Gray Matter
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Our critics praised while London's reviewers damned
The 50th anniversary of the first performances of Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party is being celebrated by a new production of the play which opens on Monday at the Lyric, Hammersmith. Now recognised as one of the 20th century landmarks in European theatre, the piece was a notorious flop when first aired at the same theatre in 1958. National critics, to their shame, put the boot in mercilessly. The Guardian called it "half-gibberish and lunatic ravings"; the Daily Telegraph pointed to an author "who wallows in symbols and revels in obscurity".
Alone among national critics in recognising its worth was Harold Hobson, of the Sunday Times. Alas, the play had already closed by the time his notice appeared. The provincial critics, however, had told a different story, as Hobson generously pointed out in charting the production's progress to London. Among those singing the praises of the play were the critics of The Oxford Times and our sister newspaper, the Oxford Mail. "Baffling but brilliant" was the headline over The Oxford Times's notice (above) by "C.J.C.", initials cloaking the identity of Irishman Connolly Cole, one of the newspaper's sub-editors. "A fascinating puzzle" was the headline above the review from the Mail's David Jones (see right). Then a young reporter in his early twenties, fresh from Balliol College and National Service, Jones went on to make a name for himself (the name by then "D.A.N. Jones") as a journalist on The Listener.
That the local critics did themselves credit on this occasion was explained in a letter I received a couple of weeks ago from Mrs Jennnifer Hainsworth, of Bladon, the sister of Jones (who died six years ago, having retired to live in Woodstock).
Mrs Hainsworth was unsure, in fact, whether her brother had written the Mail's notice. An undergraduate at St Hugh's College at the time, she attended the press night at the Playhouse with a number of local journalists, and was unsure which of them had written the review. I have now sent her a copy of her brother's perspicacious piece.
Mrs Hainsworth told me that The Birthday Party had impressed all the members of their group. "We thought it was a very interesting and good play. We thought the acting was extremely good. I particularly remember John Slater in the role of the villainous Goldberg."
Slater earned high praise in the Mail's review; Jones wrote: "John Slater makes Goldberg frighteningly purposeful as he glibly charms the landlady and seduces the sweetly provocative Lulu (Wendy Hutchinson). But he can hardly remember his own name and his insistence on physical fitness exposes his weakness."
The special quality of the play was made clear in the very first sentence of the review: "Harold Pinter's new play is going to fascinate and baffle everyone who sees it - and a lot of people are going to see it." (Not in Hammersmith they weren't, where the play closed after a week. Pinter found himself among a audience of six at the Thursday matinee, one of whom was Harold Hobson.)
d=3,3,1Jones ended his review with another clear statement of the play's special merits: "It is the words, beautifully written and beautifully spoken, that make this play so funny and powerful. Some people may find the play irritating, If so they should go twice and try again. It will be best to surrender to the spell and not try to puzzle it out until afterwards."
How often was that sort of remark to be made about Pinter's work over the next half-century?The 50th anniversary of the first performances of Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party is being celebrated by a new production of the play which opens on Monday at the Lyric, Hammersmith. Now recognised as one of the 20th century landmarks in European theatre, the piece was a notorious flop when first aired at the same theatre in 1958. National critics, to their shame, put the boot in mercilessly. The Guardian called it "half-gibberish and lunatic ravings"; the Daily Telegraph pointed to an author "who wallows in symbols and revels in obscurity".
Alone among national critics in recognising its worth was Harold Hobson, of the Sunday Times. Alas, the play had already closed by the time his notice appeared. The provincial critics, however, had told a different story, as Hobson generously pointed out in charting the production's progress to London. Among those singing the praises of the play were the critics of The Oxford Times and our sister newspaper, the Oxford Mail. "Baffling but brilliant" was the headline over The Oxford Times's notice (above) by "C.J.C.", initials cloaking the identity of Irishman Connolly Cole, one of the newspaper's sub-editors. "A fascinating puzzle" was the headline above the review from the Mail's David Jones (see right). Then a young reporter in his early twenties, fresh from Balliol College and National Service, Jones went on to make a name for himself (the name by then "D.A.N. Jones") as a journalist on The Listener.
That the local critics did themselves credit on this occasion was explained in a letter I received a couple of weeks ago from Mrs Jennnifer Hainsworth, of Bladon, the sister of Jones (who died six years ago, having retired to live in Woodstock).
Mrs Hainsworth was unsure, in fact, whether her brother had written the Mail's notice. An undergraduate at St Hugh's College at the time, she attended the press night at the Playhouse with a number of local journalists, and was unsure which of them had written the review. I have now sent her a copy of her brother's perspicacious piece.
Mrs Hainsworth told me that The Birthday Party had impressed all the members of their group. "We thought it was a very interesting and good play. We thought the acting was extremely good. I particularly remember John Slater in the role of the villainous Goldberg."
Slater earned high praise in the Mail's review; Jones wrote: ""John Slater makes Goldberg frighteningly purposeful as he glibly charms the landlady and seduces the sweetly provocative Lulu (Wendy Hutchinson). But he can hardly remember his own name and his insistence on physical fitness exposes his weakness."
The special quality of the play was made clear in the very first sentence of the review: "Harold Pinter's new play is going to fascinate and baffle everyone who sees it - and a lot of people are going to see it." (Not in Hammersmith they weren't, where the play closed after a week. Pinter found himself among a audience of six at the Thursday matinee, one of whom was Harold Hobson.)
Jones ended his review with another clear statement of the play's special merits: "It is the words, beautifully written and beautifully spoken, that make this play so funny and powerful. Some people may find the play irritating, If so they should go twice and try again. It will be best to surrender to the spell and not try to puzzle it out until afterwards."
How often was that sort of remark to be made about Pinter's work over the next half-century?
3:16pm Wednesday 7th May 2008
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