Githa Sowerby: from Children's Author to Dramatist
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Serving Weekend Brunch Monday Night Wing Night 2 For Tuesday Slider Wednesday Friday Martini Night Private Party Room available for all occasions Happy Hour Monday thru Friday 11am-8pm Kitchen Open Daily till 2AM Present this ad for 10% discount on checks of $20 or more at the Rogue! 356 West 44 Street, NYC Tel: 212.445.0131 Website: www.theirishrogue.com MINT THEATER COMPANY Jonathan Bank, Producing Artistic Director Sherri Kotimsky, Finance & Production presents RUTHERFORD & SON by GITHA SOWERBY with Robert Hogan, Eli James, Allison McLemore, James Patrick Nelson, Sandra Shipley, Dale Soules, Sara Surrey, David Van Pelt Sets Costumes Lighting Vicki R. Davis Charlotte Palmer-Lane Nicole Pearce Composer & Sound Sound Props Ellen Mandel Jane Shaw Joshua Yocom Dialects & Dramaturgy Wigs Casting Amy Stoller Gerard Kelly Amy Schecter Production Stage Manager Asst. Stage Manager Production Manager Allison Deutsch Andrea Jo Martin Sherri Kotimsky Press Representative Advertising & Marketing Graphics David Gersten & The Pekoe Group Hey Jude Associates Graphics Inc. Directed by Richard Corley OPENING NIGHT FEBRUARY 27TH, 2012 Rutherford & Son is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature and with public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. CAST RUTHERFORD & SON Living Room of John Rutherford’s home. Act I An evening in December. 10 Min. Intermission ACT II Two Days Later 10 Min. Intermission ACT III One Night Later John Rutherford Robert Hogan John his son Eli James Richard his son James Patrick Nelson Janet his daughter Sara Surrey Ann his sister Sandra Shipley Mary young John’s wife Allison McLemore Martin David Van Pelt Mrs. Henderson Dale Soules ROBERT ELI JAMES PATRICK SARA HOGAN JAMES NELSON SURREY SANDRA ALLISON DAVID DALE SHIPLEY MCLEMORE VAN PELT SOULES RUTHERFORD & SON ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT GITHA SOWERBY: FROM CHILDREN’S AUTHOR TO DRAMATIST by Patricia Riley Very early on the morning of and inferior example of evolu- February 1st, 1912, Githa Sow- tion. Women were considered erby crept out of the London to have been created by God flat she shared with two of her solely for the procreation of sisters and headed for the near- children and the sexual satis- est news vendor’s stall. Was it faction of men. In that climate really true that yesterday after- it is no coincidence that Ruth- noon, after the premiere of her erford & Son was billed at its first play Rutherford & Son, premiere as having been writ- that the Royal Court Theatre in ten by “KG Sowerby”, not by Sloane Square had resounded “Githa Sowerby”. The manager to cheers, prolonged applause, of the Royal Court knew that and cries of “Author! Author!”, Githa’s play would not get a and tickets for her play were fair hearing unless her gender now the hottest theatre tickets Opening night program was hidden. in town? acclaim for a play written by These patronising and sexist Any lingering doubts Githa a woman was unprecedented. attitudes can clearly be seen may have had about the re- English Victorian and Edward- in the astonished reactions of ality of the previous day’s ian middle-class family life had journalists who subsequently events were quickly dispelled. been founded on the premise interviewed Githa once the se- The success of Rutherford & that women, to be considered cret was out. Keble Howard of Son was headline news and pure and womanly, must not as- London’s Daily Mail wrote: pire to a role outside the home. the billboards were screech- “This new dramatist, about ing: COURT THEATRE-NEW Astonishing as it may seem to us now, it was then widely ac- whom half the play-going world AUTHOR’S REMARKABLE is talking, is just the sort of young cepted (in accordance with TRIUMPH. Within a few min- Englishwoman you may meet by utes Githa was walking back Charles Darwin’s theory put the score on tennis lawns or up along the Thames embank- forward in his 1871 book “The the river. Tall, fair, with a pretty ment clutching copies of all Descent of Man: Selection in face and a very pleasant voice, the morning newspapers, and Relation to Sex”) that females you might suspect her of eating the billboard poster which the of all species, including hu- chocolates or talking nonsense in the shade, but you would never kindly news vendor had let her mans, represented a stunted dream that she could be the au- keep. It was no dream. Ruther- thor of a play with the grim force ford & Son, the tale of a ruthless of a Pinero in the story or the father who sacrifices his chil- sureness of a Galsworthy in the dren for his huge glassworks in characterisation.” England’s industrial north, was Nor was there less critical in- a smash hit. Indeed, it was be- credulity when the play crossed ing hailed as the best play to be the Atlantic later that year. staged in the West End for a de- Rutherford & Son came to cade, and the writing was being New York’s Little Theater in compared to that of Ibsen. December 1912 and, in a piece In our more enlightened twen- entitled “When Lovely English ty-first century, Githa’s success Miss Turns to Playwriting- Be- as a female playwright may ing A Discussion of One No- not seem particularly remark- table Achievement With A Hint able. But in 1912 such critical Of What Tea Table Ambition Githa Sowerby circa 1912 ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT CONT. RUTHERFORD & SON Sometimes Leads To”, the New the Shaw Festival Theater Rutherford & Son has been York Times critic Adolph Klauber in Niagara-on-the-Lake in hailed by the National The- scoffed: 2004. In 2009, Rutherford & atre in London as one of the “Even with Miss Sowerby as a shin- Son came triumphantly home top 100 plays of the twentieth ing example, we do not feel that the to Tyneside when it received century, and I feel very privi- playwriting instinct in young ladies its first professional produc- leged to have been entrusted calls for immediate or emphatic en- tion with a complete cast of in 2007 by Githa's family couragement.” Tyneside actors at Newcas- with the job of telling her Clearly Githa Sowerby was a wom- tle-upon-Tyne's Northern story. an of determination and consider- Stage. able courage: it was no mean feat to take on the British male theatre establishment and win through as she did. But from where did Githa get the ideas that eventually gave birth to this searing indictment of the legacy of the industrial revolu- tion- a legacy that in the play she compares to child sacrifices to the ancient fire god Moloch? For many years this information was hidden by the smokescreen of misinfor- mation that Githa herself created, presumably to protect her own and her family’s privacy. But through the research I did for my book “Looking For Githa,” published in England in 2009, the answer finally emerged: the ruthless industrialist John Rutherford is based on Githa’s grandfather, John Sowerby (1808- 1879). After her marriage Githa continued to write very successful children's books. She also wrote a number of other plays, but none achieved the success of Rutherford & Son. She died in 1970 aged 93, believing that her work had been forgotten and, wrongly, that her family had no in- terest in her achievements. In 1980, however, an abridged version of Rutherford & Son was performed in London by women's group, Mrs. Worthington’s Daughters, and since that time there have been a number of amateur and professional pro- ductions in England and America, notably by the National Theatre in London in 1994, by the Mint The- ater in New York in 2001, and by RUTHERFORD & SON ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT TIMELINE 1851 John, Githa's grandfather, opens the huge Ellison Glass Works on the banks of the River Tyne in the north of England. He raises his two sons to take over the glassworks, and arranges marriages for his four daughters that will benefit the business financially and socially. The Ellison Glass Works becomes market leader, dominating the European and American markets for mass-produced glassware. 1871 John's eldest son John George (Githa's father) takes over the glassworks. John Sowerby, In 1872 John George Sowerby marries Githa’s Grandfather 1872-82 Amy Hewison and they have six chil- dren, including Githa, born 1876. 1883-90 Record sales are achieved, but the board forces Githa's father to resign. He returns as a salaried worker. Githa's brother, Lawrence enters the 1890 glassworks as a manager but leaves and refuses to return, emigrating to Canada in 1912. Githa's father severs his connection 1896 with the glassworks. Building on his previous hobbies of landscape paint- ing and illustrating children's books, he John George Sowerby, becomes a full-time artist. Githa’s Father 1905-11 Githa moves to London with her sister Millicent, earns her living writing chil- dren's books which Millicent illustrates. They take on the care of their disabled sister, Marjory. In 1905, Githa becomes a socialist and joins the Fabian Society. 1912 Rutherford & Son is a smash hit at London's Royal Court Theatre. She be- comes engaged to poet and dramatist John Kaye Kendall after knowing him only three weeks, and marries him two months later. Githa gives birth to a daughter, Joan, 1918 whose memoirs account for much of the material in the book Looking For Captain John Kendall, Githa. Githa’s Husband Photos on previous page:Top:Githa, far left with umbrella, and the Sowerby Family Bottom: Newspaper ad for Sowerby’s Elllison Glassworks ABOUT THE DIALECT RUTHERFORD & SON Geordie: “Standard” English: A’m gannin’ hyem to wor lass.