New Plays in Manhattan

The White Steed (by Paul Vincent Carroll; produced by Eddie Dowling) is, thematically, much the same play as Carroll's Shadow and Substance. But it is a better play. Shadow and Substance leaned too heavily on portraiture; The White Steed also has plot. Shadow and Substance was enveloped in a cloud of mysticism; The White Steed shows the warm flesh of humanity. Shadow and Substance had too literary a finish; The White Steed is often combustibly dramatic.

Carroll's centre of conflict is again religion, and the Church's relation to the people. The warmhearted, benignly sly old Canon of an Irish village has become paralyzed, and a younger man, Father Shaughnessy, comes to take over the Canon's duties. Glacial, snooping, bullying, Shaughnessy, like the Clown in Twelfth Night, thinks that because he is virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale.

He organizes Vigilance Committees to spy in pubs. He threatens to fire the schoolmaster unless he gives up his Protestant sweetheart. He badgers a spirited girl (Jessica Tandy) who will not knuckle under. Finally, he attempts to override the law. But he goes too far--the worm of a schoolmaster turns, the police inspector gives as good as he gets. the defiant girl stands her ground. Shaughnessy foments an uproar which it takes all the bluff diplomacy of the old Canon to quell.

Contrary to the suggestions of overexcited critics, there is nothing subtle or thought-provoking about Carroll's contrasts between the letter and the spirit of religion. His plays are allegorical in form and emotional in appeal. Their very simplicity is a stage asset, has the strength of black against white. Carroll is not yet really important, but he is Irish: he has rich-juiced dialogue, abundant humor, powerful characterizations. Mellow, charming Canon Lavelle and frigid, heartless Father Shaughnessy possibly provide too pat a contrast. But both are brilliant stage characters, inspire the belief that Carroll will some day achieve an even greater creation--mere human beings.

To his native Ireland tiny, bald, 38-year-old Playwright Carroll owes his thick brogue and the background for his plays. But to Scotland he owes his livelihood, and to the U. S. his fame.

Victim of "one of those goddam spurious Irish colleges," Carroll as a young man lit out for Glasgow. There for 15 years, living in the slums himself, he taught slum children about "who discovered America and other such nonsense." He wrote plays which got a hearing at Dublin's famed Abbey Theatre, but brought in little income. England and Scotland ignored him. The U. S. success of Shadow and Substance last year gave Carroll his first independence, enabled him to quit teaching, buy an old country villa.

Ireland, though he has no wish to live in it--"I am not one of those sentimental Irishmen who love leprechauns and hobs" --is the country Carroll will go on writing about. The U. S., where at present he is visiting, he would not live in either, but its theatre is the one in the world that excites him. Scotland, though dramatically a cipher, is the place to live --because "its people leave you alone." England, full of "those gentle barbarians so much more dangerous than bloody barbarians," he despises.

Says Carroll: "I write as Ibsen did. I take the life of a small village and enlarge it to encompass all human life." It is finding a theme that takes time with him; writing comes easy. He plans no more religious plays. The theme of his next work, Kindred, is that a common love for art can bind people more strongly than blood or nationality.

Dear Octopus (by Dodie Smith; produced by John C. Wilson). In real life the English surround their country houses with high hedges, for privacy. But in the theatre, English country houses are always ostentatiously on display. Dear Octopus provides the latest sentimental exhibit, peopling the manorial hall with one of those varied but unvarying families who know what Britannia--and the more genteel theatre public--expect of them. Every item in the ritual is carefully observed:

1) The Golden Wedding, which brings the dispersed clan together. 2) The halting but hearty toast to that "dear octopus," the Family. 3) The nursery, full of memories, and the old teddy bear, now minus an arm. 4) The old nanny, who has been with the family 47 years. 5) The plump married daughter. 6) The slim single daughter. 7) The angular eccentric daughter. 8) The red-faced son-in-law, all teeth, plus fours and fatuousness. 9) The attractive unmarried son. 10) The mousy but pretty companion, in love with him.

With such a bill-of-fare, Dodie Smith has had very little dinner to cook; it all comes, ready to serve, in cans. But she has laid the table beautifully, with the bes, china, the oldest silver and the thinnest glass. And though she goes in pretty heavily for thick white cream sauce, she has favored sauce piquante also, even uses a drop or two of tabasco.

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