THE BOLSHEVIK THEATRE.
THE Russian Revolution and the sense of liberation experi- enced at any rate by the industrial workers of the big cities are finding ready expression by means of the theatre. The change in theatrical enthusiasm since the revolution is so great that even figures and statistics, generally so misleading in the arts, show that something has happened. Before the revolution about two hundred and ten theatres were producing plays in Russia ; to-day, says Mr. Huntly Carter, there are five thousand, two thousand of them being regular playhouses , and the rest smaller but active theatrical centres. Mr. Carter says that at first the pieces played in these theatres were severely revolutionary. He, of course, will never willingly speak ill of anything Communist, but reading between the lines one gathers that these plays inculcated red doctrines with about as much intelligence as a Surrey-side melodrama champions the value of kind hearts as against that of coronets, or illustrates the assertion that " A Man's Best Friend is his Mother." There was a rigid eensorship, and not only was _ nothing counter-revolutionary permitted, but it was appar- ently expected that plays should be actually improving. How awful to the young enthusiast is the moment when he realizes that Dr. Smiles is as happy in a red shirt as in a surplice.
As the revolutionaries, however, began to get the upper hand the solemnities of timidity left their theatrical expression, and—possibly coinciding with the corning of some element of disillusionment—a second period set in. Farce and satire , succeeded prosy triumphs of the red ideal. Pieces corres- sponding to revue took their place, their manner suiting the Russian aptitude for broad comedy. Thus a form of enter- tainment has grown up in which back-chat, dancing, and a Robey- or Lauder-like improvization predominate, and the structure of many theatres has been altered to establish the necessary intimacy between actors and audience. With this sort of theatrical show are associated all sorts of processions and pageants and outdoor demonstrations. Mr. Huntly Carter divides the present Russian theatre into three groups, and following the prevalent Russian method of politicizing everything, he describes these as the Left, the Centre, and the Right. The Right consists of groups of which the chief is the old Moscow Art Theatre, the Centre, of the Government Theatres under Lunacharsky and of associations like the ' Kamerny Theatre, while the Left consists of what Mr. Carter : rather horribly calls the " Proletcult " and the Open Air Mass ' theatre.
Readers of the Spectator are not likely to sympathize either - With Bolshevik aims or methods, yet it is more than possible that the author of this book may be right in his insistent praise of the present Russian theatre, partisan though his enthusiasm partly is in origin. Who could see even such scanty examples ' of Russian plays and entertainments as have reached us here, without realizing that the Russians, as &race, have a colossal ' aptitude and appetite for the theatre. And now, with the revolution, there has been a strife of ideals, there has been physical fighting, there has been fanaticism. These things are essentially dramatic, and from the point of view of the stage ' the suitability or the unsuitability to the actual world of the ' doctrines fought for is beside the point. The theatre has its origin in religion, both the Elizabethan theatre and the Greek theatres, for instance, growing pretty directly out of religious usage. 'On the face of it then it seems likely that this new faith of the Russians in the ideals of Communism may be going to afford the motive force for a great dramatic move- Arent. The Russians have now what we have not, a world
divided between the forces of good and evil, and in which the - fbrces of darkness and of light confront each other. We may
have more finesse, we may even be " right," but our rightness' and our finesse are inappropriate to the great shadow-graph of the theatre, which gives the auditor, not the delicate balance of one mind, not nicely considered opinion, but some general ' concept reflected in the minds of half a dozen ministering and - interpreting artists.
It is, of course, extremely difficult to discover what are the actual achievements of the present Russian stage, for the ' London onlooker has little evidence save that of this _exhaus- tive but confused book, and one or two admirably imaginative
plays by Lunacharsky which have appeared here in trans- lation. But there are more difficulties in the way of our apPraisement than the confusion- of - Mr. Huntly Carter's nevertheless most valuable book: Russian actors and proeueeis are boiling over with every sort of new idea and, as in all vital art, there is only a step between sense and nonsense, indeed the distinction between sense and nonsense may be largely a matter of the indiS'Idnal :onlooket. : And with a language barrier it is impossible to judge. rhad the pleasure of seeing some of the work of the Kamen,/ theatre during a season they gave recently in Paris. I could see with my eyes that the scenery was beautiful, strange, and interesting, and :the movements of the actors impressive and expressive, but a complete ignorance of Russian reduced the area in which I was 'competent to have an opinion too much for me to appraise the whole production. I thought it wonderfully good, but it may not have been. Mr. Huntly Carter seems to hold that the Russians have nowhere stepped over into nonsense, but this, on the analogy of, say, the Elizabethan dramatic outburst; I should very much doubt, just as much as I should doubt that somewhere amid the boiling and efferves- cence of this new work there was not a good deal that was of first-rate value.
The book sets out to concern itself with- cinema as well as the theatre, but here Mr. Huntly Carter is practically reduced to devoting two chapters to the task of saying that in Russia there is no cinema, but that- he believes that perhaps there will soon be one. However, eyen he does not pretend that the revolution has' cured all evils in Russia. As a punctual man- he suffered frein-the fact that in Ruisia no'play and no interview with an official ever takes place less than an hour after the appointed. time. Samuel 'Smiles and tutpunctualityl Some of it sounds very much like the old world. TARN.
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