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The Drama Club

Over the last four years the Drama Club has put on three major productions. In 1054, Nada Martin produced Under the Sycamore Tree, a satirical play about ants and a scientist by Sam Spewack. Ian Rich played the scientist, and among the ants were included Melda O'Reilly, Pauline Kermode, and Chris Beeby. In 1955 we had Much Ado About Nothing, produced by Maria Dronke. Beatrice and Benedick were played by Dulcie Gillespie-Needham and Gavin Yates; we also saw Pat Adams, John Norton, Grant McInnes, with Bill Sheat as chief rustic. The production was a great success, even financially, but it marked the end of an era. The following year the club passed into eclipse"—it was unable to find a producer for its major production. However, there were signs of revival in The Critic, a rehearsed reading of Sheridan's play which was produced later in the year by John Dawick. Then in 1957 Margaret Walker took on The Cherry Orchard (Chekhov). Probably this was our best major production during 1954-7. Although it did not have the vigour of Maria Dronke's Much Ado, producer, cast, play and theatre were suited to an extent not equalled in either of the others, and the result was a rewarding and delicate production. Elizabeth Gordon (Madame Ranyevskaya), from a very consistent cast, had the longest and most exacting part.

Every year the club enters a one-act play in the British Drama League Festival. During the past few years, we had won a reputation for being one of the clubs to watch for a production of interest and originality, even if inexperience and lack of technique prevented it from ever achieving the cherished honour of a recall. Last year our reputation was upset: Pauline Kermode produced Moliere's Sganarelle (translated by Miles Malleson), which, starring John Archibald, scored a success and earned the club its first recall for many years.

Winter Tournament presents the same problem as does the B.D.L. Festival, to find a good one-act play. In 1954, in a production which took place in a 'flu epidemic and under conditions of great stress, Rosemary Lovegrove fainted during the performance. It was an omen; since then, V.U.C. Drama Club has had little success at Tournament. Perhaps the task of finding two one-act plays a year is beyond us, perhaps we have lacked experienced producers, perhaps the eternal wrangles over the Tournament team are not conducive to the highest artistic achievement"—anyhow we shall try to do better in future.

The club's other activities have been play readings, ranging from Giraudoux to Farquhar. During the past two years, one of these has been presented as a fully staged and costumed production"—a style which seems particularly suitable for the time of year (second term) and for a second production. In 1955, in collabaration with the Classics Department, Peter Dronke produced Euripedes' Hippolytus, and last year at the request of the English Department, John Dawick produced Sheridan's The Critic.

At present, the club stands fairly well. The two big problems which face an amateur society of our size are finding a producer and finding money. As regards the first, we can but hope for the best, although there are few producers willing to take on a production with the prospect of no financial reward, little gratitude, grudging co-operation, and no one with quite enough experience to look after such matters as publicity without help. The page 79 financial problem is less serious, for we are extremely fortunate in having a Little Theatre to which we can retreat when outside conditions become too rigorous. There is also a bank balance of over £100, although this would be quite inadequate to finance a production in the Concert Chamber. Another problem which, as Mr. Bertram has pointed out, concerns us particularly at present, is finding people to look after the technical sides of a production"—stage management, lighting, and so on. We have the obvious difficulties of any club which requires a considerable fund of experience in such matters, but whose members are completely inexperienced when they arrive, and who leave after three or four years. The club has never lacked talent, but it does lack the organisation and technical skills required to use it properly.

For the future, our brightest prospect is the new Students' Union Building, which we are told will contain a Little Theatre with outstanding lighting and stage facilities. It is greatly to be hoped that in the final outcome we will not be skimped of the small built-in details which could transform juct another Concert Chamber, with its own different disadvantages, into a first class Little Theatre. A theatre of its own is indispensable to the University; at the present time it would also be invaluable to Wellington, which has nothing of this kind. It would help to shift the centre of cultural activities towards the University, where it belongs, and where it is not at present. On the other hand, another second class theatre would be pointless.

From our own point of view, a really good theatre would give us the opportunity to become one of the leading societies in Wellington. It is a position to which a University Drama Club should certainly aspire. I think it is a position we might be able to achieve, but only if we can put on enough productions to allow people to acquire experience that they can use before they leave, and only if we can maintain an organisation strong enough to continue although the people within it change. There can be no greater concentration of talent and ideas than among the 2500-odd students of the University. Besides, the Drama Club meets a real interest among students. It seems to be one of the few these days whose flame is not too feeble to be quite extinguished by the effects of changing ideas and personalities.