Two comments on the Stratford season: I: Stratford’s Festival Theatre, 1970

l'eau s'est videe, une sorte de miracle s'est prodult. Une sangsue grande comme un lacet a bondi, ondulant de toute sa longueur. Un vrai petit poisson d'aquarium, un petit poisson transparent luisant vert ou luisant bleu s'est degage de la masse des petits tetards noirs et des petits mollusques immobiles. (pp. 35-36) 7. Le rabbi Schneider parle de ceux qui ne craignent pas le vrai Dieu. 11 dit que le Dieu des Armees a dit qu' 11 foudroiera ceux qui ne le craignent pas, qu'll ne leur laissera ni racine ni feuillage. Si le rabbi Schneider pense que j'ai peur, II se fourre le doigt dans l'oeil. Les frissons qu'll me donne, son "Dleu des Armees," ce sont des Two comments on the Stratiord season J: Stratford's Festival Theatre, 1970 JOHN PETTIGREW The Festival Theatre gave us this summer a superbly fresh and joyous School for Scandal, an excellent Cymbeline, a respectable Merchant of Venice, and a Hedda Gabler that impressed many. Nevertheless, Stratford 's eighteenth season, quite apart from the sudden death in August of Leo Ciceri, was not one of its happier ones, and some of this season's happenings give cause for real concern. It seems to me vital that, so far as drama is concerned and however different its policy may be at Ottawa's National Arts Centre, the Stratford Festival must continue to devote itself in the main to classical theatre. This is not of course to say that it should not give us such things as Reaney's Colours in the Dark, the occasional gorgeous romp like Peter Raby's version of The Three Musketeers, Wesker's The Friends. These productions provide their own justification. But they must, I feel strongly, be seen for what they are: rewarding but superadded charms, departures from the norm of classical repertory . There is, it seems to me-though not apparently to some of the powers that be at Stratford - a distinction between the city of Stratford in summer and major Canadian cities in winter; the city's size and location, together with the facts that Stratford's is a summer festival and that its main theatre is specifically designed for productions of Shakespeare and his contemporaries, and its Company and traditions geared to such proJournal of Canadian Studies frissons de colere. Plus ii en parle, puls je le meprise. lls ont un Dieu comme eux, a leur image et a ressemblance , un Dieu qui ne peut s'empecher de hair, un Dleu qui grince des dents tellement sa haine le fait souffrlr. Quand le rabbi Schneider par:e comme ga, je pense a mon orme. Mon orme se dresse au milieu de notre grande ile, seul comme un avion dans l'air. Ce doit etre un impie. Je ne Jui ai jamais vu de feuilles. Son ecorce tombs en lambeaux; on peut la dechirer comme du papier. Sous l'ecorce, c'est lisse Iisse, doux doux. Quand ii vente, ses grandes branches seches claquent, on dirait qu'il est pleln de squelettes. (pp. 11-12) ductions - all these things and hard financial facts mean that the Festival must remain true to a conception that has helped to make it one of the world's major theatrical centres. It has not been, and cannot be, Stratford's policy to perform much new and experimental work during the Festival, and I am growing tired of hearing the old cliche that a theatre must experiment or die trotted out as if it were a universal truth, especially now that Ottawa provides an outlet for experimental work. I therefore deplore much about this summer 's choice of programme. We had less Shakespeare than ever before this summer, since Cymbeline had only a short run; and the policy for the Avon was obviously hurriedly decided, extreme - and ill-considered as attendance showed. It is surely silly to give an extended run to a "play" (if we can dignify such a work by giving it that name) like Arrabal's The Architect and the Emperor of Assyria, and all the sillier when the Avon could have been filled all season with Hedda...