Milton Shulman At The Theatre
THE CHINA MAIL,
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1956.
WHY ALL The Anguish of the 'Doria
THIS FUSS ABOUT BRECHT?
London
THERE is no sitting on
the fence about Ber- tolt Brecht, the
Ger- died man playwright who recently and whose East Berlin company has arrived at the Palace Theatre to must three of his present famous productions, "Mother Courage," "Trum- pets and Drums" and "The Caucasian Chalk Circle."
Either he was oth of 1/ greatest theatrical minds of the
: 20th century—one of us more
exuberant obituaries suggested he might
"Shakespeare reborn'
tract- <12 he was boyant propagandist Boga
the dead horse of German ex- #1 ti pressionism 30 years And uttered its last sumirant Mith.
With sty customary prebar anything marking of serious hit pose
14 Wel Erd ther Shed clear of Brecht for ove Three decades.
Except for one minor pro. ductions, the mordant nenatal, The Threepenny Oprea is all That Lonch h
Been of Brecht. it be unfortun are that our arst opportunity of
property should Judging him
come to
us in Germ wouk! the Berliners make Christopher Fry in English"
JERKY ACTION
INLESS one knows
UNLE
What
what
Brecht is up to, much of the production of "Mother Courage" might be dismissed as rather heavy Teutonie eccentricity. The lighting is as stark and unyielding
11A
it a paralytic electrician were
switches clinging to he
action
12
Jerks clumsily
The
through
1
by
scene changes separated
the opening and closing of two off-white coloured sheets
thol
be
look as though they might The entrance 14) municipal bath; the neling is sometimes se casual and detached that you would not be unduly surprised it un petor walked off the stage and asked you for a match.
cun- of these The purp ventions
to 1-4
thwart illusion of Trality and to pre- vent an audience from mistaking the theatre for life
Don't
entobemalty
volved in my characters, Brecht, tea, e Biey are illustrations
any
An-
av
ON
I am try-
hg to teach you. The wagging of the lecturer's Anger is STION important him than the wave of the magician's Wand
Mother Courage, a ngabol of the coming man's indes fineli- bility and humanity. wanders fier- through 12 years of the
Living man Thirty Years' War
with loot, rape and murder resigned scepticism, One of her sons is shot because she haggies
she has to pay bribe brother son becomes a 179 entury
and her mute Anally daughter is raped ond murdered But Mother Couragė, bent double Willy despair,
over
-FILMED TWO DAYS BEFORE IT HAPPENED IN THE UNCANNIEST ACTION PICTURE OF THE YEAR
THE PICTURES ABOVE THE PILM STARS IN
4. Mpira Lister
1 James Mayta Maria LMD11 Mei esterne Pamer *. David Heura Ketsalli o Jolie Strafta also: 2011 Metreed In Steuben Day 1 11 Edifís derne : 12. Orlands Martin 14 la Breustr 15. Matub Muhach 10 Derth Rydwy
Russell Spurr concludes his
Sinkiang tour with a report on
ISLAM IN CHINA
T
the
of
them
older
themselves, HE frail old man in the ligion much
black cap and grey route, but they did not inter- fere with other people's views, gown might indeed, they encouraged cotton have been a retired scholar. by muking grants to mosques,
which and The buikling round he conducted me--a shabby
" 240 yum a month my- sad the rain. More than Chinese temple. The roofs still curled defiant into a factory durents He was a very the
and privileged person
summer sky,
pensions I
prešt
sell
R
rare.
Con-
Robert Gordon Menzies, Prime Minister of Australia, has been in the news spotlight as leader of the delegation representing 18 nations which explained the Suez conference decisions to Egypt's Nasser
man and his career is a penetrating profile of the
This
THE MAN WHO
WENT TO CAIRO
By LES ARMOUR
volunteer, goung Robert should be left to pursue his studies,
Thus he emerged in 1918 a barrister-at-10 sv
But it seems to have blown like a clean. fresh wing through Australan polllies.
AL
WILS 41, he. Allumey-General.
餞
"Before any big speech," he I could clap my hands says. together and they would splash with perspiration. People don't But the truth is, believe that. of course, that unless you are nervous, you are not strisitive to an audience and your speech is likely to be dull and boring."
Behind his public appearances Federal and behind his every political
Is nove here
immense
An
By the time he was 38, he His rise was níėteorie, party Wh Attorney-General and because his Was n generation Deputy Premier of the State of who e flower had been targely Victoria. Then he resigned
conferted a seat OBERT MENZIES is destroyed by war, but mostly hard
the that
almost because he had the constitution Federni Parlament. contradictory of a car! horse and the mini
of a mechanical brain. creature the The growing nerommodatiert
Three years later he appeared dragons
lintels the
between Communism and Islam Servative radical.
the before
High Court 05
In 1939, he resigned from the amount of personal research. A hundred and fifty years counsel breathed imaginary fire at 6s me of the most potent poli-
of Cabinet after for
night the Slate
Preparing to lead his deloga- tion
to see Col. Nasser, for the evil spirits. The paint, tiral developments of this de-
instance, he went to the BBC in almost every promise on though, was peeling from cade. Its sponsorship was official- ago. Menzies would have Ta mania. In succeeding years, xnsions.
ly relatined at the Bandung been revolutionary. As it he took part
major industrial litigation ant the wheme
and watched a special film of the sturdy pillars. undi enference, when the Arab cause is, he finds himself leading, emerged an one of the country's tributary.
Nasser being Interviewed by a Israel was openly em- quite literally, the forces of top barristers.
lop journalist, many of the paper-covered against windows continues to pull her
384-2′′ punctured braced. Support at Egypt follow-
reaction. ed the predetermined
pattern. cart and faces life alone.
and forn,
Encouragement, ove
even subsidisa tion of Muslim minorities, be- became a vital "Repairs will
of Russian man and Chinese policy. No more muje," the
govern fortrinaire closing of mosques of apologised. ment has granted us 10,000 king of priests they must be
Nazi:
2
FOR ILLITERATES RECHT, » Communist whose
BR
alm was a theatre for the "broad masses," had no inflated opinions about the reseptive pro-
NOOD
old The
CCESS of the profetariat. £5 SARY. These days we are almed his effects 1 an almost fortunate." insultingly low level of In- telligence.
1
paraded for Muslim visitors
ond reassurance.
T
Come
over He refused to com- the principle that ought to be con-
Then
Now there are rumours that Menzies reels that he had done all he. can In Australian
is
for and
looking politics
Thire fields.
cro broader rumours in Australia that he try his hand in British politics....and who cows?
DID.
For a month, be languished in the political wilderness, The Prime Minister, Mr Lyons, A reactionary, in the dic-
died and Menzies, after a hard org tionary
elected leader of the night, wa sense, is one who
34, he was the youngest
Australia Party Не United strives to restore n
Counsel past King's
ever pormed
a coalition with the Party and became state of affairs, and Menzies pented in Australia and his In Country in has battled hard and long £10,000 a year-a very hand-
wis said to average Prime Minister, It
was he may who declared war on Germany an atmosphere of brotherhood— | to untangle the mass of
i 1930. some sum indend in those days. bureaucratic organisation
Little
then that. wonder
The coalition, however, was and the complication pat-
when he turned to polllies, he always uneasy, for reasons of Lerns of welfare state
should have become imbued personality rather than principle thought which, in his view, with a conviction that private and, two years later, it broke threatened Lo
A temporary govern- strangle enterprise and individual initia- down.
tive were cardinal virtues.
ment Was formed under Sir Australia.
Arthur Fadden, the leader of He had made his own way, the Country Party, but six His is the spirit that every inch of it, and he raw no week later two Intlependents carved Australin from the reason why anyone else with voted with the opposition and wilderness, that built the requisite ability to do like-
the government fell, wise should not do so too. and incredibly powerful prosperous nation out of As for the real? the Arab tradition. All are supe Forty priests and worshippers what, for long, was thought He once Enid: "I have a porled by the
racial are now making the pilgrimage to be for pri vily for the respect for the rights of the top who have tooked to to Mecca government cx-
dog. I hold no foolish doctrine in the pace of the confusion China for architectural inspira- pense, A great new mosque is as a penal settlement.
of equality between the active created by the collapse of the Hon. The mosque was visiting being
planned for Urumchi
and idle.' the intelligent and coalition, and the United Aus- elected another the dull, the frugal and the im- train Party provident,"
Icoder.
Muslim College There are now 150 priests in Urumeli, More than ever be- fere. Thirly religious schools re- ceive stale nid, They are train- ing 90 new priests and 300 Junior students, Public buildings are lent out for the two main
days are granted and licences in issued to kili sheep without the aro
mosques Yet none is built in usual government tax.
He ushered me into a sade Not only have his homilies
room where hot black tea WZIN musty Fing of
He told eld-fashioned, served in tall glasses. Communist
prupaganda theme the Then and Now stories common
man must bear the that everyone retails so earnest load, priosts and officers arc
ly in Sinking, while 1 kept re- hypocrites or loots, religion 13 minding myself that this was the the oplate of the people-but senior most imam of Urianchi,
and they are laberiously etched out
the completely Chinese as if for an audience of ititeräte | Lilding I was sitting in wow. Musilm festivals. Public holi- presants.
in fact, a mosque, A lantern slide before each There scene tells us where we are ond Urumchi what is to happen, and then it happens. It is as If a panto- mime announced its action with the words, "Little Red Riding Hood walks into the house and sees her grandmother in bed. served some of the Northwest There is even talk of a Muslim
who first college. But it is not her grandmother. Chinese community It is a wolf."
trekked out here as merchants
various
Moments of Mother Courage and small tradesmen. It was a form it was never like that be-
anti-Brechtlan?
DR CALICARI
YET for all its bursting power, familar. Exquisite
sold the old. Imam,
The first Friday worshippers
★ ✰
11
☆
THE Socialists won the ensu- Ing clretion by a landslide
On the other side he po Shortly afterwards. he was -the exccution of the good, son ornately Chinese that a second
would have taken a rash
snid: "It is the responsibility back, as leader again and he and the killing of the daughter glance was needed at the cres-
prophet to predict that of top dogs were entering the mosque. They
to toll, as far as set about reorganising the -revent Brecht's sturiling cent on the roof to realise It removed boota and shoes at the this would be the fate of possible, in the interesis of United Australia Party into the ability for
theatrical had any connection vivid
with
the edge of the rat carpet, the boy born 62 years ago dogs of all degree,” ·
Liberal Party. The old party effects. But by being emotional- {religion of the Prophet.
preparation for the three obel-
together by a ly involved are we not being
Gances. As many as 80 or 90 men in the hamlet of Jeparit, in Like Adam Smith, he believed had been held Grants To Mosques came at a time, I was told. To the State of Victoria. that the "Wealth of Nations strange mixture of nationalism, Empire loyallum; and militant would day there might not be so many
proeper through the
free enterprise, The interior
more as it was raining. When there His grandfather was a Scot" charts of the active, the inter- Turkestant was a good
frugal congregation
The new party emerged with thetish couliminer who was black gent "Mother Courage" does not carpels and two large
fretted Imam would
them listed for his part in forming minimise their losses. nddress
maximise
zaina and a coherent programme and an live up to the claims that have lanterns conjured up memories strictly on spiritual affairs, re- the first Australları miners'
appeal that was more rational been made for it. Too often it of Constantinople, Surrealist de- ferring generally to pre-selected unions--and who lived the rest
and less erhollona). verges on something between signs were drawn on the plaster passages of the Chinese transla of his life a fighting and bitter Doctor Caligeri and an Illustrated walls; above the entrance. to the tion of the Koran.
Socinilst. red The old innner prayer hall was o lecture on rood safety.
remembered Heleno Welgel, haughty, lacquer plaque with the four comething else ---- religious His father was a storekeeper
continuing, ho who ultimately become
among the MP.
YE
and Allah is Merciful,"
bawdy and eternal, perfectlygilt Chinese characters for epitomises the urgency tenacity by which man, clings to life when it is thoing its bost to shake him off. Almost as im- pressive is the agonising per- formance of Angelica Hurwicz as the mute daughter.
man
me.
and the
their
to
Menzies took off for the for his reaction, hustings and spent most of his The radical in him to eight years in opposition drums
CO' much
an natural counterpart,, Ho be ming up popular support.
lieves that men múst be as free On the platform,' he has an The old Imam was 80. Four children. Now It who dono
from government as possible, ease of delivery which suggests younger bearded priests waited at home by the parents,
There was little money, and, that government must always that he is master of overy shua- upon him respectfully. He under the Instruction of a visit young Robert educated him- bộ in the hands of the people tion, is sharp and sometimes sipped his tea, falicing in the ing price. In the schools, it had self an scholarships, first in the and ready to respond to their wounding wit, and a zest which cracked tones of the aged, drift been discontinued. I recalled an state schools of Victoria and demands,
'éven the slocplest Ing off into thought and back to official telling me that teaching later at the University of Liko Rousseau, he belloves makes the thread of his remarks was now entirely based on Melbourne.
that the only Justification for autfence alt up and diaton, to produce something more com- Yes, there days the Muslims "sclentlile” methods. But that
government 1 that it does As an after-dinner speaker he pelling and demanding than were fortunate. The Commun- Islam was regarded with special Ils family held a conference gonuinely serve the governed, was in constant demand-a
Mother Courage" before I can its had not turned out to be the favour by the Chinese govern on the outbreak of the, firat da There was nothing novel in rare thing for a politician, understand what all the fuss is athelets people had been led to ment there was not the slight-World War and decided that, the philosophy with which he Actually, his platform techni-
Texpect. They didn't go for re- est doubt,
though his brothers, should sought to win over the, votere, qiao le mot as tuny us, it seemus.
But this company will have
about.
་
Photo
News
BY JOHN LAMBERT
E
LEVEN survivors in a lifeboat. Eleven taut,
terrifled faces which hold only ono . hope sur- vival.
a
A black, brutal sea bat- ters at the human flotsam of a shipwreck....it is sceno snatched from the anguish of the Andrea Doria disaster.
But this picture was actually laken on a big water tank at Shepperten Alm studios, The survivors are film stars, making a film of the sinking of a ship called the Crescent Star.
'TOO FANTASTIC'
The point is this: Director Richard Sale sent in a script to his film basɛga แ year ago, "This is fantastic," they sala. "Such A thing could revou
happen nowadays, with rodar arct The rest of the safety gadgets."
Sale fought them-and Iwo days after filming started on "Seven
Waves Away" the Andrea Dorta sank.
The picture looks realistic enough
but it is all make- believe. like this: that ley- looking water is really heated to 80 degrees and is only 5ft, sin. deep, Those pounding wives are whipped up by four | Admiralty?, designed water-
eburners.
BRANDY BOOST
Five men spend their days throwing pails of water into a wind machine, which whooshes it at Tyrone Power und the other stars in the boat.
When the cameras stop there are shower baths, two cases of brandy, and six dozen warn towels on the set to soothe the stars.
But even though this is make- believe, the realism of it ail is catching. One of the biggest demands on the set is for sco- sickness tablets. Fifty Aro isturd every morning shooting.
POCKET CARTOON by OSBERT LANCASTER
HALL
WHIST DRIVE
"and Ethel says that
the
Vicar
condone
continues 10 gambling
BOOTCT or later someone's going to
discover some compromístno
ilitic diaries 7 {'
YOU?
KNOW
Calories spent as energy can never be dopoalled
as fat and you normally use up as many calories as you got in a teaspoon of SUGAR overy 74 minutes. SUGAR is neither a roducing nor fatting food There is no such thing—all fooda'supply calories buti
·SUQAR can be usod generously as part of the normal; well-balanced diet by all healthy people. But it has a special value to those who have a tendency to over- weight..
One of the chief causes of qverweight is overe eating but BUGAI used as a between-moni scientiste ribble takes the edge, off hunger — and with the minimum of calories.
TAIKOO SUGAR
REFINED SINCE 1884
of