W i ll
Waspe
American money invested in American shows for production in London with a long-term view looking to subsequent production on Broadway is invariably lost without trace. There have been many such shows, mostly so unmemorable that they elude Waspe's memory (although Ambassador, I think, was the hapless last). They are rarely even moderately successful in London and thus rarely reach Broadway, and when they do (as in the case of Ambassador) they flop.
I therefore view with some sympathetic scepticism the plans ot impresario Franklin Gollings to present a show called Cherry in London "prior to New York." If it is worth doing at all it is worth doing on Broadway, where the pickings are so much richer for managements. The show might seem to have a lot going for it, being taken from a play by William Inge (Bus Stop) adapted by George Axelrod, but my enthusiasm remains bridled. Inge has never been a popular playwright with British audiences
(not one of his Broadway hits ever made it in the West End), and it cannot be a good omeu that both Inge and Sean Kenny, who was to have designed the set, died last week.
Oh, Lucy!
I am no longer susceptible to surprise at anything that is put on display in art galleries, but I can still be given pause by some of the things they blandly put in their catalogues. If I pick on Lucy Milton, it's only because I thought better of her than anyone would think from a study of the blurb accompanying the current show of Perspex boxes by a Dutch couple in her Notting Hill gallery. It reads in oart:"truus wilminck and joost baljeu were born in holland within a very small range of space and a wider dimension in time. they live and work together in the hague. their first meeting which took place in a semi-professional atmosphere, seemed to bear no consequences. yet, soon after they suddenly found themselves married."
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