in Brock Pemberton's pro-
ductions on Broadway for five years.

"I would love to do it!"

But the time was not ripe, although North Carolina was a leader^ among
the Southern states in Negro education and in friendly race relationships. We
had to wait. It was with great satisfaction in later years that this same play

-{ 11

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

was brought to our Playmafcers* stage by a visiting group of Negro players
from St. Augustine's College in Raleigh. And now we have flourishing Negro
inter-collegiate and inter-high school dramatic tournaments each spring in
North Carolina. The Jim Crow sentiment of the old South is gone and an
audience crowded our big Memorial Hall to the rafters when Richard B.
Harrison, formerly a teacher in Greensboro, North Carolina, came to Chapel
Hill with The Green Pastures.

TENANT FARM DRAMA

Twenty-one years ago Harold Williamson, a student in the playwriting
class from nearby Carthage, brought to our makeshift stage in the high school
the first play of the Southern sharecropper hitherto undiscovered by the
American theatre as far as is known. It was a little tragedy about a tenant
farm girl, Peggy. The drab cabin that was her home which we had passed a
thousand times as a dull sight, on the stage became suddenly something new,
something interesting, something wonderful. Here the jaded farm woman,
Mag, with snuffstick protruding from the corner of her mouth, getting sup-
per of corn bread and fat back, singing the while snatches of an old ballad,
was no longer a commonplace figure. She had been transformed by the
magic of the theatre. The tragic fact of her hard-won existence had become
a reality to us life itself that moves and feels a gripping drama! A
neglected chapter of the Southern scene had come to life on our stage,

A little later came Paul and Erma Green's little drama of the grinding
poverty of the sharecropper's life in Fixiw's in which the pent fury of the
work-driven wife, Lilly Robinson, is portrayed with grim and terrible real-
ity. She craves a little beauty, "purty fixings." But her husband's eyes can-
not see beyond the sod he plows. The scene is a bare cabin home in Harnett
County, North Carolina, but the theme is universal the pitiful conflict of
two natures which are irreconcilable.

The next morning after our Playmakers' tour performance of Fiiwn's in
Atlanta, before a sophisticated audience in evening dress, a man came to me
and said, "I think I owe it to you to tell you of the effect that little play,
Fixin's, had on me last night. I come from New York, and Pve been seeing
the best shows in the theatre there for thirty years. But that little play last
night got me so much that, before I went to bed, I went to the Western Union
office and telegraphed some flowers to my wife in New York! "

And after a performance in western North Carolina, the reviewer in the
Greensboro Daily News wrote: "Fixings presented a scene of such stark and

DRAMA IN THE SOUTH

terrible reality as to make at least one person in the audience want to rise up
and say, 'This thing has got to be stopped. 5 " The little play had gone be-
yond the theatre into life itself.

Today the plight of this forgotten class of country people has been vividly
portrayed f or better or for worse in Jack Kirkland's sensational treat-
ment of Erskine Caldwell's story of the degenerate poor white sharecropper
of the backlands of Georgia in Tobacco Road. And the tragi-comic figure of
an irrepressible Jeeter Lester has held the stage for more than five seasons
now.

TROUPING

From the first The Carolina Playmakers have been interested in the mak-
ing of a native theatre throughout the state and beyond their own borders.
Traveling in their Show-Bus, with three sets of homemade scenery atop,
portable lighting equipment, costumes, and stage properties, they have
played all over North Carolina, in cross-roads villages in the mountains and
in "neighborhoods" by the sea in school auditoriums, old-time opera
houses, and outlived town halls.

The Playmakers' present trouping f adlities offer a striking contrast to the
first tour of The Dakota Playmakers over 800 miles of treeless plains when
it was necessary to spend several hours at a junction point sometimes wait-
ing for an "accommodation" train to take them to a little prairie town at the
end of a branch line. Then the players drew lots to see who would peddle
the handbills to advertise their arrival in town. Now The Playmakers ride
in royal fashion over the hills and through the valleys of the Blue Ridge,
blossoming with dogwood and flaming with the judas trees of a Carolina
spring; now announced in three-sheet posters in gay colors, and by high
praise in the newspapers, their coming is like a triumphal entry.

The thirty-six tours of The Playmakers have not been confined to North
Carolina. We have played in one hundred and twenty-one different towns
and cities all the way from south Georgia to Boston, Massachusetts, and
as far west as the National Folk Festivals at St. Louis and at Dallas, Texas,
playing three hundred and twenty-two performances to a total audience ^ of
more than three hundred thousand. In their thirty-six tours The Carolina
Playmakers have played forty-five of the folk plays written and produced
originally at Chapel Hill. They have played in the beautiful University
Theatre at Yale, on three successive tours at Columbia University in New
York City, and twice at the Fine Arts Theatre in Boston, where the troupe

-[ 13

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

was greeted by Governor Frank Allen at the Massachusetts State House. On.
our first visit to Washington, D. C., we were cordially received at the White
House by President Calvin Coolidge, who actually went so far as to say he
thought our work was "very interesting."

Of The Playmakers' first appearance in New York the reviewer of the
Theatre Magazine wrote: "The rare characters and the homely qualities of
these plays linger in one's memory long after some of the more sophisticated
plays of Broadway have been forgotten. In fact, each time we witness a pro-
gram of the CAROLINA FOLK PLAYS, we feel for the moment that we, too, are
just 'folks' along with those other folks on the other side of the footlights,
who transport us for a brief but happy period back to their hill country, with
its rich traditions, legends, and folklore. 7 '

DRAMA IN EXTENSION

Simultaneous with the organization of The Carolina Playmakers at the
University twenty-one years ago was that of the Bureau of Community
Drama as a unit of the Extension Division. At first the work was conducted
by correspondence and by a play-lending and bulletin service. Later the
demand was such that a traveling Field Director was provided to assist
schools and rural communities in the writing and production of plays, pag-
eants, and festivals. In 1925 the state-wide Carolina Dramatic Association
was formed which, under the aegis of John W. Parker of our Department
of Dramatic Art, is holding its Seventeenth Annual Festival and State Tour-
nament here this week as a part of the anniversary celebration. The member-
ship of the Association now includes one hundred and one college, high
school, and country theatres from all parts of North Carolina from the
Great Smoky Mountains to the shoals of Hatteras.

A remarkable development of the North Carolina state organization is the
annual National Folk Festival now held in this, the seventh year, in Wash-
ington, D. C. The founder of the National Folk Festival, Sarah Gertrude
Knott, resigned as State Representative of the Bureau of Community Drama
in North Carolina to become the founder and director of the nation-wide
celebration of American folk arts. "If one state, North Carolina, can do it,"
Miss Knott asked, "why not the United States?" She has succeeded beyond
all expectations.

PLAYS OF A COUNTRY NEIGHBORHOOD

In this connection it is interesting to note the achievement of Bernice Kelly
Harris, author of Purslane and of a recent volume of FOLK. PLAYS OF EASTERN

DRAMA IN THE SOUTH

CAROLINA, of her own country neighborhood in Northampton County,
North Carolina, not far from the Roanoke River. These plays of the simple
lives and homely ways of her neighbors and friends were produced original-
ly in her home town of Seaboard and brought in successive years to the an-
nual festivals of the Carolina Dramatic Association at Chapel Hill. Bernice
Harris, as a teacher of English in a rural high school, was a member of the
first summer playwriting group in Chapel Hill twenty-one years ago. She
was so captivated by her first adventure in playwriting that she was impelled
to pass on to her boys and girls the new wonder she had found in folk play-
making. "I saw the beauty of a new sort of humanism," she has written of
that first summer.

MEXICAN FOLK PLAYS

Since publishing five volumes of Carolina plays and a book of twenty
American folk plays, The Playmakers issued in 1*938 a volume of MEXICAN
FOLK PLAYS written at Chapel Hill by Josephina Niggli of Monterrey,
Nuevo Leon, Mexico, and produced originally in The Playmakers Theatre
here. Plays of the humble lives of her own people, their restless history,
their legends and the childlike wonder of their folkways. These Mexican
plays have been widely produced throughout the United States and Canada,
and many times abroad.

CAROLINA AND CANADA

Sometimes our home-grown plays of Chapel Hill are transplanted to far
places. A play of the Canadian frontier, Still Stands the House, which Gwen-
dolyn Pharis of Magrath, Alberta, Canada, wrote here in 1 938, was last year
awarded the first prize of $100, as the best native Canadian play entered in
the annual Dominion Drama Festival in 1939.

Another case. Funeral Flowers for the Bride, written for The Playmakers
in 1937 by Beverley DuBose Hamer of Eastover, South Carolina (who
vowed at the first that she "couldn't write a play") won first place in England
in the International One Act Play Competition of 1938 over one hundred
and sixty-six plays entered. It was produced in London at the Duchess
Theatre on November 27 of that year.

A CHINESE PLAYMAKER

A Chinese boy came to Chapel Hill for playwriting: Cheng-Chin Hsiung
of Nanchang, China.

"Hsiung," I inquired, "what kind of play do you want to write?"

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

"I want to write a play about the Chinese-American problem a mixed
marriage of a Chinese boy and an American girl."

"A good idea, but you can't do it. We should like to have you write of
your own people. You have a marvelous store of legend in old China. We
are interested here in what we call the <f oik play. 1 I wish you would write
for us a Chinese folk play."

"If you let me write this Chinese-American marriage play first, then I
will write for you a Chinese folk play."

"Hsiung," I said, "you know that you can't understand the mind of an
American girl."

"Well, I have been in this country five years."

"Five years ! Some of us have lived here fifty years, and we cannot do it !
But go ahead, write your problem play first} then write a real Chinese play."
So he wrote a play called Poor Polly and it was well named!

Then he went to the storehouse of old China and wrote a charming play,
The Thrice Promised Bride, in the manner of the Chinese stage a play of
romance, of comedy, of poetry. We were so much impressed with it that I
sent it to the editor of Theatre Art$> who wrote back, "I like it so much that I
want to publish it in our next issue." There Frank Shay saw it and wrote for
permission to include it in his anthology Twenty-Five Short Plays, Inter-
national, as the only play in the volume representing China. There Henry
Lanier, editor of the Golden Book> saw it and paid $105.00 for permission
to reprint it.

So Poor Polly passed and The Thrice Promised Bride arrived. Then he
wrote another Chinese play, The Marvelous Romance of Wen Chun-Chin^
which was published in Poet Lore.

Our Chinese Playmaker's plays have been favorites not only in the United
States but especially in England j and we sent him a royalty check for a per-
formance not long ago in far away Kuala Lumpur, Straits Settlements.

THE CAROLINA PLAY-BOOK

Besides publishing plays The Playmakers have issued twelve volumes of
a unique little quarterly, THE CAROLINA PLAY-BOOK, devoted to the making
of a native theatre. THE PLAY-BOOK has the distinction of being included
for two seasons in the International Exhibit of Periodicals at the Century of
Progress Exposition in Chicago as one of only three American theatre jour-
nals the other two being Theatre Arts and Stage. A valuable supplement to
THE PLAY-BOOK is THE CAROLINA STAGE, an attractive publication in mimeo-

DRAMA IN THE SOUTH

graphed form, designed to meet the practical needs of the members of the,
Carolina Dramatic Association.

THE PROFESSIONAL AND THE PEOPLE'S THEATRE
From the first The Carolina Playmakers have been interested primarily
in the making of a people's theatre, and a host of our graduates have gone
back to their home towns and cities near and far resolved to do their bit in
the making of such a theatre in America. Of course a number of Playmakers
have escaped to the professional theatre and found success there, more re-
cently, Shepperd Strudwick and Eugenia Rawls on Broadway and Lionel
Stander and Kay Kyser in Hollywood. Although successful on the New
York stage in his early days, George Denny found a wider field for his
talents. Now he is President of New York's Town Hall and director of the
NBC "Town Hall of the Air," which he founded.

Shepperd Strudwick (from the village of Hillsboro, just twelve miles
from Chapel Hill), after several years of struggle on Broadway, found a
place in the New York Theatre Guild. More recently he has been the lead-
ing spirit in a group of young actors, The Surry Players. He has had con-
siderable success with M-G-M in the pictures too. Only last week I received
an enthusiastic letter from him in Hollywood. "The more experience I have
in the theatre," he writes, "the more strongly do I yearn for the theatre of
Paul Green's Johnny Johnson and The Lost Colony, plays that excite me more
than anything the theatre has had to offer for years. Abe Lincoln in Illinois
and The Grapes of Wrath do it in the movies and I hope to get a shot at it

here before I get through The times are ripe now to receive what The

Playmakers have to give with a more open understanding than ever before.
The times need The Playmakers badly now. That's why The Lost Colony
project is so exciting to me."

COMMUNAL DRAMA OF AMERICAN HISTORY

Paul Green's The Lost Colony, you recall, was written and produced ori-
ginally in the summer of 1937 to commemorate the 350th anniversary of the
first English settlement in America. It has played for three seasons now on
Roanoke Island to tens of thousands of people in an outdoor theatre on the
actual site of the landing of our first English colonists. Brooks Atkinson in
an article in The New York Times not long ago, "Ought We to Found a
National Theatre?", is eternally right in saying that The Lost Colony has
become a permanent part of the culture of the people on Roanoke Island. He
goes on, "As long as they live, these people will have a grander notion of our
heritage than they had before this reverent drama was written."

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

In November of the present year Mr. Green wrote a second drama for the
American people's theatre, The Highland Call, commemorating the bicen-
tennial of Scotch settlement in the Cape Fear River valley of southeastern
North Carolina, the stirring events of Revolutionary times and the heroic
leadership of bonnie Flora Macdonald. Extending the idea of communal
playmaking in The Lost Colony, The Highland Call was produced in Fay-
etteville by The Carolina Playmakers in collaboration with the citizens of
that historic town. It evoked such enthusiasm there that plans have been com-
pleted for its annual production.

Now Mr. Green is at work on the third drama of his trilogy of early
American history. It is to be given for the first time in old Williamsburg,
Virginia, beginning early in June and closing before the opening of the sum-
mer-long run of The Lost Colony on Roanoke Island. Mr. Green holds that
America was regarded by the under-privileged classes in the old world as a
"land of opportunity," and that this was the compelling motive and promise
which brought all classes to our shores and which America must fulfill to
validate her beginnings.

Brooks Atkinson observes further in the above-mentioned article that we
are just coming to realize that our country is rich in folklore and "should
yield an abundant harvest of drama, and a national theatre that will serve the
entire country, should develop regional plays and contribute to a deeper na-
tional understanding." I know of no better way toward an imaginative, a
spiritual expression of our tradition of democracy.

COMING OF AGE

From the first we have thought of our Playmakers as a fellowship of
young people working happily together toward a single ideal the making of
a communal, a people's theatre in America. Walt Whitman happily expresses
it/'An institution of the dear love of comrades." Important as the individual
is in the theatre, it is well for us to remind ourselves constantly that the dra-
matic is essentially a social art. Whatever The Playmakers have achieved is
due primarily to their holding fast together to such an objective. Whatever
we have done, we have done together.

We have come a long way in twenty-one years. Beginning traditionally in
the Department of English as a one-man theatre we now have a separate
Department of Dramatic Art with a full-time theatre staff 5 and, in lieu of
the traditional research thesis in English for the Master of Arts degree, a
student may submit an original play.

A year ago the Department entered the field of cinema and radio. Films

DRAMA IN THE SOUTH

from the Museum of Modern Art library are shown regularly in The Play-
makers ^Theatre, and old favorites from The Playmakers' repertory (and
new scripts, too) are now being broadcast from the University radio studio
over a network of the Mutual Broadcasting System every Saturday after-
noon at 3 :30. The production this week is the first "Carolina Folk Play" of
twenty-one years ago, When Witches Rlde y by Elizabeth Lay (now Mrs.
Paul Green).

Now we are wondering how long it will be before we take on television!

THOSE WHO COME AFTER

Time alone can tell what will be the effect, for good or bad, of our folk
playmaking. According to the editor of Holland's, The Magazine of the
South, the influence of The Carolina Playmakers "has spread indubitably
into the associated fields of the novel, the short story, and even nonfiction
works. From the basic idea underlying their work and philosophy stem such
writings as those of Caldwell, Heyward, Miller, Bradford, Faulkner,
Stribling, and other and younger novelists. Not that many more influences
have not impinged sharply and deeply on Southern writers and on Southern
thought generally} but The Carolina Playmakers and their example have
been a centralizing, crystallizing, and vitalizing force unequaled in Southern
literature to date."

From the first we have believed in the South, we have held that the South
had something rich and strange to contribute to America, something of na-
tive honesty and of beauty. Dr. Albert Shaw in writing of the beginnings in
Dakota and in Carolina interpreted our hope in an editorial article in The
American Review of Reviews of September 1919: "When every community
has its own native group of plays and producers, we shall have a national
American Theatre that will give a richly varied, authentic expression of
American life. We shall be aware which we are only dimly at present of
the actual pulse of the people by the expression in folk plays of their coordi-
nated minds. It is this common vision, this collective striving that determines
nationalism, and remains throughout the ages, the one and only touchstone
of the future."

In thinking of the next twenty-one years I go back to a conversation of my
high school days with one of Walt Whitman's friends. On his last visit to the
Singer of America he remembered Old Walt standing in the door of his little
home in Camden and calling out in farewell, "Expecting the main things
from those who come after."

Scholium Scribendi

ARCHIBALD HENDERSON

E live in an age of calculated advance: projected undertakings for
the improvement of the present and for enhanced benefit and
prosperity in the future. Post-war planning is the mot d*ordr& of
the hour. No state or institution is deemed up-to-date or progres-
sive which does not outline constructive plans for the coming day five year
plans, ten year plans, and the like, and attempt to implement them construc-
tively. The blue-printer is the potential educator, statesman, and leader
of the future.

After twenty-six years of steady advance, under the leadership of the
late Frederick H. Koch and a corps of able colleagues, The Carolina Play-
makers face the future, under new leadership, and confronted by many thorny
and complex problems. At this moment of transition, careful inventory and
realistic assessment of tangible assets are clearly indicated as both desirable
and imperative. It is not necessary to retrogress in order the better to pro-
gress reculer four m%e^x sauter^ as the French have it. The imperative
need is to balance losses and gains, and to assess the basic values and calculable
gains upon which to build a more stable and beautiful structure. Such a
structure, to withstand the pressure of competition and effect some adjust-
ment to changing conditions, must be supported in part by idealism and
dream $ but in order to survive, this fabric of idealistic dream must be firmly
woven upon the loom of the real.

The Carolina Playxnakers is an educational organization primarily devoted
to giving instruction in the arts of the drama and the theater, with its con-
temporary adjuncts of the film and the radio. It is an educational organiza-
tion for enhancing the qualities and values of cultural phenomena which are
themselves educational in character. It is buttressed upon two extraordinary
postulates: that anyone can write a play, and that everyone should write a
play. ^ These postulates, based upon faith in a certain human modicum of
esthetic talent and creative power, are, like all postulates, incapable of phik>-

SCHOLIUM SCRIBENDI

sophic and critical demonstration. They can only be j udged in terms of their
consequences j and it is the consequences of twenty-six years of "playmak-
ing" upon which attention should be focused.

One may concede, at the outset, that any person of normal intelligence, by
sufficiently prolonged and intensive study of the history and technic of the
drama and the arts of the theatre, may acquire under careful supervision and
meticulous instruction a certain facility in casting story in dramatic form. The
many scores of plays written by Carolina Playmakers and produced with
moderate and in some cases more than moderate success appear, on prelim-
inary consideration, to validate the soundness of the postulates mentioned
above. But it does not follow that the authors of these plays are playwrights
in the professional sense or will succeed in the grilling competition along
the "Great White Ways" of the world.

Indeed, we shall find, on reference to capable practitioners and eminent
critics of the arts of drama and the theatre, that to the two postulates men-
tioned above must be added a third: no candidate need apply who has not a
natural aptitude, an instinctive capacity, for casting story in dramatic form.
This postulate has been firmly supported by two conspicuous examples of
^successful practicing playwright and dramatic critic respectively: Bernard
Shaw and Brander Matthews. In a measure, this third requirement is met
in the case of would-be playmakers, both here and in similar schools of play-
writing elsewhere; and the number of candidates who fall by the wayside is
surprisingly small. It is also noteworthy that, of those plays written by stu-
dents and produced by The Carolina Playmakers, an appreciable number are
found to be worthy of unsubsidized publication in collections of plays issued
by reputable publishing firms. The eleven volumes of plays, published under
the directorship of Dr. Koch, while containing a certain amount of duplica-
tion, constitute not unimpressive testimony to the success of this idealistic
and pragmatic experiment in pedagogy.

The school for playwrights at Chapel Hill, it should be realized, is not
primarily designed to provide specific preparation and immediate training
for "Broadway." With the large number of original plays constantly press-
ing for production, time does not permit of that slick finish and streamlined
perfection indispensable to metropolitan production. But for ambitious and
aspiring youth there are always, agleam on the horizon, the glamour and allure
of the great prizes of the drama and the theatre. There are always room and
encouragement for talent and genius although it is well recognized that
the Paul Greens and the Tom Wolfes are few and far between.- Yet there

-If 21

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

is always, among The Carolina Playmakers, an electric thrill in the expecta-
tion of the arrival of a new star whether dramatist, novelist, poet, actor,
dancer, or stage director. There is always the feeling, to use Arnold's phrase,
that the future of the theatre is immense.

The avowed purposes of the school are cultural study and dramatic reflec-
tion, through stage representation, of certain restricted segments of Ameri-
can society, the manners, customs, folkways, traditions, peculiarities of
speech, dialects and all other manifestations of strata of population living
dose to the soil. Plays of this character, dealing "with the legends, super-
stitions, customs, environmental differences, and the vernacular of the com-
mon people," to quote Koch's own words, are called "folk-plays"} and the
term "folk" is said to apply to "that form of drama which is earth-rooted in
the life of our common humanity." The term has taken on historic signifi-
cance, in that, in this specialized connotation, it is believed to have been first
used in the American theatre on the playbill of the initial production of plays
by The Carolina Playmakers at Chapel Hill in 1919, This form of art is
distinctively novel and authentically American & wide demarche from the
classical meaning of folk literature, as works of communal inspiration, and
gradual popular evolution. The Punch and Judy show, the traditional Eng-
lish folk-play of "St George and the Dragon," for examples, stand at one
end of the scale j the mystery and miracle plays of the Middle Ages suffice
to serve as mean; and the mighty narrative of Homer's "Iliad," with its
almost infinite richness of human interest stories for dramatic representation,
marks the apex of popular story, whether history, legend, tradition, or sheer
invention, slowly filtered down through the sieve of native record and com-
munal transmission.

Ill

In looking towards the future policy of The Carolina Playmakers, the
question of enlargement of the scope and widening of the aims of the or-
ganization naturally arises* The comparatively brief period of apprentice-
ship here argues conclusively that, as at present constituted, the organization
cannot aspire, even if this were its aim, to serve as a school of direct training
for "Broadway." There be some who regard Thomas Wolfe as a gifted
playwright "lost" to the American theatre, although he engaged in inten-
sive preparation for the profession of playwriting for some six years. Walter
Prichard Eaton has expressed the firm conviction that at least ten years of

SCHOLIUM SCRIBENDI

academic and theater study are indispensable as a preliminary to Broadway
competition.

The enlargement of the scope and aims of The Carolina Playmakers, it
would appear, does not lie in the direction of specific training for Broadway.
New vistas, however, open in other directions. The domination of the folk-
play idea, useful as this has been because of a natural and untapped reservoir
of material ready to hand, cannot continue indefinitely. A point of satura-
tion for any soil is ultimately reached j and the necessity arises for the ex-
ploitation of new and virgin areas. The "naive wonder" which made the
early Carolina folk play so effective has lost much of its poignancy for the
more sophisticated drama students and would-be playwrights of Chapel Hill.
Student dramatic authors of the future, as pointed out by William Peery in
his essay on Carolina Playmaklng y which won the Gray Essay Award of the
Dramatists' Alliance at Stanford University in 1 939, "will have to face prob-
lems typical of today or lose that creative power of native materials which
largely accounts for the success of folk movements in the past."

Surely the lesson to be learned and the moral to be drawn are dear. Sub-
ject matter however quaint ; vernacular however autochthonous; myth,
legend, or tradition, however bizarre, cannot take the place of authentic dra-
matic inspiration 5 nor can stories bearing these features dispense with es-
thetic forms of interpretation and universalization. "To hold, as 'twere, the
mirror up to nature," as a means of reflecting the eccentricities, whimsicali-
ties, and bizarreries of peculiar and isolated segments of population, usually
remote from civilization's contagion and culture's impact, is not enough
even on the authority of so supreme a dramatist as Shakespeare. It is neces-
sary to sift out, from the heterogeneous stream of sentient life, the signifi-
cant features of human experience j and to give those features, in dramatic
form, the sequential collocation of self -interpretation, and to impart to
them the enduring investiture of art.

In focusing attention upon local folk-materials and revealing to other
sections the particular features of North Carolina character and the South-
eastern milieu. The Carolina Haymakers have rendered yeoman service in
the pioneer period of their activities. From the social, industrial, sociologi-
cal, and religious viewpoints, it is highly important that the conditions under
which various underprivileged classes live and suffer and survive should be
brought to light. The South, as regarded by a liberal President, is economic

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

problem Number 1 3 and various remedial measures have been proposed and
some even put into effect. But it is one thing to regard the South as an eco-
nomic ward of the Nation, and quite another to proceed upon the assumption
that the only materials suitable for dramatic treatment which the South af-
fords are the share-croppers, the "crackers," the mud-eaters, the pallid vic-
tims of the hookworm, the tenant farmers, the underpaid and exploited mill-
workers, the Negro.

The drama is a universal, not a particularistic, art. It takes all humanity
in its scope. In any effort towards advance, full recognition should be taken
of this universal quality of dramatic literature and of the drama as theatric
representation. A clearer picture of the people and a wider perspective of
the entire region will be obtained if all phases of life be taken into dramatic
survey. North Carolina history is rich to overflowing in materials well
adapted to dramatic treatment. The novels of Inglis Fletcher, for example,
dearly point the way in this direction; the treatment for literary purposes of
historical materials of vivid human interest and romantic appeal. Paul
Green's "The Lost Colony" affords a conspicuous example of the pageant-
drama quarried out of historic materials. The thrilling stories of the early
colonists, the wanderings of the Palatines, the contributions of the Mora-
vians, the Scotch-Covenanters, and the Huguenot refugees, the pioneering
of Daniel Boone and his companions, the founding of Boonesborough and
Nashville, the opening of the West, the careers of William R. Davie, Andrew
Jackson, Thomas Hart Benton, Andrew Johnson, James K. Polk, Nathaniel
Rochester, Sam Houston, John Sevier, James Robertson, Hinton Rowan
Helper, and Benjamin Sherwood Hedrick; the glories and the tragedies of
the brothers' war, the horrors of "Reconstruction" and the grim, dark en-
deavors of the Ku Klux Klan these are topics which, from among countless
others, come readily to mind.

In this proposal of a broader treatment of regional themes and individual,
political, and social problems, of all classes of the population and all strata
of society, there is no suggestion that, in preoccupation with the universal,
the dramas of the future to be written here should ignore or neglect the dis-
tinguishing mores and characteristic qualities, speech, and Weltanschauung
of the people of this region. Koch always rightly laid stress upon writing
about "the life and the people we live with and know here and now. w And
the injunction has never been better expressed than by Bernard Shaw:

"The writer who aims at producing the platitudes which are *not for an
age, but for all time' has his reward in being unreadable in all ages; whilst

SCHOLIUM SCRIBENDI

Plato and Aristophanes trying to knock some sense into the Athens of their
day, Shakespeare peopling that same Athens with Elizabethan mechanics
and Warwickshire hunts, Ibsen photographing the local doctors and vestry-
men of a Norwegian parish, Carpaccio painting the life of St. Ursula exactly
as if she were a lady living in the next street to him, are still alive and at home
everywhere among the dust and ashes of many thousands of academic, punc-
tilious, most archaeologically correct men of letters who spend their lives
haughtily avoiding the journalist's vulgar obsession with the ephemeral."

The average person, even if he or she has attended performances by The
Carolina Playmakers, scarcely realizes the extent and range of the instruc-
tion. The popular impression is that pupils are taught merely how to act
and how to write one-act plays. Actually the instruction covers Shakespeare,
American drama, modern drama, comparative drama, playwriting and tech-
nical problems, history of the theatre and of the drama, experimental pro-
duction, acting, costuming, voice and diction, radio writing and production.
The consequence is that this program is preparing pupils not merely to be-
come practicing playwrights, but to enter into various special professions
connected with the drama and the theatre, the films, and the radio. No at-
tempt at a full catalogue will be made here ; but some indication will be given
of some of the erroneously regarded "by-products" of the instruction of The
Carolina Playmakers. To the films and the stage have gone Kay Kyser,
Shepperd Strudwick, and Sidney Blackmer; to the "legitimate" stage Eu-
genia Rawls, Marion Tatum, Bedford Thurman, Robert Nachtmann,
Elizabeth Taylor, Howard Bailey and Claudius Mintz. Lee ("P. L.")
Elmore has directed many important productions, including those of Mar-
garet Anglin for two years. Foster Fitz-Simons was associated with Ted
Shawn's group of male dancers, and performed a season at The Rainbow
Room in New York, toured South America, and has exhibited marked talent
as stage designer. Walter Terry won the post of dance critic for the New
York Herald Tribune. From those who hold academic positions should be
singled out Hubert Heffner, who after serving here, at Wyoming, Arizona,
and Northwestern University (Professor of Dramatic Literature, 1937-
1 938), was called to the headship of the Department of Speech and Drama
at Stanford University. George V. Denny, well remembered as highly ef-
ficient publicity man for The Carolina Playmakers, served for a time on the
professional stage; became director of the Institute of Arts and Sciences at
Columbia University; and later, president of The Town Hall, New York

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

City, and founder of "The Town Hall of the Air," which has been signally
successful.

In the contribution of The Carolina Playmakers to the field of literature
may, it is suggested, be found the germs of future development in the fields
of creative and critical writing drama, novel, short story, essay, journal-
ism and magazine writing, translation, and adaptation for stage and film, and
the writing of radio plays and script. Foremost in the list of those who have
achieved success in varying degrees in these fields stand: Paul Green, emi-
nent as dramatist, novelist and short-story and film script writer; the late
Thomas Wolfe, who failed to "register" as playwright, but achieved a sen-
sational success as novelist and short story writer; and Betty Smith who,
after long and pertinacious study and practice in playwriting, rang the bell,
nationally, with the resounding success of the novel, "A Tree Grows in
Brooklyn." Not a few Carolina Playmakers have achieved distinction, in
varying degrees, as authors: Jonathan Daniels, sometime editor of The
News and Observer, special writer for Fortune^ author of several well-writ-
ten books, and one of the confidential secretaries of President Roosevelt;
Loretto Carroll Bailey, with marked gifts as playwright, whose most ambi-
tious work was "Strike Song," written in collaboration with her husband, J.
O. Bailey, professor of English here; Bernice Kelly Harris, author of a
number of folk-plays and of two novels of rural life in North Carolina which
won considerable acclaim, "Purslane" and "Portulaca"; Noel Houston, suc-
cessful professional writer for national magazines; William Woods, whose
interesting novel, "The Age of Darkness," was recently filmed, with Walter
Huston in the leading role; Howard Richardson, whose promising play
"The Dark of the Moon" is now playing in New York; and not a few
others of varying gifts as writers in various fields, including Gwen Pharis
Ringwood whose plays have won praise, prizes, and productions; Frances
Gray, talented as actress and poet; Joseph Mitchell, sophisticated writer for
The New Yorker and author of "McSorley's Wonderful Saloon," Wilbur
Stout, director of the college theatre at Mississippi Southern College,
Howard Bailey, member of the faculty of Rollins College, and Frederick
H. Koch, Jr., director of college dramatics at Miami University.

Somewhat more than thirty-five years ago, the late Walter Hines Page,
distinguished writer and editor, and later to become Ambassador at the Court
of St. James's, urged Edwin Mims, who had just come here as professor of
English, to "grow a crop of effective writers, start a new, great educational
movement, give literary studies a new meaning and a new vitality . . ," The
basic principle was thus stated by Page: "The way to teach literature is to

SCHOLIUM SCRIBENDI

teach men to write and to talk." It is not too late to take Page's advice and
to follow his counsel of perfection. If the so-called "by-products" of the
instruction of The Carolina Playmakers have been measurably conspicuous,
as just indicated, there is reason to surmise that the time has come for the
establishment of a school of creative and critical writing, expression, speech,
and diction, in which the departments of English, dramatic art and literature,
journalism and expression might co-operatively unite. The fulfilment of
Page's dream is clamoring for realization.

Thus far, The Carolina Playmakers, under the leadership of Koch, Green,
Selden, and their able co-ad jutors, have been creatively influential and na-
tionally pervasive in directing attention to sources of native inspiration in
the fields of folk literature and Afro- American social and sociological con-
ditions and phenomena. Hatcher Hughes' "Hell Bent for Heaven," Roark
Bradford's "Green Pastures" and innumerable short stories of Negro life
and character, "Porgy" and other successful dramas and stories of Dorothy
and DuBose Heyward, the writings of Carl Carmer, Erskine Caldwell's
"Tobacco Road" as dramatized by Jack Kirkland, Lynn Riggs' "Green Grow
the Lilacs" in its smashingly successful adaptation, "Oklahoma," Maxwell
Anderson's "Winterset," Robert Sherwood's "Abe Lincoln in Illinois,"
Lulu Vollmer's "Sun-Up," and Eugene O'Neill's "All God's Chillun Got
Wings," as arresting examples, testify to the vitality and far-reaching influ-
ence of the thrust toward native sources of fictive and dramatic inspiration.
In this creative illumination of fecund origins and sources, Chapel Hill has
been a radiating center of high voltage. These words from an editorial in
Holland's Magazine (July, 1936), which may slightly transgress the
bounds of realistic critical appraisal, nevertheless testify eloquently to the
opinion entertained by not a few competent judges of the value of the work
and influence of the late Frederick Henry Koch:

"His wide influence not for a long time yet to be fully assayed has
spread indubitably into the associated fields of the novel, the short story, and
even non-fiction works. From the basic idea underlying his work and phil-
osophy stem such writings as those of Caldwell, Heyward, Miller, Brad-
ford, Faulkner, Stribling, and other and younger novelists. Not that many
more influences have not impinged sharply and deeply on Southern writers
and on Southern thought generally $ but Frederick Koch and his example
have been a centralizing, crystallizing, and vitalizing force unequaled in
Southern literature to date."

First Stage and First Theatre

Of (The Carolina tPlayma
FREDERICK KOCH

EFORE the coming of The Carolina Playmakers there was no
stage designed for dramatic performance at the University of
North Carolina. Each year the dramatic club put on a play in
Gerrard Hall, one of the oldest buildings on the campus. But
Gerrard Hall had no stage, only a lecture platform about eight inches above
the floor.

"How did you manage to stage plays here?" I inquired.

"Well, we built a temporary platform over the front row of seats and
strung a curtain across; the actors dressed in the Y.M.CA. building across
the way and got onto the stage through the window there."

I gasped.

"Is this the only way you have of staging plays? How do you manage
rehearsals when Gerrard Hall is used for chapel exercises every day? You
can't very well leave your furniture and properties around, can you?"

Looking back now, I salute those pioneering players who produced plays
on this makeshift stage with all-male casts for there were no coeds thqn
and who even carried their productions to neighboring towns on occasion.

I investigated all the buildings on the campus but none afforded even a
platform suitable for dramatic purposes. I was discouraged. But only for a
moment. As to so many other desperate directors who have had nothing to
begin with, an idea came. And it proved to be a good one.

A new public school building, several blocks oif the campus "unfortunately,
had just been completed; and it contained a comfortable auditorium with a
fairly good platform-stage.

"This will do," I said. And the village officials agreed.

So we extended the apron stage into the auditorium and designed an at-
tractive proscenium arch, a canopy over the stage, and a matching curtain of
lovely brown rep bearing the newly-designed mask of The Carolina Play-
makers. Fortunately my early experimentation with the same problem at the

FIRST STAGE AND FIRST THEATRE

frontier University of North Dakota served admirably as a model. With
the collaboration of various departments of the University, as in Dakota, the
new Carolina stage was equipped with homemade f ootlight troughs, tin-can
spots, and a stationary framework for hanging the scenery. We got the cheap-
est kind of cotton sheeting we could buy and sewed the strips together to
make the three walls of the log cabin set for the first play, When Witches
Ride by Elizabeth Lay. The walls were mounted on battens and hung like
window shades. At the corners, the "canvases" were tacked to the two-by-four
supports. The tacking and hammering, and the bumping and hoisting of
the heavy rollers in the change of sets prolonged the intermissions to such an
extent that I was called upon to talk to fill in the time. Elizabeth Lay says
this got me into the bad habit of long curtain speeches on tour to help the
audience forget those distracting sounds and the long intermissions.

The whole enterprise in the making of our first stage, aspiringly dubbed
"The Play-House," was entirely a communal affair. As I write this I have
before me the playbill of the original production of our first Carolina Folk
Plays, and I note that the executive staff for the opening production included
the names of twenty-eight volunteer workers of the University staff and of
the village community. It was a happy gang "an institution of the dear
love of comrades" in the inimitable phrase of Walt Whitman. "The Play-
House" was designed to make Chapel Hill a creative center of folk play-
making in North Carolina. It served for seven years in those brave new
days as a temporary home for The Playmakers.

Of course, there were many problems and not a few headaches in those
first years. Boys and girls shouting and playing in the halls at recess time and
broad-jumping overhead were distracting enough. But the problem of fur-
niture and properties was the limit! They were constantly out of place or
even missing altogether. It's a wonder we ever got a show on. But somehow
we did, and survived. . . ,

All manner of strange parcels arrived in the village Post Office: scenic
paints, gelatine color sheets, electrical switches and plugs, etc., etc. I shall
never forget an express parcel of gelatine color sheets addressed to "Miss
Caroline Playmaker"!

I wish I could pass on to you the thrill of the moment when the new plays
came to life. The initial playbill of the opening curtain on that memorable
first night of March 14, 1919 included Thomas Wolfe's first play and first
published work, The Return of Buck Gavin> with Tom himself in the title

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

role of a mountain outlaw. Here was something new and strange and won-
derful! Life itself that moves and feels.

Then came The Last of The Lowries by Paul Green of Harnett County,
a story of the Carolina Croatan outlaw, Henry Berry Lowrie, who carried
seventy pounds of firearms on his person, and on whose head there was a
reward of $50,000.

Soon followed in the first year a little play called Peggy, a tragedy of
tenant farm life by Harold Williamson of Carthage in eastern Carolina.
Here the drab tenant cabin we had passed a thousand times as a dull sight
revealed for the first time the stark tragedy of the forgotten sharecropper.
It was the forerunner of Erskine CaldwelPs Tobacco Road! Then came
Wilbur Stout's little comedy of a country courtship in the piedmont, In
Dixon's Kitchen, which everybody loved.

Always there was an expectant and eager audience for the new plays. On
the little homemade stage the earliest Carolina Folk Plays were first re-
vealed. That was twenty-five years ago now as time runs

The work grew. Still the Playmakers had no home on the campus. On
every side we heard, "Get your plays out into the State and the people will
see that you get a theatre."

So we toured. In the first seven years we carried our little homespun plays
to every corner of North Carolina. One editor wrote, "The homef oiks took
to the homemade drama as to homemade sausage and corn cakes on a frosty
morning." The plays found an eager audience wherever we went* The
people knew them for their own.

That's how in 1925 the University Trustees voted unanimously to give
The Playmakers one of the oldest and most cherished buildings on the cam-
pus, Smith Hall. Of historic tradition and classic design, Smith Hall,
erected in 1850 as The Ballroom of the University, was the scene of many
festive occasions. It was renamed Smith Hall because of the public senti-
ment against dancing. In 1885 the building was taken over by the Library,
the basement serving as the chemistry laboratory and the University bath-
house! Later it was occupied by the College of Law. In 1925 the lawyers
occupied a new building just completed for them and Smith Hall became
The Playmakers Theatre; the first building in America to be dedicated to
the making of its own native drama.

The University Trustees appropriated $25,000 to remodel Smith Hall

FIRST STAGE AND FIRST THEATRE

as a theatre. The little building lent itself admirably to the reconstruction.
But the appropriation was not sufficient to furnish the theatre. We found it
would take $13,000 still to supply seating, lighting, and stage equipment.

Remembering the enthusiasm for our work of the veteran American dra-
matist, Augustus Thomas, I went to New York to place the problem before
him. He introduced me to Frederick Keppel, President of the Carnegie
Corporation. Mr. Keppel listened with interest to the story of our folk
playmaking and said that he would place the matter before his Board of
Directors. Discouraged, I went back to Mr. Thomas.

"I'm afraid I f ailed ; Mr, Keppel didn't promise to do anything."

"I guess you didn't fail," in a kindly voice, "we'll just have to wait and

see."

The following spring while I was on tour with The Playmakers in Char-
lotte, came a telegram from President Chase, "CHECK FOR $13,000 RE-
CEIVED FROM CARNEGIE CORPORATION FOR PLAYMAK-
ERS THEATRE."

On November 23, 1925 The Playmakers Theatre was dedicated with the
Sixteenth Series of Carolina Folk Plays. The great crystal chandelier
sparkled. Appropriately the opening curtains revealed a romance of college
youth in '61, Out of The Past by Frances Gray of Raleigh. The play re-
called the last dance held in the Ballroom before the outbreak of the War
Between the States. The setting was the moonlit portico of the old build-
ing itself. The music of the waltz and the gay laughter of the dancers came
from within. It was interrupted suddenly by the excited entrance of an old
Negro slave, with the startling news, "Sumter is fired!" And the last dance
ended in the historic Ballroom until the University was reopened five years
later.

That night President Harry Woodburn Chase dedicated the building as
The Playmakers Theatre "in the confidence that it may make possible about
our common life a little more of the stuff that dreams are made of j that its
existence here shall mean a little less monotony, a little more glamor about
our days; that the horizons of imagination shall by its presence here be en-
larged so that we shall come more steadily and wholly to see the place of
beauty and of its handmaiden, art, in a civilization not too much given to its
encouragement. To such purposes this building, the first permanent pro-
vision for any of the fine arts at the University, is from this night set apart"

The work of The Playmakers expanded, and a separate Department of

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

Dramatic Art was created by the University in 1936. The little Playmakers
Theatre has become altogether inadequate for our rapidly widening activi-
ties. We are looking forward now to a Dramatic Art Building on the campus,
and we.are making definite plans for erecting such a building in the near fu-
ture. One of the Foundations, which has generously helped in developing
the work of the Department, is holding for us a gift of $ 1 50,000 toward this
building as an endowment, with the condition that the University raise $450,-
000. The University has undertaken to raise this sum of money and has
affirmed its intention to do so.

Such is our dream of widening horizons.

The Battle Cry of the Western Theatre

For here once walked the men of dreams,

The sons of hope and pain and wonder,

Upon their foreheads truth's bright diadem,

The light of sun in their countenance,

And their lips singing a new song

A song for ages yet unborn,

For us the children that came after them

"O new and mighty world to be!"

They sang,

"O land majestic, free, unbounded P*

Such a song was never sung by any of the characters, or any of the choruses
created by Aeschylus, Sophocles or Euripides. The lyrical cry in Classical
tragedy was a high lament for intense but will-less suffering. The cry in
Western Theatre is a battle cry, a hymn celebrating the fighting search for
something afar off, not easily attained maybe never to be attained directly
but something the steady striving for which keeps every muscle taut and
the blood surging victoriously*

Samuel Selden (quoting from the Prologue to
The Lost Colony). "The Lost Colony and the
Greeks*" Souvenir Program, 1939.

From Script To Stage

Experimental ^Production of C^Cev? ^Plays
By* EDWARD MUSCHAMP

Tlie idea of presenting new plays for an actively critical audience is, we believe, distinc-
tively a development of The Carolina Playmakers. It is interesting to trace its beginnings in
this extract from a posthumously published article written by Thomas Wolfe. (The article
was unfinished, and was called, when first published in the March, 1943, issue of The Caro~
Una Play-Book, "The Man Who Lives with His Idea.")

When a student completes a play in Mr. Koch's course it is subjected to the
"round-table criticism" in which all the members of the class take part. The class
is seated around a large table, every effort being made to give an informal atmos-
phere to the class meetings. The play is read by the author and is then criticised
by each member of the class. Mr. Koch puts great dependence on the opinion of
the students in the discussions, and the revisions that are made in the play after it is
first read to the class are usually the direct result of student criticism. "I find the
student to be the best critic in the long run," he says. "It is true they know little of
dramatic technique as *it is done' today, but on the other hand they are not hide-
bound by form and their criticisms are usually real and just."

About two dozen plays were written before Christmas in 1918 by Mr. Koch's
first class. Three of these were selected finally for production after an "author's
reading" had been held which was open to the attendance of the student body. The
author's reading, another feature of the Playmakers* method, was attended by a
large number of students and they voted by ballot for the three plays that, in their
opinion, would give the best program.

The method described herein was still in effect in 1930. In the early thirties, there was
a slight change in that all completed manuscripts were given such production as the authors
and their friends could summon, and were presented in groups of four and five on successive
afternoons and evenings. From this orgiastic melee would emerge the three best plays, which
were then given full production for the subscription audience. As the Dramatic Art Depart-
ment grew larger, this unwieldy plan was of necessity modified; so that by the late thirties,
the present scheme was reached of selecting only the three best plays twice each quarter, and
giving them more ample production. The growth of the idea of audience participation is
amply treated by Mr. Muschamp in the following article.

)W IT IS A CLEAR, crisp winter evening like a crisp October
I evening in Maine. But in the Piedmont section of North Caro-
lina in the clear, crisp winter evening the light of a million stars
I twinkles down through the stark outlines of the great oak trees
that mark the campus of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill,
as students, townsfolk, and guests at the Inn hurry along the gravel paths

E EDWARD MUSCHAMP, well known Philadelphia journalist

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

in the direction of The Playmakers Theatre. For "Proff" Koch and several
picked groups of his students are putting on one of his now justly-famous
evenings of "Experimental Productions of N$w Plays/' wherein the audi-
ence in a good-natured but very-much-in-earnest way locks horns with the
playwright. And every man, woman, and child in the theatre may for the
"speaking up" become "Mr. First Nighter" himself and tell the author just
what he likes about the play, and exactly what he does not likej and the
author, in turn, may accept the criticism, or reject it as he sees fit, and de-
fend himself and his actors accordingly.

But step lively, folks, for if you don't get in the theatre early you not
only won't get a seat, but all the S. R. O., will be gone, and so will all the
"choice seats" on the steps! For these evenings of "Experimental Plays"
have become one of the most intriguing features of Chapel Hill life, and,
what is of even greater consequence, potentially one of the most important
developments in the cultural and educational life of the nation. True, they
cannot yet be counted as a serious rival, in popular appeal, to a Duke-
Carolina football contest! But it is quite within the realm of the possible
that in the not-so-very-distant years to come, when the world's bayonets and
bombers are again beaten into plow-shares and commercial transport planes,
and mankind has once more settled down to the enjoyment of the more
humane art, what Proff Koch, and his colleagues and students in the
Department of Dramatic Art of the University are doing today, may have
a more beneficial and more lasting effect on the pleasurable life of the
nation than all the football games that have ever been played in Chapel
Hill, the Yale Bowl, and the Rose Bowl all rolled into one. For it is a
conservative statement that the dramatic department of, the University
of North Carolina working through these evenings of "Experimental
Plays," which constitute the spear-head of its general work is laying the
foundations for a crop of American playwrights and an era of playwritlng
that hold infinite possibilities for the future of the American theatre and
all that may mean to the future entertainment and culture of the American
people. All of which is based, in a sense, on the assumption that the
legitimate stage in America is far from dead} and that, offered really
good plays well acted and at admission prices that are within the pocket-
book reach of the average family, the American people will again flock
to the theatre as they used to do before the advent of that form of pub-
lic entertainment sometimes known as "movin' pit-tures."

But hurry you must, folks, or as we warned you, you won't even get

rtf 34-

FROM SCRIPT TO STAGE

standing space. Its only a little after seven and every seat in The Play-
makers Theatre is already occupied, and more people are coming in.

ENTER PROFF KOCH

Presently the figure of a youngish looking middle-aged man his dark
hair plentifully streaked with gray, smiling, garbed in his customary Nor-
folk suit, and holding his pipe in one hand, stands up down by the foot-
lights, and announces, "We are about to begin the 80th series of Ex-
perimental Productions of New Plays, written and directed by students
in the University's playwriting course" 5 and, with only an occasional ex-
ception, wherein a part is taken by one of the townsfolk of Chapel Hill
who has been called in to complete the cast, the acting also is done by
University students.

The speaker, of course, is Frederick H, Koch, head of the University's
dramatic department, and founder and director of The Carolina Play-
makers one of the best known and most capable of college theatrical or-
ganizations, the sponsoring group through which the "Experimental
Plays" are given. But only on the most formal occasions is he so intro-
duced. To the more than 5,000 students at Chapel Hill, and to all the
thousands who have studied there some twenty-odd years, and in profes-
sional and amateur circles throughout the nation from Times Square to
the proverbial Podunk, he is simply and affectionately known as "ProfP
Koch although there are those who insist that the correct spelling is
"Proff," others persist in writing it "Proph" by way of proclaiming Koch's
prophetic quality along with his other talents. But "Prof," "Proff," or
"Proph," whichever the genial Koch is, he continues as he looks up over
the hill-side of occupied seats that rise tier upon tier to the uppermost reaches
of the Theatre not unlike the seats in a medical students' surgical clinic:
"The author of our first play this evening is Barry Farnol, of Chicago. He's
right here beside me, and he's going to tell you just why he wrote it the way
he didj and after his play has been performed, and the curtain is down,
he'll be back here again to face the music of your criticism and comments
which he will be very glad to hear. Barry, the *platf orm' is all yours."

The young playwright stands up, is greeted by a round of friendly ap-
plause, makes his brief statement concerning his play, and "ducks" down
into the pit and to the stage, for as it happens in this particular instance,
the author is not only directing the production and performance of his play
but is also acting one of the parts. A moment later the curtain goes up and

35 }*-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

the play is on. Twenty minutes or so later the last lines have been spoken,
the curtain is down, the applause has come to the last hand clap. Proff
Koch is again standing, smiling and looking up at the audience, and beside
him stands young Mr, Farnol ready and anxious to "take his medicine"
for it is direct audience reaction to his playwriting efforts, and he knows
that however good his play may look on paper if he has not "sold" it to
his audience, he has not succeeded. Moreover, he knows that under Proff
Koch's stimulating encouragement at previous Experimental Plays, his
auditors will feel absolutely free to speak their honest opinions be they
critical or complimentary.

THE AUDIENCE TAKES A HAND

"Well, folks/' the Proff begins, "how did you like it? Is it a good play
or is it a bad play? Is the plot clear or is it too involved? Did Barry make
his points, or did he muff them? He told you before the curtain went
up just what he had in mind when he wrote his play; now he wants to know
how well he succeeded in getting his idea across the footlights. For after
all is said and done, a play, you know, isn't really a play until it has registered
in the minds of the audience. In other words, the drama is a social not a
solitary act. It comes alive only through the response of the audience. It
would be safe to wager that if there were no audience, the drama would not
long survive; for in the final analysis, drama is the response of an audience
to the actors' embodiment of the playwright's design. Or, if you will grant
me just a moment or two more, the final test of a play lies in its appeal to an
audience; hence these experimental productions of our best student-written
plays, with the audience playing a direct and active part in the program.
Audience participation in the play, you know, harks back to the good old days
of the Greeks and the Elizabethans, and to the boos, hisses, whistles, and
foot-stamping of the Nineteenth century. But in owr experimental theatre
it is a new kind of participation in which each one of you may become a critic,
giving your honest impression of the play to the new playwright* . . . Now",
then, how about it, George" the Proff is now directing a question speci-
fically to a senior who is not studying in the dramatic department but who is
known to be interested in the theatre and is a regular attendant at the Ex-
perimental Plays. "What do you think of this first play of the evening?
What are your reactions to it?"

"Well Proff," the senior begins, rising as he speaks, <c he's got a corking
good idea for his plot, and on the whole I think he's done a good job with

FROM SCRIPT TO STAGE

it. But the 'conversion* of the principal character toward the end of the
play his realization that he has completely misjudged the attitude of the
people of his town, is too sudden, I think j it came too quickly. I realize, of
course, that the action, or the dialogue, or whatever you call it, can't be too
drawn out as you come to the climax of the play. But it wasn't clear to me
why the old man changed so suddenly, and I was just wondering whether
that point couldn't be cleared up in some way. I don't know anything about
the technique of playwriting, but "

"And yet, after all George," interrupts Proff Koch goodnaturedly, "you
are potentially the fellow who walks up to the Box Office and lays down
the cash for two aisle seats ! And if you don't like the play, or feel that it has
been marred, or weakened, by the playwright's failure to make the denoue-
ment perfectly clear, you are not going to be very enthusiastic about it, or
recommend it to your friends. Your point, if it is sound, is a very prac-
tical one, and I wonder how many others in the audience feel the same
way."

Then Proff asks for a show of hands pro and con. By this time the dis-
cussion is on in full force. Some in the audience agree with George, others
do not. Over here, a woman has gained recognition from Proff Koch, and
is voicing her criticism, altogether different from George's. She thinks
there are too many extraneous characters, that they are confusing, and
that if a couple of them were eliminated, and the time that they consume
given to additional lines for the "old man" and his "niece," the plot would
be perfectly clear and the play improved one hundred per cent. From one
of the "standees" at the back of the theatre comes the comment that too many
of the "lines" are "speeches," and all the play needs is to break the "speeches"
up into more dialogue. And so it goes. The young playwright smiles, and
is serious, as from time to time he speaks up to defend or explain his tech-
nique and method.

Word reaches Proff Koch from "back stage" that "time is up" and the
next play is ready to go on. He and the young playwright thank the audi-
ence for their interest and participation in the discussion} there is another
round of applause, and "the show goes on!" At the conclusion of the
second Experimental Play there is another "friendly autopsy" or "inquest,"
as it were} and so on until the conclusion of the evening's program.

How THE PLAN WORKS
The evolution of these "Experimental Productions" is a remarkable

37 )>>-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

story in itself, and is based on the Koch dictum that "a play is not a play
until it is produced and until an audience has reacted to it" a fact that pro-
fessional producers know all too well from many costly and bitter experi-
ences. And it is by no means too exaggerated a statement to say that had
Broadway the facilities for doing exactly what Proff Koch is doing in his
Experimental Productions, Broadway might be saved many dollars and
many heartbreaks. Nor is it unreasonable to assume, by the same token, that
out of Koch's work may come a crop of American playwrights that, guided
and tempered in the furnace of Experimental Productions, will possess a
fundamental understanding of what constitutes successful playwriting, and,
an equipment for doing such work, that may lead the way to a genuine re-
naissance of the American theatre. Indeed there are not a few persons who
feel that the renaissance is already underway and that Koch and the work he
is doing are playing a very definite part in the development j for as one critic
has written of the plays produced in the Chapel Hill class rooms: "They

have a spark, a glow of life and they ring true Their real significance lies

not only in their relation to the now flourishing little theatre movement, but
as trail-blazers for such plays as The Green Pastures , In Abraham's Bosom,
Abe 'Lincoln in Illinois, Our Town, Winter set ^ and Tobacco Road.

But, to record this evolution, briefly: it began with a student-author sitting
at a bare kitchen table in an ordinary room reading his play before a commit-
tee of judges such committees being composed of various members of the
University faculty, who at the conclusion of the reading engaged in a free-
for-all discussion of the play. Before long it was decided to invite such of
the public as might be interested, to attend these readings but the public's
job was merely to sit and listen, and say nothing! Then it occurred to Koch
that it would probably be much more interesting and bring out more of the
play-manuscript if they held what he called "script performances." That
is to say, the various parts in a play were assigned to various student-actors,
and they in turn read the parts. But in these "script performances," much of
an advance over the original readings as they were, there were no costumes,
no make-up, and no scenery, and the slim audiences for up to this time
these embryonic "experimental productions" had failed to arouse very much
public interest continued to sit "mute and inglorious," Just the same, it
was quite perceptible that these "script performances" marked a definite
advance over the original authors' readings. So Koch said: "Fine, but let's
go a step further. Let's see what we've got in the way of odds and ends of
costumes and scenery that we've used in some of our regular plays, that we

FROM SCRIPT TO STAGE

can now use again to 'back up 5 these script readings without spending any
time or money on the work." Thus another step forward was recorded. And
then realizing how much the makeshift costumes and scenery were adding
to the performances, it was decided that it would be well worth while to
provide costumes and scenery to fit specifically each new experimental play.
But still the public was permitted to do no more than to listen to "lay
low" and say "nothinV Finally Koch said to himself one day: "If these
really are 'experimental* plays, and I am right in my theory that a play is
not a play until it has been performed before an audience, and the audience
has reacted to what has transpired on the. stage, why not invite the audience
to participate in the performance? Why not ask the audience to 'speak
right out in meeting' as it were, while the production is still 'warm, 3 and
discover just what these folks out there on the other side of the footlights
think of the play, and learn what they like, and what they don't like, and
why."

So, the first completely evolutionized "Experimental Production of New
Plays" at the University of North Carolina came into being, and the Koch
"revolution" in the process of teaching young men and young women to
write and produce plays, had triumphed. Once again the zig-zag and multi-
farious "story of mankind" had taken a positive and forward step.

Our Way of Play writing

I believe that when the Good Book says "God created man in His own
image," it means that God imparted to man somewhat of his own creative-
ness; in a sense He made man a co-worker with Him potentially an
artist! In our way of playwriting we try to cherish the creative spark of
the student. We encourage Kim to examine, with understanding and imagi-
nation, the eventful happenings of his own experience, the characters of his
own neighborhood. Then we guide him in shaping his materials in an ap-
propriate and interesting pattern for the stage.

Frederick H. Koch. Introduction to American Folk Plays.

Dramatic Art in a University

Program

By* SAMUEL SELDEN
ART on EDUCATION?

NCE a year, on a late December afternoon, the university Profes-
sor of Drama locks the door of his office, packs his suitcase, and
boards a train for New York to attend a conference of the Na-
tional Theatre Association, There for three exciting days he

forgets his world of lectures, term papers, and departmental reports and
thinks only of a world of art.

At night, perhaps he goes to view a new play by John Van Druten. It is
a sensitively drawn character study of an immigrant family in Philadelphia.
The actress playing the role of the valiant mother performs her part with
consummate skill, with a warm, vibrant tenderness. The other actors also
are goodj and everything about the external presentation the direction, the
settings, the costuming, the lighting is eminently satisfying. The Profes-
sor, whose senses and emotions have been dulled by months of hard labor
with collegiate thespians, is stirred once more into singing life* How beau-
tiful is this institution of the Theatre! he tells himself.

The next day, at a conference meeting, he hears a leading playwright plead
passionately for the preservation of the nascent arts in American life. The
speaker makes reference to a "needy generation" and states the impelling
opportunity the Theatre has to bring to a hungry people something of vision
and faith. A director and a critic echo his words.

Then other prominent represetnatives of the Stage, together with emis-
saries from the Radio and Screen, address remarks directly to the university
delegates. They discuss feelingly the passing of the old stock companies
which once served as training schools for apprentices. Now, they say, a
great void exists. Young actors, playwrights and designers have nowhere to
go for their basic training. Only the university departments of drama can
supply this lad:. Therefore these departments have a high responsibility. But
they cannot discharge it unless those who teach dedicate themselves to their
work. Instructors in the Theatre must cease to think merely of training for
appreciation and give thought to the quality of their students 1 products} they

-ng 40

DRAMATIC ART IN A UNIVERSITY PROGRAM

must establish stricter standards 5 they must be satisfied with nothing less than
perfection. University students of Dramatic Art should be equipped to
stand at the forefront of the embattled lines of the Theatre, and they can
do this only when they themselves are imbued with an uncompromising am-
bition.

The atmosphere of the conference is heady. The Professor is still affected
by its spell as he sits in his Pullman seat on the way home. He keeps think-
ing of the remarks of the Playwright, and he repeats over and over to him-
self the last words of that address: "In the temple of drama the 'non-profes-
sional 1 has no place. Every aim, every standard must be, in the best sense of
the term, 'professional.' . . . One art one Theatre indivisible!"

The Professor ponders his own work at the university. He has labored
hard. Yet the results seem in many ways dissatisfying. Why? He has
spread his time and the time of his colleagues over too many minor activities,
perhaps. The members of the Department have lost themselves in a maze
of petty academic chores. Consequently they, together with the students
they are teaching, have lost the vision of their work. Well, that must stop.
Hereafter, the Professor decides, there must be more singleness of purpose.
Everyone, faculty member and assistant, and plain buck student must strive
with new effort for a Theatre of standards. Hereafter, no compromises!
Work! Work as never before!

THE PERCH ON THE FENCE

Full of bright confidence in the new prospects, the Professor walks next
morning into his office. On his desk he finds a letter from the Dean:

"There seems to be a growing disposition on the part of students in the
Department of Drama to spend a disproportionate part of their time in stage
activities to the detriment of their studies in other fields. We hope that this
situation can be adjusted at once. . . . This letter is not meant to be a criticism
of your program, but I do wish to call attention to the fact that our theory
has always been that we should not develop in the direction of the conserva-
tory type of education."

The Professor of Drama sits for a long time staring at the letter. First
he is stunned, then a little angry. Then a strange kind of shame creeps over
him. He has been dreaming beautiful, but foolish, dreams, and he has been
caught at it. He should know better than to do that at his age! Yes, the
Dean is quite right. The Professor's department is part of a General Col-
lege of Arts and Sciences, and as such it should concern itself primarily with

-*f 41

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

basic education, not technical training. Fair-haired playwrights have per-
suasive tongues! Maybe what they say makes sense when addressed to the
right people, but they have mighty little understanding of the requirements,
and the limitations, of collegiate programs!

Already the beautiful words uttered at the conference have begun to fade.
The Professor likes teaching in a university community, and he is quite will-
ing to view his specialty of the theatre as a cultural curriculum only. All
right, from now on no Art, just Education.

But then he is assailed by a strange new doubt. He has turned his back on
one area of activity. Now, can he and his department legitimately be re-
garded as having a place in the other? Does a dramatic curriculum really
belong in Education? he asks himself. He believes or he wants with all
his heart to believe that it does, but he has difficulty finding the absolute
proof he desires to bolster his faith in that position. The casual evidence, at
least, seems to weigh against him. The Professor remembers his last three
experiences with the Divisional Committee to which he presented requests
for an extension of credit on certain basic Theatre courses. After much de-
bate the members of the Committee granted his requests, but with obvious
reluctance. The term "skill courses" was used frequently, and at one point
the chairman sighed. "If we permit our programs to be cluttered by very
many more of these technical courses without content, 3 * he remarked drily,
"I can see the death of the humanities."

Technical courses without content! Suddenly a bitter feeling of frustra-
tion sweeps over the Professor. What is he anyhow? To his mind comes
the figure of a queer creature he has seen once in a cartoon. It is a Mug-
wump, a sad bird doomed to sit forever high on a fence between two green
gardens, with, its mug on one side and its wump on the other and unable to
reach the ground on either side.

FACING THE PREDICAMENT

The peculiarly exalted position of the academic Mugwump makes him an
unhappy individual. He has no liking for his elevated perch, he hates to
be divided, and the direction of his posture fills him with acute embarrass-
ment. Viewing with equal yearning the gardens 'aft and 'fore his place on
the fence, he is distressed by the fact that he must point his wump at one of
them.

The Mugwump is not only a sad bird, he is also a lonely one or that is
how he usually sees himself. The truth is that his species is numerous. If

DRAMATIC ART IN A UNIVERSITY PROGRAM

he once lifts his eyes from his own misery he is apt to discover that neighbor-
ing fences are full of companions. The sight of all those self -divided birds
sitting in melancholy gloom high on their draf ty perches would be a tragic
one if it were not so ridiculous.

It is my conviction that most of the Mugwump's anguish springs from
causes which originate in his own mind. The fence which elevates him above
the ground where he would like to be is, to a considerable extent at least,
a psychological one. The primary reasons for his predicament are three-
fold: the Mugwump does not really understand the areas of Art and Educa-
tion he yearns to possess, he lacks the courage to declare his right to occupy
them not one, but both of them and he suffers from the delusion that any
barrier set up between them is indissoluble.

In the following pages of this article I want to examine the first and third
points in the Mugwump's problem with the purpose of showing that the
Professor of Drama can rightly claim a place in both Art and Education, and
that there need not be any fence between them.

PROFESSIONAL TRAINING AND LIBERAL TRAINING

First, I want to state my premise: that is, that fair-haired playwrights
need not necessarily be regarded as impractical dreamers, and fast-talking
emissaries from the world of Commercial Theatre may speak sense. Theatre,
in the broad meaning of that term which includes Radio and Film together
with the Stage, is today the most lively, if not the most extensive, agency in
the country for the communication and dissemination of ideas. Nightly,
literally tens of millions of minds are affected by its spell. Thus Dramatic
Art, dynamically stimulating by its very nature, exerts an almost fearfully
powerful force on the development of the cultural life of America. The
University which is interested in exploiting every implement for education
available cannot reasonably ignore the resources of the Theatre.

If the University has a stake in the Theatre, the reverse is also true.
The Theatre needs the help of the University men and women. The stock
companies are dead. There are now almost no dramatic conservatories which
offer anything beyond the most elementary training. The majority of them
limit their appeal quite frankly to star-struck youths and debutantes. More
and more, therefore, the Stage, Radio, and Films have been forced in recent
years to turn for apprenticeship material though they have often been re-
luctant to admit it to the Community Playhouses, but particularly to the

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PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

University Departments of Drama. This is especially true in the fields of
writing, but it is also true in acting, directing and designing.

The University which desires to associate itself practically with the
Theatre must do so fearlessly. Courses merely in the appreciation of Dra-
matic Art cannot carry much influence except to those persons who wish to
watch the ceaseless game of action from the sidelines. When the University
determines to exert its influence aggressively it must train people with dedi-
cated minds and able hands ready to take an actual part in creative work.
But it must train them well, for the world of Theatre is keenly competitive,
a world in which good intentions unsupported by expert knowledge of
mediums stand no chance of employment whatsoever.

A curriculum of specialized training for those who wish seriously to be-
come professional craftsmen on the Stage, in Radio or Films or in the
fields of Community Theatre or Recreation has, I believe, a thoroughly
legitimate place in a University program. A Department of Drama which
does not seek adequate equipment and qualified personnel for at least some
specialized instruction in Art is, it seems to me, missing an important op-
portunity.

However, the Department which regards all of its work as specialized is
as wrong as that one which ignores advanced training entirely. The Depart-
ment which sets itself up to be a conservatory primarily is headed for certain
trouble. The end is usually suicide.

First of all, the assumption that all those who enroll in such a Department
are worthy of advanced training is untenable. The really talented student,
the one who can rightfully be encouraged to direct his ambitions toward
earning a living in the precarious world of Art, is a rare one. To turn the
thoughts of the manifestly ungif ted even for a moment toward this goal is
criminal. Out of a yearly enrollment of perhaps fifty or seventy-five intel-
ligent young men and women, the Department would be fortunate if it
could honestly recommend a small dozen for the professional courses.

But this does not mean that all the others should be discouraged from
studying Dramatic Art. To do that would be to deny the value of dramatic
study as liberal education. The Professor of Theatre who is ever doubtful
about this should resign from his Department and go into other work. I am
fully convinced that Dramatic Art, rightly taught, is as stimulating, informa-
tive, and illuminating and has potentially, at least as much "content" as
English, History, Language, and Philosophy.

Concerning the several courses in Dramatic Literature and History in the

44 fr-

DRAMATIC ART IN A UNIVERSITY PROGRAM

Department's curriculum, there is seldom any question raised. They are
filled to the brim with subject matter generally recognized as sound. What
are commonly challenged by outsiders are the so-called "practical" courses,
such as Acting, Directing, Playwriting, Scenery and Lighting. Although
these are respected as useful disciplines for students desiring to develop tech-
niques, they are suspected of having little to offer beyond mere skill. When
the courses are carefully examined, however, they can usually prove them-
selves to be among the most truly "liberal" parts of the whole Dramatic
program.

The common opposition to the "skill" courses springs from an ignorance
of what they actually include. One of the least understood is Acting. By
most persons acquainted only with high-school commencement plays and
other informal theatricals, learning to act involves three things: the con-
quest of stage fright, learning how to move without stumbling over other
people's feet, and acquiring enough lung power to blast one's words to the
rear of the auditorium. Useful as these specific "skills" may be to the ego-
centric student who wishes to display himself in grease paint, they may in-
deed have little to offer in general education.

If a University course in Acting covered these three points only, the
critics would probably be right in questioning the place of such a study in a
liberal arts program. Actually, however, a well-set-up course in Acting
covers far more territory than that indicated. It stresses from the beginning
a careful study of people. The course begins with a sociological investiga-
tion of the personalities who compose the audience. The student examines
the organization of the community which surrounds the spectators, and then
these spectators' conditioned desires in the playhouse for diversion, for
stimulation, and for illumination of their daily lives. Thus from the very
start the apprentice actor is taught to view his art in terms of a relationship
and responsibility.

The second phase of the work is concerned with the study and exercise of
the whole body in order to make it a vibrantly expressive instrument not
for use in the theatre only, but everywhere. Careful attention is given to
good posture and to the development of a strong, but flexible and sensitive,
control of every part of the physical, vocal, and mental organism. In sub-
sequent lecture and practice periods the actor is taught to see clearly each of
the several factors in typical human situations (off the stage as well as on)
which force a person into a responsive attitude; and then the actor is en-
couraged to experiment freely with the actions which grow out of those at-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

titudes so that he may understand why people and therefore players
behave the way they do in different circumstances.

This is only the beginning. More complex problems arise to be solved
when the student starts to interpret actual passages of dialogue, and particu-
larly when he tries to analyze, visualize, and construct a living characteriza-
tion. Throughout his course he has been taught the value of alertness,
preparedness, and dependability, and he has had rigorous practice in thinking
beyond himself into the minds of his dramatic team-mates and the minds of
the people seated out front.

Not all effective courses in Acting have identical programs, of course, but
the fundamentals are the same. A student who completes his work in any
of them has had skill training. At the same time he has had something
more. He has advanced his appreciation of both the thought and the lan-
guage of dramatic literature, he has exercised his knowledge of human
psychology, and he has learned to be expressive.

Similar claims can be made for every other course in the "skill" group.
Playwriting involves practice in setting speeches together in such a way as
to make a reading of them "sound like easy, natural conversation." But
Playwriting also demands research and analysis in human behavior, experi-
ments in visualization, and a careful study of problems in design. Courses
in Scenery and Lighting include instruction in the manual manipulation of
tools, but they also include work leading to a new appreciation of form and
color, of materials, and especially of the psychological relationships between
a man in action and his environment the house he lives in, the furniture
he sits on, the implements he handles. These courses of study review every-
thing the student has learned elsewhere about physics, and they encourage
him to check back over his knowledge of historical materials. Courses in
Speech, Directing, Costuming, Radio Production, and all the rest, though
rightly stressing "skill," are also full of "content."

A scholarly approach to learning in any field of study demands a full use
of all the tools available. The student of Classical Literature who wishes
really to understand what he is reading must make himself familiar with
grammar, vocabulary and verse forms. It is just as important for the stu-
dent of the Literature of the Theatre to become acquainted with the dynamic
structure of his subject. Drama is the art of "doing something," in motion.
Manifestly that means acting, setting and lighting. As absurd as trying
to study music without a concert hall is trying to study plays without a stage.
Here then is the primary reason for the theatre "skill" courses. They have

-Hj 46

DRAMATIC ART IN A UNIVERSITY PROGRAM

great educational value in themselves 5 they have even greater value as ad-
juncts to the reading courses.

THE EMOTIONS IN LIBERAL EDUCATION

One of the greatest lessons taught us by the history of the last six years is
that people are influenced in the long run less by reason than by emotion.
Commentators have pointed out repeatedly that much of the bloodiest fight-
ing has taken place between nations which before the war boasted the highest
levels of literacy. Knowledge and the ability to rationalize are not wholly
dependable guarantors of sanity. When the heart of man is stirred he gives
little heed to his mind. Recognizing this fact, American education which,
since the turn of the century had devoted its chief attention to information
and rationalization, has in recent seasons begun to give consideration to
problems of human feelings.

In an article entitled "Education for the Emotions" which appeared in
the August 1 9, 1 944, issue of The Saturday Review of Literature, George
F. Reynolds points out the strategic influence which may be exerted on our
feeling by the artist. He says:

"Our emotional responses are 'not Time's fools,' they are not easily
changed. . . . Changes come mostly through contagion the influence of
people we admire, of new groups we become a part of. And some changes
also come from the books we read, the pictures we see, the music we hear
in general, the arts we vitally experience. But the arts so subtly shift our
points of view, widen our tolerances, soften our prejudices, that we often do
not catch them at it. They make us laugh with people or at them, make them
seem glamorous or repulsive, something to imitate or something to despise."

Although Reynolds does not here specially mention the art of the Theatre,
he implies it for he mentions it elsewhere in the article. An intelligent study
of the best of Dramatic Art, like that of books, pictures, and music, helps
the student acquire through contacts with the emotional factors an intuitive
recognition of values, a feeling for moral relationships, and a sense of un-
rationalized, but nevertheless valid, perspectives. An association with the
forces of Drama often brings with it an illumination not acquired by any
other art experience, since the Theatre possesses a third dimension in action
peculiar to itself.

A perception and understanding of the emotional factors of human living
(as reflected in the Drama) may be acquired to some extent in those courses
which concern themselves solely with the appreciation of literature and his-
tory. Points of view are established much more firmly, however, when the

47 JH-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

strictly content courses are supplemented by practice courses ia creative writ-
ing, designing, and interpretation, for then the student approaches the study
of emotion, not just from the outside, but also from the inside. In these
supplementary courses the student, working under supervision, actually
experiences emotion. He makes it, expresses it, controls it. At every step
of his work he meets the human challenge of a small representative society
composed of his instructor, his fellow craftsmen, and the members of an
audience. Thus he has abundant opportunity to learn firsthand what is the
real meaning of such terms as "motive," "drive," "stimulus-and-response,"
"environmental pressures/' "primitive urges, 57 "social checks," and similar
factors in behavior. Gradually, but surely, he comes to understand the dif-
ference between excitement and sentimentality on the one hand and genuine
emotion on the other, the differences between momentary stimulation and
long-range satisfactions. Those are the things about which plays are written.
But probably the greatest lessons in the recognition and management of
emotion come in the activities outside the classroom in rehearsal hours, in
the scene shop, on the lighting crew. Here the student learns the value of
personal initiative and responsibility, a respect for order, and a healthy con-
cern for deadlines. Above all things he gets daily experience in cooperative
effort similar to that required in an athletic team. He finds out just how
necessary it is to plan his own contribution for a right place and a right in-
stant, and to fit it into the master design of a group performance in such a
way as not to check or distort any other part.

THREE PROGRAMS: GENERAL, SPECIALIZED, AND GRADUATE

In the foregoing pages I have tried to explain why I believe that the Uni-
versity Department of Drama should claim a place in the academic areas on
both sides of the Mugwump's fence, the garden of Specialized Professional
Training and the garden of General, or Liberal Education, The two areas
should not only exist in a friendly way side by side, they should also have
access to each other; they are mutually necessary.

Without the General training, the Specialized part has little meaning.
The theatre already abounds in specialists of a sort writers, designers, ac-
tors, engineers. For that reason there would be small sense in inviting young
people to come to a University community filled with rich resources of
broad knowledge if they are to confine themselves after they arrive simply
to grooves already well established elsewhere. What the Theatre (includ-
ing Radio and Films) needs from the American University is young men

DRAMATIC ART IN A UNIVERSITY PROGRAM

and women who are generally well informed and who have learned to look
at life steadily, honestly, and inquiringly without too much concern for
passing fads of thought, and who then and only then have begun to
develop certain disciplines necessary for professional employment.

Whether the time will ever come when the University-trained craftsman
will be able to regard himself on graduation as a fully qualified professional
is extremely doubtful. The company or studio in which he seeks employ-
ment will almost certainly wish to do the finishing job on him. But, under
the right kind of tutoring during his student period he should be able to go
far with his preliminary conditioning. There is a great deal of basic pre-
paratory work he can do at the University.

If the Specialized program needs the association of the General, the con-
verse is also true. As I have already suggested, very few of the students
enrolled in the Department will be eligible for the more advanced work.
Nevertheless, the "regular," or common student, who looks forward to en-
joying the Theatre as avocation only, will gain much from working side by
side with the student who is earnestly concerned about professional stand-
ards. The presence of the specializing students will check the development
of those easy compromises which tend to creep into college dramatics, and
help to maintain a healthy respect for truly ambitious effort.

The broad base, however, will always come first. The genius, if he is
not to become a brilliant but impractical floater in the Theatre, must learn
the values to be found in literary, historical, scientific, and esthetic research,
and especially he must come to recognize the need for habits of cooperative
thinking. All along the line of creation the work of the genius has to have
the support of many lesser artists laboring with him. Maxwell Anderson,
in a speech he made at the Founder's Day exercises at Carnegie Institute in
1937, aptly pictures the process of united labor:

"The supreme artist is only the apex of a pyramid} the pyramid itself
must be built of artists and art lovers, apprentices and craftsmen so deeply
imbued with a love for the art they follow or practice that it has become for
them a means of communication with whatever has been found highest and
most admirable in the human spirit."

Besides the General and the Specialized curricula, the University Depart-
ment of Drama must give attention to a third, not yet mentioned in this
article. That is the Graduate. This is, of course, that field which will be of
interest primarily to the student concerned with Dramatic Literature, His-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

tory, and Criticism. Most of the men and women who elect this program
will be preparing themselves for teaching.

In a well-integrated plan, however, there might well be a considerable
amount of overlapping between the Graduate and the Specialized curricula.
If the Specialist is going to guard himself against any too-early orystalization
of his working methods he will have to establish good habits of research. On
the other hand, no student should be permitted to receive a graduate degree
without some first-hand experience in technique- Only at the point of climax
should the two programs veer away from each other.

The following diagram suggests how the three fields of Dramatic study
dealt with in this article might be viewed together.

SPECIALIZED

GRADUATE

Advanced

Bas/c

6ENEPAL

Basic

For the General and the Graduate fields of study the University already
has degrees, the Bachelor's and the Master's, For the other field of Special-
ization there is now no degree offered in more than a very few institutions.
Perhaps no degree is advisable. However, since ambitious students usually
wish to have their records labeled for convenient reference when they are
applying for employment, the University might grant a certificate, A stu-
dent would become eligible for this special award only when in the opinion
of the Dramatic faculty the quality of his work had reached a level of excel-
lence which merited recognition. This kind of certification would encourage
those who are preparing for teaching to supplement their graduate training
with practice in the techniques of the Theatre, and thus fit themselves for
more well-rounded service.

Thus, it seems to me to be apparent that the Mugwump's fence need not
exist at all. Dramatic study belongs on both sides of the dividing line, and
there is no need of a barrier if those who are planning the various curricula
see clearly how they may at the same time be differentiated and integrated*

DRAMATIC ART IN A UNIVERSITY PROGRAM

Barriers tend to rise only when instructors are uncertain in their own minds
or fail to explain their purposes clearly to others.

A THEATRE OF THE COMMUNITY

Important as the study programs are, they will occupy just a part of the
attention of an active Department of Drama. The Department will give
thought also to the community in which it operates.

A live University Playhouse serves the town in which it stands only when
it recognizes several extramural responsibilities. It must be a general recrea-
tional center, providing good entertainment to many people. Its auditorium
doors should be open to all who wish to enter, and its stage door should wel-
come all who wish to participate in playmaking activities. It is true that the
most important work should be assigned by rights to University students
seeking training, but interested persons from the town should have an op-
portunity to try-out for the plays and to offer their help in the scenery and
costume shops.

Beyond the limits of the local town is a county and a state. For these
larger territories, the University Playhouse and its staff must provide in-
spiration and guidance in many matters related to Dramatic activities. It
should give technical advice where it is requested, help with the organization
of new projects, and offer assistance in seasonal festivals.

But most of all, the University Playhouse must be an institution serving
the community in the cause of the human spirit. It must be, not just a
school and a theatrical agency, but also a temple of beauty. In a humble
way it must strive to fulfil the responsibility suggested by President Harry
Woodburn Chase when in 1925 he dedicated the Playmakers' Theatre:

". . . that it may make possible about our common life a little more of the
stuff that dreams are made of j that its existence here shall mean a little less
monotony, a little more glamour about our daysj that the horizons of imagi-
nation shall by its presence here be enlarged so that we shall come more stead-
ily and wholly to see the place of beauty and of its handmaiden, art, in a
civilization not too much given to its encouragement."

The Lyric Lazy South

Excerpt from a Letter to c^Cell battle Lewis
By* PAUL, GRKEN

MY thesis then as now and always will be is that
we as a people, a state., nation, or world will have a
better chance to get out of the thick woods and night of
tragedy wasteful, perverse tragedy when we can go
beyond a belief in the almighty power and value of things and their money-
functioning to a philosophy of their beauty and enjoyment seeing them
not as competing and fighting units and tokens in an economy of life but as
instruments and means of cooperation and enlightenment among men
which is their real value after all, or they have none. Yes, the artist as
prophet and statesman is what I'm talking about.

In the realm of true religion and beauty (and they both are one) the tragic
dilemma of destructive and suffering man comes nearer to being dissolved
away than not. Of course it can never be entirely dissolved, for man must
suffer, hope and die until the end of time as he has from the blind beginning.
But he can have those exquisite, isolated and mainly individual moments of
vision and affirmation, and can increase those moments among his fellows.
And there's where the urge and the call come in. And he can create these
moments, .lift himself out of the rut of a too-pragmatic and nose-to-the-
grindstone existence into another kind of existence the kind that Socra-
tes, Plato, Goethe, and many another follower of harmony and gracious-
ness have talked about and worked to make prevail can if he will.

Three hundred years ago the dreamers came into this land of ours the
rabble, the crooks, the cranks, the weak men, the idealists, the strong men,
the hopeful and despairing and all were hunting for something, some-
thing not only outside themselves but inside.

First, they conquered the wilderness.

Second, they created the democratic form of government.

Third, they led the way in the creation of the machine age,

It took them two hundred and fifty years to do these three things. My
contention is that now it is up to us to do the fourth thing, to create an age of
culture in the life of our country (yes, I know that's a suspect word, but
still it is the right word) the age of art, true science, right thinking the

-C52

THE LYRIC LAZY SOUTH

transfiguration of our life into terms of art, the art of living. It seems to
me that one might say that it was for this very thing that our country was
created. And if we fail to make our contribution in bringing it to pass just
so much we fail those who struggled before us, fail the hopes and the pur-
pos of those who come after us, and worst of all fail and betray ourselves.

We are already fifty years late!

Yes, that's what I mean life is an art: green winter fields in this the
lyric, lazy and indulgent South j paint on the houses, flowers at the door,
and care and beauty and love surrounding our bare, pitiful little country
churches} lights and water and conveniences for men and their housewives,
not that they may snooze the light away and grow fat in greasy ease, but that
they may have more time for books and music and singing. And then out-
door plays and festivals and the beauty of maydays and the sweet and tender
girl queen with the pridef ul young king walking by her side j and good health
and joy and imagination among our children} and the poets in Lillington,
little Washington, Asheville, Henderson or anywhere, writing better and
better verse of their dreaming for the papers} and festivals and choruses and
orchestras and so on to the mutual stimulation and give and take among us
all ! For these decorations of life are the inspiration, the fire, the color and
drive and depthf ul meaning of life. And it is now no longer a matter of
the pocketbook, if it ever was, but a matter of the soul. It is the soul Pm
talking about*

I am talking about the soul

Music in the Theatre

Everywhere there is music in America good and bad, stimulating and
deadening, enriching and pauperizing but music just the same, waiting
for its worthy and inspiring use. What of a nation with its song on every
lip, .with its melody in every heart, with its feet ready to move to every
dance? And asking so I wonder to think that those who make the plays of
men and what men do and dream should so continue their pale frustrated

page and set their characters down in dry and empty wordiness It is still

my belief that only in an imaginative, poetic and musical theatre can the
true heart and soul of this great upsurging nation of ours find adequate and
worthy dramatic state. ,

Paul Green. The Carolina Play-Book, Vol. XII, No. 2.

Drama In Extension

KAI HKIBERG-JURGENSEN

F the Office of Defense Transportation permits, the Caro-
lina Playmakers Theatre in Chapel Hill, N. C. will resound with
young voices, earnestly declaiming the lines of plays, original and
professional, for the twenty-second time in twenty-two years
when The Carolina Dramatic Association holds its Annual Drama Festival
and Tournament on April 12-14, this spring.

The beginnings of this organization and its wildfire growth in the State
of North Carolina make a fascinating tale that sings of courage and persever-
ance and, above all, faith. It had its start back in 1 9 1 8, when, in the Annual
Report of the President of the University of North Carolina, the Director of
the Bureau of Extension noted the addition to the Bureau's staff of Profes-
sor Frederick H. Koch, "who is to direct the activities of the Division of
Community Drama."

Fighting for elbow-room every day of his life in North Carolina, finding
one extension after another too small to satisfy his vision and ambitions, Pro-
fessor Koch built dramatic activity in North Carolina until the State was
called "the most theatre-going in the Union." Then he stretched the work
beyond the state, flooding the entire South with his ideas until finally, one
day, the American drama historian, Arthur Hobson Quinn, stood before an
assemblage in Chapel Hill and said:

"Frederick H. Koch has done something which no one except himself and
his pupils has been able to do, and I believe his success is due largely to his
unquenchable spirit that has never been discouraged by circumstances and
never truckled to anything that was base or banal in the theatre. The best
way to epitomize his service is to try to imagine what the American drama
would have been during the last twenty-one years without him."

That was in April, 1940, two decades after North Carolina had been de-
scribed by H. L. Mencken as "the Sahara of the Bozart."

Professor Koch began his work during a period of confused ideas and
tawdry values in the American theatre. Scorning imitation, he turned swift-
ly, innately to the people for his answer. He believed that what is essen-
tially true of the common people in one locality is essentially true of all
common people in all localities. Hence the logical attack for his ambition

54 Jfr-

DRAMA IN EXTENSION

was a simple one. He started with the University community. When he
looked beyond the campus, he continued to work with communities. After
organizing several local pageants which called on the active help of large
bodies of citizens, he turned his attention to the more intensive development
of local drama groups. Next he promoted the writing and production of
local folk plays by these groups, then tours of folk plays, and finally state-
wide festivals. His emphasis throughout was on original, creative labor.
Little by little, Mr. Koch won over the people of his state, and eventually
the local work of North Carolina influenced the entire country.

There can be little doubt that Professor Koch's work leads toward a Na-
tional Drama and a National Theatre. Naturally, he was aware of the fact
that a national culture and hence a national art are based deep in the hearts
of the people. If we examine the works of the great composers of every
country, we find invariably back of their work a tremendous body of folk
music. The dramatists and the novelists are dependent on similar mate-
rials. They go to the people of their nation for material, to the dreams and
the voice of the people, and express what they find there. The road Fred-
erick H. Koch followed led through these folk materials. Here are the
steps he took:

PAGEANTRY

His first problem was that of reaching the common people of the State
through their educators and through their community leaders} for it is the
people who make a theatre and not the actors. A dozen companies of ex-
cellent actors would be of no avail without an audience and without sub-
stance for their plays. There lies the communal power of the theatre in a
participation by the people on both sides of the footlights. Mr. Koch knew
this and he also knew how to achieve this participation.

It was indeed fortunate that the city of Raleigh celebrated its three hun-
dredth anniversary in the year 1919 and needed a Tercentenary Pageant to
dramatize its history. Thus at the very beginning of his career in North
Carolina, the young Professor Koch struck at the very heart of the state with
his composition and production of the historical pageant, Raleigh, the Shep-
herd of the Ocean. That was the beginning of what was to become one of
the most important phases of the dramatic development of North Carolina.
The popularity of pageants spread like a prairie fire pageants for every
purpose, but in the main either historical or educational.

The importance of these pageants lay not in their art, but in their com-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

munal quality. They drew within their circle people from all levels of
society, all working together writing, acting, carpentering, making cos-
tumes or directing to present the history of their community, or a drama-
tization of the advantages of education, or some other theme of civic im-
portance.

The communal quality of the early pageants was advanced to real na-
tional importance in Paul Green's symphonic drama, The Lost Colony, as
well as in his historical drama, The Highland Call.

The Lost Colony was written to celebrate the 350th anniversary of the
beginning at Roanoke Island in 1587 of English colonization in America,
Directed by Professor Samuel Selden, it was staged at the seaside on the
original site of the landing of Sir Walter Raleigh's early colonists. In the
summer of 1937 and for four following summers it drew into its activities
the participation of the 'Federal Theatre Project, The Carolina Playmak-
ers, the CCC boys of the Works Progress Administration, the Westminster
Choir School of Princeton, N. J., and the people of Roanoke Island, Over
a quarter of a million people attended.

The Highland Call was produced at Fayetteville October 14-November
2, 1939, to celebrate The Cape Fear Scottish Festival. The Carolina Play-
makers, thejtocal people, students from Flora Macdonald College and sev-
eral professional actors all had a part in the production which was directed
by John W. Parker, Field Agent for the Bureau of Community Drama.

THE BUREAU OF COMMUNITY DRAMA

The avowed purpose of The Bureau of Community Drama, initiated in
1 919, is <<to promote and encourage dramatic arts in the schools, colleges, and
Communities of North Carolina; to meet the need for a genuinely construc-
tive recreation; to cooperate in the production of plays, pageants, and festi-
vals of real worth, and to stimulate interest in the writing of native drama."
After familiarizing the people with drama through the communal pag-
eants and keeping them continually aware of it by a constant succession of
speeches, addresses and lectures, Professor Koch now reached out into every
corner of North Carolina through the Bureau of Community Drama. It of-
fered help in the organization and productions of drama groups; gave ad-
vice as to play selection, direction, scenery construction, make-up and any-
thing else which might fall under the heading of community drama and
offered it free of charge.

The enormous and rapid growth of the Bureau of Community Drama is

DRAMA IN EXTENSION

best illustrated by noting how the demand for its services leapt forward from
year to year. In 1919-20 there were calls for forty playbooks; by 1922-23
the number had jumped to 875 j and in 1924-25, five years after the Bureau
was founded, 2,150 playbooks were sent out to North Carolina communi-
ties.

In 1921 an Institute for Dramatic Workers was planned to be held an-
nually in order to promote cooperation between independent groups of
"community players." Today, twenty-four years later, this gathering still
takes place every year. It is now known as the Directors' Conference.

Another milestone was passed with the appointment of John W. Parker
as Extension Instructor in Dramatic Art in 1934. Instituting Extension
courses in Play Production for the purpose of training leaders to direct dra-
matic activities throughout the State, teaching ever-increasing numbers of
students, mailing out pamphlets and planning study-courses, Mr. Parker
had developed a broad organization by the time he was called to the Army
in June, 1942.

One of the most remarkable chapters in the history of the Bureau of Com*
munity Drama is that which records the power of survival displayed by the
organization during the dark years immediately following the crash in 1929.
While one activity after another was falling by the wayside, the Bureau
bound up its wounds and went ahead under the direction of Professor Koch
and his assistant, Mrs. Irene Fussier, both working without remuneration.
It was their love of the organization and their belief in its necessity that kept
it going,

THE CAROLINA DRAMATIC ASSOCIATION

By 1 922-23 so many community drama groups had developed that a more
effective organization became necessary in order to render them essential
aid and encouragement. For that purpose a new institution came into exist-
ence: The Carolina Dramatic Association.

Then again began a wildfire growth that reads like a statistical whirlwind.
In 1 923-24 there were thirty-two groups enrolled in the C.D.A., the next
year there were fifty-two; and in 1927-28 the membership consisted of one
hundred and sixteen groups.

By this time Professor Koch had advanced three steps up the ladder to-
ward his goal: first, the Pageants to make the people of North Carolina drama
conscious, then the Bureau of Community Drama to encourage these people
to form permanent dramatic groups, and finally the Carolina Dramatic As-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

sociation to knit these organized groups into one state-wide organization,
drawing everything into one State drama group.

Professor Koch had been dreaming of the day when North Carolina com-
munities would not only produce plays in organized groups, but would be
writing their own dramas and comedies. The ground was now prepared 3
the State was ready.

CD A. FESTIVALS AND CAROLINA PLAYMAKER TOURS

The declared purpose of The Carolina Dramatic Association was to find
means of promoting and encouraging dramatic art and stimulating play-
writing in North Carolina. To accomplish these ends Dr. Koch and his
assistants utilized two methods: state-wide festivals and competitions, and
extensive tours of Carolina Playmaker companies performing their own
plays.

The method of teaching one group by showing it what another similar
group has done was a favorite procedure of Professor Koch's. He used it
in his playwriting class, the textbook for which was a book of plays written
by former North Carolina students. The reaction of the students to this
book has always been the same: "If they could do it, so can we! "

This method was successful in the case of school and community
drama groups also. In the annual festivals, beginning in the spring of 1 925,
drama groups from all over the State have met and competed locally in
District Festivals for the honor of appearing in the finals which are staged
in Chapel Hill. In this way each group is exposed to a comparison of its
work with that of other similar organizations, and the comparison has been
strongly conducive to the raising of the general level of standards.

In addition to the productions of plays, demonstrations of distinctive dra-
matic work being done over the State, exhibits of stage models, costume de-
signs, and scrapbooks, and lectures by authorities in various fields of theatre
have been regular features of these meetings. Among the guest speakers of
national importance who have addressed the Festival audiences are Pro-
fessor George P. Baker, Arthur Hobson Quinn, Clifford Odets, Bernice
Kelly Harris, Barrett H. Clark and many others.

At least two of the Festivals held at Chapel Hill have been of importance
beyond the borders of North Carolina, the Southern Regional Conference
on the Drama in 1 928 and Drama in the South in 1 939. To these two Re-
gional Festivals came representatives, leaders of other drama groups from
the colleges and civic groups of many Southern states, to see plays, to listen

DRAMA IN EXTENSION

to authoritative theatre men, and to hear again and again the gospel of the
"People's Theatre."

To show the people of North Carolina and other States what young ap-
prentice playwrights can do, Professor Koch organized a total of thirty-seven
tours of The Carolina Playmakers covering North Carolina systematically
on an average of two to three times a year and going as far afield as Texas,
Missouri, Wisconsin and New England. Traveling by car, train and private
"show-bus/ 1 his touring companies played in school and civic centers in
North Carolina, in New York City, at Yale University and in all the states
between North Carolina and New York. In 1934 they performed at the
First Natidhal Folk Festival in St. Louis before an audience of thousands.
In 1936 they traveled all the way to Texas to play at the Texas Centennial
Exposition in Dallas.

Dr. Koch expanded the program in the autumn of 1 941 when "The Caro-
lina Playmakers Repertory Touring Company" toured for two months in
their own "show-bus" playing Paul Green's The House of Connelly in forty
towns and cities in twelve states to an audience of 25,000. The company
covered New England, New York and the Middle West, traveling 8,000
miles. The tour was sponsored and booked by The Redpath Bureau and
the sixteen Carolina Playmaker actors were paid Equity wages.

With this tour The Carolina Playmakers had achieved an extension of
their activities to influence thousands of people on a true professional level.

RADIO ACTIVITIES

It was not until 1940 that a Radio Studio was actually organized on the
campus in Chapel Hill. Professor Koch was quick to take advantage of it.
"The Carolina Playmakers of the Air/ 1 directed by Earl Wynn of the De-
partment of Dramatic Art, produced programs over various local radio sta-
tions, and a series of six plays was presented over a national network of the
Mutual Broadcasting Company through WRAL in Raleigh. Such well
known Playmaker authors as Paul Green, Betty Smith, James Boyd, Noel
Houston and Josephina Niggli were among those to write new plays for the
national network series, which extended the Playmakers far beyond their
usual limits to a potential audience of several millions of people. The or-
ganization flourished for three years, until Mr. Wynn left to join the Armed
Services and the Navy appropriated the radio studio's physical plant.

~*g{ 59

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

THE ADDRESSES, READINGS AND PUBLICATIONS OF
PROFESSOR FREDERICK H. KOCH

A profuse and persuasive speaker, Professor Koch spoke to thousands
of people all over the country in what would undoubtedly add up to hun-
dreds of speeches in the quarter of a century during which he directed the
dramatic activities of the state of North Carolina. It is not to be wondered
at that nearly all of the titles of his addresses include such words as "folk-
plays" and "native drama" and "playmaking" and "people's theatre," for
these were the things for which he stood. Tirelessly he applied his energies
to spreading the word about a people's drama and a people's theatre when-
ever and wherever he was given an opportunity.

Dr. Koch wrote numerous articles and pamphlets during his active life;
but important as these publications were in making his work known through-
out the country, his most important literary work would seem to Be the
eight books of plays he edited, every one of them filled with plays his stu-
dents had written. There can be little doubt that they comprise ^some of
the most effective extension work he did. They have been a definite influ-
ence on the playwriting in this country for the last fifteen years. Judging
by the annual royalty reports, some of the plays are done every year, not
only in this country, but as far away as England.

An unique venture was The Carolina Play-Book, now in its seventeenth
year of publication, and its later supplement, The Carolina Stage. An ideal-
istic success, The Carolina Play-Book was honored with the distinction of
being one of only three theatre publications included in the International
Exhibit at the Century of Progress Exposition in Chicago, the other two
being Theatre Arts Monthly and Stage.

As a young man at Harvard University Professor Koch earned a good
deal of his keep and tuition by giving spirited Shakespeare readings. Up
until the last year of his life he continued to give one-man performances of
Shakespearean plays, clinging with a warm enthusiasm to the old, heroic
style of acting a style that in his hands was most effective. He had done it
so often that he knew whole plays by heart, favoring Hamlet and A Mid-
summer Night's Dream.

In the second year of his career as a teacher at the University of North
Dakota, Professor Koch read Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol to a gath-
ering of his colleagues. The reading was so successful that he was called
upon to repeat it for the students and eventually for the public. This was

DRAMA IN EXTENSION

the origin of his annual readings of this beloved ghost-story, readings that
took him far and wide to great cities and small communities, goodnaturedly
pushing his way through the snowy nights of winter in order to meet his
many dates and leaving behind him the spirit of "The Ghost of Christmas
Present." It took him to Town Hall in New York and his voice was heard
over a National Radio Network for several years, reaching out all over the
country with his spirited characterization of old Scrooge. In thirty-nine
years these readings exceeded two hundred in number. A Christmas Carol
came to be an institution, anticipated as a traditional high point in the yule-
tide by young and old in many communities, and was probably the most
important work Professor Koch did. The spirit of warmth and tenderness
which he left behind him on those missions of love was unf orgetable.

The spirit of this energetic teacher is still stirring all through the Ameri-
can Theatre. Applying principles which are closely akin to those of the
Abbey Theatre, he approached the dream of an American People's Theatre
even as Yeats and Synge and Lady Gregory had striven for an Irish Theatre.
For one who has worked with The Carolina Playmakers it is impossible to
avoid making this comparison. The spirit of the Abbey Theatre Players
is everpresent. But the burden which Mr. Koch lifted onto his own shoul-
ders was possibly a greater one than that which was carried by Yeats. The
latter was reaching out to the limited population of a small island with a
theatre situated in a comparatively large city, the capital city of the land,
sooner or later visited by almost everyone in Ireland. The Theatre of
Frederick H. Koch was in a tiny village far away from the metropolitan
centers. Through this small theatre it was his desire to reach millions of
people in a vast land. It would have been manifestly impossible for him to
carry out his plans had he concentrated all his work in Chapel Hill. His
only alternatives were extension work and touring. Being a man of expansive
imagination he was impelled to cultivate these fields to the utmost. How-
ever, as the territory he was trying to develop was by nature expansive, he
was faced with tremendous handicaps not existing in the little Ireland of
Yeats.

In Ireland it was possible to achieve a National Theatre within the span
of a lifetime* In great, sprawling America it remains a goal of the future.
There are indications, however, that the seed has taken root.

Of one hundred and forty plays entered in the National Playwriting
Contest of the Pittsburgh Drama League last year, at least a hundred
would have Mien under his denomination of American Folk Plays. When

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

Robert Porterfield of the Barter Theatre in Virginia announces that he is
planning twenty-two Veterans' Theatres after the war with the hope that
they will eventually grow into twenty-two people-supported State Thea-
tres, we can be sure that "Proff" will meet him up the road somewhere, for
that is an old road for him. He must have rejoiced last year when John
Golden, the New York producer, contributed $100,000 toward the inaugu-
ration of a National Theatre in this country.

The men and women who were students of Professor Koch or who were
touched in some way by his magic wand are not satisfied with our American
Theatre. Theirs is a vision destined little by little to come true. They are
aware that day by day a "people's drama" is being written, and their hope
is that the end of the war will see a vigorous resumption of Frederick H.
Koch's struggle for a "people's theatre" dedicated to the performance of
these plays.

Here in Chapel Hill such a theatre is to be erected to the memory of this
great teacher, and a higher standard of professional training for the stu-
dents is being planned. Already the possibilities of much more extensive
tours are being discussed j and though the body of the man who first saw the
vision is dead, his spirit will be present when the final goal is reached.

The American Theatre Today

The American theatre today is not on Broadway but in the thousands upon
thousands of amateur and non-professional groups in the hamlets and towns,
in the granges, the high schools, the colleges, universities, trade union halls,
army posts, and in the civic centers everywhere. It is the theatre of the

whole vast United States Where there were once five thousand theatre

stages in the country and all an extension of Broadway and its syndicalists,
now there are twenty-five, thirty, even fifty thousand, built and created by
people themselves for their own needs, their feelings, purposes and vision.
And here night after night they act and see acted and set forth in all intensity
and sincerity dramas and stories of their own choosing and often of their
own writing. . . . Here is a vast and growing theatre, rugged and dynamic in
its nature, and the gloss and finish, wherever it is lacking, will ultimately be
polished into being.

Paul Green. In his The Hawthorne Tree.
62

Presence by the River

By* PAUL GREEN

HERE was once an old question as to who could chart
the winds and the nature thereof and who could fore-
tell the weather and its whims. The question still
stands today unanswered as it did in Job's time. No
doubt there are laws governing all such phenomena, and maybe someday
these laws will be understood laws that have no irrational phantom dancing
within them. But even so those who understand will have no power to
bring either drought or rain, for the wind will still blow where it listeth and
it will rain when it will rain.

And as with the weather, so with writing a play so with any work of
art. It comes pretty much when it will come, is absent when it will be ab-
sent, and no man can provide its presence at his will. So if I may be per-
sonal in replying to your question, "Why do you write plays," I can on first
consideration easily say, "I don't know." It is much like the weather to me
the what and the why, the wherefore and results. About the only answer
I would venture is that I seem to need to. If I were certain that the drama
were the one means of gaining honor or wealth or mental stability there
would be some obvious sense in spending one's life trying to set down lines
for people to speak on a stage. I believe I should want to write plays,
though, if little or nothing came of them, but naturally I want a, lot to come
of them.'

Of course your question goes further than any easy answer or any meteor-
ological metaphor. It raises the whole problem of aptitude and calling. I
think all people are by nature artists, that is, more or less so. The usual
European designation of the American builder and business man as a money
hog, for instance a creature who takes pleasure only in dollar profit and
pain only in dollar loss seems to me obviously false. There is more to it
than that always more. Sinclair Lewis in one of his novels, <c Work of
Art," tries his hand at showing that one Myron Weagle with his dream of a
perfect hotel might be considered essentially an artist. There is a lot of
human truth in his contention.

-C63 }**-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

Now if all of us have this so-called artistic urge, then why do some of us
become hotel keepers and others banjo-pickers or playwrights? That is
the next question. The answer is perhaps that circumstances always play
their part. One child happens to have access, say, to a piano near at hand but
finds his fingers too stiff or too short to allow of his becoming a performer.
Perhaps he turns to composing, or bricklaying. And so it goes. Each of us
could make some sort of statement as to his proper calling. Take your own
case you run a drama magazine. All sorts of odds and ends of circum-
stances and people went into your choice of that career.

Two incidents happened to me years ago, I remember, which turned me
to writing plays. Norman Foerster, who was one of the finest English
teachers ever to appear at the University of North Carolina, announced in
class one day that the seniors had decided to do a play at Commencement and
were holding a contest for original scripts. He advised me to try my hand.
I took a chance at the thing and happened to win out. The play was pro-
duced in the forest theatre and I was thrilled to death. After that though
I didn't set my heart on playwriting, for I had always been more interested
in poetry and short stories than anything else. Then in 1919 "ProfP Koch
came riding in from the Dakota prairies, his arms full of plays and his head
full of dreams. In no time a stage was up, and everybody near and far,
little and big, black and white realized for the first time that he, said body,
was an artist of some sort mainly a dramatic artist. Some went in for de-
signing, some for acting, some for writing. I chose the last. And after a
few productions, I was caught fast in my choice and had struck acquaintance
with all the bat-like terrors that inhabit the shadows of the stage.

Your next question is easier to answer. "Why do you write the plays you
do? w The answer is that's the only kind I know how to write. Most of
the plays I have written can be designated as folk plays, and I know this
seems a narrow boundary. Perhaps it is, but since the "folk" are the people
who seem to matter most to me, I have little interest in trying to deal with
others who are more foreign and therefore less real to me. Not for a mo-
ment do I claim to have done justice to an inspiring subject matter, but the
challenge is there, clearer, sharper, and more compelling every day. For
there is, something in the life of "the people" which seems of deeper signi-
ficance so far as the nature of the universe goes than the characters who
might be termed sophisticated. To examine the matter a little further, it
seems to me that the folk are those living closer to a terrible and all-wise

PRESENCE BY THE RIVER

nature than their brethren of the sidewalks and opera house, and if I were
seeking a philosophical statement for the matter it would be somewhat as
follows:

The folk are the people whose manners, ethics, religious and philosophical
ideals are more nearly derived from and controlled by the ways of the out-
side physical world (Cf . Synge's "Riders to the Sea^ 3 ) than by the ways and
institutions of men in a specialized society (Cf . Schnitzler's "Anatol" cycle).
And the outside natural world is the fountain of wisdom, the home of the
fruitful all-mother, the omnipotent God. The line of demarcation be-
tween the folk and sophisticated drama is not always easily contrasted} to
instance once more, Ferenc Molnar's "The Guardsman" and S. Ansky's
"The Dybbuk." And between the last two Pd always choose "The Dyb-
buk" even though technique should shift for itself.

I don't claim that sophisticated drama may not be great in its own right,
but somehow I never thrill to it as I do to what I like to term the folk drama
the Greeks wrote, the kind Shakespeare and Tolstoi and Hauptmann wrotej
the kind Alexis Granowsky used to produce in Russia with its lovely burden
of folk imagery, music and song. In reading "Lear," for example, I al-
ways feel a sudden lift when we come to the heath scene. There is something
grand and universal in the naked relationship of the old king to the powers
of nature around him.

And as characters available to art purposes, to repeat, those who live as it
were with their feet in the earth and their heads bare to the storms, the light-
ning and the gale those who labor with their hands wresting from cryptic
nature her goods and stores of sustenance these develop a wisdom of living
which seems to me more real and beautiful than those who develop their
values and ambitions from rubbing shoulders in a crowded city.

And that wisdom it is which seems important a wisdom which is a con-
sciousness of the great eternal Presence by which men live and move and
have their being and without which they die. And if the pkywrights who
tell of captains and lords, kings and queens, dolls and manikins, can open up
the doors of crowded buildings, cut through the filmy arras that conceals our
human instincts and hopes and fears and go to the first principles of human
identity then they raise the hair on our heads too with their voice from the
sacred grove of Colonus. And no longer do we think of man as sophisticated
or folk, but man man alone with his God and his destiny. And when this
happens and rare is Shakespeare, rarer than the Phoenix then the matter
is all one and listeners are all one.

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

But the present dang and confusion of wheel on iron, yelling and clamor
of tickets and tellers, the secrecy of vaults and locks and braggarty mono-
liths of incorruptible concrete and steel these all make it harder for us to see
and hear the God who is the principle of our lives. Maybe I'm crazy on the
idea of God, but then aren't we all? I refer to the wild pell mell rush
every evening out of the city to the country to the country where the birds
are, where the grass is and where there is peace or should be. ^

Now you catch me almost carrying on into a scheme of social philosophy.
And if I wanted to apply this half-surmised esthetic theory to the control
and arrangement of peoples I should say there ought to be plenty of trees
and land and outdoors for every man. For only in the outdoors can we
associate with power and mystery in their most sublime manifestation. And
heaven knows we ought to sense in any way we can whatever touch of sub-
limity there may be vouchsafed unto us in this darkness.

Now it seems that after all I'm saying for myself that folk-drama as
such is or can be more significant than sophisticated drama. Not at all. I
mean to repeat that in the last analysis it is a question of neither folk nor
sophisticate but of man, man in his environment, and it is in the main a
matter for the poet, the creator, the seer. And I would say that indoors
sooner or later man must perish and outdoors there is more of a chance far
him.

To make another dogmatic statement, I would say that cruelty, scorn, and
evils of all sorts are more native to the great cities than not, and therefore
we should be better off without any great cities I mean dose, skyscraper,
bedlam cities. (There's something other than politics behind Russia's ef-
forts to create the ideal commune.) And all the little towns that get too
large for their britches and so full of metropolitan urges and apings that
they cut down all the trees on their main streets and cover the grass and
ground with concrete will be better off when they tear up the concrete, reset
the trees, and grow grass again. And maybe now that we have evolved
wheels and telephones and radios and machinery of long-distance coopera-
tion of all sorts we can all begin to live more among flowers and trees again
and yet keep in touch with each other enough for our sophisticated needs.
Then haply now and again we may also have a word with the Great Pres-
ence where He walks by the river bank at evening ....

Dramatic Art Building

By SAMUEL SELDEN

OR nineteen years The Carolina Playmakers have centered their
activities in the old university building now bearing the name o
The Playmakers Theatre. Erected in 1850, the building had

irTT i acquired a considerable body of tradition before it was remodeled

into a playhouse in 1925. In the two decades since the Playmakers entered
it the old hall has added to itself a thousand more memories. They are
bright memories, most of them memories which will forever be associated
with a little porticoecf theatre set beside a row of green maple trees at "Caro-
lina." For many hundreds of men and women who have come and gone
some to far-away corners of the earth this is the beloved home and symbol
of Playmaking.

Regarded from a sentimental viewpoint, the present Playmakers Theatre
has taken on a certain character which could never be duplicated in any
other building. It has charm, it has intimacy, it has traditions inextricably
bound up with the early life of the University and with the beginnings
of The Carolina Playmakers. For nineteen years, it has served well the
needs of the organization housed in it. Viewed dispassionately, however,
the little theatre has several unconcealable deficiencies^ The activities ^ of
the Playmakers have grown so extensively in the years since their inception
that the present building cannot now hold more than a small part of them.
The office of the Director, the Dramatic Museum, the Business Office, the
Bureau of Community Drama, the Radio Studio, the Scene Shop, the Cos-
tume Shop, and the several store rooms are located in seven different places
on and off the campus all of them outside the theatre and jnost of ^them
at a considerable distance from it. The University classes in Dramatic Art
have trouble finding adequate room for laboratory work, and directors are
constantly hunting spots in which to hold their rehearsals. ^

But elbow room is not the only kind of space which is deficient m tfie
present building. There is another, and perhaps even more important kind.
That is the s&nse of dramatic magmtu&e a sense which every student
actor, playwright and scenic artist must appreciate before he can really
master the techniques of the stage. One of the primary elements of dra-
matic effect is spaciousness. And this cannot be learned very well in a

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

small room. It may be true that an experienced player can stand in a box
and, by the force of his art, make the spectator feel distant horizons and
the far-away stars j but when he is an apprentice he must have certain tan-
gible images of space in order to understand space. Without them, he can-
not learn how sensuously to stretch his muscles and extend his voice to fill
space with his presence. The stage in use now is very small. The proscen-
ium opening is only nineteen feet wide, in contrast with a normal width of
thirty or thirty-two feet. There are practically no wing space and almost
no fly space. Influenced by these limitations, all dramatic action for the
Playmaker stage must be scaled down. The result is often a distortion of
the desired effect. Student craftsmen exposed constantly to such conditions
tend in time to develop a tight, unnatural attitude toward the problems of
pantomime, playwriting and scenery. If later they are assigned to work
on full-size stages, they must learn much of their techniques over again.

The need for a new theatre building became apparent eight years ago.
In 1936 the Playmaker staff began to lay plans. It made a careful study of
the whole problem of housing Playmaker activities, and it formulated a
tentative program in accordance with this study. The main divisions of
the new plan were to include an Auditorium, a Stage, Scenery and Costume
Shops, Dressing Rooms, Store Rooms, Class Rooms, and Offices large
enough to take care of present needs and to allow for considerable expan-
sion in the future. Then the Playmakers looked around for an architect.
They sought the advice of Donald Oenslager, Broadway designer and Pro-
fessor of Design in the Yale University Department of Drama. He was
largely responsible for the planning of the fine Yale Theatre. Professor
Oenslager in turn consulted with Dean Meeks of the Yale School of Archi-
tecture, and the result was a recommendation of two men who were judged
to be most fitted to cope with the peculiar requirements attached to the
campus at Chapel HilL The choice finally fell on Waldron Faulkner of
Washington, D. C. He was approached, and he agreed immediately to
undertake the designing. Several tentative plans were drawn up.

Tlie architect and, the Playmaker staff decided to consult an outside au-
thority before they adopted a final scheme. Mr. Cleon Throckmorton,
leading New York^designer and consultant on many theatre projects, was
turned to at this point. His reaction was clear. He advised changes in the
basic articulation of the building. In the light of his experience, he said
he wa^ convinced that any scheme for a laboratory theatre should have the
stage in the center, with all the other elements (School, Shops, Auditorium

A DRAMATIC ART BUILDING

and Dressing Rooms) grouped around it in such a way as to allow one to
cross from any element to another without having to pass over the Stage.
This was certainly a logical idea. It seemed so utterly sound that Mr.
Faulkner, already somewhat restless over the conditions hitherto imposed
on him, asked if he might scrap all the older schemes and present a new one.
With this permission granted, he completely redrew the theatre in accord-
ance with Mr. Throckmorton's suggestion. This required a search for a
new site, because the revised plan demanded a considerably larger area of
ground than the one then assigned to it. Finally, with the help of the
University Buildings and Grounds Committee, a satisfactory plot was picked
in the New Campus on the level ground just east of the Bell Tower. It
is a beautiful spot. Set in the edge of the University Woods and flanked
by one of the paths leading to Kenan Stadium, it is just across the road from
the Library. While the location is now some distance from the center of
campus activities, it lies directly in the path of future expansion. With the
development of the New Campus, the center of university life is bound to
shift. A building erected on the site selected will then be very favorably
located.

The present plans for the new Dramatic Art Building are shown in the
diagrams on the following pages. The basic composition includes four
wings, comprising Auditorium, School, Shops, and Dressing Rooms, grouped
around the Stage in the middle. In this arrangement, the Stage becomes
the pivot and radial center for all activities in the building. At the same
time, means are provided for traffic between the four wings especially be-
tween the School block and the Shops and Dressing Rooms without a
crossing on the stage. This scheme permits work in the rear and two side
blocks to continue without fear of any disturbance to rehearsals and per-
formances in progress on the stage.

A glance at the plan of the first floor shows an ample stage house with
a total inside width of seventy feet, depth of thirty-eight feet, and a pros-
cenium opening of thirty-two feet. The gridiron is sixty-five feet above the
floor. The Auditorium is designed to hold slightly more than five hundred
spectators. Since the University already has a large auditorium in Memo-
rial Hall, the seating capacity for the new theatre is, perhaps, adequate.
One of the leading desires of the architect and his advisers from^the de-
partmental staff is to carry over into the new theatre some of that intimacy
which constitutes a principal part of the old theatre's charm. The place-
ment of the Business Office, Lobby and Coat Rooms is conventional. A

--4 69

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

cloister on each side of the Auditorium makes it possible for one to reach
the Stage from the front of the house on this floor without undue exposure
to the weather. The School block on the first floor contains the Green
Room, the Drafting Room, and the Library. The Library is so located
that it may be readily accessible to the artists in the Drafting Room, crafts-
men in the School as a whole, and the technicians in the Shops. Opening off
the Green Room is a small pantry for the use of actors and technical people
having to work late} and near one of the outer entrances is an information
booth for students and visitors.

FIRST FLOOfc PLA/f *

The Dressing Rooms are in a block near one School entrance, and the
Scene Shops are in a block near the other. The Paint Shop is two stories
high. On the floor directly below is the Construction Shop where scenery
is built out of earshot of the stage. When the units have been assembled,
they may be passed up through a slot to the floor above where they will be
painted. The Paint Shop, when not in use for painting, can be made to
serve as an emergency dock for scenery and properties*

-[ 70 )*>-

A DRAMATIC ART BUILDING

If one turns to the plan of the second floor, one sees the upper parts of
the Stage, Auditorium and Paint Shop* The Costume Shop where costumes
will be designed, made and stored is directly over the Dressing Rooms on
the floor below. The control of costume and make-up work is thus unified.
Over the Lobby in the front of the house is a Museum for showing books,
stage drawings, models and other materials of general interest. At one end is
the Office of the Director, and at the other that of his Secretary, who
will from this situation control the entrance to the Museum. On the second
floor of the School block are located Office and Seminar Rooms. On the
floor just above there are two more large rooms for rehearsal purposes. The
balcony over the Auditorium contains a projection booth for motion-pictures.

SECOND FLOOR. PLAM

The basement of the building is a very busy place. Under the Lobby is a
Lounge where audiences can gather during intermissions. The Lounge
serves also as a lobby to the Rehearsal Theatre on this floor. This second
theatre, smaller than the one on the main floor, will be used for rehearsals
and for the Experimental Tryouts of new scripts. The auditorium is directly

-S{ 71 ]>-

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

under the main Auditorium and its stage is under the trapped portion of
the main Stage. Corridors on each side make it possible for one to reach the
rear of the building without going out-of-doors. The rest of the basement
is set aside largely for storage purposes and for supplementary Dressing
Rooms.

1 j r-Htt

karma rvn/uTvtt littttMft jg

(U* U" U

* BASEMENT PLA/f *

Since the time these drawings were made, plans have gone forward for
the development of an All-University Radio Studio. Because much of the
equipment and personnel which would be employed in it would have to be
drawn from the theatre organization, it would seem logical for the Studio
to be placed in or near the projected building here described. Several ideas
have been advanced. One is to locate the Radio rooms on top of the School
block. Another, and probably better, idea is to construct a separate building
back of the Theatre. If some day the University should erect also, as
planned, a small studio for the making of educational and dramatic films,
this unit with the radio unit might together fill out a design around a little
service court behind, or beside, the main playhouse.

Miracle at Manteo

F YOU'RE looking for the birth of a communal theatre in this
country, watch Roanoke Island, for here is maturing a dramatic
innovation which is taking its place in the economic pattern of
the community.

Anthony F. Merrill, The Baltimore Sunday Sun, Oct. 9, 1938.

The Lost Colony, Paul Green's drama of American democracy, was pre-
sented each summer from 1937 through 1941 in the Waterside Theatre on
Roanoke Island at the site of the old "Citie of Raleigh." A culmination of
the annual local celebrations held since 1894, The Lost Colony began as a
commemoration of the three hundred fiftieth anniversary of the founding of
the first English colony in the New World.

The production, designed and directed by Samuel Selden, merged Manteo
townspeople business men, housewives and children with CCC boys, pro-
fessional actors, singers from the Westminster Choir School of Princeton,
New Jersey, and a group of actors and technicians from The Carolina Play-
makers into a homogeneous dramatic spectacle. The result was so potent
dramatically that The Lost Colony grew quickly from a local celebration into
a national institution, interrupted only by the exigencies of war.

The impact upon the nation of the uniquely American drama is evidenced
in excerpts from the writings of leading critics.

Editor's Note.

Mr. Green has written history with a compassion that turns his characters
into unconscious symbols of a brave new world. He has communicated their
earnestness by contrasting the egotistical court of Queen Elizabeth with the
rude austerity of life inside the embattled log fort amid hostile savages..
The dances translate the freshness and wildness of the new world more elo-
quently than words or scenery could. The glory of the ancient English
hymns, carols and ballads, sung to an organ accompaniment, pulls the lost
colonists into the great stream of human nobility. Part pageant, part
masque, The Lost Colony is a simply stated idealization of the adventurous
impulse that founded this nation in the restless image of Shakespeare's Eng-
land. We can be wise 350 years after the event. Mr. Green's wisdom is
rooted in a poet's love of a fair land. ...

Being chiefly a community enterprise, it overflows with sincerity. For
the simple things, when they are honestly intended, are both humbling and

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

exalting. They are more religious than sermons. They are the truth of
the spirit that oftentimes makes men greater than they mean to be.

Brooks Atkinson. The New York Times, August 1 5, 1 937.

To Paul Green and his associates, the whole Roanoke Island venture has
become a broad canvas for theatrical experiment. This has been done along
the most independent lines, and with no regard for what Broadway and the
Schuberts would have done under similar circumstances. . . .

They shy from producing a 'pageant,' just as many audiences refuse to
watch them. But in The Lost Colony } there are scenes in which masses of
people on the wide stage make the effects. . . . An opera could be written on
the Virginia Dare story, but the superb music of the Westminster Choir and
an organ woven subtly into the story serves far better, . . .

All the so-called modern staging systems are used. A permanent set
behind movable flats and props and two side platforms are used alternately.
By clever lighting, the eleven scenes move along without a second's wait.
. . . The production pleased the First Lady, Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt, who
arrived last night sitting in the back of a CCC truck with a large party. It
probably will please equally the 100,000 expected to see it before the season
closes. . . . Paul Green's major dramatic experiment. . . .

John Selby, Associated Press Arts Editor.

The conventional musical show is a shabby frame for robust material j the
familiar pattern of libretto, song, dance and low comedy flattens out an
honest subject. What the American saga needs to arouse an audience is a
serious work of art part masque, part pageant, part symphonic drama,
based conscientiously on the known facts of our history. Paul Green's The
Lost Colony j produced during the summer at Roanoke Island, N. C, is a
case in point. It was the idealized story of Sir Walter Raleigh's mysteri-
ously tragic attempt to found a colony in America in 1587; it was written
out of a profound love for our heritage, set to old English music and folk
dances and staged with exalting reverence.

Brooks Atkinson. The New York Times, September 12, 1937.
,-4( 74

Retrospect and Prospect

By* GEORGE R. COFFMAN

WENTY-SIX years ago Frederick H. Koch, to use his happy
phrasing, came back home again "among the red hills and green
pines" of his ancestral South. With his coming, the history of
The Carolina Playmakers began. With his passing August 16,
1 944, its historian must turn back to 1918 and on page one write Retrospect
as the chapter heading. Professor, dreamer, builder these are the key
words for that unwritten chapter. In its beginnings the scope of The Caro-
lina Playmakers was Chapel Hill. In 1944, it embraced the Continent.

During those early years when Professor Koch and Paul Green and
Elizabeth Lay, Hubert Heffner and Thomas Wolfe, and others of the
playwriting group sat around "the long black walnut table" in the library,
their efforts centered almost exclusively on the campus of the University.
Soon Professor Koch through the annual state festival and drama tourna-
ment of the Carolina Dramatic Association broadened his activities to in-
clude all of North Carolina. The wider range came next with The Caro-
lina Playmaker tours, extending geographically from the deep South to
Washington, New York, and Boston. As Professor Koch spread far and
wide the gospel of the "f oik play" through lectures and summer school
teaching, he became internationally known. Then, in turn, critics and his-
torians of American drama gave him first ranking as leader of a regional
movement for native drama.

It is fitting that here in Chapel Hill Professor Koch should have^envi-
sioned such a dream and should have made it a reality. The University of
North Carolina is the home of dreamers, seers, and builders of a new eco-
nomic and cultural South. The Nation's Problem Number One is and has
been their opportunity. The briefest roll call suggests the band of choice
spirits with whom Fred Koch became allied as colleague when he came from
North Dakota to North Carolina. Professor E. C. Branson in 1914, under
the inspiration of President Edward Kidder Graham, founded the Departr-
ment of Rural Social Economics to study and develop constructive policies
for the country life of this commonwealth. Its business was to teach the
citizens of the state the "North Carolina of day-after-tomorrow." In 1922

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

a group of ten faculty members conceived the idea which under the director-
ship first of Dr. L. R* Wilson and later of Mr. W. T. Couch developed into
one of the best university presses in the United States. Next in order, in
1924 Dr. Howard W. Odum became first director of the University of
North Carolina Institute for Research in Social Science. The far-flung range
of its activities and the dynamic energy of its director reach from studies in
sociology, economics, history, geography, and law to folklore and other
fields of linguistics and literary interests. Then there is Dr. J. G. deR.
Hamilton, who in 1927 began to work out a project conceived several years
earlier and who today knows every highway and byway of every Southern
state. As a result, from public offices and private attics he has massed
2,000,000 manuscripts the Southern Historical Collection. These manu-
scripts, including diaries, unpublished reminiscences, letters, plantation rec-
ords, ledgers, and other documents of industrial and business undertakings
form unrivaled data for a historical interpretation of practically every
phase of Southern life.

So it was fitting that Dr. Greenlaw, another of these dreamers and work-
ers, should in 1918 call Professor Koch, a new torchbearer, to the Univer-
sity of North Carolina. Here what he did yesterday, what his fellow-
workers are doing today, and what they and others will do tomorrow are
being "woven into the romance of the Southern institutions."

In this Sesquicentennial year of the University and in this volume of its
publications entitled Pioneering a Peoples Theatre, it is highly fitting that
we now look to the future of all that The Playmakers and its founder have
come to represent. It is a nucleus and a symbol 3 and it is still the living
embodiment of a creed. Around it a university department is to be further
consolidated and developed and to be coordinated with allied departments
in the creative and interpretative arts. Its leaders through The Carolina
Dramatic Association should continue in the spirit of its founder to be the
hspjring force and the guiding counsel for wholesome and constructive dra-
matic entertainment in every rural community and in every town and city
of this State. The annual festival of this Association in the Koch Memorial
Theatre, combined with those of music and the other arts, might prove a
model for a state theatre throughout the South and over the whole country.
Thus through this cultural medium a great contribution might be made to
the physical and spiritual regeneration of our people as a whole.

In prospect it seems especially fitting this Sesquicentennial year to sug-
gest a project here outlined in brief. This project would be a comprehen-

-8{ 76

RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT

sive history of drama in the South. Such a history would use studies that
have been made or are being made, for example, of the history of dramatic
production in Williamsburg and Richmond, Charleston and New Orleans.
It would evaluate these and other dramatic activities down to the dose of
the colonial and post-colonial periods in relation to the political, social, and
cultural life of the times. As a background to the renaissance of the past
two decades, it would utilize materials collected by Dr. Hamilton, studies
made through the Institute for Research in Social Science, or other books on
the Southern scene by the University Press. Most important as basic mate-
rial in the South for the past twenty-five years would be the carefully filed
and documented records preserved by Professor Koch. Again, with this
period of the renaissance the historian would study creation in drama in com-
parison with oth^r literary activities here in the South. And finally, he
would evaluate this whole movement through the South for a native drama
in relation to similar movements abroad and in this country.

But, to return, the great task implicit in realizing a people's theatre a
task nobly begun is one to which The Playmakers through the Depart-
ment of Dramatic Art in the University may highly dedicate itself.

Credo

From the first our particular interest has been the making of fresh dra-
matic forms, in playwriting and in acting. We have cherished the locality,
believing that if the locality were interpreted faithfully, it might show us
the way to the universal. For if we can see the lives of those about us with
understanding with imagination why may we not interpret that life^in
significant images for all? It was so with the Greeks before us, and with
our own English forebears. It has been so in all lasting art. It should be
so for us here in America.

Frederick H. Koch. The Carolina Ploy-Book, Vol. XVI, No. 1.

The Staff of the Carolina
Playmakers

By* MARION FITZ-SIMONS

HEN a theatre history is written, the historian if he be a wise
and just chronicler emerges not with a calendar of dates and
productions, although they serve as milestones, but with a group
of personalities, of living men and women. The theatre idea
may be one man's dream and one man's vision 5 but the theatre in practice
and the theatre growing is a laminated structure built of the energies, shaped
by the minds and colored with the imaginations of all who have worked in
it and for it. So with the Playmaker Theatre and the Department of Dra-
matic Art which has grown up around it: the story of the people who have
directed the course of the last twenty-six years is the story of the develop-
ment of a college department, extended to include most of the tributary
theatre arts, and a Theatre with at least state-wide impact. The Playmaker
Staff, although by no means the only people who have contributed toward
the design and structure of the theatre, are at least the core 5 and the sum of
their efforts is the organization as it is known today.

GEORGE V. DENNY, Carolina graduate and actor in the first Playmaker
production, When Witches Ride, was the first staff member, becoming Busi-
ness Manager of the Playmakers and Instructor of Play Production in 1 924.
His genius for promotion and real understanding of publicity values led
him to organize the first subscription audience and to book the first tours,
which carried the Playmaker name and gospel throughout North Carolina,
and on up the eastern seaboard as far north as Boston. He also directed and
acted in a number of productions. In 1926, he resigned to enter the pro-
fessional theatre 5 and is now president of Town Hall in New York and
founder and director of Town Hall of the Air.

P. L. ELMORE^ in 1923, while still a student, became Playmaker Stage
Manager, which position he held after graduation in 1925 until his resig-
nation in 1927 to enter the professional theatre. Lee Elmore has been in
and out of the theatre since leaving the Playmakers, alternating directing
(most recently of The Day Will Come for Leo BirinsH) with his position
as an official of Lord and Taylor department store in New York.

THE STAFF OF THE CAROLINA PLAYMAKERS

HUBERT C. HEFFNER, himself a Playmaker actor and author of Dod
Gast Ye Both, joined the staff in 1926, after having taught at the Univer-
sity of Wyoming and the University of Arizona. He was Assistant Di-
rector and headed the Playmaker work in the year 1926-27, when Professor
Koch was away on leave. Under his very successful management, Play-
maker touring became not only an established institution, but such a lucra-
tive one that it almost entirely financed the Chapel Hill productions of the
Playmakers. He is author, with Samuel Selden and Hunton D. Sellman,
of Modern Theatre Practice. He left in 1930 to head the dramatic work
at Northwestern University, where he stayed until called in 1938 to be head
of the Department of Speech and Drama at Stanford University, which
post he still holds.

*SAMUEL SELDEN came in 1927 as Instructor in Dramatic Art and first
Technical Director of the Playmakers. A graduate of Yale, professional
actor, stage manager, and technical director listing experience with The
Provincetown Playhouse, the Theatre Guild, the Intimate Opera Company,
the road company of Eugene O'NeilPs Desire Under the Elms, and five
resident and traveling stock companies he offered courses in the Construc-
tion and Painting of Scenery, Stage Lighting, Acting and Directing. Under
his tutelage the theatre techniques of the Playmakers definitely emerged
from the pioneer period. In 1929 he went on leave from the University to
the New York School of Fine and Applied Art to study Art and Architec-
ture; in 1930 he became Assistant Professor of Dramatic Art and Assistant
Director of Playmakers; in the summers of 1932 and 1933 he studied at
Columbia University in New York; in 1937 he directed Paul Green's The
Lost Colony, which ran for five succeeding summers until closed in 1941 by
wartime restrictions; in 1938 he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship and
spent half the year in New York in study and the other half in touring the
theatres of Europe; in the same year he became Associate Professor of Dra-
matic Art and Associate Director of the Playmakers. During these years,^he
worked insistently on the curriculum of the Dramatic Art Department, ini-
tiating new courses both on the undergraduate and graduate levels, teach-
ing a wide range of technical courses, and assisting with the teaching of Pro-
fessor Koch's courses in Playwriting. Through this period, he was also
writing a number of books, at least two of which lead popularity lists of

C * The asterisk is used here and hereinafter to indicate that the peraon is a member of the present itaf
of The Carolina Playmakers.

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

theatre texts for colleges and high schools. Stage Scenery and Lighting, a
collaboration with Hunton D* Sellman, A Player** Handbook, Modern
Theatre Practice, with sections by Hubert Heffner and Hunton Sellman,
and The Stage in Action are to be joined this year by a new actor's text, soon
to be published by F. S. Crofts. Since the death of Professor Koch in the
summer of 1944, Mr. Selden has been Acting Head of the Department of
Dramatic Art and Director of the Playmakers.

ELMER HALL, a graduate of Massachusetts Normal Art School, has been
associated with the Playmakers on several separate occasions, the first of
these being in 1929-30 when Samuel Selden was on leave in New York. In
1929 and again in the summer of 1931, Elmer Hall was temporary Tech-
nical Director and Instructor in theatre techniques. In 1 938 he again joined
the staff as Assistant Professor of Dramatic Art and Technical Director of
Playmakers, giving courses in Scene Design, Construction, and Painting
and Stage Lighting. His chief contribution to the body of Playmaker tra-
dition was a healthy respect for fine craftsmanship. He left in 1940 to be-
come head of the drama work at McGill University in Canada.

RALPH WESTERMAN came from the Cape Playhouse in. Dennis, Massa-
chusetts, where he had been a staff member for a number of years, to become
Business Manager for the year 1930-31. Mr. Westerman left to go to the
west coast to take a position in extension work in adult education.

fHARRY E. DAVIS came to the Playmakers in 1931, after having taught
at Mississippi State College for Women and having been for two years di-
rector of the Town Theatre and the Children's Theatre in Columbia, South
Carolina. He became Technical Director and Business Manager of the
Playmakers and Instructor in Dramatic Art, teaching courses in Scene De-
sign and Construction and Stage Lighting. In 1 933 he organized the Junior
Carolina Playmakers, a children's group which presented plays for a child
audience. Two of these, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves and Cinderella
were also written by Mr. Davis. In 1937 he organized, directed and acted
with a group, selected from and sponsored by The Carolina Playmakers,
^Wch presented a summer season of Carolina plays at the Nantucket Yacht
Club, Nantucket, Massachusetts. In the same year he was relieved of the
duties of Business Manager and became an Assistant Professor of Dramatic

C 'fThis fymbol h wed here and hereinafter to designate members of the Playmaker Staf on leave with
the Armed Services. .

if 80 :}>-

THE STAFF OF THE CAROLINA PLAYMAKERS

Art and Assistant Director of Playmakers. In the summer of 1939, he be-
came Stage Manager of The Lost Colony and played the part of the First
Soldier, and was Associate Director of that play in 1 939 and 1 940. He went
on leave to Columbia University for further study in the fall of 1939, re-
turning in 1940 to hold his position of Technical Director. In the fall of
1941, he managed the Playmaker company of The House of Connelly on
an extensive Redpath Tour and played the part of "Robert Connelly." He
left in 1942 to join the army.

ORA MAE DAVIS, wife of Harry Davis and "Mammy" to several genera-
tions of Playmakers, came in 1 93 1 to find the costume department practical-
ly not extant, except for the volunteer services of faculty wives, notably
Mrs. Prouty and Mrs. Valentine. At first her field by a sort of default,
Playmaker costuming later became her own province by divine right of
indefatigable labor and fearless undertaking of staggering assignments
which piled Shakespearean productions on top of operettas and climaxed the
whole by the brilliant dressing of the two Paul Green symphonic dramas,
The Lost Colony and The Highland Call. At the time of her death in the
spring of 1942, costuming had been raised, solely through her efforts, to a
major technical department of Playmakers and to a place in the college
curriculum. Mrs. Davis also gave work in dance and body training, though
always on an extra-curricular basis, and designed the movement for several
of the operettas and Shakespearean productions.

PHOEBE BARR, ex-Denishawn dancer, came to Chapel Hill in 1931j and
although she was never officially a member of the Playmaker Staff, the im-
pact of her work upon Playmaker activities is still apparent. In the fall of
1 932 she organized a private dance group of men and women. At the same
time she associated herself with the Playmakers as an actor, as visiting lec-
turer on movement for the stage, and choreographer for the outdoor pro-
ductions and operettas. The performance in Kenan Stadium in the summer
of 1932 of Alcestis, with choric dances created by Mrs. Barr, fully demon-
strated the compelling power of the integration of music, dance, and drama 5
and since that year, no outdoor production, no operetta has been presented
by The Carolina Playmakers without dancing designed to decorate and
amplify it. Mrs. Barr's stimulation of individual students is apparent from
the record: six professional dancers and teachers of dance list ^ her as ^ first
teacher j and many more actors, teachers, writers, students in widely diver-
gent fields were influenced to the profound benefit of themselves and their

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

work. Mrs. Barr left Chapel Hill in 1936, when her husband was called
to the faculty of Tulane University.

DARICE PARKER, departmental secretary-extraordinary from 1934, and
as such, ex-officio staff member, took over the duties of Business Manager
and Executive Secretary of the Carolina Dramatic Association when her
husband, John Parker, left to join the array in 1942. A storehouse of in-
formation, master diplomat and wise to the delicate adjustments necessary
between the sprawling, ramified elements of so complex an organization,
she was sorely missed when, in the summer of 1943, she resigned to be with
her husband. She was active for a season in U. S. O. work.

*PAUL GREEN joined the Playmaker Staff officially in 1936. Member
of the early illustrious group of pioneer Playmakers, philosopher, poet,
essayist, novelist, scenarist, author of In Abraham's Bosom (Pulitzer Prize
Play in 1927), The House of Connelly (produced in New York in 1931),
Johnny Johnson (Broadway production in 1936), The Lost Colony (pre-
sented at Fort Raleigh on Roanoke Island 1937-1941), The Highland Call
(given in Fayetteville in 1939 and 1940), Native Son (a dramatization of
the novel by Richard Wright produced in New York in 1941), Shroud My
Body Down, Enchanted Maze, The Field God, Roll Sweet Chariot, The
Man Who Died at Twelve O'Clock, The No 'Count Boy, and other plays,
many of which had their first production in the Playmaker Theatre he
became literary adviser to the Playmakers and Professor of Dramatic Art,
teaching seminars in Philosophical Ideas in Dramatic Art, and Technical
Problems in Playwriting in the newly formed graduate division of the
Dramatic Art Department. He apportions his time now between Chapel
Hill and Hollywood, following his own profession on the one hand and
guiding the professional skills of the students on the other.

HOWARD W. BAILEY, one-time Playmaker, later actor and radio actor in
New York and elsewhere, then North Carolina Director of Federal Theatre
Projects, became in 1937 Business Manager of the Playmakers and first In-
structor of Voice and Diction in the Dramatic Art Department. Through-
out the five summers of The Lost Colony, he played the part of "Lord
Essex," and in 1941 became Associate Director of the play. Mr. Bailey
stayed with the Staff only one year, leaving to become director of drama at
Rollins College in Florida.

fJoHN W. PARKER, former Playmaker, author of Sleep on, Lemuel, and

THE STAFF OF THE CAROLINA PLAYMAKERS

State Director of the Bureau of Community Drama from 1934, became
Business Manager of the Playmakers in 1938. As Executive Secretary of
the Carolina Dramatic Association, he traveled extensively over the state,
helping to organize groups, giving extension courses in theatre work and
helping to direct plays. He directed several pageants, and is perhaps best
known in the state for staging and directing The Highland Call, by Paul
Green, in Fayetteville in 1939 and 1940. Mr. Parker made a lasting con-
tribution to the cause of drama in the State in his work with the organization
of dramatic curricula in the high schools. He has been on leave since 1942,
serving with the U. S. Army.

fEARL WYNN came to the Playmakers in 1938 from Northwestern Uni-
versity to become Instructor in Voice and Diction and to organize courses in
Radio Acting and Production. In 1 939 he directed the radio productions of
"The Carolina Playmakers of the Air" with programs at first for a local,
then a state, and finally a national audience. In the summers of 1940 and
1941 he played "Governor White" in The Lost Colony. Mr. Wynn re-
signed in 1 942 to work as a civilian with the Quartermaster Corps of the
U. S. Army and has since joined the Navy and is now in Hollywood writ-
ing scripts for Naval training films,

f LYNN GAULT, one-time Playmaker, became the first Staff Designer in
1940 when he left his position at Hiram College to join The Carolina Play-
makers. A writer, author of His Soon Companions published in American
Folk Plays, authority on English Folk Dance, he assisted with the scenery,
directed the country dance, and, in 1941, played the "Master of Ceremonies"
in The Lost Colony. Mr. Gault remained with the Playmakers until called
to enter the Army in 1 942.

*!RENE SMART, who assisted in the costume work for The Lost Colony and
The Highland Call, and with Play maker costuming from 1939 to the death
of Mrs. Davis, became in 1942 Director of Costumes and Assistant in the
course in Costuming in the Dramatic Art Department. She has maintained
the dressing of Playmaker productions on the high level established by Mrs.
Davis, and given her students, in addition to a fine feeling for color and
line, sound training in the fundamentals of clothing construction. She is
now a full Instructor on the University faculty. In the summer of 1944,
Mrs. Smart worked in New York with Eaves Costumes and later with Paul
Dupont, assisting with the costuming for the productions of Anna Lwasta
and The Seven Lively Arts.

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

JOSEPHINA NIGGLI, former Playmaker, Texan-Mexican playwright, au-
thor o a popular volume of one-act Mexican folk plays as well as several
full-length dramas, returned to the Playmakers first as an Assistant and
later, in 1942, as Instructor in the radio division. Herself an actor and
playwright, her energies were more directed to script-writing and dramatic
production than to technical radio. Miss Niggli resigned in 1943 and re-
turned to her home in San Antonio, where she is at present working. Her
novel, Mexican Village, is soon to be published by the University of North
Carolina Press.

*DOUGLAS HUME, ex-Playmaker, student of Maria Ouspenskaya, actor
and part-time director of The First Theatre in Monterey, California, left
his position at Chico College and joined the staff in 1942 as Assistant Pro-
fessor of Speech and assistant to Professor Koch in the dramatic literature
courses. In 1943 he became an Assistant Professor of Dramatic Art; and
in the years of the wartime manpower shortage, has doubled in brass as an
extremely conscientious teacher on the one hand and an able and versatile
actor on the other.

*FOSTER Fixz-SiMONs, former Playmaker, internationally known
dancer, who has appeared with Ted Shawn's Men's Group one-night-stand-
ing in all of the forty-eight states, in Canada, Cuba, and England, and who,
with Miriam Winslow, toured the United States and Argentina, author of
Four on a Heath, (published in 1934 by Row, Peterson) and Road into the
Sun (brought out in 1939 by the Dramatic Publishing Company) became
in 1942 Staff Designer and Instructor in Scene Design and Costume Design,
and assistant to Professor Selden in the course in acting. In 1 943 he col-
laborated with Tom Avera on The Twilight Zone, a full-length play pro-
duced as the major original of the year. For the Extension Division he has
taught the course in Modern Drama, and is now reorganizing and will teach
the course in Playwriting. He has served the Playmakers, in addition to his
specific function of designer, as director, actor, choreographer and composer.

*ROBERT BARKER BURROWS came to the Playmakers from the position of
Director of Drama in Lincoln High School, Seattle, Washington, after the
beginning of the 1942 season. He has taught courses in Scene Construction
and Stage Lighting, and designed the setting for the Playmaker production
of Watch on the Rhine in 1 943. In the summer of 1 943 he attended North-
western University for further study j and in the summer of 1944 he acted
as technical director for the University Theatre at Ann Arbor, Michigan.

THE STAFF OF THE CAROLINA PLAYMAKERS

JOSEPH SALEK, ex-Playmaker, joined the Staff as Business Manager and
Executive Secretary of the Bureau of Community Drama for the year 1943-
44. In that year he also assisted Professor Selden in the course in acting,
directed the operetta, acted in several major productions and assisted with
the painting of scenery. He is now in Santa Fe, New Mexico, painting.

*LuciLE CULBERT became a member of the Staff in 1943 while still a
graduate student in the Dramatic Art Department. She assumed the duties
of Instructor in the radio branch upon Josephina NigglPs resignation} and
has with consummate determination and energy achieved a new studio (the
Navy having taken over the space occupied by the original one) under war-
time labor conditions and, in spite of an apparently impossible wall of
priorities and governmental red tape, managed to secure reasonably ade-
quate equipment. In 1 945, in conjunction with the Department of Journal-
ism, she has been producing a series of sustaining programs through sta-
tions WPTF and WRAL in Raleigh.

*KAI HEIBERG-JURGENSEN, a native of Denmark, first became a Play-
maker after work with the University Theatre in Copenhagen when he
was granted a Rockefeller Assistantship in the Department of Dramatic Art
in 1941. In 1942 he collaborated with Robert Schenkkan on a new trans-
lation of Ibsen's Peer Gynt for production in the Forest Theatre} and in
1943 his Down to the Sea y a full-length play, was produced by the Play-
makers. In the year 1943-44 he held the position of Visiting Lecturer in
Playwriting and Theatre Literature at Carnegie Institute of Technology}
and in 1944 he returned, as Visiting Lecturer, to the faculty of the Carolina
Dramatic Art Department. He assists Professor Selden in the Playwrit-
ing and Acting courses, edits the monthly News Letter to Playmakers in
the Armed Services, and has recently helped to organize the showing of a
series of fine foreign films in the Playmaker Theatre.

*LYNETTE WARREN, who was in 1 943 the able and efficient secretary in the
Playmaker business office, became the Business Manager of The Carolina
Playmakers, Secretary of the Bureau of Community Drama, and Execu-
tive Secretary of the Carolina Dramatic Association in 1944.

.These men and women, with the single exception of Phoebe Barr, have
been the paid, official members of the Playmaker Staff from the beginnings
of the organization and still the picture is not complete. The time, sym-
pathetic interest, and encouragement of a host of other people, especially

WONEEfcING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

in the early difficult days, have gone into the building of this institution:
members of other departments in the University Edwin Greenlaw, Archi-
bald Henderson, George McKie, Urban Tignor Holmes, John Manning
Booker, George Coffman, Robert Sharpe, and Russell Smith, to list a few
of the many faculty wives and townspeople, Mrs. A. A. Kluttz, Mrs. Ruth
Valentine, Mrs. W. R Prouty, Mrs. U. T. Holmes, Mrs. Irene Fussier,
Josephine Sharkey, Mr. and Mrs. William Meade Prince and Walter ^ Pres-
ton among others and the long, unsung list of graduate assistants in the
Dramatic Art Department, who have given of their creative resources and
have oftentimes carried responsibilities almost equal to those of the formal
staff.

The mere listing of this group of people and their personal achievements
is no more than a catalogue} the sum of their lives and the dedication of their
energies bears potent testimony to the integrity of the theatre ideaL

The Dramatic South

The South remains what it is mainly a rural region whose ideologies
and ethics of living are derived from the fields, the trees and the hills a
region of violent contradictions like nature itself, of startling beauty and
blinding ugliness, of hate and love, of wealth and degraded poverty, of fer-
tile land and eroded land, of bountiful rainfall and parching drought, of
passion and sloth, of soaring ambition and empty death. . . . But no matter
what happens, whether the ragged sharecropper winds up with hardwood
floors, frigidaires, a perennial cow, electric lights, and gold teeth from the
dentist or not, human drama will go on. For there is no solution to life ex-
cept death. And the only mysterious thing about the South is that it is so
full of both. I don't know why this is so. Only those who understand the
will of God and the principles of history can explain it. For me it is enough
ia the main to say that the materials of songs, poems, stories, art, navels,
and drama will remain here as long as men remain, in whatever condition
of servitude or pride.

Paul Green in his Out of the South.

Plays Produced by the Carolina
Playmakers 1918-1944

ORIGINAL ONE-ACT PLAYS

1919-1920

When Witches Ride, a play of folk supersti-
tion, by Elizabeth A, Lay.

The Return of Buck Gavin, a tragedy of a
mountain outlaw, by Thomas Wolfe.

What Will Barbara Say?, a romance of Chapel
Hill, by Minnie Shepherd Sparrow.

Peggy, a tragedy of a tenant farmer, by Harold
Williamson.

The Fighting Corporal, a Negro comedy, by
Louisa Reid,

Who Pays?, a tragedy of industrial conflict,
by Minnie Shepherd Sparrow.

The Third Night, a ghost play of the Caro-
lina mountains, by Thomas Wolfe.

The Hag, a comedy of folk superstition, by
Elizabeth A. Lay.

1920-1921

Of Nag's Heal, a tragedy of the Carolina

Coast, by Dougald MacMillan.
The Last of the Lowries, a play of the Croatan

outlaws, by Paul Green.
The Miser, a farm tragedy, by Paul Green.
The Vamp, a comedy of university life, by

William Royal.
The Old Man of Edenton, a melodrama of

colonial Carolina, by Paul Green.
The Chatham Rabbit, a comedy of college

life, by Legette Blythe.
The Reafmg, a play of social problems, by

John Terry.
In Dixorts Kitchen, a comedy of a country

courting, by Wilbur Stout.

1921-1922

Reward Offered, a comedy of mountain char-
acters, by Jane Toy.

Trista, a play of colonial superstition, by
Elizabeth A. Lay.

Waffles for Breakfast, a comedy of newly-mar-
ried life, by Mary Yellott.

The Lord's Will, a tragedy of a country
preacher, by Paul Green.

Dogwood Bushes, a romance of the Carolina
country, by Wilbur Stout.

Blackbeard, Pirate of the Carolina Coast, by
Paul Green and Elizabeth A. Lay.

1922-1925

Wrack P'mf, a melodrama of the Carolina

coast, by Paul Green.
Agatha, a romance of the old South, by Jane

Toy.
Wilbur's Cousin-, a comedy of college life, by

Ernest Thompson.
John Lane?s Wife, a tragedy of the farm, by

Mack Gorham.
The Berry Pickers, a Colorado folk comedy,

by Russell Potter.
Mamma, a comedy of modern manners, by

Ernest Thompson.

1923-1924

The Black Rooster, a comedy of country folk,
"by Pearl Setzer.

Nat Macorits Game, a romance of a revolu-
tionary patriot, by Osier Bailey.

Gaius and Gaius, Jr., a comedy of plantation
days, by Lucy M. Cohb.

Servants of God, a , play of a small-town
preacher, by Robert S. Pickens.

The Beaded Buckle, a comedy of present-day
aristocracy, by Frances Gray.

Fixings, a tragedy of a tenant farm woman, by
Erma and Paul Green.

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

The Younger, a comedy of the present-day
flapper, by Sue Byrd Thompson.

The Wheel, the evolution of a college boy, by
Ernest Thompson.

1924-1925

The Honor of Bonaua, a chapter from Recon-
struction days, by Robert Watson Win-
ston.

Politicin' In Horse Cove, a comedy of moun-
tain folk, by Martha Boswell.

The Scuffletown Outlaws, a tragedy of the
Lowrie gang, by William Norment Cox.

Out of the Past, a romance of college life at
Carolina in '61, by Frances Gray.

Jon Bide 0* Sunk Creek, a tragedy of moun-
tain folk, by Martha Boswell.

Quare Medicine, a country comedy of a quack
doctor, by Paul Green.

1925-1926

A Carolina Pierrot, a play of Pierrot on the
university campus, by William J. Macmil-
lan.

Clay, a play of the farm, by David Reid
Hodgin.

1926-1927

Lighted Candles, a tragedy of the Carolina

Highlands, by Margaret Bland.
The Muse and the Movies, a comedy of

Greenwich Village, by Alice Rodewald.
Mr* Perry Writes a Play, a burlesque of folk

play writing, by William DeCatur Perry.
The Marvelous Romance of Wen Chun-Chin,

a Chinese folk play, by Cheng-Chin

Hsiung.

1927-1928

Mountain Music, a California folk play, by

Edith Daseking.
Job's Kinfolks, a tragedy of the mill people,

by Loretto Carroll Bailey.
The Queen Has Her Face Lifted, a fantastic

satire, by Alvin M. Kahn.
The New Eve, an expressionistic play of the

future, by Mary Dirnberger,

Day's End, a California folk play, by Alice

Pieratt,
A Shot Gun Sflicin', a mountain comedy, by

Gertrude Wilson Coffin.

1928-1929

The Family, an episode of the American home,

by Catherine Wilson Nolen.
Graveyard Shift, a play of California factory

workers, by Edith Daseking.
Promise Me, a modern romance cycle, by

Curtis Benjamin.
The Lie, a play of Revolutionary Carolina,

by Wilkeson O'Connell.
Black Water, a sequel to Job's Kinfolks, by

Loretto Carroll Bailey.
Comfanion~Mate Maggie, a Negro comedy,

by Helen Dortch.

1929-1930
The No 'Count Boy, a comedy of Negro life,

by Paul Green.
Magnolias Man y a comedy of the mountain

people, by Gertrude Wilson Coffin,
Being Married, a domestic comedy, by Cath-
erine Wilson Nolen.
For Auntie's Sdke, a comedy of college life,

by John Patric.
Hollyhocks, a play of New England village

folk, by Joseph Philip Fox.
Suspended Animation, a comedy of playmak-

ing, by Kent Creuser.
Death Valley Scatty, a play of the California

desert, by James Milton Wood.

1930-1931

Samuel Hinkle, Fireman, a comedy of New
England village life, by Joseph Philip
Fox.

Cloey, a play of Winston-Salem folk, by Lo-
retto Carroll Bailey.

Git Up An' Bar the Door, a farce of Missis-
sippi folk life, by Arthur Palmer Hudson,

Eve? Snitch, a comedy of Carolina fisherf oik,
by Irene Fussier.

The Blue Remembered Hills, a play of col-
lege life, by Theodore Herman.

PLAYS PRODUCED BY THE PLAYMAKERS, 1918-1944

A Very Pale Pink Angel ', a whimsical satire,

by Ellen Stewart.
Always A Bettin* Man, a comedy of Maryland

folk, by Tom Loy.

1931-1932

A Vision of Eugenics, a very modern extrava-
ganza, by Maurice Ferber.

Old Aus Ramsey, a comedy of Carolina moun-
tain folk, by Charles Elledge.

The Mandarin Coat, a very foolish comedy,
by Olive Newell*

Those Children, a modern comedy, by Os-
mond Molarsky.

Whispering Shadows, a tragedy of the blind,
by Vernon B, Crook.

Patches, a comedy of family life, by Jo Nor-
wood.

The Last Two Shots, a mountain tragedy, by
Irene Fussier.

Treasures, by Irene Fussier.

King, Queen, and Joker, a drama of royalty,
by Irene Fussier.

Birds of a Feather, a domestic comedy, by Jo
Norwood.

Gnmny, a domestic tragedy, by Jack Riley.

The Golden Lioness, a fantasy of Paris in
1750, by Reuben Young Ellison.

Proof, a play about love, by Osmond Molarsky.

Boat-din* Out, a mountain folk comedy, by
Charles Elledge.

Sleep On, Lemuel, a Carolina Negro comedy,
by John W. Parker.

Bloomers, a comedy of family life, by Jo
Norwood.

The Common Gift, a tragedy of working
" women, by Elwyn de Graffenreid.

The Loyal Venture, a drama of colonial Caro-
lina, by Wilkeson O'Connell.

Neighbors of the Dead, a tragedy of heredity
(first act of a full-length play), by Ver-
non Crook.

Q/> Honeycutfs Boy, a play about a country

boy, by Jack Riley.

The Boss of the House, a Carolina country
comedy, by Lubin Leggette.

Chicken Money, a play of Iowa farm life, by
Winifred Tmtle.

The Battle of SAaztfs Mill, a Carolina coun-
try comedy, by Charles Elledge and Mal-
colm Seawell.

Election Returns, a social tragedy (Act I of a
full-length play), by Alonzo Hoyle.

Freights, a drama of the side-lines, by Mar-
jorie Craig.

A Revolt in the Nineties, a romance, by Anne
Wilson.

Playing With Tire, a tragedy of country life,
by Thea W. Whltefield.

A Little Cajun, a play of Louisiana folk, by
Peg Williamson.

Ifs Just Too Bad, a tragedy of college yonth,
by James Alfred Stanley.

Blessed Assurance, a Carolina country com-
edy, by Evelyn McCall.

1932-1933

Old Ninety-Seven, a tragedy of railroad life,
% by Wilbur Dorsett.

Nothing Ever Happens, a modern domestic
tragi-comedy, by Elmer R. Oettinger, Jr.

Gateway, an interlude, by Eugenia Rawls.

Four on a Heath, a grotesque, by Foster Fitz-
Simons.

Sour Fodder, a play of Iowa small-town folk,
by Burdette Kindig.

Creek Swamp Nigger, a Carolina Negro trag-
edy, by Harry W. Coble.

Hell Bent for Honolulu, a college comedy,
by William Bonyun.

And They Lived Happily, a domestic com-
edy, by Marion Tatum.

Stumbling in Dreams, a comedy of Tin Pan
Alley, by George Brown.

Davy Crockett, a play of the frontier, by John
Philip Milhous.

Coal, a play of West Virginia mine folk, by
Marguerite McGinnis.

The State Rests, a play of a small-town court,
by Peggy Ann Harris.

In His Hand, a play of village folk, by Betty
Bolton.

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

The Elders Play, a problem play of youth, by

Sue Roberson.
Honora Wale, a play of Georgia folk, by

Eugenia Rawls,

Each Door, a Carolina folk comedy, by Wil-
bur Dorsett.
Fool's Justice, a Negro tragedy, by Harry W.

Coble.
A Little Boat to India, a springtime farce, by

Foster Fitz-Simons.
Heart Trouble, a comedy of Georgia village

folk, by Bradford White.
Mumsey, a drama of Long Island folk, by

Sarah M. W. Huntley.
One Every MmuU, a modern comedy, by

Everett Jess.
Malone, an Irish folk tragedy, by Marion

Tatum.
The Last Skirmish, a play of West Virginia

mountain people, by Marguerite Mc-

Ginnis.
Second Edition, a psychological drama, by

Robert W. Barnett.
Lights in the Sky, an American comedy, by

William Bonyun.
Design- for Justice, a social commentary, by

Elmer R. Oettinger, Jr.
Comedy at Jive, an American comedy, by

Martha Matthews Hatton.
Mihdusetts Wager, a drama of Polish mili-
tary life, by Edward V. Conrad.
Discontent, a play of industrial strife, by J.

M. Ledbetter, Jr.
Blow Me Down, a comedy of sailor folk, by

William Bonyun.
And the Poet Laughed, a modern comedy

drama, by Burdette Kindig.
Etowah Plantation, a legend of the land, 1 846-

1864, by Eugenia Rawls.
Twtegfi, a dream play, by Martha Matthews

Hatton.
Farewell to Glamour, a modern American

comedy, by James P. McConnaughey.
My Son, a tragedy of a Southwest trapper, by

Frank Mclntosh.

The Salted Puf, a comedy of the time of sap
and smalle fooles, by John Philip Milhous.

The Moon Turns, the conclusion of a youth-
ful romance, by Elmer R. Oettinger, Jr.

Beer on Ice, the burp of a nation, by Harry
W. Coble.

Bull Session, an ironic comedy of college life,
by George Brown.

For Poland, a tragedy of the Great War, by
Ed Conrad.

No Word from the Wise, a comedy of small-
town people, by Wilbur Dorsett.

A Mocking-Bird Singing, a romance of the
South, by Foster Fitz-Simons.

Judgment Comes to Dan'l, a folk comedy of
eastern North Carolina, by Bernice Kelly
Harris.

Eternal Spring, a tragedy of prejudice, by
Robert Barnett.

The Queen Was in the Kitchen, a persistent
comedy, by Ellen Stewart.

Burgundy for Breakfast, an effervescent farce,
by Martha Matthews Hatton.

Three Muggy Rooms in the Bronx, a play of
father and son, by George Brown.

Henna Rinse, a play of "Ye Venus Beauty
Shoppe," by Marion Tatum,

1933-1934

Showing of Eight, a play of a small-town mov-
ing picture theatre, by Leonard Rapport,

Woman, a modern comedy of an ancient
tragedy, by Carl G. Thompson.

November Night, a play of a Pennsylvania
mining town, by Margaret Belle Mc-
Cauley.

HelPs Dreams, a play of modern life, by
Frederica Frederick.

Diana, a moonlight chase, by Kathleen Kra-
henbuhl.

Shadows of Industry, a drama of the financial
world, by Vermont C. Royster.

Smg Jour Own Song, a comedy we hope!,
by Nat Farnworth.

Flight Unending, a tragedy of youth, by
Robert W. Barnett.

r~* 90

PLAYS PRODUCEt) BY

Everglades and Hickory, an episode in the
life of Andrew Jackson, by John F.
Alexander.

Grand Slam, a satiric comedy, by James
Thompson,

Copper Penny, a modern domestic drama, by
Douglas Hume,

Bought with the Vittles, a dude ranch comedy,
by Alton Williams.

Opposite Poles, a play of the divorce prob-
lem, by Margaret Siceloff.

New Rasthenia, a nervous break-down, by
Herman Fussier.

The Head-Ax of Ingfell, a tragedy of the
Igorote hill folk of the Philippines, by
Anne B. Walters.

Driftwood, a tragedy of the fisherfolk of east-
ern Carolina, by Patricia McMullan.

La Capilla, (The Chapel), a legendary ro-
mance of Spanish California, by Fred-
erica Frederick.

Over the Door sill, a play of small-town life,
by Harry W. Coble.

Another Journey, a modern tragedy, by Vir-
gil Lee.

Borrowed of the Night, a tragedy of youth,
by Kathleen Krahenbuhl.

Moon in the Hawthorne Tree, a Georgia
farm tragedy, by Foster Fitz-Simons.

Prelude, a story of youth, by Vermont C. Roy-
ster.

The Stars Are Fire, a comedy of earnest
youth, by Nat Farnworth.

John Brown, an episode in his campaign in
"Bleeding Kansas," by John F. Alex-
ander.

Oh, Hell, a very modern political satire, by
Margaret McCauley.

Shipmates, a play of the water-front, by Don-
ald Pope,
Cottie Mourns, a comedy of sea island folk,

by Patricia McMullan.
Tomorrow, a play of a lodging-house, by

Douglas Hume,
The Lo Fan Joss, a subtle thing, by Herman

PLAYMAKE&S, 1918-1944

Fussier.

Pretty, Plump Angel> a play of youth, by
Leonard Rapport,

"Never a Second Time, a romantic interlude,
by Leonard Rapport.

Release, a play of courage, by Jean Smith
Cantrell.

Third Verse, a comedy of a small-town news-
paper, by Wilbur Dorsett.

Unto the Hills, a play of faiths, by Leonard
Rapport.

Strange Interlaken, a vignette, by Robert
Barnett.

Lifeguards and Fish, a modern comedy of er-
rors, by Margaret Siceloff.

Back Page, a newspaper melodrama, by Don
Shoemaker.

The Golden Wedding, a romantic comedy,
by Alton Williams.

Rich Man! Poor Man!, a Marxian romance,
by Cecilia Allen.

When Floosies Meet, a comedy of pseudo-ar-
tists, by Walter Terry.

The Suicide, a modern interpretation of hell,
by Sara Seawell.

A Beating of Wmgs, a poetic tragedy, by
Foster Fitz-Simons.

Beginners, a belligerent satire, by Bradford
White.

Belle, a small-town tragedy, by Patricia Mc-
Mullan.

When Doctors Fail, a comedy of faith heal-
ing, by W. A. Sigmon.

The Skeleton Rattles His Bones, a modern
domestic comedy drama, by Douglas
Hume.

Spare-Ribs, a comedy of nautical cookery, by
Donald Pope.

Crash, a story of "The Street," by Milton
Kalb.

1934-1935

Sea Psalm, a tragedy of Carolina sea-folk, by
Charles Edward Eaton.

New Anarchy, a play of the banking crisis,
by Philip Goddard Parker.

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

New Nigger, a tragedy of the tobacco coun-
try, by Fred Howard.

Clam Digger, a play of Maine sea-folk, by
Jean Ashe.

Hunger, a tragedy of North Carolina farm
folk, by Ella Mae Daniel.

Traficante, a play of Spanish. Florida, by
Maxeda von Hesse.

The Girl with the White Sweater, a fantasy
of the Carolina mountains, by Margaret
Siceloff.

Where There Is Faith, a sophisticated play
of an unsophisticated girl, by Kathleen
Krahenbuhl.

Concealed Aim, a drama of a small-town bank,
by Carl W. Dennis.

The Passer-By, a play of Carolina village folk,
by Ralph Lyerly.

Ancient Heritage, a drama of a New Eng-
land family, by Philip Goddard Parker.

Octagon $oaf, a Carolina country comedy, by
Nancy Lawlor.

Damned Idealist, a college drama, by Charles
A. Poe.

Rations, a mountain folk comedy, by Cath-
erine Threlkeld.

Confidentially Speaking, a satire on true-story
writing, by Wilbur Dorsett.

Muddy Jordan Waters, a tragedy of the Caro-
lina mountains, by Mildred Moore.

The Villain Gets the Girl, a modern satire in
the old style, by Charles A. Poe.

Pensioner, a play of contemporary social con-
ditions, by Alice A. Truslow.

The Devil's Trampn* Ground, a tragedy of
mixed blood, by Sara Seawell.

Yours and Mine, a comedy of domestic dif-
ficulties, by Ella Mae Daniel.

/ Sing Forever, a tragedy of the North Caro-
lina mountains, by Mildred Moore.

The Settin* Uf, a country wake, by Sara Sea-
^well.

Tsalagi, an historical drama of the Cherokee
Indians, by Billy Greet.

And So They Grew, a play of little ladies,
by Ellen Deppe.

Wait a While, the first act of a full-length
domestic drama, by Kenneth Bartlett.

Goldie, a comedy of a Negro Saturday night,
by Wilbur Dorsett.

Crazy-Patch Quilt, a play of the Carolina
tobacco country, by Anne Hyman Moore.

Co* line, a Carolina folk comedy, by Bernice
Kelley Harris.

Metropolitan Feodor, a romantic drama of
seventeenth-century Russia, by Philip
Goddard Parker.

So It Will Last, an eighteenth century ro-
mance, by William Howard Wang.

The Best Butter, a modern tea-room comedy,
by Joseph Lee Brown.

Virtue, a satiric interlude, by Leonard Rap-
port.

Hangman's Noose, a tragedy, by Charles A.
Poe.

Bathroom Echos^ or The Tale of a Tub, a
slightly ribald farce of character, by
Walter Terry,

Dark Journey, a drama of a farm family, by
Virgil Jackson Lee.

There Ain't No Escape, a comedy of arrested
courtship, by Ella Mae Daniel.

Thou Thief I, a play of small-town compla-
cency, by Ralph Lyerly.

Barn Trash, a mountain mystery-comedy, by
Mildred Moore.

Penny-Wise, a drama of misunderstanding, by
Ellen Deppe.

Queer New World, a Negro comedy-com-
ment, by Wilbur Dorsett.

Debtor's Hall, an historical incident of colo-
nial Massachusetts, by Jean Ashe.

1935-1936

The School Teacher, a play of character con-
flict, by Kenneth E. Bartlett.

The Jew, a drama of the Inquisition, by Wil-
liam Howard Wang.

Across the Tracks, a play of Southern slums,
by Frank Durham.

Cockle Doody Doo, a play of Carolina fish-
erfolk, by Patricia McMullan.

-f 92 }*-

PLAYS PRODUCED BY THE PLAYMAKERS, 1918-1944

Hjemlengsel (Home Longing) , a Norwegian

folk play, by Gerd Bernhart
The Red Velvet Goat, a tragedy of laughter

and a comedy of tears, by Josephina Nig-

gli-

Take 'Your Choice, a play of college liberal-
ism, by George Starks.

Block Sheef, a tragedy of the color line, by
Marjorie Usher.

Election, a play of politics in a small Texas
town, by Mary Delaney.

The Other W-ay, a tragedy of indecision, by
Lawrence Wismer.

A Most Lamentable Comedy, a true story, by
Barbara A. Hilton.

Horses and Mice, a tragi-comedy of musical
playmakers, by Joseph Lee Brown.

With Onions, an illogical play of social pro-
test, by Frank Durham.

There Is No Guilt, a play of a pacifist who
died, by William Howard Wang.

Transient, a play of homeless men, by Walter
Spearman,

The Eternal Comedy, a play of adolescence,
by Mary Delaney.

Prairie Dust, a play of the Dakota drought,
by Gerd Bernhart.

Raise a Time, Sister, a play of Carolina fish-
erfolk, by Patricia McMullan.

Grandmas Bonnet, a comedy of age, by June
Hogan.

Brownstone Front, a modern domestic trag-
edy, by William Chichester.

Soldadera (Soldier-Womm), a play of the
Mexican Revolution, by Josephina Nig-

Awakening, a play of disillusionment, by
Eleanor Barker.

An Orchid to You, a comedy of sorority life,
by Jean Walker.

Cat Alley, a college comedy, by Kenneth
Bartlett.

An Active** Pledge, a play of college fra-
ternity life, by William A. Barwick.

Frame-Uf, a play of social protest, by Jane
Henle.

Azteca, a tragedy of pre-Conquest Mexico,
by Josephina Niggli.

The Cry of Dolores, the story of Mexican in-
dependence, by Josephina NigglL

Sunday Costs Five Pesos, a Mexican folk
comedy, by Josephina Niggli.

Country Sunday, a play of white justice, by
Walter Spearman.

Mob-Tide, an anti-lynching play, by John
Walker.

Strike-Breaker, a play of protest, by George
Starks.

So Sfin the Noms, a play of Norse gods, by
Gerd Bernhart.

Fire of the Lord, a play of religious fana-
tics, by Frank Durham.

Ocean Harvest, a tragedy of Maine sea-folk,
by Jean Ashe.

1936-1937

Ugly Hands, a tragedy of factory women, by
Kate May Rutherford.

And Things Haffen, a play of post-war sha-
dows, by Don Watters.

Waiting a drama of southwest Virginia moun-
tains, by William Peery.

The Barren Year, a tragedy of a South Caro-
lina farm woman, by David Beaty.

Tidal Wave> a tragedy of the South Carolina
low country, by Evelyn Snider.

Cause Unknown, a tragedy of modern youth*
by John Walker.

Who's Boss?, a comedy of Negro farm life,
by Lubin Leggette.

Widening the Channel, a play of piedmont
Virginia, by Sally Wills Holland. ^

Six Dollars, a tragedy of youth, by Virginia
Peyatt.

Leavin*s, a legend of the Carolina mountains,
by Janie Malloy Britt.

In the Jungle, a drama of the "Milk an3
Honey Route," by William Peery.

The Steep Road, by Joseph Feldman.

Ftmerd Flowers for the Bride, a comedy of
the Blue Ridge Mountains, by Beverley
DuBose Hamer.

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

Mrs. Juliet^ an ironic essay, by David Beaty.
Rosemary's for Remembrance, a play from

the legends of Old Lynnhaven, by Sally

Wills Holland.
Abide With Me, a comedy of rural South

Carolina, by Walter Spearman.
The Sun Sets Early, a play of a small college,

by William Peery.
Near a Spring, a play of southern Indiana, by

Kate May Rutherford.
Thank Rotary, a play of the Big Brother

movement, by William Peery.
Penguin Souf, a Second Avenue nightmare,

by Jean Ashe.

Shattered Glass, a play of a 'woman's frustra-
tion, by Marion Hartshorn.
Long Sweetening a comedy of the hill folk,

by Janie Malloy Britt.
Courtship at Eight, a play of children's love

triangles, by Charlotte Wright.
By Any Other Name, a racial tragedy, by

Marion Hartshorn.
From Sullen Earth, a play of rural South

Carolina, by Frank Durham.
Earth Treading Stars, a Travelers Aid inci-
dent, by Manuel Korn.
The White Doe, a legend of North Carolina

Indians, by William Peery.
Seventy Times Seven, a Carolina folk play,

by William Ivey Long.
"A-Pimn* and A-Dyin*," a mountain comedy,

by Emily Polk Crow.

The Ivory Shawl, a folk play of south Ala-
bama, by Kate Porter Lewis.
Drought, a tragedy of rural South Carolina,

by Walter Spearman.
Fightin* Time, a comedy of southern Indiana,

by Kate May Rutherford.
Toujours Gai, a modern tragedy, by Virginia

La Rochelle.
Barge Incident, a play of the New York

water-front, by Herb Meadow.
Naughty Boy, a New York suburban comedy,

by William Chichester.
The Good-Bye, by Paul Green.

Pair of Quilts, a folk comedy, of eastern
North Carolina, by Bernice Kelley Har-
ris.

While Reporters Watched, a Christmas Eve
newspaper mystery^ by Rose Peagler.

Mary Marge, a comedy of Carolina fisher-
folk, by Ellen Deppe.

One Man's House, a play of a Canadian re-
former, by Gwen Pharis.

The Worm Turns, a comedy of adolescent
love, by Jean Brabham.

Murder in the Snow, a drama of old Mon-
tana, by Betty Smith and Robert Finch.

Three Foolish Virgins, a Carolina folk com-
edy, by Bernice Kelly Harris.

This Is Villa, a portrait of a Mexican gen-
eral, by Josephina Niggli.

Twilight Song, a play of religious supersti-
tion, by Donald Muller.

Kid Sister, a comedy of adolescence, by Wie-
der Sievers.

Pasque Flower, a play of the Canadian prai-
rie, by Gwen Pharis.

1937-1988

The Cross of Cannair, a social drama of New

York in 1887, by Lynette Heldman.
Uncle Sm&licue, a Carolina mountain com-
edy, by Lois Latham.
This Side Jordan, a play of farm life in the

middle west, by Lynn Gault,
// Don't Make No Difference, a folk play of

Tin Pan Alley, by Joseph Lee Brown.
Hello, Hanging Dawg, a Carolina mountain

comedy, by Lois Latham.
Kunstbeflissener (Student of Art), a play of

an artist's conflict, by Thad Jones*
Pennies for Their Thoughts, a domestic

comedy of an author, by Noel Houston.
Washed in De Blood, a symphonic play of

Negro life, by Rietta Winn Bailey.
Hits Man's Business, a Carolina mountain

play, by Lois Latham.
And Darling, Do Be Tactful, a domestic

comedy, by Rose Peagler*

-4f 94

PLAYS PRODUCED BY THE PLAYMAKERS, 1918-1944

The Last Christmas, a drama of death row,
by Noel Houston.

His Boon Companions, a temperance com-
edy, by Lynn Gault.

Where the Wind Blows Free, a play of the
Texas range, by Emily Polk Crow.

Hidden Heart, a comedy of Armenian-Amer-
ican folk, by Howard Richardson.

Still Stands the House, a drama of the Cana-
dian frontier, by Gwen Pharis.

Wings to Fly Away, a Negro ritual drama, by
Rietta Winn Bailey.

Last Refuge, an outlaw comes home, by Noel
Houston.

Chris Axelson, Blacksmith, a folk comedy of
western Canada, by Gwen Pharis.

West from the Panhandle, a tragedy of the
Dust Bowl, by demon White and Betty
Smith.

Let the Chips Fall, a comedy of domestic in-
trigue, by Emily Polk Crow.

Fresh Widder, a play of Colington Island
fisherfolk, by Lacy Anderson.

Stick 'Em Uf, a comedy of frontier New
Mexico, by Gordon Clouser.

Me an* De Lawd, a Negro play of eastern
North Carolina, by James Bunn Dowdy.

Montana Night, a drama of the old west,
by Robert Finch and Betty Smith.

Triflin* Ways, a comedy of the Missouri
Ozarks, by Lealon N. Jones.

1938-1939

Uncle Spence Goes Modern, a play of the

North Carolina highlands, by William

Wolff.
The Long Ago, a nostalgic Oklahoma comedy,

by Noel Houston.
Bad Yankees, a boarding school comedy of

Mississippi, by Antoinette Sparks.
Wash Carver's Mouse Trap, a Carolina

mountain comedy, by Fred Koch, Jr.
Swapptn' Fever, a comedy of the Missouri

Ozarks, by Lealon N. Jones.
Runaway, a play of a reform school boy, by

Dorothy Lewis.

Design for Stella, a comedy of Manhattan,
by Sanford Stein.

Old Man Taterlug, a play for children, by
Mary Louise Boylston.

The Reticule, a comedy of the reconstruction
period, by Katherine Moran.

According to Law, a drama of an Oklahoma
court, by Noel Houston.

Out from New Bedford, a play of the whal-
ing days in old New Bedford, by Fred-
erick G. Walsh.

These Doggone Elections, a comedy of the
Great Smoky Mountains, by Fred Koch,

Texas Forever, a play of the revolt against
Mexico, by Emily Polk Crow.

Lifstfck, a comedy of college life, by Mary
Hyde.

Swamp Outlaw, a drama of Henry Berry
Lowrie, by Clare Johnson Marley.

Store-Bought Teeth, a comedy of the Ken-
tucky mountains, by Marie Haass.

1939-1940

Squaw Winter, a play of a family in Maine,
by Frances Langsdorf Fox.

Got No Sorrow, a Negro ritual drama of the
Carolina low country, by Caroline Hart
Crum.

Strong Hands for Hurting, a tragedy of pied-
mont North Carolina, by Edward Post.

New Britches, a comedy of western North
Carolina, by Evelyn Dawn Matthews.

Winter Parade, a play of changing America,
by Adrian Spies.

Black Tassels, a play of South Carolina Ne-
gro life, by Frank Guess.

WMpflesnout, a frog fantasy for children,
by Mary Louise Boylston.

Mist in the Hills, a play of the Carolina high-
lands, by Evelyn Dawn Matthews.

Torch in the Wind, a drama of "Billy the
Kid," by Chase Webb.

Banked Tires, a play of an apartment house
janitor, by Constance Smith.

The DeviPs Bread, a morality play, by Ed-

95 -

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

ward Post.

Outside De Gate, a Negro graveyard fantasy,
by William Long.

Mi Amigo, a comedy of "Billy the Kid," by
Chase Webb.

Taffy, the Tiger, a play for children, by
Mary Louise Boylston.

Come Bping, a play of old age and relief,
by William Long.

The Woman from Merry River, a. folk fan-
tasy with music, by Chase Webb.

The Scarlet Petticoat, a folk comedy of the
black belt, by Kate Porter Lewis.

Truth or Consequences, a play of spring in
New York City, by Constance Smith.

Billy, The Kit, by Chase Webb.

Watermelon Time, a folk comedy of the
black belt, by Kate Porter Lewis.

Three Links 0' Chain, a comedy of the Ala-
bama black belt, by Kate Porter Lewis.

Party Dress, a tragedy of the Alabama back-
woods, by Kate Porter Lewis.

The Home in Avondale, a comedy of Bir-
mingham aristocracy, by Kate Porter
Lewis.

June Bug, a play about an ordinary family,
by Lucy Crenshaw.

Dark Bayou, a play of Louisiana farm folk,
by Laurraine Goreau.

August Angel, a play of "Big Meetin* Time,"
by Neil Hartley.

Cozy Corners, a farce of a women's hotel,
by Katherine Hill.

A Daughter to Marry, a comedy of the Penn-
sylvania Amishj by Carl Bashore.

Shd* Nuff Deal, a Negro comedy, by Herbert
Lee.

1940-1941

Night Run, a play of a bus trip, by Emilie
Johnson.

Sarah Baske, a play of the Maine Coast, by
Merle McKay.

The Bridegroom Waits, a comedy of the coun-
try, by Frank Guess.

Sermon on a Monday, a play of the democratic
ideal, by Joseph D. Feldman.

Nine-Hour Shift, a play of the importance of
reason, by Marian Maschin.

Swing You Sinner, a Negro play with music,
by Tom Avera, Jr.

Curse Me These People, a play of the chang-
ing world, by Joe Salek.

Too Much Paradise, a folk play of Eden, by
Sanford Stein.

Uncertain Death, a farce comedy, by William
L, Maner, Jr.

Parole, a play of man's love of freedom, by
Robert Bowers.

The Wider Field, a play of the Connecticut
Valley, by Marian Maschin.

Union Forever, a play of the end of the War
Between the States, by Mrs. A. R. Wilson.

First Wave, a comedy of refugees from Eu-
rope, by George Levy.

Saint of the Lord, a drama of rural life in
eastern North Carolina, by Elton Parker.

The Ninth Commandment, a comedy of Vic-
torian virtue, by W. T. Chichester.

Fire Worshiffer, a play of a middle-western
college, by Lelia Allen McMillan.

Bridal Mist, a romance of Hudson Valley
folk, by Mary Brill.

Hit** Bud's Army Now, a Carolina mountain
comedy, by Jane Elizabeth Morrow.

1941-1942

Black Friday, a play of Chicago middle-class
life, by Barry FarnoL

Her Star Has Moved, a folk comedy of old
Peking, by T'ang Wen Shun.

Tarantula, a play of the Copenhagen water-
front, by Kai Jurgensen.

The Cross on the Door, a tragedy of the in-
vasion of Denmark, by Kai Jurgensen.

A Man's Game, a satirical comedy of diplom-
acy, by Robert Schenkkan.

The Hand of Providence, a play of Quaker
life in Maine, by Selah Richmond.

PLAYS PRODUCED BY THE PLAYMAKERS, 1918-1944

The Red Oak, a play of an Iowa farm, by
Barry Farnol.

The Wandering Dragon, a folk tale of old
China, by T'ang Wen Shun.

The Vengeance of K y noh, a legend of the
Huron Indians, by McCurdy Burnet.

Got No Misery, a comedy of Negro supersti-
tion, by Genie Loaring-Clark.

Pen in Hand, a domestic dilemma, by Ellen
Mary Pillsbury.

A Motley Assembly, an adaptation of an
early American play by Mrs. Mercy Otis
Warren, by Marion Gleason.

Real Trouble, a domestic comedy, by Ellen
Mary Pillsbury.

Boer Commando, a play of the end of the
Boer War, by Robert Schenkkan.

Shee Shih, the Aching Heart, a romance of
ancient Cathay, by T'ang Wen Shun.

Compound Fracture, a comedy of women at
war, by Charlotte Stephenson.

The Toymaker, a play of the Danish water-
front, by Kai Jurgensen.

Androboras, a political fantasy by Robert
Hunter, Goyernor of New York; printed
in New York, 1714. The first play pub-
lished in America. Adapted by Marion
Gleason.

Flower Gold, a play of the Montana Rockies,
by Martha Knight.

Flora Macdonald, a play of the North Caro-
lina Scottish heroine, by Clare J. Marley.
The Candle Popfin', a comedy of the Ken-
tucky mountains, by June Randolph.

1942-1943

King in the Kitchen, a musical fantasy, by

Elaine Berg.
De Lost John, a Negro play of piedmont

Carolina, by Walter Carroll.
Pecos Bull, an historical play of the Texas

frontier, by Russell Rogers.
Food and' the Student, a documentary radio

script, by Wharton Black.
The Sea Wall, an interlude, by Elaine Mendes.

God and the Bishoj*, a comedy of Moravian

customs, by Elizabeth Trotman.
Park Bench Blitz, a black-out, by Lucile

Culbert.
Tim-Berrl, a tragedy of west coast loggers,

by Doris Marsolais.

Look Down, Look Down, a tragedy of a Ne-
gro convict, by Walter Carroll.
Give Us Time to Sing, a vignette of the city,

by David Hanig.
Fleas and Figs, an imaginative comedy of

Syrian life, by Mary-Averett Seelye.
My World to Grieve, a drama of youth in

wartime, by Walter Carroll.
The Right and the Left, an army blackout

skit, by Marcelle Clarke.
Back-Street Blues, a play of Baltimore street

life, by Walter Carroll.
To the Young, a comedy drama of today, by

David Hanig.
Never Miss a Trick, a ghostly comedy, by

Marion Gurney.
There Must We Ever Be, a drama of the war,

by Anne Osterhout.
Sackcl&th and Sauerkraut, a summer-time

comedy, by Ellen Mary Pillsbury.
Muddy Water, a tragedy of river folk, by

David Hardison, Jr.

Sunday's Child, a romantic comedy of a

Methodist parsonage, by Elizabeth Welch.

Crusoe Islanders, a drama of primitive folk

in the swamps of eastern North Carolina,

by Clare J. Marley.

Four in a Room, a play of working girls in
wartime Washington, by Sally Martin.

1943-1944

There's Always Morning, a drama of today,
by David Hanig.

Listen, My Children, a play for tomorrow,
by Tom Avera.

Lovingly, Gay, a wartime comedy, by Gwen-
dolyn E. London.

The Georgian Dandy, a romance of colonial

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

Georgia, by Nananne Porclier and Car-

rington Cross.
Wallers to the Wind, a study in black and

white, by Anne Bridges.
Scuttlebutt, a comedy of Midshipmen's

School, by Tom Avera.
The Valentine Princess, a tale of hearts, by

Elizabeth K. Solem.
Strange Sun, a tragedy of adjustment, by

Paul Ramsey, Jr.
Carnival Cantata, a modern fable, by David

Hanig.
Harp Ufon the Willows, a drama of the

homefront, by Staff Sergeant Harvey L.

Hannah.
Heaven Is What You Make It, a folk play of

the army camps, by Corporal Hyman

Levy.
Prologue, a fantasy, by Corporal Robert E.

Beck.

Hotel Armageddon, a fable of the last re-
sort, by Carrington Cross.
Thirty Minutes Out of Midnight, a play in

verse, by David Hanig.
Morning Edition, a comedy of the news be-

hind tomorrow's headlines, by Kat Hill.
The Wraith of Chimney Rock, a legend of

the Great Smoky Mountains, by Clare J.

Marley.
Divided We Stand, a comedy of modern life,

by Anne Osterhout.
The Tale of a Tub, a comedy of Texas

school teachers, by Myrtle Phaye Proctor.
Salt Sands, a play of Ocracoke Island, North

Carolina, by Virginia Page Spencer.
Pilgrim's Rest, a Georgia Negro comedy, by

Jessie Daniel.

1944 (Fall)

Big Meetin* Time, a ritual-play of the Fal-
conites, by Clare J. Marley.

Unshielded Lamp, a domestic play of today
by David Hanig.

Rich Man, Best Man, a comedy of a Greek
country wedding, by Mary T. Colones.

The Distances to Go, a drama of readjust-
ment, by Anne Osterhout.

Poor Mr, Burton, a comedy-mystery, by Mary
Brooks Popkins.

Wings in the Sun, a study of women who wait,
by Mary Lou MacGowan.

ORIGINAL FULL-LENGTH PLAYS

Job's Kinfolks, a play of the mill people, in
three acts, by Loretto Carroll Bailey, No-
vember 7-8-9, 1929.

Playthings, a comedy of illusion in three acts,
by Anthony Buttitta, February 28, 1931.

Rest for My Soul, a play in three acts, by
Ann Wishart Braddy, May 28, 193L

Strike Song, a new play of southern mill peo-
ple, by Loretto Carroll Bailey, December
10-11-12, 1931.

Snow White, a children's play in two acts, by
Sallie M. Ewing, May 26, 1932.

Sad Words to Gay Music, a new comedy in
three acts, by Alvin Kerr, February 23-
24-25, 1933.

A House Divided, a comedy-drama in three
acts, by Frederica Frederick, May 8, 1934.

Shroud My Body Down, a folk dream, by
Paul Green, December 7-8, 1934.

Water, a play of pioneer settlement in Cali-
fornia, by Alton Williams, April 13,
1935.

The Enchanted Maze, by Paul Green, De-
cember 6-7 and 9, 1935.

Singing Volley, a comedy of Mexican village
life, by Josephina Niggli, July 15, 1936.

The Fair~God (M aline he), a new play of
Maximilian of Mexico, by Josephina Nig-
gli, December 3-4-5, 1936.

Sharecr offer, a new Negro drama in five
scenes, by Fred Howard, February 24-
25-26, 1938.

Smoky Mountain Road, a comedy of the

98 J|H-

PLAYS PRODUCED BY THE PLAYMAKERS, 1918-1944

Carolina highlands, by Fred Koch, Jr.,

July 11-12-13, 1940.
The Marauders, a new play of contemporary

Oklahoma, by Noel Houston, March 5-

6-7-8, 194-1.
Remember Who You Are, a new comedy of

Southern manners, by Frank Guess, July

10-11-12, 1941.
Cocky Doodler, a new comedy of the South,

by William Maner, Jr., July 8-9-10-11,
1942.

Down to the Sea, a new play of Danish fish-
ermen, by Kai Jurgensen, March 3-4-5-6,
1943.

The Twilight Zone, a new play of Europe on
the eve of invasion, by Tom Avera and
Foster Fkz-Simons, March 9-10-11,
1944.

FULL-LENGTH PROFESSIONAL PLAYS

1919-1920

The Importance of Being Earnest, by Oscar
Wilde.

1922-1923
Seventeen, by Booth Tarkington.

1925-1926

The Torch-Bearers, by George Kelly.
Le Malade Imaginaire, by Moliere.

1926-1927

A Thousand years Ago, by Percy MacKaye.
She Stoop to Conquer, by Oliver Goldsmith.
Le Barbier de Seville, by Beaumarchais.

1927-1928
Ten Nights m a Bar-Room, by William W.

Pratt.
You and I, by Philip Barry.

1928-1929
The Dover Road, by A. A. Milne.

1929-1930

The Show-Of, by George Kelly.
The Crocodile Chuckles, by Elmer Greens-
felder.

1930-1931
The Importance of Being Earnest, by Oscar

Wilde.

East Lynn, by Mrs. Henry Wood.
The Perfect Alibi, by A. A. Milne.
The Taming of the Shrew, by William
Shakespeare.

1931-1932

Saturday's Children, by Maxwell Anderson,
A DolPs House, by Henrik Ibsen.

Cinderella, by Harry Davis. (Junior Play-
makers) .

The Butter and Egg Man, by George S. Kauf-
man.

1932-1933

Uncle Tom's Cabin, dramatized by George
L, Aiken.

You Never Can Tell, by George Bernard
Shaw. .

AH Bab a and the Forty Thieves, by Harry
Davis. (Junior Playmakers).
1933-1934

The House of Connelly, by Paul Green.

Princess Ida, by W. S. Gilbert and Arthur
Sullivan.

The Witching Hour, by Augustus Thomas.

Wappin Wharf, by Charles S. Brooks. (Ju-
nior Playmafcers).

Tofaze (in French), by M. Marcel Pagnol.

Hay Fever, by Noel Coward.

The Cradle Song, by G. Martinez Sierra.
1934-1935

R. U. ., by Karel CapeL

The Young Idea, by Noel Coward.
1935-1936

Three-Cornered Moon, by Gertrude Ton-
kongy.

Paths of Glory, by Sidney Howard.

La Porteuse de Pain (in French), by Monte-
pin and Donnay.

1936-1937

The Drunkard, by W. H. Smith and A Gen-
tleman.

-f 99

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

The Pirates of Penzance, by W. S. Gilbert

and Arthur Sullivan.
Monsieur de Pourceaugnac, by Moliere.
Personal Appearance, by Lawrence Riley.

1937-1938

Johnny Johnson, by Paul Green.

Boy Meets Girl, by Bella and Samuel Spe-

wack.
La Tour de Nesle y by Alexander Dumas fere

et Frederic Gaillardet.
Laburnum Grove, by J. B. Priestley.
The Blue Bird, by Maurice Maeterlinck.

1938-1939

Room Service, by John Murray and Allen

Boretz.
The Sorcerer, by W. S. Gilbert and Arthur

Sullivan.

Our Town, by Thornton Wilder.
Mr. Pirn Passes By, by A. A. Milne.

1939-1940

No More Peace, by Ernest Toller.
The Highland Call, by Paul Green.
HMJS. Pinafore, by W. S. Gilbert and Ar-
thur Sullivan.

Kiss the Boys Good-Bye, by Clare Booth,
The Field God, by Paul Green.
Ah, Wilderness!, by Eugene O'Neill,

1940-1941

Love's Old Sweet Song, by William Saroyan.

The House of Connelly, by Paul Green.

Patience, by W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sulli-
van.

Family Portrait, by Lenore Coffee and Wil-
liam Joyce Cowen.

1941-1942

The Male Animal, by Elliott Nugent and
James Thurber.

A be Lincoln in Illinois, by Robert Sherwood.

The Pirates of Penzarice, by W. S. Gilbert
and Arthur Sullivan.

George Washington Slept Here, by Moss Hart
and George S. Kaufman.
1942-1943

Arsenic and Old Lace, by Joseph Kesserling.

The Eve of Saint Mark, by Maxwell Ander-
son.

lolanthe, by W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sulli-
van. s

1943-1944

The Boss of Bar Z, by Nelson Compston.

Watch on the Rhine, by Lillian Hellman.

The Yeomen of the Guard, by W. S. Gilbert
and Arthur Sullivan.

1944 (Fall)

The Skin of Our Teeth, by Thornton Wilder.

OUTDOOR PRODUCTIONS OF PROFESSIONAL PLAYS

The Taming of the Shrew, by William Shakes-
peare, July 31, 1919.

Twelfth Night, by William Shakespeare, July
29, 1920.

Much Ado About Nothing, by William
Shakespeare, July 29, 1921.

As You Like It, by William Shakespeare, July
29, 1922.

The Comedy of Errors, by William Shakes-
peare, August 28, 1923.

The Taming of the Shrew (Tercentenary
Production), by William Shakespeare,
October 12, 1923.

Prunella, by Lawrence Housman and Gran-

ville Barker, May 30 and August 26,

1924.
The Rivals (Sesquicentennial Revival), by

Richard Brinsley Sheridan, May 29-30,

1925,
The Poor Little Rick Girl, by Eleanor Gates,

August 21, 1925.

The Romancers, by Edmond Rostand, May

28-29, 1926.
A Thousand Years Ago, by Percy MacKaye,

August 24, 1926.

-"if 100

PLAYS PRODUCED BY THE PLAYMAKERS, 1918-1944

The Tempest^ by William Shakespeare, April
30 and May 1, 1928 (Benefit Shakespeare
Memorial Theatre Fund).

Rip Van Winkle, as played by Joseph Jeffer-
son, May 24-25, 1929.

Agamemmon, by Aeschylus, July 17, 1929.

Romeo and Juliet, by William Shakespeare,
May 16-17, 1930.

Alcestis, by Euripides, July 11-12, 1932.

A Midsummer Night's Dream, by William
Shakespeare, May 19-20, 1933.

The Women Have Their Way, by Joaquin
and Serafin Alvarez Quintero, July 7,
1933.

Hamlet, by William Shakespeare, May 25
and 27, 1935.

Iphigenia in Tauris, by Euripides, July 16

and 19, 1935.
Lysistrata, by Aristophanes (Gilbert Seldes'

Modern Version), May 22-23, 1936.
Androdes and the Lion, by George Bernard

Shaw, May 21-22, 1937.
The Merry Wives of Windsor, by William

Shakespeare, May 20-21 and 28, 1938.
Noah, by Andre Obey, May 18-20, 1939.
The Cradle Song, by G. Martinez Sierra, July

9, 1939. (Junior Playmakers).
Peer Gynt, by Henrik Ibsen, May 22-23-24,

1942.
A Midsummer Night's Dream, by William

Shakespeare, May 14-15-16, 1943.
The Winter's Tale, by William Shakespeare,

May 19-20-21, 1944.

ONE-ACT PROFESSIONAL PLAYS

1921-1922

Suppressed Desires, by Susan Glaspell and

George Cram Cook.
How He Lied to Her Husband, by George

Bernard Shaw.

1929-1930

Joe, by Jane Dransfield.
The Angel Intrudes, by Floyd Dell.
The Stronger, by August Strindberg.
Modesty, by Paul Hervieu.
The Mm, in the Bowler Hat, by A. A. Milne.
The Open Door, by Alfred Sutro.
The Man on the Kerb, by Alfred Sutro.
The Mayor and the Manicure, by George

Ade.

Enter the Hero, by Theresa Helburn.
Dawn, by Percival Wilde.
Suppressed Desires, by Susan Glaspell and

George Cram Cook.

1930-1931

The Constant Lover, by St. John Hankin.
Mansions, by Hildegard Planner.
Fancy Free, by Stanley Houghton.
The Rising of the Moon, by Lady Gregory.
Cocaine, by Pendleton King.

Suppressed Desires, by Susan Glaspell and

George Cram Cook.
A Proposal under Difficulties, by John Kend-

rick Bangs.

The Chased Lady, by Ruth Welty.
The Boor, by Anton Chekhov.
Helena's Husband, by Philip Moeller.

1931-1932

The Hand of Siva, by Ben Hecht and Ken-
neth Sawyer.

The Mm on the Kerb, by Alfred Sutro.

Words and Music, by Kenyon Nickolson.

In the Morgue, by Sada Cowan.

The Open Door, by Alfred Sutro.

Things Is That-A-Way, by E. P. Conkle.

Rosalie, by Max Maurey.

The Man in the Stalls, by Alfred Sutro.

Tomorrow and Tomorrow (Act II, Scene I),
by Philip Barry.

The Constant Lover, by St. John Hankin.
1932-1933

The Stronger, by August Strindberg.
1933-1934

The Proposal, by Anton Chekhov.

Rosalie, by Max Maurey.

-Hg{ 101

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

Einer Muss Heiraten (in German), by Alex-
ander Wilhelmi.

The House Across the Way, by Katherine
KaranaugL

Modesty, by Paul Hervieu. %

1934-1935

Le Crime d?un Cerveau Malady adapted by
Walter Creech.

1936-1937

The Twelve Pound Look, by J. M. Barrie,
The Flattering Word, by George Kelly.

The Boor, by Anton Chekhov.
Fin d y Afres-Midi d'autonwe, adapted by
Walter Creech.

1938-1939

Funiculi Funicula, by Rita Wellman.
Dance of Death, by W. H. Auden.

1939-1940

Air Raid, by Archibald MacLeish.
Bury the Dead, by Irwin Shaw.
Salome, by Oscar Wilde.
L> Anglais Tel QtfOtt le Parle, by Tristan
Bernard.

-{ 102 )*-

Carolina Folk-Plays Published

In Books

CAROLINA FOLK PLAYS

First Series

Edited with an introduction, "Folk-Play Making," by Frederick H.
Koch, and containing five one-act plays by native authors. Five full-page
illustrations from the original productions. (New York, Henry Holt and
Company, 1922.)

Second Series

Edited with an introduction, "Making a Folk Theatre," by Frederick H.
Koch, and containing five one-act plays by native authors. Seven full-page
illustrations from the original productions. (New York, Henry Holt and
Company, 1924.)

Third, Series

Edited with an introduction, "The Carolina Playmaker," by Frederick H.
Koch. Foreword by Paul Green. Containing six one-act plays by native
authors. Six full-page illustrations from the original productions. (New
York, Henry Holt and Company, 1928.)

CAROLINA FOLK COMEDIES

Fourth Series

Edited with an introduction, "Adventures in Playwriting," by Frederick
H. Koch. Foreword by Archibald Henderson. Containing eight one-act
plays by native authors. Eight full-page illustrations from the original
productions. (New York, Samuel French, 1931.)

THE LORD'S WILL AND OTHER PLAYS

By Paul Green, with an introduction by Frederick H. Koch. Illustrat-
ed from the original productions. (New York, Henry Holt and Company,
1925.)

103

PIONEERING A PEOPLE'S THEATRE

LONESOME ROAD

A volume of Negro plays by Paul Green. (New York, Robert McBride
and Company, 1926.)

AMERICAN FOLK PLAYS

Edited with an introduction, "American Folk Drama in the Making," by
Frederick H. Koch. Foreword by Archibald Henderson. Containing
twenty one-act plays by native authors from various states. Fifteen full-
page illustrations from the original productions. (New York, D. Apple-
ton-Century Company, 1939.)

MEXICAN FOLK PLAYS

By Josephina Niggli, edited with an introduction, "Playmaker of Mex-
ico," by Frederick H. Koch. Foreword by Rodolf o Usigli. Containing
five one-act plays and seven full-page illustrations from the original pro-
ductions. (Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, 1038.)

FOLK PLAYS OF EASTERN CAROLINA

By Bernice Kelly Harris, edited with an introduction, "Plays of a Country
Neighborhood," by Frederick H. Koch. Containing seven one-act plays
and nineteen full-page illustrations. (Chapel Hill, University of North.
Carolina Press, 1940.)

CAROLINA FOLK-PLAYS

Edited with an introduction, "The Carolina Playmakers," by Frederick
H. Koch. Foreword by Paul Green. Containing Carolina Folk-Plays,
First, Second and Third Series. (New York, Henry Holt and Company,
194-1.)

ALABAMA FOLK PLAYS

By Kate Porter Lewis, edited with an introduction, "Plays of the Deep
South," by Frederick H. Koch. Containing five one-act plays and illustra-
tions from the original productions. (Chapel Hill, University of North
Carolina Press, 1943.)

104

The Carolina Pkymakers, founded in 1919
by the late Frederick Henry Koch and
dedicated to the writing and producing of
a native drama, numbers upwards of four
thousand students in its present and past
membership. During the last quarter-cen-
tury, some 450 original plays have been
written and produced by its members, and
more than fifty of these have been printed.
The author list of its young playwrights
contains names of men and women who
have since achieved distinction as actors
and creative writers, , _,<.,.. ~ ,

115807

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