Scottish Theatre
By MORAY McLAREN
5 a tolerable run, on the grounds that he preferred varied and 411,.teresting work in his own country, such a state of affairs means at Scotland continues to be woefully misrepresented in the ‘ondon theatre. This is not good for our reputation and can Pr°dlice for the Scot, who sees so-called Scottish acting and Production in London, some woefully embarrassing ex- Periences. 4dOnlY the other day some of us (and this is the moment to htit that I am personally and publicly involved in the Scottish 4aeatre, that many of my friends and associates are drawn °111 those who write, act in and present plays in Scotland, that Y own work has been produced by three Scottish companies, Zat am as wide open to the charge of being parti pris as would 7, anyone who could claim to write with authority on the lect) had a distressing experience. We had returned from an t'xhilarating tour of Scottish dramatic work in the country r°‘vos and had heard and seen 'the genuine thing' being ,eceived with genuine enthusiasm. We turned on our London- 'Ittrolled television set and saw and heard the play Jeannie. Nt the end of it we looked at each other and, echoing it`-nurcrehill's words, said, " What kind of people do they think we
?
4It was not only the banal and cliché-ridden Scots writing 1,110 characterisation that disturbed us, it was also the acting. English and Continental parts were beautifully performed. ie Scots acting was, with one exception, if anything more i„4'se than the writing. It was' truly embarrassing to it at home the capital of Scotland and hear an Irish-American actress (7ake an attempt at the Scottish Lowland dialect so lamentably "LI,t of key. tb.tlow far are we in Scotland justified in complaining? As ,i"togs are at present, not, I honestly thinks very much. There a time when the goal of every Scottish actor was London. tilms is not so now. As in Ireland in the Nineties and at the t r° of the century, the native actor is primarily concerned with xpressing himself in the native theatre and before his fellow- countrymen. In Ireland the Irish theatre, having struck its own roots deep in its own soil, flowered to such effect that it became internationally recognised. It is too early to say whether the theatre in Scotland will produce such an efflorescence, will achieve such an end, but it is our hope.
What has the Scottish theatre produced in its twenty years of existence and since its period of greatest activity—the post- war years? Bridie with his twenty-five plays of varying quality, some of which I suggest are fully equal to stand alongside the work of the Irish dramatists in the great days. Bridie with his untiring enthusiasm and belief in the cause nearest to his heart. Robert MacLellan with his half-dozen or so plays, mostly in the old Scots or genuinely native tongue—and for this reason unexportaMe. Robert Kemp with his quick versatile 'talent and his dozen plays in English and in Scots all springing from his native soil. Fertility and versatility are qualities which the modern critics are not fond of (they lump them together under the heading of 'facility). Nevertheless, after some preliminary girning on this score they have now accepted him—as the public has always done. He is, as dramatists go, a young man and has, one trusts, many years before him in which to develop his rich power of invention, his quick 'ear, and his growing capacity to touch the emotions. There is Alexander Reid and• Roddy MacMillan, whose All in Good Faith, recently produced by the Glasgow Citizens, is as authentically Glasgow as was Juno and the Paycock authentically Dublin. And there are others.
But it is to the subject of acting that I return; for (Bridie apart) it is in this field that I believe that the Scottish Theatre has, up to date, most vitally expressed itself. The Irish dramatic movement was literary in origin. The Scottish dramatic movement of recent years sprang more directly from the urgent, the long-suppressed desire of the Scot to act—to act not only well and professionally but authentically. It is in doing this in Scotland today that the Scottish actors and actresses are now so busily, so happily engaged.
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