The Marowitz Compendium. Charles Marowitz
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production of Marat/Sade. In the main this happened by way of a sketch in the Theatre of Cruelty season, about Christine Keeler and Jackie Kennedy. The Theatre of Cruelty season and Marat/Sade were particularly important in representing an intersection between experimental theory and a new radicalism at the time. Marat/Sade by all accounts was an unforgettable production, was filmed, and remains a signal event in post-war British theatre. It changed the lives of many people who saw it, including future innovative artists such as Mike Leigh and David Hare.
Picasso’s ‘The Four Little Girls’ (1973)
This is Marowitz production journal from the British premiere of Pablo Picasso’s The Four Little Girls, which was a part of Picasso’s 90th birthday celebrations in 1971. Picasso knew Artaud in Paris. They travelled in the same circles of fellow artists and thinkers. Picasso contributed paintings for Artaud’s benefit when he was released from Rodez asylum after World War II. The production journal also delves into detailed practical considerations and gives the reader a genuine sense of what a moment in the life of the Open Space Theatre was like. The Four Little Girls, is dreamlike and the production was extremely innovative in its immersive design elements. Picasso was a non-playwright and the surrealist unconventional structure and nature of the play allowed a fair amount of space for Marowitz and his collaborators to construct a production that was itself an extremely ambitious and unique work of art.
The Sherlock File (1987)
This excerpt is from the unpublished book The Sherlock Log, about Marowitz’s experiences bringing his play Sherlock’s Last Case, to Broadway. Marowitz wrote the play under a pseudonym in England and directed three separate versions of it before it was optioned for a Broadway production by Frank Langella, who also played the title role, under the direction of A. J. Antoon. Picking up where the Conan Doyle stories end, the play centres on a supposed plot against Sherlock Holmes by the son of his late nemesis, Professor Moriarty. Holmes finds himself imprisoned, trapped not by young Moriarty but, to his shocked amazement by Dr Watson. It turns out Watson has long been bitterly resentful of his sidekick status and Holmes’ pomposity. After Holmes' death Watson comes into his own, or seems to, until several impostors turn up claiming to be the real Sherlock Holmes.
Part Three: PLAYS
The Marowitz Hamlet (1968)
“I despise Hamlet. He is a slob, a talker, an analyser, a rationalizer. Like the parlour liberal or the paralysed intellectual, he can describe every facet of a problem, yet never pull his finger out.” Considering the play imprisoned by centuries of critical appreciation and grand acting, Marowitz has taken it bodily, broken it into pieces and reassembled it in a collage which, he hoped, makes its meaning real again. This is the original full-length version with the original 1968 introduction restored. Along with the play Sherlock’s Last Case (1984), and his book Recycling Shakespeare (1991), this is Marowitz’s most popular work and it is the prime example of his collage adaptations of Shakespeare, Marlowe, Buchner, Ibsen, and Strindberg. The Marowitz Hamlet is also indicative of the turbulent era in which it was created much like Shakespeare’s version.
Tea with Lady Bracknell (1981)
Tea with Lady Bracknell, is a previously unpublished one woman show that Marowitz wrote for actress Hermione Baddeley. Hermione Baddeley (1906-1986), was effortlessly funny and authoritative and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in Room at the Top (1959) and she portrayed Ellen the maid in the 1964 Walt Disney film Mary Poppins. In this play Lady Augusta Bracknell’s wisdom lies not only in her pessimistic yet advanced philosophy of life and marriage, but also in her mastery of language. Her words are loaded with sharp arrows that aim at her ultimate purpose, which is to test the suitability of those in her orbit. The play is reminiscent of the Stanislavski exercise whereby an actor is interviewed in-character and caries on a conversation and goes about their business. The iconic mandarin Lady Bracknell shares her hilarious subjective view of the world of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest.
Epilogue
Remembering Charles Marowitz, by Thelma Holt CBE (2014)
This is Thelma Holt’s personal account of her twelve-year collaboration with Marowitz and their lifelong friendship and association thereafter. In this piece she describes how they first met and their fervent years together running the Open Space in London. It provides among other things fascinating anecdotal information regarding the various personalities involved and describes how the trajectory of their lives and careers were greatly influenced by one another. Holt was among other things the leading lady at the Open Space and when Marowitz left England she retired from acting and stated that she would never act for any other director. This piece gives the reader the kind of personal insight that can only come from a first-hand account.
Appendix
In the included 1972 article, Artaud at Rodez, Marowitz draws in part on the interview material provided from friends and confidantes based upon the true incidents of Antonin Artaud’s life and his incarceration in the asylum at Rodez. Also, included in this section are Marowitz’s interviews with Artaud's psychiatrist, Dr Gaston Ferdiere, and leading avant-garde figures of the time such as Roger Blin, (1907-1984) one of Artaud’s earliest protégés, and one of France’s leading directors. Blin’s productions included the world premieres of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, Endgame, Krapp’s Last Tape, and Happy Days. He also directed the first productions of Jean Genet’s The Blacks, and The Screens. In addition, Arthur Adamov (1908-1970) was, with Beckett and Ionesco, considered for a time as one of the leading Absurdist writers of the 50s and one who strongly revealed signs of Artaud’s tutelage.
Acknowledgements
The editor would like to thank and acknowledge Jane Windsor-Marowitz for her generous supply of documents and permissions, Valerie Lange at Ibidem Press, Holly O’Neill at Cambridge University Press, Professor Maria Shevtsova at Goldsmiths College, London and Editor of New Theatre Quarterly, and Rainbow Underhill for her generous graphic design assistance. ‘Notes on the Theatre of Cruelty’ was first printed in the Tulane Drama Review, Volume 11, No. 2, Winter 1966, pp 152-172, reprinted courtesy of TDR: The Drama Review and The MIT Press. ‘Picasso’s Four Little Girls’ by Charles Marowitz, was first printed in TDR, Volume 16, No. 2, June 1972, pp 32-47, reprinted courtesy of TDR: The Drama Review and The MIT Press. ‘The Marowitz Hamlet’ with Introduction was first printed by Allen Lane/The Penguin Press in 1968. Penguin was contacted regarding permissions and responded that we should contact the rights holder (Jane Windsor-Marowitz). Marion Boyars which reprinted ‘The Marowitz Hamlet’ in 1978 and 1990 with a different Introduction was also contacted several months in advance of this publication but never responded. ‘Marowitz Remembered’ by Thelma Holt was first printed in the New Theatre Quarterly, 30(3), 2014, pp 206-207, reprinted courtesy of Cambridge University Press. ‘Artaud at Rodez’ by Charles Marowitz was first printed in Theatre Quarterly, Volume II, No. 6, April-June 1972.
Notes
Aronson, Arnold. American Avant-Garde Theatre: A History, London & New York: Routledge, 2000.
Shellard, Dominic. British Theatre Since the War, New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 1999.
Rebellato, Dan. 1956 and All That: The Making of Modern British Drama, London & New York: Routledge, 1999.
Marowitz, Charles. Burnt Bridges: A Souvenir of the Swinging Sixties & Beyond, London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1990.
—The Encore Reader: A Chronicle of the New Drama, (edited with Tom Milne & Owen Hale) London: Eyre Methuen, 1965.
—Open Space Plays, (editor) London: Penguin Books, 1974.
—Off-Broadway Plays, Volumes 1 & 2 (editor) London: Penguin Books, 1970 & 1972.
—The