Theatrical canard
From Michael Grosvenor Myer
Sir: Michael Vestey (Arts, 20 May) retails yet again the canard that ‘Look Back in Anger, attacked by most reviewers, was saved by Kenneth Tynan and Harold Hobson’. This bids fair to be the strongest and most persistent ‘minds made up, don’t confuse us with the facts’ theatrical folk-tale of our time. A couple of weeks ago, on the 50th anniversary of the play’s first night, the Guardian reprinted on its editorial pages Philip Hope-Wallace’s notice: a ‘has its faults but an obvious talent to watch’ piece absolutely typical of what appeared the next day — I remember reading almost identical remarks in that day’s London Evening Standard on my way home from work. But this truth doesn’t make nearly such a good story, does it?
Michael Grosvenor Myer Cambridge
Previous page
