• GEORGE LUSCOMBE: HIS L1FE AND ART 1926 - 1989
by
Delia D'Ermo
A Thesis submitted to the • Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Master of Arts
Department of English McGili University Montréal • January 1993 D'Ermo i
• ABSTRACT
ln Î 959, George luscombe, a Canadian-born actor and director, founded Toronto Workshop Productions, Toronto's first alternate theatre. For over a quarter-of-a-<:entury, luscombe pioneered the creation of a Canadian theatre of polltical and social concern and the development of plays through a collective process.
This study attempts to reconstruct the major events of luscombe's personal and artlstic Iife, and to assess his contribution to Canadian theatre through his work at Toronto Workshop Productions as revealed in company reports, contemporary records and the recollections of his friends and associates . •
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• RESUME En 1959, George Luscombe, un acteur-directeur canad len, fonda Toronto Workshop Productions, le premier théâtre 31ternatif de Toronto. Pendant plus de vingt-cinq ans, Luscombe fut un pionnier dans la créatIon d'un théâtre canadien d'esprit socio-politique, et du développement d'oeuvres par travail collectif.
Cette étude vise à reconstruire les principaux événements personnels et artistiques de la vie de Luscombe et d'estimer sa contribution au théâtre canadien par ses réalisations au Toronto Workshop ProductIons, tel que revelés par les archives de l'organization, les rapports actuels et les souvenirs de ses amis et associés . •
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• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 1 met George Luscombe in October 1987 and over the past five years have spent nearly 45 hours in interviews with him. Despite warnings of his tempestuous and difficult personality, 1discovered a kindred spirit, and count myself amongst those who became a captive of his work, his fascinating stories and his inextin{]uishable passion for theatre. 1 also wish to acknowledge the kindness of Luscombe's friends and associates, who generously allowed me to make use of their recollections; Mona Luscombe, Francois-Régis Klanfer and Jesus Garcia who helped me gather and assemble my material; my mother, Mariette D'Ermo, and my devoted companion, Richard Felx, for their support and encouragement; and the Max Bell Fellowship in Canadian and Northern Studies for its financial support . My foremost debt is to Professor John Ripley, an inspiring guide, • who tirst introduced me to Canadian theatre and to George Luscombe .
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• TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract Resumé ii Acknowled gements iii Table of Conte.lts iv Introduction v Chapter 1 -- The Backdrop: The 1930s and 1940s 1 Chapter Il -- The Inspirational Years: 1950 to 1959 17 Chapter III -- Luscombe's Approach ta Play-Making 41 Chapter IV -- The Pioneering Years: 1959 to 1969 68 Chapter V -- The Beginning of the End: 1969 ta 1989 104 Conclusion 145
Appendix A: Stage, Television and Film Raies: 151 • 1956-1960 Appendix B: Awards and Distinctions Conferred 153 ta Luscombe
Appendix C: Chronological Handlist of TWP 154 Productions: 1959-1987
Bibliography 169
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• INTRODUCTION For nearly three decades, George Luscombe created exciting new plays and championed in Canada a theatre of social and political relevance. Tom Patterson, founding father of the Stratford Festival, estimates, "there are five people who 1 think have done the most for Canadian theatre", 1 and names, besides himself, Dora Mavor Moore, Ernie Rawley, Herbert Whittaker and George Luscombe. When he established Toronto Workshop Productions in 1959, Luscombe offered Toronto playgoers their only opportunity to see experimental, home-grown theatre. At the time, the Royal Alexandra and the Crest were promoting mainstream, usually foreign drama. The New Play Society devoted itself primarily to its annual revue, Spring Thaw, while The Stratford Festival was dedicated to celebrating the Bard of Avon . Luscombe's commit ment to the creation of a serious, innovative and • socially-aware Canadian theatre was total. Against overwhelming odds, he developed and maintained Canada's only professional year-round theatre company, and the first of Toronto's alternate playhouses. His most successful shows were concerned in one form or another with abusive or insensitive social and political systems and their victims. 2 Through his drama, Luscombe spoke out for Central Americans, black people, Chileans; in Mr. Bones, he condemned racism in America; in Chicago '70, the Vietnam War and American totalitarianism; in Ten Lost Years, he told compelling, authentic stories of the survivors of the Depression; and in The Mac-Paps, he directed Toronto's attention to the Canadian experience in thf3 Spanish Civil War. The vitality of TWP depended primarily on its ability to develop Canadian work through a collective process with the writer present • whenever possible. In 1961, Hey Rube! became Toronto's first original Of Ermo vi
play realized through this approach, and the precursor of a host of others • to be created at TWP and elsewhere. While luscombe's theatre was developed by Canadian artists for Canadian audiences, its themes and style of presentation were never insular or introverted. "If one were to take a luscombe production and tour it around the world," insists Herbert Whittaker, "it would be recognized as Art Theatre of the highest level, though no one would be
able to identify where it came from. ,,3 luscombe's associates have described him as stubborn, overbearing and cantankerous; actors and crew members found him intimidating, tyrannical, emotionally explosive and often irrational. ''l'm ornery and truculent," he admits, "short-tempered and impatient, a badly battered survivor who has earned every grey hair in my beard. The only thing 1 take credit for is being stubborn ... 4 Only Luscombe's sheer stubbornness can account for TWP's longevity in the face of never-ending adversity. And whatever his diplomatie shortcomings in dealing with fellow-artists, he • offered them by way of compensation more opportunity to exercise and extend their creativity than any other contemporary Canadian director.
Despite his impact on Canada's theatre, little attempt has been made to record Luscornbe's contributions. As a result, TWP has often been treated as a footnote to Canadian theatre history, when, in fact, it is a
highlight of the narrative. This ~tudy, as a first step toward giving luscombe the recognition he deserves, attempts to reconstruct his lite in theatre and to assess, however tentatively, his artistic achievement. Although its foc:us is George luscombe, it tells the story of both the man and his theatre: indeed, they are virtually one and the same. For most of the company's 29-year existence, Luscombe was its only artistic director and producer, and through it his vision of Canadian theatre was given lite. The study begins with an examination of luscombe's artistic • tarmation, continues with an analysis ot his approach to play-making as D/Ermo vii
director and political activist, and culminates with a production-by • production survey of TWP plays he directed and sorne analysis of the reasons for the company's ultimate collapse. The period preceding TWP's opening, which stretches from 1926 to 1959, was Luscombe's learning period, about theatre, about life and about politics; and includes his early years and first experiences in theatre, and the later circumstances, both social and personal, that drew him to drama and to the politically-oriented style of theatre he advocated. From 1959 to 1988 Luscombe dedicated himself totally to the creation and evolution of Toronto Workshop Productions. An adequate appreciation of his achievement requires more than a mere catalogue of productions. It demands an understanding of Luscombe's conception of play-ma king, his rehearsal process, his relationships with actors, writers, crew members and audiences, and his influence on Toronto's emergent alternative theatre movement. By the 1970s, the new alternate theatres Luscombe's work had fostered had become serious competitors for • government funding and public patronage. And Luscombe found himself inadequately prepared ta meet the challenge. This study attempts ta examine in a final chapter the company's demise in 1988, the victim of a changing cultural, social and economic climate.
1 have used TWP's archives extensively for my research, primarily annual reports, financial statements, correspondence, press releases and programming records. Particularly helpful were the company's box-office reports to corroborate production preview and opening dates. Regrettably, TWP, like many other theatres, failed ta maintain an adequate archive system. The presence of various versions of plays without indication of the final script was a specific weakness. Much archivai mate rial that remains bears the marks of the theatre's fire and other types of damage. A major research source have been taped interviews with friends and • associa tes: writers Carol Boit, Rick Salutin, Len Peterson, Larry Cox; actors D/Erm'"' vii i
Geoff Bronstein, Barry Flatman, Tom Butler, François-Régis Klanfer, Doug and Sonya Livingston, Peter Faulkner, Ross Skene, Len Donchef, Suzette • Couture, Lee Broker, Janet Amos, Tom Kneebone; directors t extent, arbitrary, depending primanly on thelr ~vailabillty and accessiblilty It must be recognized that, despite interviewees' best efforts at accuracy, memories are sometlmes fallible and perceptions clouded by subjective concerns. 1 have tried, therefore, to balance narrative agalflst narrative throughout, and, whenever possible, have attempted to rcsolve confllctmg accounts through resort to the company archives. • This study attempts to provide not only an account of luscombe's artistic career, but also a compendium of hls vlews on theatre and hls friends' and associates' observations on his work . • D'Ermo ix • NOTES , Tom Patterson, personal interview, 10 August 1988. 2 Jerry Wasserman, "Büchner in Canada: Woyzeck and the Development of Canadian Theatre," Büchner Conference, Ottawa, 13 February 1987: 6. 3 Herbert Whittaker, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 4 Frank Rasky, "Uttle Theatre's Big Daddy Will Now Play an Envoy," The Toronto Star 1 May 1976: H3. 6 1 was unfortunately unsuccessful in locating Miss Littlewood; though Luscombe provided me with the most recent address known to him, my various letters to her were not answered . • • D/Ermo 1 • Chapter 1 The Backdrop: The 19305 and 1940s To talk with George Luscombe of life in Canada during the 1930s and ' 40s is to invite a discussion on contemporary politics and social dogma. It is also to trigger a heartfelt unfolding of long-forgotten boyhood memories. Woven through Luscombe's nostalgie tales of this less complicated period in his life are reminiscences of the Depression, and of its far-reaching effect on hlm and on his milieu. HIs expenences dunng these formative years became the backbone of his political convictions and the backdrop for the type of theatre he came to :ather. Born to Edward and Anne (D'Donnell), a working class Protestant couple, on November 17, 1926, Luscombe spent his childhood at 78 West Wood Avenue, in the East End of Toronto, ln the WASP worklng class district ealled Tod Morden. • Luscombe's recollections of Tod Morden are invariably nostalgie. With its dirt roads and weather-worn brick and wood homes heated by potbellied stoves, the district resembled any Toronto ghetto. There Luscombe witnessed the advent of electricity and plumbing to the neighbourhood, the dismantling of a fnend's outhouse, the digging up of a eellar and the inauguration of furnaces in houses of residents who suddenly "thought they were millionaires." 1 Among his fondest chlldhood memories is the local fishmonger's weekly run up hls street in hls well-stocked wagon, entering his home without knoeking on the door, and laying a fish down on the kitchen table. By the 19305, Luscombe's Engllsh "ghetto" came to mean English "out of work", with over half the people in the area unemployed and remaining that way throughout the Depression. Those who entered the labour market had virtually no hope of flnding work, and often got their • first job with the army, fighting the war. Those more fortunate found D'Ermo 2 employment with the post office, or at the Tor(J .. to Brick Works in the Don • Valley area. luscombe recalls walks with his father to the brick works, where the homeless stole nights of comfort from the vestigial heat of the avens, fleeing in the wee hours of the morning before the day foreman's arrivaI. As a child, Luscombe was aware of the D&pression, but not greatly affected by it. His father, amongst those fortunate enough to be working, was employed by the CPR as a stationary engineer, which meant that he stoked the company bailers. Though forced to spend his working hours "in the bowels of the earth on King Street,"2 his steady income ensured a comfortable albeit modest living for the family of five, including Luscombe, his older brother Jack, and sister, Catherine.3 "l'm not pretending that we had a problem," Luscombe insists, "because there was a certain funny pride in being able to survive--we never starved. We never went without anything, but we didn't have any luxuries. "4 Though the Depression failed to defeat the Luscombe family • personally, its impact on the community assaulted their consciousness at every turn. Urban decay, bickerings among friends, tensions within families, "drunken fights, 50rdid tragedies ... quarrels of worn-out parents with their idle and blasé sons and daughters who, unable to find work, must needs lie about the house ail day sunk in cynical boredom"5 tainted the atmosphere. Luscombe remembers people knocking at his father's door, begging for work, and others going "broke because they had houses. People who were wealthier than anybody on our street ... and they went bankrupt because they owned the houses and couldn't pay the taxes ... .. 6 By 1932 Toronto had established a new Public Welfare Department to help the ever-increasing unemployed, white blue and white collar workers fretted over wages that had plummeted below 1929 levels. luscombe, aged six, was preoccupied with his own quandary. After one • year of attending Chester Public, he knew that he would not fare weil in its D/Ermo 3 rigid schooling system. Thus began the epoch in Luscombe's life which he • refers to as "the terrible days of public school. Il 7 Initially, Luscombe was keen to start school; after ail, not only would he learn new subjects, but he would meet other children--a luxury hltherto rare. Instead, Luscombe WdS met by stale lesson plans and iII-tempered taskmasters. Having always been encouraged at home to explore and create, he could not understand why at school he was supposed to learn only what the teachers wanted taught. "It didn't click in," he says. "1 just didn't understand why we should be there. Why school? It was a place where you lined up; it's a place where people like a straight answer and ail of a sudden there are things to be done by a certain time. "B Inevitably, Luscombe was judged academically inept. Desplte countless efforts to better his grades, he always finished second to last in hls class, and soon came to believe, as his teachers would have him, that he was actually stupid . ln retrospect he jests that he is proud to belong to the very select • group of children who failed first grade, but, half joklngly, threatens to sue the school system "on behalf of my parents," he says, "for that time 1 had to put in there, and for the fact that they spent elght years destroying my imagination. ,,9 It is arguabl~ that Luscombe's lifelong confrontation with the Establishment owes its genesis to the Chester Public classroom. His sentence at Chester was served by 1940, and he was sent off to East York Collegiate. The move from grade school to hlgh school was, however, no more than geographical; the Collegiate was an extension of Chester Public and of its prison mentality. Here, where senior students disciplined the younger ones, Luscombe felt no less Immured than at Chester. Even the locale, a barren area of Toronto East, reeked of fngidlty. If not for the relief offered by extra curricular actlvltles, Luscombe would probably have dropped out of school. Sut East York was equlpped with a gymnasium, and, Luscombe, with a keen flair for gymnastics, • quickly made himself captain of the junior gym team. On the strength of D'Ermo 4 this triumph, he set out to accomplish a second feat--to learn how to drum. • By now war-time fervour was at its peak, and the 14-year-old gymnast found himsclf exhilarated by military march-pasts. Everyone at the Collegiate, he decided, should learn how to march, 50 he exhumed the school's long-buried drums, and, bent on becoming an East York Cadet drummer, badgered his teachers to set up a school band. The project was no sooner launched than abandoned when he discovered a four-year technical program specially designed for non academic students. A year of struggle with the Collegiate's arduous study plan and Inflexible teachers had convinced him that an industrial course would better suit his talents, 50 he requested a transfer to Danforth Technical School. There he would be given a year to settle on and excel in a trade. If he failed, he would be removed fram the program and denied reentry into East York. That he might find himself out of school at barely 15 years of age was a risk he was prepared to take . His parents, who had long since accepted Luscombe's non-scholarly • bent, encouraged his enthusiasm for a trade. His father urged him to become a mechanic (a decision motivated perhaps by a missed opportunity to open his own garage), and his mother, a little more ambitiously, wanted him to become an electrician. The title "sounded nice--electrician . .,10 "They're a little cleaner," she argued, "they don't get quite as dirty as the mechanics . .,11 Also, by learning a trade, Luscombe would finally be deemed to be working towards a respectable career. Until now he had shown no talent for any soclally acceptable occupation. "1 was a fun kid," he explains. "1 taught myself to tap dance when 1 was about three. "12 1 rF'member having a sailor suit. They put me in short pants and 1 was really embarrassed but 1 danced and my sister played the piano. We did this at organizations that my mother belonged to, my father belonged to, like Christmas parties . • l'm not sure what organizations they were, but some WASP D'Ermo 5 organizations. '3 And 1 can remember tap dancing in a sailor • suit at my father's union, when he belonged to it. 14 This token début stirred in Luscombe a craving to aGt, "and once you get that bug," he says, "you search for it [any opportunity to perform]. "'6 Vet, neither the time nor the area was favorable to aspiring actors, so Luscombe contented himself with developing his musical talents. As a teenager, he taught himself to play the piano, and entertained at summer camps and tourist venues, picking up jobs left behind by musicians at war. His brother, now serving in the army, had left him money to buy a drum set--a bass drum, a snare drum, a cymbal and a tom-tom. Luscombe set up and belonged to a number of bands, playing at dances and weddings. At Danforth, he continued his crusade for a school band, and, eager to reactivate their cadet corps which had withered away in the '30s, Danforth warmly encouraged his efforts. Lus:ombe qUickly assembled a band, appointed himself drum sergeant and got everyone up at seven in the morning to drill them on counter marches and marching circles. • Danforth suited Luscombe weil. Gone were the mandatory school uniforms, the tyrannous pedagogues and the ngld study plans that brainwashed rather than educated. Women sported bobbed or marcelled hair, cosmetics were openly applied, and boys escaped trom "the tyranny of hard collars, the ever-present coat and stovepipe pants to the ease of soft collars, rainbow-hued sweaters and bell-bottom trousers." 16 Danforth's posture was relaxed, "a human place. "'7 Also, Luscombe liked the Idea of learnmg a trade; after ail, a trade had served his father weil. In his first year, he was introduced to Danforth's range of available crafts. "It wasn't a question of choice," he says. "Vou had a year in which vou went to woodworking, to electncs, to plumbing, to foundry, to sheet metal work, to auto mechanlCS. ,,111 Two hours a day were dedicated to each trade. By the end of the year students • were expected to specialize . D'Ermo 6 ln the course of the introduction to his electric shop class, the • instructor said, "Now if you're going to be an electrician, one thing sure, you'lI have to go to bed early 'cause vou got to be wide awake otherwise you'lI electrocute yourself. "19 Luscombe had no intention of forfeiting his late night gigs and so concluded that an electrician's job was not for him. He turned to woodworking, until one day the instructor brought out "a fan saw [whichJ went around at a ferocious speed. ,,20 With a piece of wood the teacher demonstrated how easily a careless worker might lose his fingers. As an aspiring piano player, Luscombe unhesitantly dismissed this second career opportunity and moved on to explore another. The year was close to ending without a choice of craft when Luscombe chanced, rather serendipitously, upon the school's commercial art section. Here, he reasoned, was a type of work he could master; after ail, he was apt at drawing. In the last few desperate moments of that first year at Danforth, he haggled a transfer by special settlement. The following September, he returned to repeat his first year, this time in the • Arts section. Between 1942 and 1946 Luscombe proved to be a dedicated student and a skillful artist. Best of ail, he was working towards a reputable vocation--and one that he enjoyed. "1 was fairly good at drawing and thlS was an acceptable way of passing four years," he remembers. "1 just stood near the head of my class for four years .... 1 was getting A's. "21 Moreover, the program left him with ample free time to pursue his second career ln music, and to cultivate his interest in theatre. Through his association wlth the Co-operative Commonwealth Youth Movement (CCYM), a junior branch of the CCF (now the NDP), Luscombe discovered his theatrical lifework. His introduction to the CCF came through his brother Jack, who, unlike Luscombe, was academically adept, and a promising young • politician. By the time Jack started university, he was already campaigning D'Ermo 7 in support of the CCF's socialist platform, and, inevitably, sensitized his younger brother to both Communism and Socialism. • Throughout the economic and social upheavals of the' 30s and '40s, the CCF steadily gained ground, as voters became increasingly disenchanted with traditional political parties. By 1943, the CCF was voted the second party in the province, and by the late '40s, its protest against risir~ inflation gained it the support ~f most of the trade unions.22 The party's left-wing bearings readily attracted university membership, people who, like Jack, faced the prospect of earning a degree without the possibility of employment. Jack, who "became a socialist whi!, he was still in high school, "23 was elected president of the first CCF Club in East York. luscombe's involvement with the party was initlally non-political: he joined to organize entertainment. In 1943, a long-haired would-be artist, luscombe began to write musicals for CCF political rallies, and infuriated members by nearly converting the Young People's East York Club into a • song and dance organization. 24 "Since 1 was in my teens," relates luscombe, 1 was pretty adept at playing the piano and writing songs. Anything 1 was involved in would have to have musIc in it. And since the Young People's movement would do anything to attract and make itself lively, it was easy to Introduce the idea of "Iet's do a show." And this is what we did. 1 wasn't terribly aware, politically, of the socialist responsibilltles until much later as it finally became important .... In fact, 1 nearly broke up the club there, 1 put on so many shows. We got the reputation of being a variety club rather than a serious politlcal venture. 25 luscombe's skits and songs invariably dealt with relevant political issues, and were intended as propaganda vehicles. During the Hamilton • Steel Mills strike of 1946, the CCYM group was asked to entertain the D'Ermo 8 strikers, and "sang union songs and danced on the back of a truck," Luscombe remembers. "1 say that we probably are responsible for ending • that strike," he adds with wry humour, "they quickly went back to work rather than have to put up with any more of our nonsense. "26 Luscombe spent most of his free time haunting the halls of the East York Club; any extra leisure was devoted to playing the piano for variety troupes, touring army bases such as Camp Borden and entertaining in veterans' hospitals. His work with the Young People' s Club continued until after the end of the war when the CCF's popularity ebbed to the point of near-extinction. 27 At the signing of the Armistice, Luscombe's father and brother were numbered among the war-dead. Ten da ys after the war ended, Luscombe's own draft pa pers arrived. Though his time with the CCF served ta awaken in Luscombe left wing sensibilities, his primary concern at this point was how to satisfy his mushrooming urge to do theatre. Through the CCF newspaper he discov9red that a party member, Anne Marshall, had founded The Canadian • Theatre School. Marshall, who had worked in theatre and radio with limited success, urged CCF Youth Group members to join her club, to meet once a week. Luscombe enrolled with three friends, and thus leapt into what would constitute his first serious theatre experience. With Marshall, Luscombe was introduced to plays that were left wing ~nd socially-committed. As a CCF offshoot, the club supported the union effo,'t, and was devoted ta promoting it through plays that propagandized as they entertained. One of her own pieces, titled A Quiet Evening, she described as an attempt "ta approach socialism through the medium of an art rather than through the more familiar method of study ... 28 The club's commit ment to political theatre kindled in Luscombe a sense of social responsibility, and introduced him ta the widespread left wing sympathies of the artistic community. "We were choosing plays with a purpose," he realized. "We had to learn to do our work, to do it weil, but • we understood then, there was a purpose to work. There was a purpose D'Ermo 9 to the play ... 29 For the first time, Luscombe perceived theatre as an • essential part nf a society, with a duty to reflect, censure and criticize it. From Marshall he acquired a "concern for the qua lit y of his work rather than the advance of his own career ... 30 Through Marshall Luscombe also discovered Stanislavski, and his notion of drama as the exercise of deliberation and imagination. Essentially, she introduced him to the acting profession: to the rehearsal process, to the physical and emotional potential of the actor, and his responsibility, as a professional, toward the text, the audience and his fellow-players. Marshall became for Luscombe the first of two women to fil! the role of mentor in his artistic life, and to cultivate the sensibllity which was to motivate his work as a director for over 30 years. 31 Luscombe remained with Marshall's group until its demlse, Clrca 1949-50. By this time, he had graduated from Danforth Tech and found work, in 1945-46, with Vibra-lite Ltd., a bi!lboard company, as an art apprentice. Then Glendale Theatre on Vonge Street, who had seen his • work for Vibra-lite, asked him to design the advertisement board for the opening of their new movie theatre. Soon Luscombe was doing art work for 20th Century Fox and Famous Players Theatres, filling in start and finish dates and times on movie playbills.32 ln 1947, he joined the staff of The Toronto Star, where he earned up to $75 a week for ttnine amusing months .. 33--doing touch-ups on photographs and preparing layouts for the Star and Star Weeklv. "What 1 liked about it," Luscombe remarks, "was that it was ail rush work. Vou could never plan for the work. It came in at the last minute and vou had to do it within seconds, and it was out again ... 34 "Sa between nine and 10 o'clock we were working like hell; by 11 :30, the first edltlon had come out and you'd sit back and just touch up the work and talk politics. "35 On occasion, Luscombe would clear his art board to stand on it, and pontificate on politics in an effort to raise money for the CCF or recruit new • party members. D'Ermo 10 During these nine months, the Star workers unionized, a move which meant a sizable increase in pay. "Weil of course 1 was ail for the union," • "36 Luscombe asserts. "Outspoken about wanting to join. Yet, shortly after, he resigned. "Couldn't see being tied to a desk," he says, "an art board becomes a desk. "37 ln 1948, at the age of 22, Luscombe joined the People's Repertory Company, run by Ernest Sterndale-Bennett. This was Luscombe's first job as a full-time professional actor. Sterndale-Bennett, an Englishman and drama teacher at the Conservatory of Music, had long felt an obligation to provide his acting students with professional theatrical experience. None was otherwise to be had ir, Toronto. A tour was organized for the fall of 1948, playing one night stimds in selected areas of Southern Ontario--the first venture of its kind in Toronto in approximately 20 years. 38 luscombe became involved because Bennett was two men short. He knew a couple of the students, underwent an audition and was accepted into the group. Bennett was quick to discover the young actor's • art background, and immediately set him to work, painting and woodgraining doors, and building sets. To finance the tour Bennett invested a few thousand dollars of his own money, and each of the actors donated $100. Those who, like Luscombe, had been earning more gave $150 to $ 200. Their first expenditure was for a vehicle large enough to transport them and their equipment. They settled on an old army truck belonging to one of luscombe's friends. Then, in early Fall, the troupe set out. For the company of 10, this was a great adventure. "We ail sat in the back of the truck with our feet up against the ceiling," says Luscombe; "some of us drove the truck. "39 "The scenery was on one side and we were on the other ... 40 Bennett, who was scheduled to teach, was left behind as was one student who was too young to go. Kate Reid watched • the ot"er8 drive away with tears in her eyes . D'Ermo 11 The company toured a repertoire of three plays: J.B. Priestley's • Dangerous Corner; a Will Evans farce, Tons of Monev; and a Lennox Robinson melodrama called Far Off Hilis. "Of course, it never oceurred to me whether we should have a Canadian play," Luscombe asserts, "nobody knew what the hell it was, there was no such animal as far as we knew. "41 Their circuit included stops at Orangeville, Napanee and Bowmanville. Bennett's wife, also acting manager, was deft at getting the Wornen's Guild or the Women's p. ess Club of eaeh town to promote ticket sales; yet the meagre capital investrnent and slim box-office takings allowed the company only a brief life-span. Sy the spring of '49, the tour was finished and Bennett was broke. When Luscombe returned, he decided that the time had come to learn interpretation of dramatie text. He eontacted Mrs. Baker, another teacher at the Conservatory, and asked her to familiarize him with the classies, and to teach him phonetics and voiee and speech . After nearly 12 months and 30 lessons, Luscombe had made little • progress. "1 could read it in her face, Il he remembers, "'poor man, he won't get anywhere. ".42 Yet, Luscombe did master the phonetic alphabet, and was proud of hic:; , Lility to transeribe any play phonetically. "1 wanted to learn what the secret was of interpretation," he muses. "1 never learnt it. If there was any secret Mrs. Baker didn't know it."43 By then Anne Marshall, through her connections with the CBC, had landed Luscombe an affiliation with The New Play Society, Dora Mavor Moore's company operating out of The Museum Theatre. 44 On Mareh 20, 1947, Luscombe played in Time of Your Life directed by Fletcher Markle, and was thus assimilated into the Toronto theatre eommunity whieh included among its celebrities Lorne Greene, Don Harran and John Drainie, actors who worked at the CBC but who moonlighted at the Museum Theatre to gain stage experienee. Some of them eneouraged luseombe to audition for CBC and for • radio work. Il And true enough," he says, "somebody had told Andrew D'Ermo 12 Allan about me, and he'd seen me do something or other somewhere, or • heard about me, and decided that 1 would make a very good Henry Aldrich because they were gorng to do the Canadian Henry Aldrich. It was a big opportunity for the kid from East YorK, right? ... What 1 didn't know," he continues, was how lucky 1 was not to have been involved in that area, at that age, at that time in my life. 1 talked with Anne [Marshall] about it, and 1 think she gave me the best advice.46 The best thing she told me: 'If vou want to be a radio actor you're go mg to move into the circle. You won't have any trouble' (because they ail knew my work from my amateur work and left-wing sympathy), 'but you won't learn theatre. If vou want to learn theatre you have to find the theatre, and there's nothing here.'46 luscombe knew that radio was not a medium to which he was prepared to dedicate his life. He wanted to learn stage technique and was • determined to pursue a theatrical career. He also realized that Canada offered virtually no opportunity for full-time stage work. Part-time acting jobs were occasiona"y available with companies such as The New Play Society, but most actors were obliged to seek in the United States or England the experience that Canada couldn't offer. "You see, everybody departed, there was no hope for a living to be made in this country," he says. "Very few people had the temerity to even mention the fact that there should be a Canadian theatre. These things were not a consideration in the groups that 1 met ... 47 His training with Marshall had shown him how to work with a certain level of professional competence; he was proud to have participated in a theatre that was socially-aware, and demanded his full commitment. This, he was convinced, was the type of theatre he should cultivate; and to find • it, he would have to go abroad . D'Ermo 13 He decided that England would best suit his needs. Not only had i' a • long and brilliant theatrical history, but his family roots W€ie ihere. Luscombe packed evervthing he had, and bought a one-way ticket. "1 didn't know when 1 was coming home or If," I~e recalls. "But 1 took an easel, 1 took mV canvasses, 1 took the brushes, 1 took. shirts for God kno\ilfs how long. . .. 1 got the train from here down to Montréal, the boat train, which used to go right up beside the boat, and Vou got out of the tram ami went into the boat at the lowest level, vou know, with gang planks. Everything was so exciting. "48 On March 1, 19!:O, Luscombe salled for England . • • D'Ermo 14 • NOTES 1 George Luseombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 2 George Luseombe, unpublished interview, The Ontario Historieal Studies Series, 7 Feb. 1979: 3. 3 Jaek (b. 1923-1945) was three years older than Luseombe. Though his given names were Nicholas John, everyone, including Luscombe, knew him as Jack. Luscombe's sister, Catherine Ellen, was born in 1918 and died in 1990. 4 Hlstorieal Studies interview 4. 5 Hubert Garner, "Toronto's Cabbagetown," Canadian Forum June 1936: 14. 6 Historieal Studies interview 5. 7 George Luscombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 8 George Luscombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988 . 9 George luscombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. • 10 George Luseombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 11 Historical Studies interview 4. IL George Luseombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 13 George Luseombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 14 Historieal Studies interview 6. 15 Historieal Studies interview 6. 16 Robert M. Stamp, The Schools of Ontario - 1876-1976 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982) 112. 17 George luseombe, personal mterview, 17 May 1988. 18 George Luseombe, personal interview, 9 March 1990. 19 George Luseombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 20 George luseombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 21 George Luscombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 22 Joseph Sehul/, Ontario Since 1867, Ontario Historical Studies Ser . • (Toronto: MeClel/and and Stewart Limited, 1978) 310-333. D'Ermo 15 23 Historiea' Studies interview 7. • 24 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 17 May 1988. 26 Historiea' Studies interview 8. 28 Historiea' Studles interview 1 5. 27 Schull 333. 28 CCF News'etter, 27 March 1947. 29 Historiea' Studies interview 10. 30 Gordon Vogt, "The Politics of Entertainment: George Luscombe and TWP," The Human Elements, ed. David Helwig (Canada: Oberon Press, 1981) 134. 31 Vogt 134. 32 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 18 May 1988. 33 Historiea' Studies interview 20. 34 Historiea' Studies interview 20-21. 36 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 17 May 1988 . 38 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 17 May 1988. • 37 Historieal Studies interview 1 7. 38 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 17 May 'j 988. 39 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 17 May 1988. 40 Historiea' Studies interview 1 6. 41 George Luscombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 42 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 43 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 9 March 1990. 44 The New Play Society, founded in 1946 by actress-producer director-teacher Dora Mavor Moore, was Canada's first indigenous professional theatre. Over its lifespan, the Society produced over 70 plays, 11 Canadian. Its most eelebrated commercial achievement was its highly successful Canadian revue, Soring Thaw. For a more detailed history of Dora Mavor Moore and her work with The New Play Society see Paula • Sperdakos, "Dora Mavor Moore Before The New Play Society," Theatre D'Ermo 16 History in Canada 10. 1 (Spring 1989): 43-64, as weil as other related • works by Ms. Sperdakos. 46 Historieal Studies interview 28. 48 George Luseombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 47 George Luseombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 48 Historieal Studies interview 31 . • • D'Ermo 17 • Chapter" The Inspirational Years: 1950 to 1959 London excited Luscombe from the moment he arrived. With new found relatives, he set out post haste to explore the city's cultural and historie sites. He rented a room from Glen Burns--a homespun contact from his days with the Museum Theatre and Time of Vour Life. The room, usually tenanted bya dancer away on tour, was comfortable, even lush, and expensive enough to urge him into an immediate search for work. In a nook around Trafalgar Square, he stocked up on pictures of himself, and began to dispatch letters and résumés, extending and glamorizing his few Canadian theatrical experiences. Jobs were difficult ta find. Actors scrambled for work, and competed fiercely for even trivial parts. Luscombe had the added liabllity of his national identity: "They didn't know Canada," he remarks, "they • couldn't care less. They understood America. We were just a colony. ,,1 He spent most of his days rummaging through the hundreds of want ads fram y"ariety and Spotlight. At one point, he sought out an agent related to a CCF friend who claimed Luscombe as a long-Iost family member. Luscombe found the agent "very standoffish": He didn't think this was going to work at ail. But he wouldn't say "no" to a relative, no matter how distant. . .. He didn't have a hell of a lot of time to talk, but he was polite, very British, very English. And he took out this thing: "Ves," he says, "they are casting for comedians for a tour of Johnny Belinda to go through the provinces." He said, "It's not very much, just a tour of the provinces. But maybe you'lI consider it." He said this with a British, languid tone. 1 sald, "Sure, 1 • need the work." 2 D'Ermo 18 Luscombe was punctual for his audition. He was asked to read for a • few 5mall parts, and, to his delight, was immediately cast. At his first rehearsal, he arrived excited but nervous. When the director began to eut and edit the play, Luscombe, who had come without a pencil, asked to borrowone. "And that put him off," he says. "He was angry .... The man got quite fed up with me and the next thing 1 knew 1 was firedl Ilost the job. 1 got the job, and 1 lost the job because 1 didn't have a pencil. 1 fell ln the door and out the door. 1 was not prepared for the rehearsal. "3 He was once more writing letters and watching his money dwindle when an audition cali came for a new musical in the West End, with Noel Coward directing. He arrived to find a queue of auditioners that went three times around the theatre. When he finally reached the door he was pushed onto a massive stage in a long line of other actors. Swiftly, someone ran through the pack and chose--you, vou, you and you--until Luscombe identified the type they were 100 king for. It was "the smart street wise kids .... 1 remember," he says, "deciding not to look down at them but to • look ail over, taking an interest in the theatre. "4 Out of approximately 20 actors in every line, five sifted through, of whom Luscombe was one. Once chosen, they were told to sit in the audience, and from there watched newcomers undergo the same ordea!. Those cu lied numbered about 500. They were asked to return a day or two later, to a different theatre, and the cutting process was repeated. Roughly 50 actors, includlng Luscombe, survived the second eut. At the third and final me et came the audition. "We were told that the show was a Cockney musical. And that we were going to audition for Mr. Coward. We would do our little piece and then Mr. Coward would make his decision. "5 Luscombe had no experience of Cockney dialect, and despaired of mastering It in time for the audition. Instead, he decided to prepare a short piece about himself and his trip to England, including anecdotes about his • fascinating boat voyage. D f Ermo 19 On the day of his audition, Luscombe was first in line, "and that's an • awful place ta be." he says. "1 went out, 1 stumbled through my words and 1 sweated. . .. 1 had my one button roll blue suit coat on and black pants that were tight at the ankle. 1 looked really sharp but very American. Very American." At the end of the audition, Coward said: "Thank you very much, George. But George, Vou know the d;fficulty of English musicals. really don't think we can find a place for an American at this point." A crestfallen Luscombe woefully turned to make his final exit, when in a last desperate appeal he blustered: "Mr. Coward, 1 also play the piano and 1 sing too! Would vou just like to hear them?"e Luscombe was near financial disaster when he received a telegram from the Midland Repertory Company in answer to one of the many applications he had sent out. "Can place you," it read. "Second. Supporting roles. [stop] Join Immediately. [stop] Do not conslder thls a contract. [stop)"7 Luscombe realized that for a Canadlan ln London, good acting roles would be difficult to find. "If 1 got work," he reasoned, "1 • would still be an American in the theatre, playing American roles, which some of my friends were dOlng, and trying to make it that way. 1 wanted to learn what theatre was about. "8 He decided that his best opportunities lay in the provinces, so he packed his bags, bought a train ticket and set out to join the Midland Repertory Company. The challenge of doing two plays a week, as Midland had stlpulated, was a daunting one. How could he memorize so much in so short a time? For his début, he was sent the part of Clive ln See HQw They Run to study -the lead role--a circumstance Luscombe thought odd, considering he hadn't even been auditioned. Luscombe worked hard to memonze the raie, on the train, throughout the night. The next day, with eyes boggy from lack of sleep, he was collected from the train, and taken directly to meet Jimmy James- • or the old man, as the company ca lied him--the director of Mldland . D'Ermo 20 ln the course of their conversation, Luscombe suddenly realized that • Mr. James was expecting him to play Reverend Lionel Toop and not Clive in See How They Run--he had sent him the wrong part to study. With dogged composure, luscombe casually brushed off the blunder, lest he should, once more, lose a job before starting it. He was left with one night to memorize his new lines. Luscombe spent most of his first performance in the wings waiting for his cue--running through his lines, setting the script down, darting onto the stage to deliver his speech, angling back behind the wings, scooping up the script again, and waiting for his next eue. "And finally the play was over. And It wasn't a disaster. We got through it, .. 9 he sighs, remembering his relief; then he was handed the next evening's play with a smaller part to learn. The Midland proprietors were seasoned performers, vaudevillian survivors who decided to invest their tél lents in a touring repertory operation. It was a family affair "Ieft over trom the Victorian age of the • family theatres," Luscombe says. "What happened was the people met each other in the old music halls and variety shows, and if one was an actor and one was a musical man they'd get together and they'd forrn their own company, and away they'd go and tind their little area of playing. It worked for many, many years. "10 When Luscombe joined, the movement was being threatened by the advent of television, and those companies that survived, like the Midland, were obliged ta play remote towns in northern England, Scotland and especially Wales. The company operated as a "fit-up", which meant that the players were responsible for setting up at each of the venues their own stage, scenery and whatever el se was needed to get the show up and running. "When we went to a hall," says Luscombe, ail we [the company] had was a platform, which had a frame . . . müde out of lumber, which went up on both sides to form a • box, a large box within which we played, giving a roof ... D/Ermo 21 and there were rolls of cloth tied across the top ... which • could then be lowered and raised. You've seen things like that in the movies, where the man stands to the side and rolls up the scene. So it could be a Roman court yard for Sign of the Cross and then when the scene changes they roll up a cloth and reveal the amphitheatre painted on the next roll down further, and ... the wall of [Marcus'] house with great marble statues would be painted on the backcloth, and halfway through there would be a wingcloth ... and there might be trees painted on the wingcloth. 11 It was the actor's responsibility ta roll and unroll the cloths: at the end of a scene he would walk off into the wings, only a few feet away, and roll up or down the next set. The company played its repertory in each town until the crowds stopped coming, and the bill was usually changed nightly. Midland stayed in a town anywhere from six ta eight weeks, and even 10 weeks in their more popular venues. • Within a month of joining Midland, luscombe's routine was set. He spent the tirst hours of his mornings reviewing his lines. Wlth 10 (;'clock came rehearsal, though "the rehearsal was not a rehearsallike usual. Rehearsal time was walk through time, just walk through," he says. "Everybody mumbling at the pages. 1 couldn't understand it because l'd been introduced to Stanislavski, and, you know, the concentration and the getting into it a". We", 1 never saw anything like thls before in my life.,,11 Each actor read his lines from a script that contained only his part. Only Mr. James had a full script. After one year, luscombe needed only to glance at a play and ail the parts, not just his, would be memorized. Sy 1952, Luscombe was playing leads and earning [5 a week. Tours had taken him throughout the south of Wales and into the north. He had performed in over 100 plays: mod-::rn melodrama~, such as Emlyn Williams' Night Must Fall, or old Welsh favourites like The Mald of • Cavenedra, and even popular West End hits, such as Shop al Sly Corner. D'Ermo 22 His time with Midland at once benefited and harmed Luscombe: the exigencies of the repertory system taught him discipline in the theatre and • gave him "a healthy respect for getting the show on the road, "13 but its fit up operation lured him Into aIl unsubtle, extemporaneous acting style. Bad habits acquired during this period luscombe would have to unlearn later. Luscombe remalned with Midland 1 1/2 years. His decision to leave was prompted by a recognition that the Midland was on its last legs, and by CI growing craving for fresh experience. The time had come to move on, 50 when the offer of a job in Manchester arrived, he accepted it. It was Mr. James himself who wrote to his friend Frank H. Fortescue to ask if there was work for luscombe. Fortescue "was an amazing man who was past his prime when 1 joined him," luscombe says, "but in his prime, in the North of England, he was a very big theatrical manager, and he had 13, 14 companies [ca lied Fortescue's Famous Repertory Companies] ail going into large theatres where they would play sometimes twice nightly. ,,14 His actors affectionately ca lied themselves "Fortescue's • Flying Fleas" or "Fortescue's Famous Fleas." Since no other work was available, Luscombe was assigned to pantomime. For an aspiring actor, this was a substantial step up the ladder--the repertory was weekly rather than nightly and pantomime pa id weil, up ta [9 a week. "But again," he remarks, "1 seem[ed1 to be meeting everything as it is [wasJ dying--certainly over there--because pantomime was in a terrible mess. ,,15 When Luscombe arrived, Fortescue had maybe six or seven companies left, playmg the more popular areas such as Manchester and small towns around the north of England. During one of the company's runs, in Workington, Luscombe met and shared digs with Jim Lovell, a scene painter who painted ta earn a living, though his true passion was the study of theatre. Every afternoon, Luscombe and lovell would settle by the fi replace at their lodging and talk of Shakespeare and Elizabethan playwriting. "1 mentioned . .. how • intimidated 1 was by the works of Shakespeare," Luscombe says. "He D'Ermo 23 [Lovell] wrote to the British Museum and got copies of the Folio editions, "16 • and tutored him in the playwright's masterworks. They also talked of the controversial new dlrector Joan Littlewood, whom Lovell knew. Her artistic and political ideology and her application of the Elizabethan drama and the Commedia dell'Arte irreslstibly fascinated Luscombe, who pressed Lovell for an introduction. On his behalf Lovell wrote Littlewood to say there was a young man he thought she should meet, then warned Luscombe that, if he ever joined Theatre Workshop- Littlewood's company--not to stay too long as "she's a wonderful teacher but they're ail a bunch of raving Communists." 17 ln August 1952, at the end of their Workington run, Fortescue gave his "Fleas" time off, and while most of the actors set off for London in search of extra work, Luscombe headed for the Edmburgh Festival. There Littlewood and her company were playing on "the Fringe". Littlewood wasn't aware of Luscombe's coming. In the Oddfellows' Hall--Theatre Workshop's rented space--he found her sitting at a large • table, her actors hovering around. They looked "a bit scruffy" but "full of humour, .. 18 remembers Luscombe. He offered cigarettes, and within seconds had the actors flocking to the table. Cigarettes, he would soon discover, were a luxury ta the struggling troupe. Quite spontaneously, Littlewood invited him to stay and watch a rehearsal, a privilege unheard of in her company. They were rehearsing Ewan MacColI's The Travellers, and Luscombe was immediately struck by the content of the play and the excitement of the wming. ''l'd been looking for it [Littlewood' s style of theatreJ," he recalls, and 1 knew it when 1 saw it, that that was It. 1 knew It politically. 1 knew It socially. 1 wanted to work wlth people who had that commltment and that made the work fun and interesting. Anything else was playing at being in theatre. You see, 1 always thought the ktnd of level that Canada was • at that time before 1 left was something 1 really didn't want ta D'Ermo 24 be a part of. 1 liked the cocktail circuit but it really didn't have • any meaning for me at ail. . .. When 1 want to have a party, then let's have a party. But wh en 1 want to be in the theatre, please let me work in something meaningful. 19 Co-founder and Artistic Director of Theatre Workshop since 1945, the Stockwell-born Littlewood was committed to championing an outspoken, leftist brand of theatre through original works that spoke out against fascism, war, unemployment and capitalism. 20 Following his encounter with Littlewood, Luscombe returned to work with Fortescue, and in November 1952, was cast as the villain Demon Black Sheep in Bo Peep to tour in January. 21 At that point, Littlewood wired him to invite hlm to join her company for theïr upcoming productions of Henr)' the Fourth and Malade Imaginaire. Luscombe could scarcely believe his good fortune, and at the end of the run of Bo ~, he left Fortescue to join Theatre Workshop . The company lived in a large, old house in Manchester. Each actor • was assigned a room, and chores were carefully meted out. "If you wanted to act, write, direct or whatever," remembers Peggy Soundry, Theatre Workshop member, "first of ail you had to paint and decorate and use a vacuum cleaner. "22 Once again, Luscombe foûnd himself working for petty wages; but nO'..'\I he felt some hardship was justified. Indeed, ail that would come to characterize Luscombe's style as director of Toronto Workshop Productions owed its inspiration to Littlewood's influence. "That" he highlights, "was the real beginning in my training."23 Littlewood's actors worked fram morning till night. At 10 a.m. they met in the living room and practised Laban movement24 and other physical exercises until mid-morning, when they switched to vocal limbering. In the afternoons, they df.:veloped improvisations and explored theÏ! upcoming play. Despite the taxing nature of the workouts, Luscombe eagerly immersed himself in this new rehearsal process, new to him as to much of • Europe and most of Canada in the '50s. D/Ermo 25 Littlewood was a thoroughgoing disciplinarian. Luscombe describes her as a "tough hard v/orking lady" who "demanded a lot fram herself of • course, and therefore from us. "25 Howard Goorney, a member of the company for over 30 years and author of The Theatre WorkshOp Story, says: "Joan was the driving force. She was remarkable. Remarkable. She was also subject to extreme changes of mood: trom being in a state of complete exaltation she would start the most terrible rows, absolutely appalling ones, seemingly over nothing .... She made a lot of mistakes, she was also a genius. "26 Gerry Raffles, general manager and longtime companion of Littlewood remarks: "Sho was both the most generous person you could meet, and she could be the toughest. She loved conflict, enjoyed provoking and could demolish people--and then she'd go and make them a meal in the Green Room. "27 "It seems to me", sums up Irving Ward le, theatre critic for The London Times, "that there are two breeds of great director: those, like Stanislavsky, who are totally immersed in the theatre; and those, like Brecht, who practise their art in the service of sorne • larger objective. Miss Littlewood belongs to the second category. ,,18 Littlewood's "Iarger objective" was to establish theatre as an "organic unit in the organic structure of society. "29 More particularly, it was to use theatre as a weapon in the class struggle against the capitalist system. Ken Hill, who worked with the company during the '70s, contends that Littlewood "invented the working-class actor.',:10 She filled her stage with "people of small means and great imagination", says a Time correspondent, and put "the British people back on the stage, and the British people of every variety'" back in the audience toO. 31 As a socialist, Luscombe was convinced he had the right credentials to join Theatre Workshop, but was surprised to find himself decried as a liberal. "You had to begin as a Communist and that was tough, "32 he remembers. Littlewood's work system was militant,33 and actors had to be willing to sacrifice both tflemselves and their finances. From Littlewood's • political energy and artistic talents emerged triumphs for Theatre Workshop D'Ermo 26 such as Jaroslav Hasek's The Good Soldier Schweik and MacColI's Johnny • Noble, Uranium 235 and The Travel/ers. Her creative gifts as director and teacher discovered and nurtured such outstanding performers such as Harry Corbett and George Cooper, to say nothing of playwrights Brendan Behan (The Quare Fellow and The Hostage) and Shelagh Delaney (A Taste of Honey). Her primary inspirations were Brecht and Stanislavski. It was the first time since Marshall that luscombe had been exposed to Stanislavski, to his notions of units and objectives, and, this time, for eight hours a day. With every new production, the company aspired to use theatre to discover theatre. "Theatre Workshop," its mandate decreed, is an organization of artists, technicians and actors who are experimenting in stage-craft. Its purpose is to create a flexible theatre-art, as swift moving and plastic as the cinema, by applying the recent technical advances in light and sound, and introducing music and the 'dance theatre' style of • production.34 "What we were presenting, Il explains Goorney, "though revolutionary in this country, was a development of ideas in staging that had prevailed on the Continent, particularly in Russia and Germany, since the turn of the century. "36 Improvisation was a key element of Littlewood's technique, and actors were often asked to invent sequences for plays prior to reading the script. When Behan's prison drama, The Quare Fellow went into rehearsal, Littlewood attempted to show her actors "what prison was like by leading themall up to the theatre roof, marching them around on the grimy slate for hour after hour, stopping now and again to permit them a quick cigarette and furtive, prisonyard conversations. "36 If an actor created something wonderfully different during a rehearsal Littlewood would smile: "And 1 can always remember her face in rehearsal when we discovered • something, did something weil," recalls Luscombe, "not only did she smile Of Ermo 27 with great appreciation ... but she would look like a little girl ... a very little girl enjoying herself."37 "It was an organlc company and a highly • Il "38 disciplined group, he insists. "Vou were pulsating in that company. luscombe's first months with Theatre Workshop were spent touring schools. Then came the offer of the Theatre Royal at Stratford East, and long debates as to whether or not the company should move closer to the city centre. The Theatre Royal stood 10 miles outside of London, ln a sium district on Angel Lane Street. It offered a 51 2-seat auditorium, with a "proscenium arch theatre built by an actor, wonderfully enough, ln the old Victorian tradition with the boxes on the sides and the ground tloor, and .. . two balconies. "39 The theatre first opened its doors on December 17, 1884 and featured melodramas, variety, revue and nude acts, until Theatre Workshop occupied it in 1953. The company WUIi,,- ~ " .jefatigably to make thelr new venue viable. Rehearsals ran from 10 in the morning until 11-11: 30 at night, when, during changeover weekends, actors were expected :0 help the technecal • director, John Bury, with sets. The shift wlth Bury ended at 6 a.m. or thereabouts, and by 10 a.m., the actors were expec1ed to be ready for Littlewood's rehearsal. Fridays were paydays, and the average weekly wage, when paid, was under f2. On one occasion, company members recelved only five shillings, and on another, there was nothing at ail. Thelr dlet usually consisted of a "dally allowance of vitamin pills, benzednne and coffee, .. 40 supplemented by cracked eggs, bruised tomatoes and the fat of bacon, the cheapest food ta be found on Angel Lane. Cast and crew cooked their food ln the theatre, ln violation of flre regulations, and by the middle of their first season, most of the company, unable to pay their rent, moved Into their dressing rooms. When Inspectors arrived to verity rumours that the theatre was being used as a lodglng house, someone would announce over the tannoy "Walter Pllnge IS wanted • on stage", a coded eue to hide the beds and set everythmg stralght. 41 D'Ermo 28 The company opened its first season at the Theatre Royal with two • week repertory, and by the end of the tirst year they switched over ta a three and four-week pattern. In the tirst three years, the company's vintage period, they staged more than 45 productions, classics and original scripts adapted by or written for the company. It was "great stutf for a young actor," sa ys Luscombe, "that's the way vou should go at it. It leaves a hell of an Impression on Vou. "42 Luscombe remalned with Theatre Workshop until some years before it moved into the West End, in 1958--a culturally-respectable and commerclally-successful institution. "People were lining up, fighting to get into Llttlewood's company," Luscombe declares. "1 knew it was a privilege to be in there, but 1 still had had enough . .,43 "The truth," he continues, lOis that 1 was trytng to get the hell away from Group Theatre." It was difficult work. "1 mean we were working 14 hours minimum a day, every day. was young and capable of it," but he was tired. 44 Luscombe had spent three tough years with Littlewood, and they • were the best artistlc training he could have hoped for. He had played dramatlc characters from Aristophanes to Hasek, and accepted artistic challenges every worklng day. From Littlewood Luscombe learned the value of Imagination ln the maklng of good drama, and the importance of discovering the "purpose to a play"--political and artistic. Littlewood satiated Luscombe's craving to do meaningful theatre, and profoundly affected the type of d,rector he became. At the end of hls apprenticeship at Theatre Workshop, in early 1956, Luscombe declded to return to Toronto, though he had no desire to form a company: "1 had had enough of that close contact," he maintains, "living on top of each other for five years, "45 and having only enough money to survive. Instead, he was determined to try his hand at the new medium of television. At least, he hoped, he illight be able to earn a decent living. His welcome in Toronto was disappointing: no one cared about his • work in England, nor his experiences with Littlewood. His résumé D'Ermo 29 inventoried the hundreds of productions he had played in, including tours to • Poland, Germany, and France, but no one was impressed. For nearly three months, he found no work. Stratford had opened in 1953 and the Crest was still running, but Luscombe couldn't see himself belonging to either organization. The Jupiter had come and gone and The New Play Society had disappeared. The only work to be had was on the Summer Theatre circuits, but the pay was minimal, and Luscombe was tired of working for nothing. His first audition was for CBC, which had by now turned from radio to live television; and, though thriving, there was no work for Luscombe. Once again, he was forced to fall back on his training in commercial art. During the next several munths, Luscombe worked for Murray and Donald Davis, J. Walter Thompson, Maclean Hunter Publishers, and then The Financial Post. He never told his employers that he was an actor. "It was quite obvious that 1 was pretty goddam rusty wh en it came to commercial art," he says, "because you have to be very slick. It was something 1 • didn't care mu ch about in any case. My heart wasn't there. 50 it was an excuse ta get through. 1 would just say: 'Weil 1 was painting in Europe', and 1 could mention ail the wonderful places 1 had been ta, and 1 had been there and 1 was an artist in Europe. ,,46 Then Sterndale-Bennett's wife, who had heard of his return ta Toronto, called to encourage him to audition for CBC producer Leo Orenstein who was 100 king for young actors. Luscombe auditioned and was hired ta play the part of Passe-Partout--a French Canadian--in Marcel Dubé's Zone, ta be shot in Montréal. "To work with Orenstein first made a big difference to me in my attitude about Canada. We got along so weil together," says Luscombe, who impressed Orenstein by arriving at his first rehearsal with his lines memorized. "It was a piece of cake. It was easy work," he recalls. "And it was great fun .... It didn't take us long ta feel • like a company of actors. ,,47 D'Ermo 30 Through his involvement in ~ came more work for Luscombe at • CBC and then at NFB, enough to keep him busy in television for the next few years. Also, he played in a few stage productions. On July 30, 1956, he appeared at the Centre Island Playhouse in Dear Charles. On December 11 of the same year, he played Frank Verhoff, the principal role in Mary Jukes' Every Bed is Narrow, directed by Herbert Whittaker at the Crest Theatre. On June 23, 1958 he opened in Solid Gold Cadillac at The Garden Centre Theatre--a summer touring venture--starring Zasu Pitts. On July 7, at The Garden, he played in Mr. Roberts. Herbert Whittaker found Luscombe's Ensign Pulver "a high-powered goon, a coward and a braggart but loveable, too", if "a shade on the deliberate side".48 On August 8, 1958, Luscombe was married. "It didn't take long," he muses. "No 1 couldn't get along. 1couldn't live alone. So better get that settled, move on. "49 "1 was very sure l'd come to no good if 1 didn't settle down, because 1 ."Jas getting into ail kinds of trouble with my love life. "50 Over • the next 35 years, Mary Mona Walton proved to be a generous wife, loyal friend, devoted companion and right-hand person to Luscombe as box office manager and administrator of Toronto Workshop Productions. Then, in early 1959, director Hugh Webster, whom Luscombe had known since his CCF days asked him to play Kirt Brovich in his upcoming production of Ibsen's The Master Builder to open on March 5 at the new Lombard Theatre. Luscombe accepted, and halfway through rehearsals, when Webster left to direct at the Crest, Luscombe assumed his directorial responsibilities. The production marked luscombe's first experience as a director in Canada, a milestone he remembers as "very enjoyable and very hard work. "51 Mavor Moore, critic for The Telegram, described "George Luscombe's spare production" as "always thoughtful" .52 Herbert Whittaker's review for The Globe and Mail was more forthcoming: • "Disdaining ail flourish, the members fix each other in the eye and pursue D'Ermo 31 truth to the wall," he wrote. " At the end, we feel we have come to grips • with the Ibsen masterwork ... 63 During his work on The Master Builder, Luscombe received a cali from Antony Ferry, whom he had met in London when his wife Joan auditioned for Littlewood. The Ferrys both worked in theatre, he as a journalist and she as an actress. Like Luscombe, Joan had travelled to England to gain acting experience. She had attended London's Central School, and studied ballet and mime with Claude Francis at the Comédie Française. Antony Ferry had written for the Quebec Chronicle-Telegraph, Maclean's and the Winnipeg Tribune, and launched in England an avant garde theatre magazine called Encore, the success of which encouraged the couple to stay abroad until 1958 when they returned to Canada.54 Antony Ferry contacted Luscombe and invited him to a meeting at his house, but wouldn't tell him its purpose. The young actor arrived to find on hand Powys Thomas, a performer familiar to Luscombe trom his work in London's West End and his current success in Canada. While the • three men swigged home made beer, Ferry reminded his guests that the quality of theatre in Canada was subc;tandard if not pathetic, and argued that what this country needed was a national theatre where native actors, writers and directors could be trained. He suggested that Thomas, Luscombe and himself undertake the project. Luscombe's interest was piqued. Ali three concurred that a national theatre would have to incorporate a school. None of the established theatres, the Crest and the Stratford Festival, for example, offered their actors training. The new theatre school must, they agreed, educate writers as weil, and thus champion Canadian plays. Also, they envisioned a bilingual school run for artists and by artists--a land mark vision for 1959. Luscombe insisted that, in addition to offering a training ground, the organization would have to mount professional-quality productions. He wanted "nothing to do with schools that would not produce. Nothing to • do with these institutions and these sausage-making machines". Let the D'Ermo 32 school feed the theatre and the theatre the school, and let the school "only get as large as is needed to feed that theatre. "66 • The r.1eeting lasted into the morning, and at its conclusion the three men decided to launch Theatre Centre, which they described as a place for "people to congregate who can bring their talents and skills to the arts to make the real, exciting kind of theatre that we ail believed in. "68 luscombe left Ferry's home with much to consider. "1 thought to myself," he remembers, "yes, l'm willing to go forward if it has to be, because 1 can't work here otherwise, 50 1 would give this a little time if it works . .,57 Over the next several weeks, planning went forward apace. On February 1, 1959, Ferry ran an advertisement in The Toronto Star: "Dedicated but penniless theatre group seeks warehouse Ha where it can work nights and Saturdays. Would sorne business man be a patron and offer rent free or nominal quarters to actors. "5B On February 27, the company was offered by Toronto Industrial Leaseholds Ltd. rent-free quarters at 47 Fraser Avenue, the heart of Toronto's industrial area, in the • basement of a printing shop. A portable stage and 50 chairs were donated to fill the 100-seat space. On March 21, The Toronto Star's Dennis Braithwaite announced that A group of live theatre enthusiasts are hard at work on a project which they fervently hope will develop into the first distinctively Canadian theatrical workshop and acting company. The Theatre Centre, which will incorporate the activities of both a dramatic school and a working company, has set up shop in a downtown office building and is planning for its tirst summer school, which will open in June ... ,59 Critic Nathan Cohen noted that "Theatre Centre aims at being both a school and ët working organization. Its avowed goal is to train professionals and young students into a permanent acting company, by • giving them instruction and practical experience. ,,60 D'Errno 33 Theatre Centre's first registration session saw 47 Fraser jammed • with actors and would-be players eager to sign up. Classes were scheduled to be he Id once a week, in the summer, with Antony teaching dramatic literature, Thomas, acting, Interpretation of text and make-up, and Luscombe, the Laban method of movement and Stanislavski's units and objectives. Among the Centre's other teachers would be Carlo Mazzone, Italy's leading mime and one-time partner of Marcel Marceau, who was "tremendous" and "exciting, .. 61 recalls Luscombe. O.le morning, Luscombe was awakened bya telephone cali from Thomas. "1 remember the phone cali," he says. '''George, we got ail the money we needl'" announced Thomas. Financial support for Theatre Centre was not going to be a problem. A group of people interested in their venture had contacted Thomas, commended hlm for the project, and expressed interest in backing the group financially. "What are the strings? ... What do we have to do to get this money?"62 were Luscombe's questions. The answer: to build a theatre school without a theatre, and to • have Michel St. Denis head the project. For years, people had talked of setting up a national theatre school. "It's typical of this country's approach to the arts," remarks wnter Gordon Vogt, "that a theatre school should be given precedence over the work of creating an actual theatrical life. ,,63 Initially, Luscombe and Ferry decided to meet with St-Denis, but when he said "sorne scurrilous things about Littlewood" Luscombe took offence and corrected him at once. "1 was very ticked off about that," he gripes, "because he mouthed the easy thing that people criticize: 'Ah weil, ail Vou do is improvise the plays there. Nothing is written at ail'. That's absolute nonsense ... 64 Fundamentally, however, both Luscombe and Ferry were opposed to the idea of building a school without a theatre to support It, and ultlmately refused to participate Ï;l the project. Thomas, on the other hand, who had • studied with Michel St. Denis and looked forward to working with him D/Errno 34 again, was appointed director of Montréal's National Theatre School on • June 4, 1959. Meanwhile, Luscombe and Ferry continued with Theatre Centre, and set up their summer program. They planned to rehearse Goldoni's The Servant of Two Masters and Ferry's own adaptation of Hasek's The Good Soldier Schweik, set in Québec during the conscription crisis. Their first professlonal Workshop went ahead on schedule, in Haliburton, Ontario, at a farm that belonged to one of Luscombe's friends. The ensemble trained in the open air on weekends, with Ferry, Luscombe and Mazzone giving classes in playwriting, acting and mime respectively. It was a secluded area, and the group lived and talked only theatre. Many friendships were formed. ''l'm sure," reminisces Luscombe, "ail of those who were there those days remember the hilarious moments in the evenings when we did ail kinds of nonsense. We improvised little bits in plays that we tried to do. "65 ln time, Luscombe developed marked teaching skills. "The love of the theatre we ail expenenced that summer," writes Joan Ferry, "together • with the spartan living conditions (many lived in tents) and the pooling of our montes for food, fostered a community spirit. This was the spirit we brought back to Toronto with us in Spptember 1959. "66 The group also brought back disastrous finances. By the fall of '59, Ferry was broke and Theatre Centre was $2,000 in debt. As administrator of the company, he had been applying student fees against teac1"lers' stipends, and there wasn't enough money to go around. To pay his rent, he was forced to take on a full time job at The Toronto Star, and to close Theatre Centre, leaving Luscombe jobless and unpaid. When Theatre Centre disbanded, six actors who had been working with Luscombe encouraged him to continue training them. Luscombe agreed to hold three classes weekly, on certain cnnditions. "1 want two things," he said. Flrst, "Iet's dismiss Theatre Centre from our minds . .,67 The company had been poorly administered by Ferry who had hired more • teachers than he was able to pay. In Luscombe's l'lew compallV, he would D/Ermo 35 be the only instructor. Second, "1 don't promise that we'lI do any • productions. That's not the point of the training. At this pOint, it's going to be work. We'lI just see hoV\l .~ make out and how we grow. If we think we've learned enough we will then produce something. Somethlng small. "68 With the rules set and accepted, Luscombe Initiated classes. He named his new company Workshop Productions, to highlight both its training and production thrust. Ferry became writer for the group. On December 14, 1959, Workshop Productions premiered with Chekhov's one-act farce The Boor and an adaptation of Lorca's tragedy Don Perlimplin. On May 6, 1960, Chekhov's The Proposai and a stage adaptation of Len Peterson's radio play Burlap Bags followed. Luscombe trained his students as he had been trained with Littlewood, in Laban movement and Improvisation, whlch his actors absorbed enthusiastically. "Improvisations," says Joan Ferry, "began in earnest during the summer of 1960. . .. Increasingly, we came to trust our own resources for improvisation." During a rehearsal, Eleanor Seattie, • an actress, pulled out from a dark corner a dusty old trunk: Eleanor Beattie claimed it as a kitchen table and mlmed serving us food on it. Discussions about food and where we'd got the money to buy it ensued. Then other topics arose, including that of a circus. One of the actors silently broke away from our dialogue and began to mime a Juggllng act ln a corner. Gradually our attention was drawn away trom the dialogue to the action, and one by one we worked out through mime our own personal circus acts.69 The action on stage excited Luscombe, who agreed to develop a story line. He hired one of Ferry's friends, Jack Atack, to write a Clrcus play, but wasn't satisfled with the brief one-page plot that Atack submltted a few days later. He discarded the draft, flred Atack and asked Ferry to Slt in the bleachers and tailor-make a circus play based on the actors' • improvisations. In her article, Joan Ferry relates that her husband wasn't D'Ermo 36 sure whether or not to write the play for Luscombe who was quickly • gaining a reputatlon for being stubborn and singleminded. Eventually, he acquiesced, and Luscombe put it into rehearsal in the early fall. By January 1961, Luscombe decided that their new play was ready to open, while Ferry felt it needed more work. Their artistic disagreement evolved into a serious row, which cost both men their working relationship. Ferry, who lost the argument, demanded that his name be omitted from the program, and Luscombe agreed. Hey Aube! opened on January 21, 1961, and was a huge success. The collective creation process by which it came into being was new to Canada, and would inspire many more productions of its kind. Hey Rube! ran for six weeks, with the late critic Nathan Cohen attending at least twice. Toronto Workshop Productions had come to birth, and Luscombe had proven "that a small theatre group operating on a non-existent budget could have a vital impact on the theatre scene."70 Ali eyes were on • Luscombe and TWP . • D'Ermo 37 • NOIES 1 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 2 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 3 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 4 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 5 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 6 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 7 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 8 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 9 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 10 George Luscombe, unpublished interview, The Ontario Historical Studies Series, 7 Feb. 1979: 38. 11 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 12 Historical Studies interview 42 . 13 Gordon Vogt, "The Politics of Entertainment: George Luscombe • and IWP," The Human Elements, ed. David Helwig (Canada: Oberon Press, 1981) 136. 14 George Luscombe, persona! interview, 18 May 1988. 15 Historical Series interview 47. 16 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 17 George Luscombe, personal interview, 9 March 1990. 18 George Luscombe, personal interview, 18 May 1988. 19 Historical Senes interview 58. 20 See Howard Goorney, The Theatre Workshop Story (Great Britain: Eyre Methuen Ltd., 1981) 44. Also Michael Coren, Theatre Royal: 100 Years of Stratford East (Great Britain: Mackays of Chatham Ltd., 1984) 24. 21 Frank H. Fortescue, letter to George Luscombe, 27 November 1952. 22 Coren 30 . • 23 George Luscombe, personal interview, 16 October 1987. D'Ermo 38 24 The Laban technique is a movement theory developed by Rudolf • Laban--known as "The Father of Modern Dance"--a French time and efficiency expert who claimed that ail human motion could be simplified into eight basic movements (or Efforts) which could be defined in terms of weight (Energy), direction (Space) and speed (Time). Littlewood was acquainted with his technique in 1938 during her work with Theatre of Action. For more detailed information on the Laban technique see Rudolf Laban, Choreutics, ed. Lisa Ullmann (London: MacDonald & Evans, 1966); also, A Life for Dance (London: MacDonald & Evans, 1975); also, The Mastery of Movement, revised by Lisa Ullman, 2nd ed. (New York: DBS Publications, 1967). 26 Historical Series interview 53. 26 Coren 25. 27 Coren 42. 28 Irving Wardle, "Joan Littlewood," The Times [London] 3 December 1970: 13. • 29 Special Correspondent, "What Miss Littlewood Demands of the Theatre," The Times [London] 12 July 1961: 5. 30 Coren 30. 31 "Theatre Abroad: Strasberg-on-Avon," Time 31 October 1960: 62. 32 George Luscombe, personal interview, 9 March 1990. 33 Vet her militancy applied more to the art of acting and to the creation of theatre than to her actors' political bent; Littlewood wasn't interested in converting anyone, in fact, her company was made up of ail types, including Harry Corbett, a WASP liberal. Notwithstanding this, since his association with Theatre Workshop, Luscombe considered himself converted, though he was never actually a member of the Communist Party. 34 Goorney 42. 36 Goorney 44. 38 "Theatre Abroad" 62 . • 37 George Luscombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. D'Ermo 39 38 George Luscombe, personal interview, 16 October 1987. • 39 Historieal Series interview 54. 40 George Luscombe, personal interview, 17 May 1988. 41 Coren 29. 42 George Luseombe, personal interview, 16 October 1987. 43 George Luscombe, personal interview, 16 October 1 987. 44 George Luscombe, personal interview, 16 October 1987. 45 George Luscombe, personal interview, 16 October 1987. 48 George Luseombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 47 George Luseombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 48 Herbert Whittaker, "Mr. Roberts is Lively, Funny," The Globe and Mail 10 July 1958: 11. 49 George Luseombe, personal interview, 16 October 1987. 50 George Luseombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 51 George Luseombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988 . 52 Mavor Moore, "The Answer to a Dilemma: The Master Builder, Il • The Telegram 5 Mareh 1959: 50. 53 Herbert Whittaker, "Ibsen in Miniature," The Globe and Mail 5 March 1959: 42. 54 See Joan Ferry, "Experiences of a Pioneer in Canadian Experimental Theatre, Il Theatre History in Canada 8 (Spring 1987): 59-63. 55 Historieal Series interview 69. 58 Historieal Series interview 68. 57 Historieal Series interview 69. 58 Ferry 64. 1 was, unfortunately, unsuccessful in confirming this reference through primary sources. 59 Dennis Braithwaite, "Pure'y Canadian: New Theatre Group," Toronto Daily Star 21 March 1959: 27. 60 Nathan Cohen, "No Madness to the Method, Il Toronto Daily Star 24 April 1959: 28 . • 81 Historical Series interview 72. D'Ermo 40 82 George Luscombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988 . • 83 Vogt 137. 84 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 24 May 1988. 86 George Luscombe, persona' interview, 24 May 1988. 88 Ferry 64. 87 George Luscombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 88 George Luscombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 89 Ferry 66. 70 Ferry 66 . • • D/Ermo 41 • Chapter III Luscombe's Approach to Play-Making Critics and theatre aficionados werp, from the first, captivated by Luscombe's unorthodox directing style and the ski Il of his company of virtually unknown actors. Herbert Whittaker, then cntic for The Globe and Mail, recalls that "Luscombe was, from the start, admired by the best of the reviewers. . . . We were aware that something unique was there, and so it was given attention. "1 Atop the theatre's doors, a black and white sign read, "Workshop Productions", and "workshop" was the word that intrigued local critics, and led them to christen the company of 12 as "the underground theatre movement with a differenee. "2 What was unique about Luscombe's theatre? His politieal mandate was unique. His fondness for offbeat, contemporary scripts was unique. His drive to establish a permanent • company of actors with a distinctively Canadian theatrical style was unique. In 1960, when TWP unleashed on Toronto its first collective creation, Hey Aube!, critics were quick to notice. Luscombe had direction, style and dedication. Sa ys June Faulkner, TWP manager and public relations person for over 13 years, Luscombe "has always been very clear about his goals, and about his passion for the theatre. . . . That's how he survived and got people to stick with him ... 3 Luseombe's effort to Impress on Toronto his own notions of theatre, ushered in a new theatncal era, and established TWP as Canada's first professionaJ alternate theatre. TWP was, in fact, an alternate theatre before the term was comed. ln the 1960s, ventures whieh advocated a drama that ran counter to established norms and conventions were dubbed "underground". Sy the '70s, the term "underground" had become "expertmental" or "alternate", and was used to describe such iconoclastie organizatlons as Theatre Passe • Muraille (1968), FaetoryTheatre Lab (1970), Toronto Free (1972) and the D'Ermo 42 Tarragon (1971). However, a decade before alterna te theatre became • fashionable, luscombe's TWP had pioneered the format. "If that was, as 1 tond to think," Herbert Whittaker remarks, "the beginning of the so-called Underground Theatre, it was the most positive step taken in a period of weil meaning and yearning. George didn't want to yearn, he wanted to get it done, get it started. And, by Gad, he did. ,,4 luscombe was "alternate" in his ideals, in his work system, in his directorial approach; his drama existed to challenge the status quo. Vet, his theatre was never related to the '70s alternate movement. "There was the Establishment Theatre, there was the Alternate Theatre and then there was George luscombe," 6 claims Len Peterson. While others e xplored issues of psychiatry, homosexuality, sex, and shock for the sake of shock, luscombe was concerned with society and its political forces. His time with Littlewood had taught him to respond to drama with a sense of social and political responsibility, to tackle every new play with a kind of crusading spirit. TWP survived, in part, because of luscombe's • steadfastness to his political purpose: his plays had value and content, and he, a iNell-defined point of view. Before TWP, there was no other professional organization in Canada, except perhaps Montréal's Théâtre du Nouveau Monde, that was as tenaciously political as TWP. For luscombe, a writer without social concern "is not a part of the world," --(" 1 have no time for writers who are not propagandists" he blurted at Playwrights' Workshop's 1989 George Ryga Retrospective)6--and "a theatre without opinion is not a theatre. Stratford, for instance, is a museum ... 7 luscombe's politics were of a particular kind--leftist--and his drama was eminently middle of the road working~class. Of the virtual 100 plays that luscombe produced at TWP in 28 years, over half glorified the working class and condemned oppression. luscombe's sentiments were with the little guys, the underdogs who vied for freedom against monopoly, dishonesty and capitalist exploitation. "With each successive play at • Toronto Workshop Productions," wrote Richard Horenblas in 1983, "it 0' Ermo 43 becomes clearer that artistic director George Luscombe has dedicated his career to presenting the history of this century which is left out of the • history books. "8 Luscombe envisioned his TWP as a theatre of the people and for the people, accessible to ail, playing in shopping plazas, squares or any open space; costing "something on principle but it should be something affordable, "9 and government-subsidized. "We have a social problem concerning the theatre in this country," he insists. "Canada has yet to understafld that the theatre is an essential part of a human being and that it should not be forced to pay its own way to justify Itsdlf. Theatre is education, "10 he says, education of the emotions, and the most natural way for Canadians to speak of themselves and for themselves. The vitality of TWP had always depended on Luscombe's drive to build a permanent company of actors and crew, and to work with them as many years as needed to develop original works related to the Canadian experience, improvised and honed in the theatre, wlth the writer present. • At TWP, Luscombe pioneered over 50 original Canadian plays and adaptations. Yet, more critical to him than the development of Canadian drama was the cultivation of an original Canadian style. "The fact that Canada hasn't yet developed one," he says, is that the middle class ... want what they see in the store window of another country. They have no idea of creatlng something new related to the excite ment of your own country. And look to your own country and say what does this country need, not what does England do, not what does France dO. ll Our most vaunted theatres today are not products of Canadlan development, but rather poor Imitations of what we Imagine the Old Vic to be, or feeble attempts ta be as slick as our cousins south of the border. Our way is dlfferent. It IS Canadian and what exactly that means we must find out for • ourselves .... We must solve our problems, economic and D'Ermo 44 artistic in new, possibly drastic ways. The conditions under which we work are different. It'II be peculiar to Canada. • 12 Then it will truly be a Canadian theatre. Essentially, Luscombe envisaged developing at TWP a raison d'être for Canadian theatre. "And that," says Whittaker, .. makes him very distinctive in that period. . . . luscombe made the difference between thinking that Canadians should have their own way of expressing themselves, and doing it, .. 13 though not by commemorating Canada's history and its heroes, but by representing his own view of Canada, in his own style of theatre. His plays had one main objective: to present original drama that blended explicit social comment with a high level of entertainment. Though ostensibly poUtical, luscombe never sacrificed artistic quality to ideology. And artistic quality, as he saw it, was inseparable from a company's work system. He took his inspiration for TWP from the example of Group Theatre, embodied in the work of Joan Littlewood, and thus introduced the form to Canada. Group Theatre, by its very name, 1 implies a theatre created by and dependant on the entire company as opposed to one or a few individuals, and where artistic responsibility and creative power are transferred to the artists as a collective. In this setup, the director becomes a co-ordinator, there only to supply "the imaginative impulse to the company both in rehearsals and in study ... 14 Ali other facets of production are handled collectively. As the company operates always within the context of its own past work, it quickly gains flexibility, encourages self-sturty and a move away from repertory performances towards original works. With every new play at TWP, luscombe and his writer met and discussed in general terms theme, situation and character development with the actors and technicians. Then improvisations began. "Slowly, through constant analysis of what seemed right, characterizations deepened, relationships developed, scenes formed, lighting, set and • costume design progressed in step with the improvisations,"15 and the D'Ermo 45 writer began to set words to a script based on the actors' work. Through • rigorous exploration, the company eventually came to answer the most basic of questions--what can our drama not do without? What remained was what Brecht ca lied "the most frequently repeated of what has not been rejectec "16_-t he final play script. Luscombe preferred to r.all his form of Group Theatre ensemble or collaborative theatre, because hls company did not confine itself exclusively to collective creations, but produced also scripted works. Ensemble theatre at TWP meant collective creation not so much of a text (as with Paul Thompson at Theatre Passe Muraille) as of a production--TWP actors and crew developed ail facets of production together, and every cast and crew member was expected to participate in the creation of the drama, including the "seamstress sitting in the back corner of the theatre"l/ who had to be as aware of what was happening on stage as any of the actors. This did not mean that she wrote dialogue. "Language is the province of the writer, .. 18 maintains Luscombe, and the actors and crew no more wrote • dialogue than the writer created movement or the technician created music. Actors at TWP were required to be present at every rehearsal, regardless of whether or not their section was scheduled, and Luscombe insisted the y be so familiar with the evolving work that they could spontaneously participate at any time in the stage-action wlthout ma king a wrong or unsuitable move. "The creative process at TWP is a bit unusual and that's one of the reasons why 1 like it," observed Astrid Janson, TWP set and costume director from 1974 to 1980. After ail, "a designer's place is not at home. A designer's place is in the theatre."19 Usually, in most theatres, long before rehearsals commence, creative personnel meet to plan the production. At TWP, sa ys Janson, "we have no discussions untll rehearsals begin, because the script is usually developed [there). 1 attend rehearsals to watch, and gradually 1 begin to make contributions and • suggestions, in a conceptual way, not just in the visual sense. Together D'Ermo 46 we try to arrive at a concept for the show which is an all-encompassing one. "20 • Bob Greene, who became lighting and set director in 1980, sat in on every rehearsal, and reckons that, however demanding, luscombe taught him more about design, in terms of both lighting and set, in the five years that he was wlth him than he probably would have been able to learn in 10 years elsewhere. As with every other production facet, mise-en-scène at TWP evolved from the action being explored on stage, which meant that even the concept for a set rarely took firm shape until three-quarters of the way through rehearsals. During runs, stage managers were forbidden to cali eues. Bath lighting and sound operators were expected to handle their eues with ail the sensltivity of an actor. There was no such thing as "here's the cue, hit a button, the lights happen, no computer driven boards. . . . The lighting operator and the sound operator were responsible for knowing the show, Il explains Greene. "They were responsible for knowing the timlng--which changed from night to night--in terms of how the actors • were feeling, in terms of how the scene was going, in terms of the response they got from the audience. On some days, it was not a five second fade. It was an eight second fade. The operators had to be very much in tune with what was happening on stage, and were as much a part of what was going on as the actors themselves were."21 Group Theatre at TWP, as with Theatre Workshop, implied not merely ensemble but "total theatre": colour, sound effects (mechanicalor human), and music and dance, were integral to every production. Consequently, when choosing an actor, Luscombe looked for adaptability and versatility--"actors who, given an idea, [could] create their own interpretations from within themselves"22--w ho had a sense of music, and could play a musical Instrument. If an actor was hired who couldn't play an instrument, he was dispatched to Doug livingston (music director • without the title), and assigned one to learn . D'Ermo 47 Luscombe's stress on music was not an eccentricity: "Music gives a man a sense of rhythm, of melody, and an actor needs this, .. 23 he insists. • With time, it became common knowledge among TWP auditioners that to become a TWP actor one had to be politically and socially aware, a skilled juggler or a good musician. Ross Skene, for instance, had an unimpressive audition, until he played his guitar and sang a few original songs, and told Luscombe that he also played the drums. He was hired on the spot. At tryouts fN TWP's 1972 Hev Rubel revival, Geoff Bronstein was hired after dElceiving Luscombe into thinking he could play the clarinet. When Luscombe stipulated that he would only hire actors who played an in~,trument, Bronstein bought a clarinet, and begged Doug Livingston to teach him how to handle it convincingly for his audition. Livingston gave Bronstein a combination of three notes. "It'II squeak," he said, "and when it squeaks tell hi"" (LuscombeJ that something's wrong with your clarinet." Bronstein did exactly that, and won a place in the company. "He made the perfect adaptation," recalls Luscombe. "He was tall and thin and he looked • wonderful with this black clarinet. He knew how to take it apart, and put it together [again] and clean [it]. And he could blow a couple of notes .... It was good acting. "24 Eventually and inevitably, Bronstein did learn to play. Until 1976 Luscombe's auditions consisted largely of set improvisations. Then he drastically changed the process: now would-be actors were instructed to entertain him for half an hour, using whatever was available in the theatre. "We had people climbing ropes," Luscombe remembers. "We let them go into our costumes, and take what they wanted. We'd give them lights if they wanted, but we wouldn't impose anything upon them. They had to ask for it and tell us what to do. "lb At ail times, Luscombe was interested in testing the actors' ablilty to grow and adapt to his work system. General auditions were followed by "workshop auditions" --better • known to TWP actors as Luscombe's "hockey camp workshops" or "boot D'Ermo 48 camp period"--intended to eliminate actors who were inflexible. To form a company, Luscombe usually hired as many auditioners as possible, and in • the course of workshops whittled their numbers down to a dozen or 50. Because there were always hundreds of new actors waiting to join his company, Luscombe could be as exacting as he wished. At hls 1962-63 "hockey camp workshop", Luscombe selected 90 from the hundreds of actors who auditioned, reduced these to 20, trained them for two months without salary, and finally hired seven. By the mid- 1970s, increasingly stringent Equity rules forced Luscombe to reduce his workshop period to two weeks, usually at the start of a new season. After selecting approximately 45 auditioners to work with, Luscombe divided them into two groups, trained one in the morning and the other in the afternoon, and, gradually, over the two-week ~,eriod, decreased the numbers to 14, including apprentices. With thnse he formed his new company. Usually, Luscombe needed only to rp.place a few departing actors a year, but when friction built i" the company he would fire • everyone or the actors would quit, and a new company would be formed. TWP's 1963 group became Canada's first full-time permanent company of actors. They earned $25 a week (apprentices, $10.00), and were pa id on Friday nights at 6:05 p.m., following rehearsals. Like Littlewood, Luscombe trained his actors in the concepts of Stanislavski, particularly his notions of concentration, improvisation and imagination. A writer, Luscombe concluded, could supply only "the beginning, only the thread, the throughline" of a play. It was the company's responsibility to exploit the words of the drama, while preservlng the author's intent. "To achieve that, vou have to have a familiarity with units and objectives, "26 he maintains. At TWP, to analyze a play meant to break it down into units in the Stanislavski manner, to define Each unit's objective, and then to follow every action, every thought directly to that objective. Luscombe referred to this as the scientific • approach to theatre. D'Ermo 49 With the units and objectives defined, the company proceeded to assign each unit a title; then each actor identified his own personal • objective within that unit. "Of course every section had an objective," muses actress and writer Suzette Couture. "And it was always metaphorical, starting with '1 must ... ' , and always with the goal of uncovering your subtext. "27 The process was slow, often lasting hours, with Luscombe arbitrarily vetoing actors' suggestions for titles. "You could never really see, or 1 couldn't see what the rules were," recalls playwright Carol Boit. "It had to be painful, that's ail. "28 Often, the group reversed the process, and used Stanislavski's approach to create a collective work. "Choose first the given circumstances of the play," Luscombe told the company, "and build it up into units, and finally objectives"29 so as to forge the play's structure. Improvisations were then used to answer the why's and where's, but only after the throughline had been formulated. With time and unrelenting practice, the company became 50 adept at handling untts and objectives, • that the y could research, write, and have a play ready for show within four weeks. After serving two years at TWP, actor Geoffrey Read reported in 1968: "Each performance is a journey, from beginning to end. And every night the undergrowth grows over and you must find your way through the play anew. If vou start to find your way too easlly, George will throw in something to foui you up. ,,30 Always, Luscombe insisted that hls actors be focused, and their performances, free of extraneous actions or words. At any time during a rehearsal he could stop and Query, "What's your objective?", and actors had to respond quickly and resolutely: 'I MUST. "That takes a great deal of work," concedes Ross Skene, who started at TWP in 1973 with Inspector General: 1 was playing Luka Lukich, the school superintendent. And 1 came on the stage beeause my eue was there, my line was • there. And 1 heard George from the baek say "What are you D'Ermo 50 doing?" 1 said: "Weil l'm here because my line is in the play." He said: "But what are you doing?" 1 said: "Weil 1 don't kn .. • . " "That's what 1 thought," [he interrupted], "get off the stage." He said: "Vou're a man without an objective. When vou have the objective come back on to the stage." My scene came up again, 1 came on the stage, and started to read my line. "What are you doing?" he said. 1 said: ''l'm being objective, or something because 1 didn't know. Il "Get off the stage." 1 started to get really pissed off with this. 50 1 came on the stage angry. And he said: "That's fine, you have an objective. Bad choice, but it's a start. "31 It took new actors months ta understand what Luscombe wanted. Eventually, the approach to character-development through carefully defined objectives became second-nature. "We got to the point that we were 50 fast," sa ys Skene, "that we could change 10 of them in a day. Till we finally found the right one for that unit. ,,32 • Luscombe's interminable quest for new and better ways to con vey meaning meant that there was no such thing as a finished, complete play. His scrupulous attention to preparation was his personal madness. Luscombe Introduced the work-in-progress to Toronto, and perhaps to Canada, but, at TWP, that meant that even after a play opened, the company continued to improvise and change it. Before Compiègne was rehearsed for two full years, for example, and har' "l total of four different versions. When Whittaker asked Luscombe how many times he was supposed to come back as a critlc ta review the play, Luscombe replied until he got it right. 33 ln rehearsal, Luscombe was never as interested in the outcome of an improvisation as in its evolution; he was process-oriented rather than product-onented, with the rehearsal being the process. At TWP, there was never a script on stage, except when the company worked on a heavily • scripted show and lines needed to be memorized, but usually, rehearsal D'Ermo 51 meant physical work. Scenes were never choreographed or blocked, yet the company was remarkably weil co-ordinated phvsically due to their • training in the Laban movement technique. The company explored the "efforts" continually to develop fluidity, awareness and physical harmonies. Essentially, Luscombe wanted his actors to discover their character through physical movement first, and to let the inner life follow. Actor Len Donchef explains: "If vou work very slow, if your body is moving slowly, then your mind will move slowly and Vou bring your who le spectrum of emotional harmonics into your movement. Then yo can attribute to the character a distinctive physical manner of being. "34 A vacuous character who is hard to pin down, for instance, is likely to express himself as a "float effort", which implies that he is "indirect, slow and light", like smoke, which can't be grabbed or held. Cast and crew referred to the Laban technique as "the Luscombe funny body movement". Critics and theatregoers found the style novel, compelling and unique in Canada. Herbert Whittaker wrote: "If vou • photographed it [the TWP actors in performance] without words vou would swear it was some Polish or Czechoslovakian company worklng because it was so unlike the rather sloppy naturalism that we were [Canada was) used to .... George's people had precision and a way of moving that was closer to dance ... and cou Id become kind of caricatures, in a way serving a purpose (in the sense of the commedia dell'arte serving a story) to clarify with a certain emphasis that was unique, so that you were entranced with how he was saying something as weil as what he was saylng. 1135 As a result of the Laban technique, tradltional directorial blocking was unnecessary at TWP. For Luscombe, to block meant to "baby sit". Blocking had nothing to do with what the actor felt. "If vou know who vou are, where vou are, what you're doing there, and what your objective is," e.'~plains Skene, "then vou know where Vou should be on the stage. ,,'16 When Theatre Passe Murallle's Paul Thompson remarked that, considering • the actors' coordination, Luscombe must spend at least two weeks D'Ermo 52 blocking, Canadian author Rick Salutin, who had worked with Luscombe, assured him that he never blocked any move or scene: • Never, nothing. l've never seen him tell an actor where to stand or where to go .... Ali he does is ask his actors to "space yourselves out, spread yourselves out." It [the Laban approach] is the kind of batty thing that might just work. Whatever the reason, the way he had them moving they looked like gazelles, whereas every other theatre had people walking around looking like Frankenstein, and ht' never told them where to go. It was amazing. 37 One of the most striking things about any TWP play were the images presented on stage. Luscombe had an extremely strong visual sense. He worked intuitively--if and when a scene worked he knew it when he saw it. Often, he could get the entire company to react spontaneously, without any cue or warning, including bursting into song. "He's almost sheer intuition as a director," continues Salutin. • When he says "spread yourselves out", he says it at a certain point when they're ready for it, and where everything has made it possible for them to respond to that in a creative way. But he doesn't have a clue about it. It's almost completely on a non discursive level, in my opinion anyway. 1 think he's perhaps the only person of real genius that 1 have met or worked with in Canadian theatre in 15, 17 years.38 Properties, sets and music used in a Luscombe production were minimal. It was the actors' responsibility to create the play's images- suddenly, a banjo became a rifle, then a baseball bat, or, turned upside down, was transformed into a dish. For their 1980 production of The Mac ~, the company used a banjo to produce the sound of a truck. For The Travellers in 1968, Luscombe prompted his actors: "find junk, we're going to do a train," and the group simulated the battering sounds of locomotion • using makeshift properties. D'Ermo 53 At best, Luscombe hoped to force the audience to become an active participant in the action on stage, to use its imagination and to work as • hard as the actors to create images. Luscombe insisted that his theatre communicate as complete an experience as possible: motion and sound were part of the overall dramatic mosaic. He wanted his audiences to leave the playhouse feeling as exhausted or as elated as his actors. The theatre feeling, he asserts, should be "as if they had just had a cold shower!"19 Larry Cox, company dramaturge from 1980 to '85, compares the experience of watching a Luscombe production ta watching a Fellini (versus a Spielberg) film. "The joy of watching a Fellini film IS that there IS so much going on, and ail of it is being concentrated on what's being said, but it's not being said directly. ,,40 Luscombe, for example, enjoyed juxtaposing time and place, anel mixing his scenes so as never to achieve the coherent once-upon-a-time scheme. With virtually every new script, he spent a part of his time with his cast and crew rearranging the new opus. Every member, equipped with • scissors, spread their copy of the script out on the floor, and began t0. cut and paste text according to Luscombe' s instructions, into a new order, lettering units from a ta z, then into double a, double b, double c, and sa on. Once the script was rearranged, improvisations began. Rehearsals were arduous. At the stroke of 10, .he actors were on stage, warmed up and ready ta work, and workshopped until 7 p.m. For eight hours, apart from Equity breaks (15 minute coffee rests and lunch), the company never left the stage. During the tlrst hait of the morning, they focused on physical activity, including calisthenics and spatial exercises. The second half was devoted ta Laban expenmentation and improvisation; and the afternoons, to rehearsing the play in hand. The first days of rehearsal were the most excltlOg for Luscombe. He began by establishing the rhythm and the flow of the scenes, and by the third or fourth day, had explored with the company the physical and • emotional potential of the play. Luscombe accepted fram hls actors D'Ermo 54 nothing short of their best. He demanded that they never hold back on creativity, and that they take responsibility for invention. He scolded • complacency and sloppy work, and strove to stimulate the actors' imaginations so as to create a brainstorming effect between director and performers. "The magic of his theatre," suggests Faulkner, "is that he could do things with theatre that didn't require ail that fancy pancy technology, none of the 'tricks'. It was like the rediscoveryof core elements, of core meanings, " .. ' or what Luscombe referred to as the difference between "doing" and "being". At TWP, one did. Rather than think or talk about action, actors were encouraged to try it. If an actor improvised any new sequence into the ongoing action, luscombe expected the other players to adapt to the new circumstances: "Vou couldn't stop a scene and say: 'George, he's not listening to me, '" says Donchef. "George would just hit the roof and throw Vou right out. 'What do vou mean he's not listening, weil then make him listen! ".42 luscombe always urged his actors to use instinct over technique. • Improvisations were never bad, terrible or good; they were either useful or not useful, productive or counter productive; they either furthered the idea of the play or didn't. Luscombe was known to spend hours with his actors exploring how a situation might be improvised without actually telling them how to do it; but "worrying them through a labyrinth of possibilities until they arrive at an apt conclusion. "43 A fter morning workouts for a 1966 revival of Hey Rubel, Luscombe sent the whole cast away, except for Donchef who was left alone on stage to do nothing for one hour every day for three weeks. Then one day, he instructed Geoffrey Read to also stay behind, and both men were told to sit and do nothing. Finally, luscombe gave Donchef a little box, and allowed him to work with it for a few days. He then gave Read the objective to take the box away from Donchef. "1 began to create something in the box," reminisces Donchef; "whatever was in the box was mine. It did everything for me. 1 had transferred my • soul into this box. Whatever 1 loved was in there. Then he [Read] just D/Ermo 55 pieked it Up, "44 whieh upset Donehef. What followed beeame part of the aetors' routine in the play, and an integral ingredient of the drama's eomie • relief. When he direeted, luseombe worked on stage with his aetors, only once in a while retreating to his table just a few feet away ta scribble sorne notes. Rehearsals were "a gruelling proeess," Skene recalls. "It was that exhausting."46 Shows ran from Tuesday to Sunday (usually with matinees on Sundays) from the beginning of September to the middle or end of July. While the company ran one show, they rehearsed the next, from early morning until 6 p.rn. (union regulations prevented them from workmg later if they were perforrning that eveningl, leaving cast and crew 2 1/2 hours ta relax before curtain time at 8:30 p.m. "1 buried myself sa much in the work," says actor Barry Flatman, "that there was no other reallty. There are hugf:' blank spots from November through to April of that year, '70-71, that 1 don't remember at ail. . .. They're just an endless blizzard of me dragging my ass to work, busting my tail ail day, going back home eattng • some green stuff or red stuff, like green pasta or red pasta, falling asleep, getting up and doing it ail over again. Bath physical exhaustion and mental exhaustion."46 Marilyn lightstone, leading actress in The Refugees in 1979, agrees that luscombe was "hard to work for", but she loved the challenge. "We're ail on stage ail the time and it's physically and emotionally draining, Il she says. "Vou never get a chance to relax or slaeken. But it's worth the effort. George is superb--he's an actor's director. ,,47 The demands that luscombe put on his cast and crew were as arduous as the hours. His insistence on discipline and technlcal proficlency earned him a reputation as a tyrant--a charge that he freely admlt5 ta. "Of course l'm a tyrant," he agrees, "but, then, 50 15 the theatre .... Insensitivity is part of our expenence in the world so much that we have to reteaeh manners related ta the theatre .... When 1 demand respect for rny • stage (and 1 say my stage but it can be yours tao when vou share my D'Ermo 56 concern for it) people are shocked. 1 demand the same from myself. 1 have met other tyrants. Lindsay Kemp was one, so was Athol Fugard, and • "48 look at their work. Respect for the theatre meant respect for fellow-workers; and also meant a company that was ego-free. If an actor spoke of waming to become a star, Luscombe would steer him toward the .. other theatres", as "only opportunists mistake attention for value ... 49 At TWP, there was no star system, no competitive rewards for which to strive; actors were workers, and a part of the proletariat, and their efforts were expected to be directed towards making the production work as an ensemble. Respect for the stage meant no reading of papers, no parties, no dancing on stage or in the auditorium--nothing that didn't have something to do with the production; the stage was a spa ce reserved exclusively for the actors and for the creation of drama. In 1959, during the company's rehearsals for Don Perlimplin, Luscombe fired an actor for allowing friends to vislt the theatre. "1 came and 1 saw ail these people walking ail over the • set pointing this out and talking about that," he admonishes. "And 1 told them to get out, and 1 was quite brutal with them and sent them ail away. ,,50 ThiS was 1 1/2 weeks bp.fore the play's opening. When an actor laughed during rehearsals, for any reason other than for sorne action precipitated by some improvisation related to the work, his "timing better be good," says Ross Skene, "or he'd better not do it on the stage" but disappear behind the flats because Luscombe would scream at him. The more pressured Luscombe was, the shorter his temper. When he was angry he broke clipboards--an average of two or three a day--and threw hls glasses around 50 that they'd be ail bent by the end of the day. "You do five shows a year for 10 years," chuckles Skene, "almost each play from scratch and you'd become like him too. "51 Cast and crew were never permitted ta interrupt rehearsals. Nor could Luscombe be approached on the interpretation of a passage, or be • asked where ta stand, or when ta move. He wanted his actors ta [)'Ermo 57 formulate their own ideas, often much to their frustration. "1 wouldn't give • them the answer to what the obvious solution was," Luseombe says. "Beeause sometimes that isn't right. The obvious solution is not right ail the time. "52 Rather, he would allow them as mueh time as was needed to discover their own solution. The more stouthearted veteran actors experimented freely with the interpretation of their character, or sometimes simply got out on stage and tried something really wild, to whlch luscombe often blustered, "It's good. Keep it." Seldom did Luscombe talk to his actors directly about performance problems. Writers refer to this as lack of communication. Actors regard it as a form of communication. For Luscombe, emotional and Intellectual perception were best achieved through movement and sound, as with dance and music. He could not tell If something was right for a scene until he saw it on stage. What Luscombe wanted to do was to help hls actors discover their character through the process of rehearsal. To do so, he pushed his actors hard, often to the point of tears, intimldated them and • manipulated them. He would often deliberately work hlmself Into a fury to make a point, or to get a certain emotional reaction from the company. Eventually, members came to judge hls state of mind by hls ticks and twitches. During runthroughs, luscombe would seat hlmself at the back of the theatre to take notes; there was always a cigarette lit, and cast and crew judged his mood by the amount of white smoke billowrng around the top of his head. If two cigarettes were lit at the same tlme, they womed. If there was only one, they were doing weil. When Luscombe qUit smoking, in the '70s, he rattled money in hls pocket, or rubbed hls hands through his hair. Peter Faulkner, TWP actor and technlclan, vows that luscombe still has a full head of hair at 66 because "he massaged It for so long. "53 When luscombe took notes it was ln pene" on a huge yellow pad. Minor comments were written in small print on one piece of paper; major • comments were penned in massive letters which eovered the whole page. D'Ermo 58 "It would drive the audience crazy," recalls Skene, "and the actors, [who] knew they were in trouble if there was ... this continuous ripping of • "54 yellow pages. ln 1977, during previews for Les Canadiens, some actors broke their final freeze for Act 1 a little too soon, and Luscombe, from the back of the house, yelled: "Keep still. Hold that position. Hold it! Hold itl"55, much to the audience's dismay. Always, Luscombe was aware of the effect he had on his group, and how his moods affected them. Francois-Régis Klanfer, at TWP on-and-off for over 10 years, claims he got ulcers working with Luscombe who kept "the company mad and tense"56 to create a certain type of electrifying excitement. "In almost Machavellian style, sometimes," adds Peter Faulkner, "he would manipulate the emotional lives of the working actors to arrive at the emotional depths or coloring of the play, and after you've been had like that the anger is immense. It's almost like emotional rape. 'Cause you've been brutalized into an emotional condition that he speculates will result in a certain kind of performance. "57 ''l've seen him • abuse somebody undeservedly," rebuts dramaturge Larry Cox, "but that is by far the exception to the rule. And 9 times out of 10 he was right. "58 On average, actors remained with TWP for two or three years. Those, IIke Len Donchef, who remained longer considered their experience "truly the most rewarding tlme in my theatrical career or any time at ail. Nothing ever compared or touched it. ,,59 Despite his overpowering personality, Luscombe built character, stamina and endurance in his companies. "What happened with a lot of actors is that they didn't stick around long enough to understand what he [Luscombel was trying to say, what he was doing," says Skene.60 "If vou survived working with George, vou could survive workmg anywhere," adds actress Diane Douglass. "And in theatre that's one hell of a good lesson to learn, 'cause theatre is not an easy place to be. "61 Those who could work with Luscombe understood that his outbursts • were never personal--they were part of his personality, and always related D'Ermo 59 to the work. It took Skene the better part of "three months to realize that • what he [Luscombe1 was trying to do was ta excite you into this moment in the scene, .. 62 and remained with the company "because there was always something ta learn. "63 "What is that in a man?" asks Barry Flatman. "What is it that touches you like that? That gets inside you and finds that place that says, 'C'mon are you man enough to really put this out here and do it?,"64 "He's very intense," argues Bronstein, "he's very passionate about theatre. He really cares. If his anger was out of pure dictatorial power-tripping then you could get really mad at him, but the thing was that his whole intensity was because of his passion for hls work. ,,65 "Working with George was a humbling experience," concludes Doug Livingston, because he made "you realize he can get the same results from somebody else ... you weren't indispensable ... 66 Luscombe seldom praised his company for work weil done. "But of course, that was the way 1 was brought up with Littlewood," he explains. "You have to bUlld a scale within yourself to judge your own accomplishments by, and that's • important, not for the sake of flattery, but for the sake of improving yourself as an artist. n67 The more familiar Luscombe became with a company member the more lenient he was with him--and that, he claims, usually took about three years. Cast and crew members, in their first year, learned to work à-Ia• Luscombe; by their second year, they discovered how to focus theïr energies for the good of the group; and in the third year, began to respond in a creative way ta Luscombe's suggestions, and the company as an ensemble turned out plays that were meaningful and excittng. Llke hls circus ringleader in Hey Rube!, Luscombe might weil have told his company, "When you're here one year, you can talk. When you're here five years, you can talk and say something. And when you're here 10 years, 1'11 listen. "68 • D'Ermo 60 His relationships with writers were no less precarious than his relationships with cast and crew. A script at TWP was treated, in the • Littlewvod manner, merely as a point of departure. luscombe assumed the right to rework any play--to improvise action, to insert scenes and to rearrange dlalogue--a freedom to which writers frequently objected. Like every other company member, a playwright at TWP was considered simply a cog in the theatrical machine. Luscombe's theatre was not a place to enshrine a playwright's words, it was a place where theatre was made. "If l'm going to run the theatre," luscombe insists, "l'm going to say what's going to go on in that theatre, l'm not going to have anyone argue with me ... (on] whether or not this scene should go in or shouldn't. In other words, there's got to be someone who's going to make the decisions. And if the person who's collaborating with me doesn't trust me to make the decisions, we're going to run into problems ... 69 Work on a scripted play often meant only a breakdown and analysis of its units and objectives. When and if Luscombe altered a scene it was • always in service of the visual image he could recreate of it on stage, and his "instincts were dead on most of the time ... 70 Scripts that were workshopped, on the other hand, usually underwent extensive editing. When luscombe rf Norked a play, he never personally rewrote or added new text. Writing WélS the playwright's job, and it was the company's responsibility only to reinterpret his words into visual images. Luscombe, however, did cut and reorder text; then returned the script to the writer/dramaturge who reworked it taking into account Luscombe's suggestions and the actors' improvisations. Writers at TWP were frequently expected to complete revisions overnight and return the next morning with a refurbished script, only to see improvisations begin anew. According to Gordon Vogt, what sets Luscombe apart from other directors is his relationship to his material--he is a creative director rather than an interpretive one. "He is capable," Vogt writes, "of taking a script • of very little literary distinction (Ain't lookin, say, [1980] which reads like a D'Ermo 61 barely sketched film script) and making it into a rich work of art. 1. • Luscombe's best work was with scripts that the company developed from scratch, and where he had complete freedom to create dialogue, develop movement and explore relationships, characters and situations. His most sllccessful plays were built on historical episodes (from the 1930s on), the daily press or any other type of political current affair. Company members arrived, every day, with fresh research material on a chosen subject matter, and used it to expand, through improvisations, on the previous day's work. What Luscombe needed optimally as writer at TWP was a wordsmith--someone who could research historical and current events and rework people's actual words into drama. Jack Winter, company dramaturge from 1961 to '67 and again between 1972 and '76; and Larry Cox, from 1980 to '85, best suited Luscombe's work style. Other wrJters found it difficult to watch their oeuvres chopped and changed. Playwright Carol Boit considered her experiences with Luscombe "frustrating", because he savaged her script, but also because he could not • communicate. "He would just sort of say: 'rewrite it'," she remembers, "and every day he would say, 'rewrite it', in a different way .... 1 just didn't understand what he was saying. So It felt very much, 1 remember, like banging one's head against the wall. And eventually we went into rehearsal with it and proceeded to change it even more.',n Salutin too found Luscombe "most inarticulate and essentially not that smart a person. 1 mean, in the sort of discursive sense he's a genius, he has genius for theatre, but he cannot explain what he means. "73 Salutin, whose Les Canadiens (1977) was one of the few texts at TWP left virtually untouched, had his first major drama, Fanshen, in 1972, massively edited. "He's certamly not a director who puts hlmself at the service of any script," Salutin maintains. "1 thlnk it's also hls notion that he doesn't want anyone to deprive him of room for him to do thrngs in hls production. He'" take the words from vou but he doesn't want anything • else ... 74 D'Ermo 62 Mostly, writers grew impatient with Luscombe's lack of interest in • character development: he was never one to explore the emotional potential of his dramatic figures. The dramatis personae on Luscombe's stage were there simply to relaya political message. Lines designed to be spoken by one character might, apparently on impulse, be allocated to another. If the actors or writer complained that the lines were out of character, Luscombe would tell them to make them in character. ln 1971, Carol Boit wondered whether or not she should submit herselt to another shattering encounter with Luscombe to stage her Buffalo J.um.u. "But he was a brilliant man," she decided, "so eventually vou said, yes. It wasn't that he was mean spirited or anything. He had, in fact, the most lovable, in a way, zaniness ... so vou sort of put up with ail his eccentricities. . .. It was very much a company feeling. ,,75 ln 1971, Winter told an interviewer: "There is no one in the business now worth working for except George. He is by light years the most vibrant thing in his theatre mainly because of his own personality. No one is more • demanding and 1 suppose harder to work with because he is so selective. He has a tremendous visual sense and for a man who has never been to university and has read practically nothing--the silly bastard--he has enormous sensitivity and responsiveness to language. He knows good language when it is good and knows it when it's bad. He has an amazing ability to take energy trom whatever source, a death in the family, a birth, anything and convert that energy into the work. Even astate ot very bad depression creates ItS own kind of yellow energy and this he uses in the work. "76 Luscombe was not a conventional theatre director who produced plays. He was an artist who happened to use live people as his medium. Throughout his years at TWP, there was one consistent reaction to his work within the community. "In the theatre itself," wrote Michael Enright, "there was always this feeling that George was keeping the flame when no • one else was. Sorne actors looked upon Workshop as a school and found D/Ermo 63 it nice to go back there occasionally to brush up. They had respect for • what George was trying to do but underneath it they were saying ta themselves: 'Thank God l'm not the one who's doing it."·77 Politically committed, idealistic, uncompromising, Luscombe built TWP as he alone felt it should be. At the conclusion of his 1971 interview, Winter declared after a moment's pause: "He will only be stopped ... [Luscombe'sJ work will stop only if he gets hit by a truck. "78 • • D'Ermo 64 NOTES • 1 Herbert Whittaker, personal interview, May 26 1988. 2 "Don't Think: Director, Students Test Acting Ways and Means," Toronto Daily Star 18 June 1960: 27. 3 June Faulkner, personal interview, 5 May 1988. 4 Herbert Whittaker, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 6 Len Peterson, personal interview, 4 May 1988. 6 George Luscombe, "Playwright or Propagandist," George Ryga Retrospective, Playwright's Workshop, 9 March 1989. 7 Uqo Kareda, "George Has Done It Again," Toronto Daily Star 29 June 1968: 33. 8 Richard Horenblas, '''The Wobbly': Union Underdogs Get the Spotlight," The Uptowner 30 November 1983: 7. 9 François-Régis Klanfer, personal interview, 10 May 1988 . 10 Kareda 33. • 11 George Luscombe, personal interview, 16 October 1987. 12 Undated TWP Publicity Brochure, clrca 1969. 13 Herbert Whittaker, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 14 Undated TWP Publlcity Brochure, circa 1969. 15 Undated TWP Publiclty Brochure, circa 1969. For the sake of continuity this passage was converted to the past tense. 16 Undated TWP Publicity Brochure, circa 1969. 17 Peter Faulkner, personal interview, 11 May 1988. 18 Undated TWP Publicity Brochure, circa 1969. 19 Astrid Janson, personal interview, 6 May 1988. 20 Billyann Balay, "Astrid Janson: Strong Words From a Young Lady of Design," Performing Arts in Canada 12.3 (1975): 40. 21 Bob Greene, personal interview, 25 May 1988. 22 Mark Czarnecki, "Workshop Grows Up," Varsity 11 November • 1965: 4. D'Ermo 65 23 Michael Enright, "Luscombe, Mysterious Keeper of the Flame," • Globe Magazine [The Globe and Mail) 16 January 1971: 7. 24 George Luscombe, personal interview, 11 August 1988. 26 George Luscombe, unpublished interview, The Ontario Historieal Studies Series, 7 Feb. 1979: 165-166. 28 George Luscombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 27 Suzette Couture, personal interview, 17 August 1988. 28 Carol Boit, personal interview, 12 May 1988. 29 George Luscombe, personal interview, 9 August 1988. 30 Larry Haiven, "Theatre's Not Oead ... It's Thriving in Downtown Toronto," Varsity 16 February 1968: 6-7. 31 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 32 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 33 Herbert Whittaker, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 34 Len Oonchef, personal interview, 27 May 1988 . 36 Herbert Whittaker, personal interview, 26 May 1988. • 36 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 37 Rick Salutin, personal interview, 13 May 1988. 38 Rick Salutin, personal interview, 13 May 1988. 39 Herbert Whittaker, "Theatre Union Otfers Luscombe Fultilment," The Globe and Mail 15 June 1961: 11. 40 Larry Cox, personal interview, 15 August 1988. 41 Peter Faulkner, personal interview, 11 May 1988. 42 Len Donchef, personal interview, 27 May 1988. 43 Anthony Ferry, "Ten Good People and an Idea," Toronto Oaily Star 5 Dec. 1959: 31. 44 Len Donchef, personal interview, 27 May 1988. 45 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 46 Barry Flatman, personal interview, 16 August 1988. 47 Sylvia Train, "Lightstone Leads Oonkey, Bochner Gets His Kicks," • The Toronto Sun 15 October 1979: 44. D'Ermo 66 48 Mira Friedlander, "Survivor: George Luscombe at Toronto Workshop Productions," Canadian Theatre Review 38 (1983): 46. • 49 George Luscombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 50 George Luscombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 51 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 52 George Luscombe, personal interview, 22 August 1988. 63 Peter Faulkner, personal interview, 11 May 1988. 64 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 66 Geoff Bronstein, personal interview, 13 August 1988. 66 François-Régis Klanfer, personal interview, 20 August 1988. 67 Peter Faulkner, personal Interview, 11 May 1988. 68 Larry Cox, personal interview, 15 August 1988. 69 Len Donchef, personal interview, 27 May 1988. 60 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 61 Diane Douglass, personal interview, 16 May 1988 . 62 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. • 63 Ross Skene, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 64 Barry Flatman, personal interview, 16 August 1988. 66 Geoff Bronstein, personal interview, 13 August 1988. 66 Doug Livingston, personal interview, 6 May 1988. 67 George Luscombe, personal interview, 22 August 1988. 6B TWP Company, Hey Rube!, unpublished play script. 69 Historical Series interview 150. 70 Geoff Bronsteln, personal interview, 13 August 1988. 71 Gordon Vogt, "The Politics of Entertainment: George Luscombe and TWP," The Human Elements, ed. David Helwig (Canada: Oberon Press, 1981) 150. 72 Carol BoIt, personal interview, 12 May 1988. 73 Rick Salutin, personallnterview, 13 May 1988. 74 Rick Salutln, personal interview, 13 May 1988 . • 76 Carol Boit, personal interview, 12 May 1988. D'Ermo 67 76 Enng . ht 9. 77 E nnght . 9. • 78 E . nnght 9 . • • D'Ermo 68 • Chapter IV The Pioneering Years: 1959 to 1969 Two years before TWP's opening, Antony Ferry held a meeting at the Parliament Street Library to which anyone interested in forming a "Group Theatre" was invited. About 18 people showed up, including George luscombe. "Grand ideas were aired, money was never mentioned, and then there was a painful pause."' Suddenly Luscombe stood up, and pledged his commitment in 11 words: "If it's worthwhile, l'm ready to give ten years." That meeting inadvertently set in motion luscombe's career as theatre director and catalyst of the Canadian alternate theatre movement; but instead of the 10 years he pledged, luscombe was to devote 28 years to his theatrical vision. In 1959 Toronto Workshop Productions was founded with 12 members, 40 chairs and a lot of idealism. By 1969, • lus combe had proven that a small enterprising theatre could make a national impact. After the demise of Theatre Centre in 1959, Luscombe continued to hold workshop classes at 47 Fraser thrice weekly, with students paying $1.00 per class. located in the basement of a factory building, in a dark outlying industrial corner of Toronto, Luscombe's playhouse was originally office space until pressed into theatrical service. On December 14, 1959, the company launched itself with a production of Chekhov's The Boor and lorca's Don Perlimplin staged behind a curtained proscenium arch. On opening night, when the house lights were lowered to cue the start of the play, an astonished Herbert Whlttaker was heard to exclaim, "My God! They've got dimmersl" Luscombe, unlike many of his amateur theatre competitors, was bent on • making TWP as professional as possible.2 D'Ermo 69 The Boor and Don Perlimolin played with success for four or five • nights, a fair run for an amateur production. Nathan Cohen informed The Toronto Star readers that: "If this were New York or Paris or even London, the theatre fashion right now would be for people to beat a path to 47 Fraser Ave. . . . Mr. Luscombe and his actors and crew have something to offer through their work of honest, aesthetic and social value. "3 From then on, Nathan Cohen, in general the ma st respected theatrical critic of the period, was ta be one of Luscombe's strongest supporters. Although Cohen normally refused to review amateur theatre, he regarded TWP as an exception. There was importance, he maintained, to what "Luscombe was doing in the thin air of Canadian theatre.,,4 He was an av Id audience member at Luscombe's next offering--Chekhov's The Proposai and Len Peterson's Burlap Bags, which opened on May 6, 1960. Burlap Bags, T\NP's first Canadian offering, was an Immediate hit. Based on a 1946 radio play by Len Peterson, Luscombe's adaptation ran for two weeks. "In a more metropolitan city," wrote Cohen, "it IBuriap • BagsJ would have caused a stir. For us, in Toronto, its Importance 15 that it indicates, ail the evidence to the contrary notwithstanding, that the Idea of theatre as original and meaningful creation is not dead. It glves one--dare 1 say it?--hope."s Gradually, Luscombe's actors grew comfortable with Improvisational work and Laban movement. One day an actor started to improvise what looked like a circus act. Soon, other players added thelr own contnbution, until finally a play took shape. Antony Ferry, as writer, put words to the actors' movements, and Luscombe contributed expenenres from hls European apprenticeship. The result was six-months rehearsal for a play ca lied Hey Rube!, Toronto's first collective creation, and TWP's tlrst major success. Adulatory reviews for the play in the Toronto newspapers put TWP on the cultural map, and established Luscombe as a dlrector to be • reckoned with. D'Ermo 70 The story the company told was simple enough, an account of the • hardships faced by members of a smalt, impoverished circus (representing the working class) in their fight to avold eviction from their premises. The unique feature of Luscombe's production was the interweavlng of a "behind-the-scenes" account of circus life with actual circus acts, to keep plot and spectacle ongoing slmultaneously. By way of décor, Luscombe's playhouse was glven a tent-like ceiling and an off ·centre structural pillar was palnted red. Strobe /lghts were used to create the impression of juggllng, an uncommon idea for 1961. Playing space and circus props were shared wlth spectators, who were made collaborators in the creation of theatncal illusion. Hey Rube' ran with great success for six weeks, at a time when Toronto runs of longer than a week were unheard of. In the end, the show made a profit, and each actor was handed an envelope containing $37.83. Hey Rube' had proven that original work could make money, and TWP had earned the nght to functlon as a viable acting company. • Artlstlc success though could not guarantee the venture's longevity, as Luscornbe expenenced the flrst of a long succession of threats to TWP's survlval. In late 1960, he was served with a notice of eviction from the Fraser Avenue site. Sy now Luscombe and his company had removed offices on the bUlldmg's west side and Increased thelr seating capacity to 100. The proscenium arch was eliminated in favour of a permanent thrust stage, wlth bleacher-type seatlng on elther side. The auditorium had been palnted and decorated wlth posters from theatres ail over the world. Now the landlords, Toronto Industrial Leaseholds, who in 1959 had donated the space, wnnted rent, so Luscombe arranged a lease. Sorne tlme later, he was served notice that the building had been judged unsafe by the ilre department. City Hall eventually agreed to let the company continue operatlng If they installed a fire exit; Luscombe promptly hired a • jack hammer, and, wlthout consulting the owner, knocked down a wall, D/Ermo 71 and had a carpenter, the father of one of the actors, build a frame and a • door. Wlth matters at home settled, Luscombe took the company, for the third consecutive summer, for a two-week summer camp-out and theatre workshop at his friend's farm in Haliburton. The TWP team set up 17 bell tents in the middle of a cow pasture to house the actors, their wives and children, and studied theatre under the sun. It was here that Luscombe met Jack Winter, who arrived to interview him for Canadian Forum. Winter, now 27 and a IIterature graduate of McGill University, was currently prepanng a doctoral dissertation on Bernard Shaw at the University of Toronto. At the same time, he submitted to Luscombe a few of hls one-act play scripts, which left Luscombe unimpressed. In time, both men discovered they had many mutual interests, and Winter, before the summer was out, became TWP's (and Toronto's first) dramaturge--a combmatlOn of translator, rewnte man, and resident playwright--and as much a partner m the company as a wnter. • From 1961 to '67 and agaln trom 1972 to '76, Winter was almost exclusively responsible for supplying Luscombe's company wlth Its texts. Luscombe was initially fascinated wlth Wlnter's knowledge of Greek theatre and invited him to lecture his students on the subject. "And that worked out very weil, liB remembers Luscombe, who dlscovered a clear area in the bush, with a dip in it, where the team could create a mockup Greek theatre. Here the actors improvised scenes from Lysistrata, and by the end of their stay, a few weeks later, they had the skeleton of a new adaptation, scheduled to open their '61-62 season. When the group returned to Toronto, dozens of would-be actors were waiting to join TWP: two classes were formed--a junior or studio group of approxlmately 20 newcomers who trained three times a week, from 6:30 to 8:30 in the mornlng, and a senior group, made up of regulars, who tralned from 8:30 to 10:30. On Oecember 28, TWP opened And They'!! MakE;LPeace, Wlnter's • first stage work, and the only play produced that season. The show was D'Ermo 72 "crucified, except for the first three minutes which Cohen ca lied 'theatrical • genius at work,.,,7 Ronald Evans called the effort "disappointing," "pumped up with pretension and philosophically fuzzy."8 "1 was getting a swelled head at that time," Luscombe admits, "because 1 was thinking 1 could do anything and get away with it. . . . 1 had a good dressing down." Badly shaken by the unfavourable response, Luscombe cut seven actors or sa from the production and reworked the play, but up ta closing night, on February 3, the production drew only small audiences.9 The rest of the season Luscombe devoted to a longstanding project- the organization of a professional summer touring operation, which he called "Theatre 35", intended "to bring theatre ta those that couldn't get ta it ... 10 He contacted lodge owners in the now-familiar Haliburton area, and arranged ta tour the Ontario countryside with five actors, a trailer and a tent on an estimated budget of $685.00, exclusive of living and travelling expenses which he expected tour receipts to caver. He booked weekly engagements to play three short comedies--two light and one dark- • Chekhov's Marriage Proposai and The Boor, and an adaptation of Pirandello's The Evil Eye. The Haliburton jaunt lasted live weeks into August 1962. This was Theatre 35's first and only tour, and, though no financial success, it was one of the most exciting things the company ever did. When the group returned to Toronto, they opened their trio of one-act plays at their Fraser Avenue quarters, under the title "Three Aspects of Comedy", ta mostly lukewarm reviews. On November 8, Luscombe staged one of Ibsen's less popular plays, When We Oead Awaken, and th'lugh "the feeling of the play came across, .. 11 Cohen found the production marred by haste. Il became in crea singly apparent to TWP devotees that luscombe was at his best when he did theatre for himself in his own personal style. On March 29, 1963, the company resurfaced with a second major success, the North American premiere of George Büchner's 1830 drama • Woyzeck. Büchner, whose untimely death at 24 left his play unfinished, D'Ermo 73 based his plot on the factual account of a German common soldier who • murdered his adulterous commonlaw wife and then drowned himself. Luscombe found in Süchner's tale of a simple man's struggle against fate, the makings of a play of social protest. Büchner's draft, fleshed out, reassembled, updated and adapted by Luscombe and Wlnter, charmed audiences and critics alike. '" want to record my deep admiration for George Luscombe's production of Woyzeck," enthused Cohen. "'t is quite the finest thing Mr. Luscombe has done since Hey Rube! ... lit is] a stunningly conceived and dynamically executed venture in the resources of total theatre. "12 Situated "on a stage open to the audience on three sldes", hlghlighted by music and songs, and "brightened by a fast movlng carnlval scene, a rough evenlng in a publie house and by the rank humour and bawdy manners of the army and its women, "13 Woyzeck's impact was Immediate and stunning. More and more, critics recognized that Luscombe was testlng the outermost boundaries of theatrical form. A Corriere Illustrato revlewer charactenzed • him as "a director of Avant-Garde theatre whose performances show a rare stylistic perfection; a tense, almost exasperating, artlstlC synthesls and controversial blending of acting, movement, color, IIghting and sound," which were more suggestive, he argued, of "a ballet. ,,14 Sy the end of TWP's run of Woyzeck, expendltures for the year amounted to $7,023.42, wlth receipts offsetting expenditures. Outstanding debts in June 1963 were sllghtly over $200.00. 15 ln its tlrst four year8 of operation, TWP had presented nlne plays and completed nlne terms of theatre classes. That year Luscombe was awarded a Senior Arts Fellowship from the Canada Councll. Throughout the four-year span, Luscombe himself dlrected and produced every show at TWP. From the start, he had sought to JOIn forces with a more financlally viable playhouse, or, optlmally, wlth a univerSity, as their in-house theatre, to relieve himself of his responslbilltles as producer . • A tentative amalgamation was scheduled for June 1961, when Luscombe D'Ermo 74 was to be named Artistic Director of the Arts Theatre Club, a professional • company dedicated to experimental plays, founded by the now-ailing director, Basya Hunter. The merger was aborted, however, when Luscombe discovered that the company was ail but bankrupt. ln 1962-6.3, the University of Waterloo: . t;~ten él search for an artistlc director for its theatre, and Nathan .r', ' m'3nded Luscombe; but artistic differences madf ~Ible. 16 For a time, a link with York University sep' . • ~JfJ4, luscombe and Winter gave York's first course ln theat, t.. -An Introduction to Theatre--with the students' time dlvided between Thursday evening lectures at York and Saturday morning classes at Fraser Avenue. In 1963, they had designed the university's new 650-seat Burton Auditorium and hoped to find a home in it. But by the time the Auditorium was completed, years later, Luscombe no longer had any role in York's theatre program. Despite Its lack of a partner, TWP was not without support. In the fall of 1963, with the help of the Canada Council and the Ontario Arts • Council (DAC), TWP hired its first full-time group of Equity actors, who until now were employed on a show-to-show basis, rehearsing nights and on week-ends. The Canada Council gave TWP $3,600 to form its new company, and the DAC, $5,400. That year, TWP also received a Metro Special Grant of $1,000. Luscombe's first new rccruits were John and June Faulkner and Nancy Jowsey, whom Luscombe met in the spring of '63, when he was Invited by the province to run a three-week workshop in Northwestern Ontario. In Thunder Bay, John Faulkner, his wife June and Nancy Jowsey liked Luscombe's classes so much that they decided to follow him to Toronto. John Faulkner served as TWP's technical director until his death nine years later. HIs wife June stayed wlth TWP until 1979, first as public relations person, and, later, as general manager of the company. And Nancy Jowsey, resident designer trom 1963 to 1973, was proclaimed by • critics as "Luscombe's most valued collaborator."17 D'Ermo 75 Certainly, there was no shortage of actors wanting to join TWP's • new full-time company. Of the 90 auditioners in 1963, Luscombe selected seven actors who were placed on one-year Equity contracts. Apprentices were pa id $10.00 weekly,18 and regulars received $25.00. TWP' s 1963-64 season began weil for Luscombe wlth the blrth of his daughter Nadine-Anne on September 11, and another original play by Jack Winter. Before Compiègne was the only new Canadian play to be presented in Toronto that year by a professional company during the regular playing season. This newest creation had already been two years in the making prior to its premiere on November 6. Before anyone but the actors read it, the script went through half a dozen rewrites. In keeping with Luscombe's insistence on adequate rehearsal, several weeks passed between the preview and the official opentng of the play. And even after It opened in December to excellent reVlews, the text continued to undergo revis ion . 19 Before Compiègne was the story of Joan of Arc, but Winter's Joan • was less "a young girl enthralled by her heavenly voices" than "a disillusioned and embittered veteran, .. 20 who, before her capture at Compiègne, came to realize that her great mission ln life had been vain and foolish. The play was fluidly staged with a dlsregard for natural time and place; but "the over-all effect is [was] excitlng rather than confustng", noted Whittaker.21 "There is more than 1 can encapsulate here, much more," added Ronald Evans for The Telegram. There is the chorus of four captains in battledress, gliding in and out to explain, comment and help sWing the whole thlng freely through sandwiched levels of tlme, space and meaning. There is poetry, stitched like crystal threads through the tapestry of prose. There is music, seeping out of the walls ln muted streams to float a mood, bursttng out of the players ln • raw ballads to lighten a moment. And there 15 movement, D'Ermo 76 brisk or fluid, stark or voluptuous, painstakingly choreographed and orchestrated. 22 • With Before Compiègne, Winter introduced an element hitherto missing in much of Luscombe's theatre--the ali-important one of language, described by Whlttaker as "strong, poetic, lively ... [and] capable of ringing in the mind. "23 Robert Fulford rated Before Compiègne "the best new Canadian play l've ever seen, .. 24 while Evans lauded it as "sure, strang, satisfying and enormously effective. It strokes the senses with beauty and jabs the mlnd with challenge, .. 25 he wrote. On June 20, 1964, Before Compiègne won the Toronto Telegram Second Annual Theatre Awards for the Best Play of the Season. The oeuvre was to be saluted on several counts: it marked the début of TWP as a partly subsidized, fully professional company; it presented a group of actors whose talents matched Luscombe's imagination; and it established Wlnter as a mature and gifted playwright.26 ~re Compiègne ran until January 12. On April 3, it moved • downtown to open the new Colonnade theatre, located in the upper promenade of a new shopping complex in Toronto's fashionable Bay-Bloor avenue area. The Colonnade, the second theatre that Winter and Luscombe helped design, featured an open stage surrounded by 200 bleacher-type seats in steeply raked tiers, patterned after Luscombe's own theatre. Luscombe hoped to make the Colonnade an annex to 47 Fraser Avenue where he would create and workshop new plays until they were ready to be moved ta the more central downtown playhouse. But the building changed hands, and Luscombe once again retreated to his Fraser Avenue venue. At the Colonnade, Before Compiègne played from Wednesday through Sunday evenlngs throughout April. Desplte the laudable 1 /Iews for the Fraser Avenue production, Luscombe and Winter completely revised and ampllfied the show for Its downtown premiere. Critics who saw the • play at the Colonnade generally agreed that something was lost in the D'Ermo 77 transfer. The play was completely recast, and most of the new actors • hadn't yet mastered Luscombe's theatrical style. Worse still, argued Evans, "some of the strength of the play has been sapped off to sweeten up the production and both suffer. There's more laughter now ln Befora Compiègne, but less potency .... The unfortunate Impression left by the introduction of so much rather patronizing buffoonery by the foot soldiers is that there's not enough play here to la st a full evening and it must be heavily padded with plummery. ,,27 Luscombe's reaction to the negative feedback was to completely re rework the play for the company's next engagement--at the University of Waterloo in the summer of '64--where the production delighted an openlng night audience of 250 and gained a standing ovation for the cast of five, Luscombe and Winter. The Waterloo engagement marked the company's first significant attempt to gain recognition outslde Toronto. A second attempt was also made that summer when Luscombe launched hls four-year Stratford extravaganza dubbed "Theatre ln the • Park". After their retum from Waterloo, Luscombe and hls team plcked up their gear and went to Stratford to grace the banks of thp. Avon wlth thelr outdoor tent stage, some chairs (borrowed from the Festival theatre), and a performance of their latest tnumph. Before Compiègne played ln Queens Park to a small but captivated audience, and desplte "such odds as the noises, poor acoustlcs and various distractions pecullar to a park, the whole performance came off quite weil," reported J. K. for Th~-.SJIatfQrd Beacon-Herald. 28 As always, Luscombe' s goal was to tmng theatre to those who might not otherwise come to it, and Tom Patterson--foundlng father of the Stratford Festlval--and the management supported the TWP initiative. After five years of struggle, Luscombe had by now establlshed TWP as Canada's only genuire Group Theatre and Toronto's most successful experimental company. With the help of the Canada Councii and the DAC, • TWP had moved from amateur to professlonal status and Luscombe's Initial D'Ermo 78 dream of establishing a professional theatre organization, with full-time director, actors, dramaturge and crew, had been partly realized. His • dedication to Group Theatre, his determination to build a permanent repertory company, and hls commitment to in-theatre playwriting had been publicly recognlzed and supported. Winter, Luscombe and the company seemed a closely knit, well-integrated and, above ail, hard-working unit.29 Luscombe launched his sixth year of operation on October 1 6 wlth a final revival of Before Compiègne, once again at the University of Waterloo. It was TWP's fourth version f')f the play, which Cohen commended as one "entitled to senous critical attention. "30 ThiS fourth and final version most resembJed the onglnal. When he returned to Fraser Avenue, Luscombe ventured on a second version of his 1963 success, Woyzeck. This latest reincarnation by Jack Winter31 opened on January 12, and was an estimated 40-50% Büchner: dialogue had been rewritten, certain themes had been emphasized, and characters had been transposed. Aiso the play had been renamed The • Death of Woyzeck. The new adaptation, though, posed senous artistic problems, particularly il1 Its cavalier manipulation of time. "It was absolutely like a spaghetti dlnner," Luscombe remembers. "You couldn't unravel it, the audience couldn't sort it out. It was just going overboard with our expenments. "32 Ronald Evans agreed. "There are some brilliant moments in The Death of Woyzeck," he wrote, "as when the whole company forms a chorus of creaks, peeps, groans and hlccups while the hero bOllnces tentatlvely up and down on the stage ... but none of these impresslve turns does a thlng to advance the action or reveal character, and, wlthout further aids, the audience is left floundering in its own confuslon."33 The problems that the company expenenced with The Death of Woyzeck botched the rest of TWP's season, whlch was to include two new plays, The Steam Bath and Francois. Yet, despite their truncated • repertory, 1964-65 was a year of slgnlficant internai development. Sy July D/Ermo 79 1, 1965 most positions at TWP were filled by full-time personnel, some of • whom until now had worked on a volunteer or part-tlme basls. Also, Luscombe's acting company was increased and strengthened. Of the '63- 64 team, only one actor left. Nearly 50 auditions produced nme more actors: three were made apprentlces, and SIX were accepted Into the company, th us increasing their numbers to eleven. Moreover, TWP's financial position stabillzed dunng the year. Despite Increased expenditures, TWP managed, once more, to balance ItS books and stay out of debt.34 That summer, the company returned to Stratford for a second attempt at Theatre in the Park, this tlme with $1,000 in backmg from the Canada Council to produce a new play. TWP opened in Stratford on July 27, and plaYt:.d for two weeks--just a few hundred feet from the Festival Theatre--Before Compiègne and thelr newest creation The Mechar:lIc, whlch had premiered at Waterloo University the prevlous summer. Dunng thelr second week of play, TWP prevlewed an untltled new show for whlch • Nancy Jowsey and John Faulkner designed an open-air stage, Insplred by the fit-up with its four poles and rolls of scenery suspended fram It. On October 14, at Fraser Avenue, TWP opened ItS Fall season with The Mechanic. Slnce its premiere at Waterloo University, the play had been continually under rev'iew. Whereas at Waterloo it was tned out with slides, in Queens Park the group played it with real automobiles, and at their theatncal crypt at 47 Fraser It was performed to Brubeck records. lb "[Tlhere has been an explOSion of hlgh SpiritS ln the basement of the factory at 47 Fraser Avenue," announced Ronald Evans. "Not slnce the heyday of Hey, Rube! has 50 much exuberance been loosed ln George Luscombe's grotto theatre as by dramaturge Jack Wlnter's new comedy, The Mechanic. . . . If you've been wondering what tlrst prompted the fervently lOYal followlng for Luscombe, or if you've been wondenng • whatever happened to the fun in theatre, vou should see The M~. .cb~. ,,'HI D/Ermo 80 The Mechanic was TWP's fifth original Canadian play, and a • collective creation. A morality farce in the Jonsonian tradition, it consisted of a bawdy, fast-paced and fluid assortment of scenes featuring Commedia dell' Arte type characters in a modern setting. Unlike Before Compièg~, The Mechanic was light-hearted, and interested more in action than in words. The Mechanic proceeded from the notion that people tend to treat humans as machines and machines as humans. As his organic symbol, Winter chose "that object of mechanization which, more than any other, helped to revolutlonaltze IIfe and reshape relationships and personal values in our century--the automobile. "37 Cohen called The Mechanic "an audacious venture ln controlled commotion and total theatre. Every ingredient of the art of production IS used and brought into synchronized play. In one scene," he recounts, eight members of the nine-member cast, evoke an uproariously nightmarish pivture of traffie in a state of anarchy. Without • moving from thelr places at the back of the three-sided stage, they mou nt an effect of ear-splitting tumult and vehicular pandemonium. . .. Later on, the mechanic lectures his naive assistant on the actual and pretended repairs of a car, and on how to gull the customer. His sermon is illustrated by players pantomiming the stirrings and workings of the various parts of that car.3B The Mechanic became TWP's longest runnlng production. It remained on the boards for a total of five months, playing full-time for seven weeks and then on weekends. While it continued to show at the Fraser Avenue theatre, the TWP team toured it elsewhere. On November 7, it opened at the concert hall stage of the Edward Johnson Building, as the second event of the 1965-66 Ten Centuries Concert Series, this time to live music. In February 1966, it was ineluded in the York University • Subscriptlon Senes which opened the new Burton Auditorium. D'Ermo 81 On February 21, Luscombe received a cali from Peter Witt, a prominent New York agent. During the summer of '65, while TWP was • playing The Mechanic in Stratford, Witt had brought Alexander Cohen, formerly the Q'Keefe Centre's Broadway representative and a leading producer, to see the show. Both men were so impressed with it that they proposed a fall opening on-Broadway at the Golden Theatre. Paullibin and Ted Mann, from New York's Circle-in-the-Square were also impressed with the show, and offered a spring opening off-Broadway. The Luscombe-Winter team carried on half-hearted negotiations with both parties, but both director and writer feared that a New York appearance would mean the eventual break-up of the company. June Faulkner, then publicity manager, was largely responsible for getting Witt to see The Mechanic; she remembers having to "practically disguise the guy so that George and Jack wouldn't get paranoid because their work was going to be taken away from them to this commercial Broadway ... 39 ln the end no agreement was reached; and when the company learned of the Winter • Luscombe fiasco, they quit. Luscombe returned to Stratford in the summer of 1966 with a completely new acting company. For one very successful month he offered old favourites--Hey Rube!, Before Compiègne, The Mechaniç and a new show, yet untitled, which, for this performance, was called HapI!Y Birthday, Death. For the past three years, the Festival management had encouraged TWP's stopover, included them on their subscription forms, sold their tickets through their box office, and promoted them in their programs. This year, Stratford's welcome turned chilly. The City Park Board asked the Stratford Navy League not to provide in the following year the sylvan spot reserved for TWP every summer. The company's outdoor performances caused undue traffic congestion they contended; besides, they didn't approve of the company living in the park, as they did, in tents. Stratford's rejection was neatly countered that same summer by a • Toronto Parks and Recreation Committee decision to allow TWP to play in D'Ermo 82 Nathan Phillips Square, which they did for the next four years. In the • afternoon of August 21, and on the evening of the 25th, TWP introduced "Theatre in the Square", playing Hey Ru!.llU to a crowd of 6,000 as part of the Toronto Parks and Recreation Department's entertainment programme. By the time luscombe's 1966-67 season got underway, TWP had been booked to tour two universities under the sponsorship of the Ontario Centennial Commission for the Centennial Tour of the Canadian Forum Program. Queens University invited TWP to perform from March 2 to 4 three performances of Hey Rubel and of The Golem of Venice, the company's latest creation. From Queens, TWP moved on to the University of Western Ontario on March 10 for one performance of Hey RubeL At both venues, the group playcd mostly to capacity audiences. While rehearsing for thelr Centennial tour, TWP performed Hey Rubel fOi a two-month run at Fraser Avenue, from November 25 to January 22. This relncarnation of the company's first major success was only partially recognizable: most of the parts written by Antony Ferry had been removed • and replaced with new mate rial by Winter and Luscombe. While TWP played Hey Rubel, advertisements went up for the February opening of The Golem of Venice. Rehearsals for The Golem had been wearisome. One month before its scheduled openlng, Winter and luscombe were still arguing over which of six possible endlngs the play should take. 40 Work on The Golem had started in the form of Improvisations two years before, in the spring of 1965, with Wmter taking notes to discover the play's possible path of development as revealed ln the actors' improvisations. For a while the wnting refused to budge: nevertheless, the group continued to improvise, and within two months had developed 45 minutes of theatre, ;.;omplete with music, songs, IIghting, costumes and set design. In fact, they had enough raw materlal for a second play--Iater known as Gentlemen Be Seated--but every attempt to extend the actors' movement into dialogue • for The Golem failed. The work was stopped and improvisations started on D' Ermo 83 The Mechanic. In the spring of 1966, work on The Golem resumed, and • by July they had the skeleton of a play, which had its first performance at Stratford that summer. 41 The Golem was scheduled to open in Toronto on February 10, 1967, but opened only on March 17, during Holy Week--an appropriate time for a play about raClsm, polltics, war and the atomic bomb. luscombe wanted a monster to symbolize the bomb, and Winter came up wlth the idea of the Golem of Prod, a Jewish folkloric creature with no soul, "conjured up ta defend European Jews from terroristic persecution. ,,42 The Golem failed, mostly because it tried ta deal with too many issues at once. The Stratford version, titled Happy Blrthday, Death, was a simple comment on anti-semltlsm. Lengthened, expanded and overproduced in Toronto as The Golem of Venice, the production featured "too great a profusion of ideas, themes, maxims and declaratlons for one play. Audience attention," Martin Stone noted, was "the object of competition tram dialogue, public address system, stylized stage business, • lighting and design. "43 The Golem closed on April 23, and the company left for Montréal to present The Mechanlc at Expo '67's new Youth Pavillon. Opening night in Montréal proved to be a disappointment: the Pavilion' s public relations department hadn't properly notlfled the press about the nature ot the show, and the French-Canadian audience elther couldn't understélnd the language or wasn't prepared ta Sit through a full length play. To make matters worse, a flreworks dlsplay was scheduled every rllght of the one week ru n, and, at a certain pOint, the entire audience would walk out of the theatre. The weary team returned to Toronto, and geared Itself for a slx-week stay in unaccomodating Stratford. The repertolre included t!!2Y.B.Y..!l~.L lhc Mechaniç, and a new adaptation, as yet unflnlshed, of Carl Zuckmayer's The Captain of Koperllck. The Stratford Park authontles denled TWP their • usual playing site and sltuated them Instead on a street beside the D/Ermo 84 Exhibition Hall where the noise of cars and buses was overpowering. A • still greater threat ta the company's prospenty was Jack Winter's resignation. Winter and Luscombe during the scrlptlng of The Golem of Venice had been abnormally agitated. Luscombe was "so stubborn that he would cut his own throat to get the last word," sa ys June Faulkner, "whlch 1s what he/s done ail his life in the theatre. "44 ln a 1971 interview, WlI1ter claimed he left TWP because he found the group Ideal to be ln declme. "We were becoming rigldlfied in ail the wrong areas," he mamtamed, "and 1 found that we were ail sitting down and confirming our prejudices endlessly. ,,45 Sorne tlme shortly after Winter's departure, Mona Luscornbe received a letter from him saying he had left to form hls own cornpany.4fl And Brooky Robins, TWP admlnistrator, had JOlned hlm. With Winter and Robins gone, June Faulkner was left to mop up the mess. She appointed herself company general manager and publlclty person, over the objections of Luscombe who "didn't believe in publlclty and didn't believe in promotion." Indeed, to date Luscombe had never had • a full-time publicity person or manager: he found the part-time services of Robins and Mona sufflcient. "Luscombe," argues Faulkner, "had IIttle respect for anything that really wasn't for the stage. He had no understanding of how a theatre should run If it was going to grow, although he thought he did because he had managed to keep thmgs going. "47 Yet, faced with bureaucratlc constraints Imposed by the cultural bodies on which his payroll depended, Luscombe soon realized the value of June, who, in time, replaced Winter as his second-m-command. The artistic problems that the company suffered over the 1966-67 season were, to a certain extent, a direct result of poor public relations and haphazard administration. Hev Rube!, t~e flrst production of the season, opened without advance promotion and wlth minimal advertlsmg. Desplte good reviews, it closed below its audience potentlal. The Golem of Velllce, the second production, endured the same handicaps ln addition to ItS • artistic ones. The company's week-Iong stay at Expo wlth The Mechanic D'Ermo 85 actually cost the company money; and though the Centennial tour to • Queen's and the University of Western Ontario made a profit, with a liUle more planning it could easily have gone farther afield, especially since the Ontario Centennial Commission was subsidizing the venture. Finally, TWP's Stratford jaunt was poorly planned. Six weeks was too long a season, even had promotion been adequate. And it was not. It was increasingly clear to Luscombe that he must now tailor TWP's artistic policy to fit the expectations of government bodies if grants were to continue. The Canada Council approved in principle a grant of $30,000 for TWP for their 1967-68 season, provided they moved to a more central and larger theatre. Luscombe promptly initiated a search for new premises; it was June who found a perfect location right in the heart of downtown Toronto, behind the Maple Leaf Gardens, at 12 Alexander Street. The place was an old warehouse, weil known to theatre people who used it as a rehearsal space, and by artists who sold paintings and designs there. By October, TWP had signed a lease and contracted architect Gerald • Robinson to draw up plans to convert the warehouse into an arena-style, 300-seat playhouse. By Oecember 1, the construction of TWP's new theatre was underway, supervised by the vigilant June and John Faulkner. TWP's objectives under the new roof would remain unchanged: (1) the development of a proficient professional ensemble; (2) the creati,:m of a repertoire of original Canadian plays; (3) the widest possible display of their work, nationally and internationally. By restricting itself to one writer and director, and by using improvisation as the sole mechanism to develop scripts, TWP had been limited in the number of productions it could do each S\1ason. A part of the company's mandate for the upcoming year was to increase the number of productions mounted, to work almost entirely with completed scripts, and to offer the public a more regular schedule of performances. TWP's policy called for six productions that season, including two • plays by Canadian writers, a classic, and three "Platform Productions" D'Ermo B6 involving another director. What Luscombe needed now were writers. He • approached Len Peterson, Antony Ferry, Hugh Webster, Emmanuel Flled, and others famlliar wlth the collaboralive style, and ail showed IIlterest Whlle the Alexander theatre was being bullt, Luscombe cOl1tmued to rehearse at Fraser Avenue, The Captaln of KOR,- ' kk ln the mornlllgs, and Gentlemen Be Seated ln the afternoons. On November 8, Ib..e.J&.ruall1 of Kopenick or Der Hauptmann Von K6penlch opened to a tull house. The play, a satire on mliitarism, was tlrst staged ln Germany ln 1931. Without altering the play's penod or plot, LusLombe and hls group extended its theme to become "an Indictrnent of p€ople's acqlJlescence ln burgeoning bureaueracy ... [ofJ thelr deference to the badges of bureaucratie power,,48_- ln this case a unlform--and of their falth ln appearances over faets. The production enjoyed excellent revlews malllly because of the quality of Luscombe's direction. "There IS the very feel, the sound and the tanned leather smell of mllitarlsm, "49 wrote Martlll Stone . Each of the cast' s 10 actors played several raies III the show, sorne as • many as four, except for François-Régis Klanfer who played the Captalll. As always, great stress was given to a kaleldoscoplc fUSion of sound, Iight and music, and eloquent mime and body movement. "A slow motion attack by a soldler on a down-and-outer becomes the prelude to a grotesque, phantorn-like ballet," noted Cohen, "wlth the vanous actors moving around as though they were mannequins, thelr arms floppmg loosely ahead of them or at thelr sldes, thelr legs buckllng at the jOlflts ... bO A red uniforrn coat was made to sail ln and out of a scene as If on ItS own, in apparent fllght on its trolley. 51 The Captalll of Kopenick ran untll December 23, playlng 29 shows III six weeks, often to full houses. Desplte hls plans to stage two other plays that Fall, Luscombe produced only The Captam of .KoIlli.D.lc!<. The rest of his time was devoted partly to rehearsing Gentlemen Be S~.ru.Q9, scheduled to open the new Alexander Street theatre, and partly to launchmg the • company's flrst public fund-raiser to help pay for the construction of their D'Ermo 87 new playhouse which to date cost $30,000. Basically, TWP had built the • Alexander house on credit. Toronto businessmen had guaranteed a loan of $4,000 to start, and a special grant from the city of Toronto had helped somewhat, but the larger yrant monies fram the Canada Council and OAC were strlctly earmarked for operating costs. TWP han thus to depend on pnvate contributions and operation surpluses to cover the capital expendlture. To promote thelr campalgn, June Faulkner sent out a witt y brochure to 10,000 Torontonlans describing TWP's achievements and aspirations, and requestlng thelr support. On November 27, TWP launched its $30,000 fund-ralSer wlth a phone-athon featuring celebntles soliciting donations. Whlttaker helped boost TWP' s campalgn with an appeal in The Globe and Mali: "Will vou be home tomorrow evening?" he quened. "If 50, vou may get a cali from Quentin Durgens or Steve Wojeck. Gordon Pmsent and John Vernon, who play these TV famlliars ... together wlth Anna Cameron, Frank Sh'Jster, June Callwood, Jack Creley, Jean Templeton, • Maggie MOrris, Tom Kneebone, Eric House, Bruno Gerussi and other leading personalitles, "h2 made approximately 2000 calls in one evening, netting over $6000. Meanwhlle, June dispatched invitations for TWP's teetotaler début nlght. Slnce Luscombe had mtended the Alexander Street theatre to be TWP's centennlal gift to the city, he was forced to open ln 1967, even though by year's end the bUilding was still not qUlte ready. Nevertheless, on New Year's Eve, the playhouse was inaugurated with the premiere of Gentlemen Be Seated. The next mornlng, however, the theatre went dark again, and Luscombe retreated to Fraser Avenue whlle finishing touches were put on hls new home. Openlng nlght at Alexander Street was a success. Gentlemen Be Seated, a CIVil nghts doc'Jmentary on the emancipation of American blacks, was staged ln the tradition of the minstrel show. In Stone's opinion • Luscombe's production marked "probably the first time the Negro position D'Ermo 88 in U.S. history has been examined m a theatre through what could be • described as Marxist criteria. To cali It a play about CIVil nghts," he continued, "underestlmates its broader problllg of the Negro's economlC poverty, polltll:al exploitation and ~oc,al diSCrimination. ,,!>.! Co-wrltten by the TWP company and Jan Carew, b4 Gentlemen..fie. Seated was praised by Ken Wolfson as "a real wmner" .bb Once settled Hl the Alexander Street venue, Luscombe contllllled ta revise the play tram performance to performance. Its focus seemed to hlm muddled and Its ending, weak. entics confessed, however, to belng "Iess Interested III what the production ha[dl to say than the bnillant méilmer III whlch Il sa[ldl it. ... Gentlemel1~ Be S~ated," explamed Jlm McPherson, "IS a splendld example of how musIc and drama, IIght and design, rnay be sk"lfully blended into one splendldly evocatlve expenence. "bn Paul Libin and Ted Mann also saw Gentlemen Be SJ~91QQ. O,lce more they renewed their inVitation for a New York VISI!, and yet agam Luscornbe refused desplte the company's unanlmous vote to accept ln an • unfortunate repetltlon of events a few years earller, Luscornbe's actors turned against him and, at the close of thelr next production, I/1e Alchemist, the entlre company qUit. Ben Jonson's The Alchemlst opened at Alexander Street ln February 1968. The play, the longest TWP had ever done, ran 2 1 \2 hours Hlstead of the usual 70 to 90 mmutes. Whlttaker found the production vlsually "fascinating",57 but other CrttlCS were less kllld. Cohen declared Il "a surprise one could do without," and "resolutely empty of 1hat Imaginative stagecraft which has become TWP's signature "l,Il "HIS ILuscomlJe'sl theatre has never before stood ln awe of a scnpt," added Stone "Surely If would be no dlsrespect for Jonson's theme, no compromise wlth Workshop's integrity, to look at The Alchemlst through modern lenses. "b9 The play was a poor cholce for Luscombe's company Jonson's Engllsh demanded "ta be spoken wlth gusto, IIghtness, speed and • precision, "60 and speech was never TWP's forte. Luscornbe's brand of D'Ermo 89 theatre never gave words a high pnority despite the fact that h;s plays had • a lot to say Audiences always had to stram to catch ail of the actors' Imes; ln TWP's tradition of total theatre, language was no more than a part of the whole drarnatlc experience Includmg sets, movement, mUSIC, lights and souild. A second contnbutmg factor to The Alchemlst's und oing was the company's murderous schedule. That year, even as they performed their last show at Fraser Avenue, The Captaln of Kopenick, the players began rehearslng Gentlemen! Be Seated for its premlere at Alexander Street. While they ran Gentlemen at night, they worked on The Alchemist in the daytlme. Though Il was good to see TWP mcrease ItS repertolre, quality was unfortunrltely bemg forfelted ln the pursuit of quantlty. 61 The Alchernlst played unt" March 3, cutting short its scheduled run by two weeks due to poor box-office. Beslde the announcernent of the play's closlng, Luscombe posted a notice Informmg the company of his Intention to dlsband It. The TWP organizatlon exhausted .tself ln the • process of open mg the new theatre, "and the air had started to go out of the balloon nght after that, "62 remembers Klanfer. Sy the close of The Alchemist, many of the TWP group had handed in their notice, and Luscombe saw no future for the company members who remained. And funds, as usual, were non-existent. lronlcally enough, on March 19, 1968, Cohen descnbed TWP as "a godsend to va nous groups 3round the city. First and toremost," he argued, the 320-seat auditorium ... provldes Toronto Workshop Productions wlth a home in the centre of things, instead of on the penphery as before. Beyond that, its avallability for rent when the company IS between presentations serves a double purpose: it helps TWP to me et its costs, and relieves the crltlcal shortage of intlmate theatres ln Toronto ... , In actual fact Workshop theatre is shaplng up as a Toronto version of • an off-Broadway centre for the performing arts. 1163 D'Ermo 90 The move ta Alexander Street was not an unmixed blessing. For • better or worse, TWP had become institutionalized and luscombe was forced ta confront greater artistic and financial pressures. TWP's move indeed meant increased revenues, but expenses increased aeeordingly and the company grew ever more dependent on grant-giving bodies Fifty-two per cent of the company's operating budget was now subsidized; and to remain solvent, Luscombe was forced to produce After a short p~riod of reflection, he invited baek sorne former actors and organized a new company for his next production, Ih.~_ JUI-,!QJler~, which had its North American premiere on May 1, 1968. Written in the mid 1950's by Scottish folksinger, Ewan MacCull, Th~_T!a_y~ller$ was tirst produced by Joau Littlewood at the Edinburgh Festival in 1952. The play, an antiwar drama set aboard a train, castigated the world for rnoving towards the West (or Capitalisrn) instead of the East (or Communism). "In the orchestration of its ec·nstituent elements," claimed Cohen, "The Travellers ... is problably George Luseombe's most soundly • conceived and efficiently carried out production since Toronto Workshop Production (sic) got started. Going to sef' a TWP attraction has always been a speculative activity. One never knew in what shape the text and the presentation would be. There was usually something unfinished about the evening. Not sa this time. Everything expresses the complete realization of a dramatie intention ... Furthermore, the four women and seven men in the cast speak clearly and nearly always in character ... What a sharne then that ail this excellence is squandered on anything as maudlin, mawkish and full of thumping soapbox insipidities as The Travellers.64 The combined failure of The Alchemist and The Travel[~r$ virtually put Luscombe into bankruptcy. By May 28, and the opening of the • season's final production, Faces, Luscornbe was exhausted and TWP D'Ermo 91 deeply in debt. To the company's immense relief, Faces had three good reviews. • First developed by H B. Playwrigl1t's Foundation in New York and written by its Artistic Director, Norman Kline, Faces was a series of light hearted, non-musical divertissements which satirized American life, and explored human behaviour when confronting or confronted by other people or situations. luscombe staged Faces as a co mie strip--on two stripes or levels, one upstairs and one downstairs, with a circular ladder joining the two. The Faulkner-Jowsey team built a set comprised of eight translucent panels (four above and four below) onto which drawîngs of properties, settings or live silhouettes of actors were projected. Silhouettes talked to three dimensional actors or to other silhouettes. "At one point an actor flexes his knees in front of a panel," recalls luscombe, "onto which a drawing of a piano has been projected, and as he goes through the motions of playing a piano we hear piano music. ,,65 Essentially, TWP had formulated a stage • version of the cinematic multiple image technique. Cohen praised Faces as "full of intelligence and graceful, apt effects. "fl6 Before it closed in July, the show was already booked for two outside engagements. The first was in Boston, where TWP was invited to represent Canada at the International Festival of Experimental Theatres at Brandeis University from July 31 through August 4. Participating in the week-Iong festival with TWP were a touring troupe trom Colombo, a French avant-garde company, and the Cafe la Marna players from off-off Broadway, who had just returned from an extensive and mu ch applauded European toUr. 67 The Boston engagement marked TWP's first appearance outside Canada. The company's next booking was in August to show Faces in Nathan Phillips Square for their third consecutive year of outdoor playing. "These first months," sighed luscombe, "My God, it'~ lleen one of • the most terrifying seasons of my life. It's been a strain to promote a new D'Ermo 92 theatre, ta trai'.l an acting company, ta attempt new pla ys and ta keep your • head above the water.,,68 Artistically, TWP finished off the season ta continuous full houses; but financially, it was barely Illaking ends meet. For the 1968-69 season, the Alexander Street theatre was estimated ta cost $100,000, of which $46,000 had ta be raised through box-office, whereas Fraser Avenue would have required only $18,000 After nine years of operation, TWP's accumulated deficit stood at about $16,500.69 The company's gravest problem, however, was the crippling capital debt balance of $25,000 incurred for the construction of their new building. To date, TWP had raised less than $10,000. In a last ditch effort, June applied ta the Metropolitan Executive Committee for two separate grants: one for the sum of $30,000 ta help meet operating expenses, and the other, a capital grant of $20,000 to partially caver construction costs. 70 Until money came in, the company walkf:d a tight rope. That sunlmer TWP didn't travel ta Stratford: they were hard at work preparing their tenth anniversary season. • ln 1968-69, TWP introduced its first subscription season, with four productions scheduled ta run for a manimum of six weeks each. As part of his program for the year, luscombe decided ta formalize his training program and to develop at least one company-member as a director. Michael John Nimchuk, whom luscombe had met sorne years previously, dropped by ta ask if he could write for the company; and luscomhe assigned him an adaptation of Jaroslav Hasek's The GQQd SQldJer _s.çttW~j.k. Meantime, luscombe skimmed scripts by acdaimed playwright Mario Fratti, and opted ta stage his Che Guevara. He promptly invited the playwright, who lived in New York, to come ta Toronto ta work on the script with the company. 71 The season kicked off on November 5 with a Canadian premiere production of Flood, a farce by writer Gunther Grass, who gained • international recognition for his novel Tin Drum. The play was a fiasco, D'Ermo 93 and closed p~ematurely on December 7. On December 17, TWP offered • the season's second world premlere, .che Guevara . .clliLGuev.QIQ chranlcled the Bohvian crusade of the Argentinian revolutlonary, and hls eventual downfall as recorded in his dianes and those of hls men. Frattl set the drama dunng the last months of Che's life, and followed hlm thraugh the Bollvlan jungle as he lead his guerrilla band Into a South Amencan Revolution whlch ended on Octuber 9, 1967 with Che's ~xecutlon. /7 Cntlcal reactlon to the TWP play was mixed. Don Rubin thought it "baslcally a confuslng plece of theatre. It never qUlte makes up its mind whether It wants to be a dramatlc exammation of the psyche of a revolutlonary or just a Brechtlan-styled biography of Guevara himself. "73 "To understand what director George Luscombe and hls company are dOlng," warned Cohen, "you must realize that Mano Frattl has written an abominable play." Frattl's script was, supposedly, the result of elght months of careful research, yet "Che Guevara is [was] amateurish • reportage, scnbbled helter-skelter fram a flle hastily skimmed over, ,,74 Cohen alleged. The show's tension ultimately denved fram the way Lliscombe staged Frattl's materla!. In Brechtian style, Luscombe had the actors step ln and out of character at the start of each scene, quoting Mao Tse Tung, Benjamm Franklin, or personal vlews of the revolution to tie the play to world issues. CedriC Smith, playing Che, described some of his personal adventures as a folkslnger while performing for the U.S. army in Viet Nam. The play's mUSIC, mamly rock-and-roll and Beatles' songs, was "unmistakeably loud, categorically youthful, and the related dancing," observed Cohen, "that further markfed] the transition fram scene to scene . . . was rugged, jllgged, dartlng" As always, John Faulkner's lighting contnbt.!ted rr.uch to the production, as did Nancy Jowsey's set, composed of a dozen or so "Ioose, danghng ropes and areas of darkness extending ta the farthest stage recesses, persistently remind[ing] us of the discomfort • and triais of jungle IIfe, the lack of ail amenities, the ever-present menace D'Ermo 94 of nature, the ever-present but never-seen threat of the Bolivian pursuers and their United States' Central Intelligence Agency advisers. tt 76 • Martin Stone called Che Guevara" one of the mos! brilliant productions TWP has ever mounted. tt76 Cohen conceded the presentation to be "the ma st absorbing show 1 have seen under local auspices sinee the production 13 months aga at the Central Library of forJun~Ul!1rJ !VI~ri_~ Eyes . .,77 Despite a slow beginning, Che Guevara became one of TWP's best attended and ma st controve(3ial attractions. After studying reviews, luscombe substantially revised the text, defining Fratti's point of view more clearly and tightening the plot to improve pace. Bookings pOllred into the theatre, and on closing night, January 18, the theatre was packcd ta capacitv, with people sitting in the aisles and many others turned away. Almost immediately the company set off on tour. At St. Catharines' new 190-seat Niag~ra Arts Centre Theatre, Ct"Je Guevara--the Centra's first stage show--played to constant full hou ses for two weeks. Later, at McMaster and Waterloo Universities, it also played to sellout crowds. • Meantime, luscombe rehearsed his upcoming production. Michael John Nimchuk's adaptation of The Good Soldier Schw~il! opened at fWP as scheduled on February 25, and, greeted by enthusiastic reviews, it was soon playing ta sellout crowds. The Good Solçlier Schweil(, wrote Stone, is "a show ta acclaim for its insight, its ingenuity, its scathir.g anti-militarist satire, its hope for e'Jen the least sophisticated of society's victims. ,,18 The play was based on the First World War classic by Czechoslovakian a\Jthor, Jaroslav Hasek, which had already inspired several other dramatic versions, including one by Bertolt Brecht, and one by Littlewood in which luscombe had performed. The~_00d_-.S.9Idier S~!1wei!!, a satire on class divisions, told the story of a priva te in the Austro Hungarian army, a bumbling, lovable simpleton who, because of his 79 • guileless candor, confounded bureaucrats wherever he went. D/Ermo 95 "George Lusr.ombe," wrote Stone, "has staged one of TWP's most • ambltlous and e4'~ectlve productions. The unique TWP trademarks--mime, eccentnc movement, accented light, basIc costume, bold design, helghtened speech, graphlc composition, economlcal sound and music--are ail here, but stronger than before .... "BO "That Luscombe's latest is wittily staged IS no surprise," noted Whlttaker. "The TWP productions get better and better-Iooklng. "B1 Agam, Jowsey's set and John Faulkner's lighting contnbuted rnuch to the play. The pair contrlved "a translucent wall, plerced by three entrances. From behmd," detalls Whittaker, "a dazzle of cartoon locations are projected, [the scenes changmg sWlftly fram the barracks to the hattlefleld, glvmg the Impression of a fast-movlng revue] agamst whlch the nme TWP actors, in white tlannel overalls, mime, march and proclalm the multl-sr.;ened saga. "02 For the tlrst tlme ln TWP's hlstory, a production's box-office receipts covered ItS operatmg costs. The play was scheduled to run for five weeks, but was extended for another two, and closed on April 12. Meantime, • Norman Kline Invlted Luscombe to bring Faces to New York to play off Broadway, and Jan Carew praposed that Luscombe remake Gentlemen Be Seated. Luscombe agreed to do both. Faces was scheduled to open in August, at New York's N0W Theatre, under the auspices of producer Leonard Sillman and Orin Lehman. And Mr. Bones, TWP's second version of Gentlemeo Be Seated, was chosen to close the company's season. Once agam, however, Carew and Luscombe had artlstic dlfferences, and the TWP team ended up wrltmg the script themselves. Mr. Bones opened on Apnl 22, 1969 to excellent revlews. The play had undergone a considerable transformation since its premlere two years earher. It retamed its minstrel show ft amework with dramatic pleces, song, dance, Improvised dialogue and music, and its subject matter, juxtaposlng the fillai events leadlng up to the American • Civil War wlth a serres of vignettes about black America, past and present. D/Ermo 96 But, whereas Gentlemen Be Seated "wound IIp as little more than an incoherent statement with absolutely nu relevance to contemporary • ,-Bo!1e~ Canada," remarked Rubin, Mr was "tight" and "fascinating" and" a first rate piece of thf!atre." Il is "far and away, the best thing that l've seen his company do, ,,83 he concluded. Despite laudable reviews, !YIr~BQ.o~~, for a while, did only fair business; but like Che Guevara audiences grew as the rlln advanced, and the season concluded on June 7 with a packed house Luscombe's decision to launch a subscription series had been fully justified. And his first 10 years of operation concluded in triumph. TWP was now the city's oldest professional theatre company. and the only theatre in Canada that operated on a year-round basis. Ernploying 22 people on a $52,000 payroll,84 it had become an important cultural institution. In the 18 months that the new Alexander theatre had been open, TWP had provided a home for three of Toronto's dance companies, The Young People's Theatre and several independent theatrical and artistic • organizations. More than 300,000 childl9n had come to the theatre for a special children's show presented each morning under the auspices of the Young People's Theatre; three dance companies had played a total of 12 concerts ta full houses; two independent Canadian theatre companies had played for periods of up ta five weeks; and two poetry readings and two art auctions had been held in the theatre.06 Many of the cornpômes that used the theatre, including the Toronto Dance Theatre, one of Canada's most important modern dance troupes, he Id sorne ot thelr tirst public performances there.86 Ov~r the years, luscombe and TWP had achieved national recognition and were now on their way to achieving international acclaim. ln the upcoming season, they were scheduled to play E ln a 1969 letter, Nathan Cohen wrote: "1 have been reviewing the • work of George Luscombe and his Toronto Workshop Productions sin ce 1959. In my considered judgment he is the single most enterprising and resourceful dire ~ ~ùr in Canada, and his is, overall, the most artistically adventurous company that we have. His every production bears his personal signature in terms of the style of the players, and the pointing out and up of the theme of the play th.ough movement and gesture bordering often on pure dance, but never becoming effete or decadent. It is my further opinion that, as a theatre figure, Luscombe stands alone. 1 know no one else in Canada or the U.S., :n Broadway, off-Broadway, regional and community theatre who works in the same manner or is able to produce the same exciting results ... 87 Cohen should have mentioned that, without question, Luscombe's greatest accomplishment of those first 10 years had been to survive . • • D f Ermo 98 • NOTES 1 Anthony Ferry, "Ten Good People and an Idea," Toronto Daily Star 5 Deeember 1959: 31. 2 George Luscombe, personal interview, 24 May 1988. 3 Nathan Cohen, "Reaehing a Play's Core," Toronto Daily Star 17 May 1960: 32. 4 Gordon Vogt, "The Politics of Entertainment: George LuscomlJe and TWP," The Human Elements, ed. David Helwlg (Canada: Oberon Press, 1981) 139. 5 Cohen 32. 6 George Luscombe, personal interView, 24 May 1988. 7 George Luscombe, personal interView, 24 May 1988. See Nathan Cohen, "Stereophonie Sound and 'Lysistrata'," Toronto Daily Star 29 December 1961: 14. 8 Ronald Evans, "A Depressing Trio," The Telegram 27 September • 1962: 58. 9 George Luscombe, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 10 George Luscombe, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 11 Nathan Cohen, "Ibsen's Valedictory," Toronto Darly Star 10 November 1962: 22. 12 Nathan Cohen, "A Remarkable Achlevement, Il Toronto Daily Star 17 April 1963: 36. 13 TWP Press Release, 18 Mareh 1963. 14 TWP Publlcity Leaflet, 17 April 1965. 15 TWP Incarne and Expendlture Statement trom June 1962 ta June 1963. 16 George Luscombe, personal Interview, 15 August 1988. 17 Joseph Erdelyi, "Twain's 'Letters' a Hit at the Workshop," • Peterborough Examiner 5 May 1973: 18. D'Ermo 99 18 Ali new members underwent a training programme of no less than • one month dunng which time they were employed as apprentices. 19 Robert Fulford, "On Canadian Drama: How a Theatre in a Factory BUllt a Canaulan Play That's Going Places," Maclean's 25 January 1964: 45. 20 Fulford 45. 21 Herbert Whittaker, "Luscombe's Basement Workshop Takes Off with a Poetic, Bawdy Joan of Arc," The Globe and Mail 14 December 1963: 11. n Ronald Evans, "The Stage by Ronald Evans," The Telegram 14 December 1963: 17. 23 Whittaker, "Luscombe's Basement" 11. 24 Fulford 45. 25 Evans 17. 26 Whlttaker, "Luscombe's Basement" 11 . 27 Ronald Evans, "The Theatre by Ronald Evans," The Telegram 4 • April 1964. 7. 2B J.K., "Company Presents Modern Play in Queen's Park," The Stratford Beacon-Herald 31 July 1964: 7. 29 Mark Czarneckl, "Workshop Grows Up," Varsitv 11 November 1965: 4. 30 Nathan Cohen, "Into the Depths," Toronto Daily Star 15 October 1964: 38. 31 John Herbert, (Jack Brundage), had origlnally been commissioned to adapt Woyzeck for the company's 1965 production; but personal and artistic differences between Luscombe and Herbert led to the withdrawal of Herbert's SCript just weeks before its opening. Winter was ca lied on to replace him, but tlme pressures marred the script and, inevitably, the production. • 32 George Luscombe, personal interview, 15 August 1988 . D'Ermo 100 33 Ronald Evans, "The Theatre by Ronald Evans," The Telegram 13 • January 1965: 56. 34 Jack Winter, letter to Mr. Milton S. Carman, 5 August 1965. 35 Herbert Whittaker, "Comie Business is a Monkey Wreneh," The. Globe and Mail 15 October 1965: 13. 36 Ronald Evans, "Mechante Brings Back Bounce," The Teleg.am 15 October 1965: 43. 37 Nathan Cohen, "Much to Admire in 'Meehanic', Nothing to Feel," Toronto Daily Star 1 6 October 1965: 19. 38 Cohen, "Much Ta Admire" 19. 39 June Faulkner, personal interview, 5 May 1988. 40 Mona Luscombe, personal interview, 19 August 1988. 41 June Faulkner, letter to Jean Roberts and Peter Dwyer, 18 July 1967. 42 Martin Stone, "Golem of Venice--Um suai, Inventive, • Thought-Provoking," The Canadlan Tribune 3 April 1967: 9. 43 Stone 9. 44 June Faulkner, personal interview, 5 May 1988. 45 Michael Enright, "Luscombe, Mystenous Keeper of the Flame," Globe Magazine [The Globe and Mali] 16 Janu~ry 1971: 9 46 Mona Luscombe, personal journals, 14 June 1967. 47 June Faulkner, personal interview, 5 May 1988. 48 Nathan Cohen, "Fittlng Finale ta Fraser Ave. Theatre," IQrQ.!J.lQ Daily Star 9 November 1967: 25. 49 Martin Stone, "A Fascmatlng Play," The Canadian TnJ2..l)J}~ 27 November 1967: 10. 50 Cohen, "Fitting Finale" 25. 51 Herbert Whittaker, "Captaln of Kopenick IS a Tour de Force," The • Globe and Mail 9 November 1967: 15. D'Ermo 101 52 Herbert Whittaker, "Luscombe Workshop Gets Aid From Stars," The Globe and Mail 27 November 1967: 17. • 53 Martin Stone, "Play Slows Fresh Breeze," The Canadian Tribune 22 January 1968: 10. 54 Jan Carew was a Guyana-born novelist, playwright and former minis ter of culture, living in Toronto, whom Luscombe agreed would work weil with the company. Though he soon started to send in bits of script which Luscombe used, by November 22, both writer and director disagrF!ed on the form the show was taking, so Carew stopped producing material, and threatened to sue Luscombe if he opened. Carew started the long-standing tradition of authors seeing what Luscombe had done, scorning it and threatenmg to sue the company. However Carew hadn't actually written Gentlemen Be Seated, but rather submitted scenes based on disentombed civil nghts debates. The play's style and framework were mostly the company's work . 55 Ken Wolfson, "Probing Civil War Saga Spells Intimate Theatre," • Ryersonlan 7 February 1968: 10. 56 Jlm McPh~rson, "A New Play, a New Author, a New Theatre--A Triumph," The Telegram 11 January 1968: 65. 57 Herbert Whittaker, "Alchemist is Commedia Dell'Arte," The Globe and Mail 17 February 1968: 24. 58 Nathan Cohen, .. Alchemist: Its Physical SOlemnity Cornes as a Jolt," Toronto Daily Star 18 February 1968: 18. 59 Martin Stone, "Swinging Sound, Flavor," The Canadian Tribune 4 March 1968: 9. 60 Cohen, "Alchemist" 18. 61 Cohen, "Alche.nist" 18. 62 François-Régis Klanfer, personal interview, 19 August 1988. 63 Nathan Coh':m, "Workshop Theatre ... It's a Godsend," Toronto • Daily Star 19 March 1968: 22 . D'Ermo 102 64 Nathan Cohen, "Travellers: Production Fine, Play Bad," Tor_onto • Daily Star 2 May 1968: 28. 65 "Theatre Scene," unpublished rev of Faces, 8 June 1968. 66 Nathan Cohen, "Bright Faces Invites a Comparison with Feiffer," Toronto Daily Star 29 May 1968: 68. 67 Roderick Nordell, "Toronto Workshop at Brandeis: Experimental Theatre Festival," The Christian Science Monitor 3 August 1968: 11. 68 Urjo Kareda, "George Has Done It Again," TorQ!ltoJ)<.Ü!Y ..$~ar 29 June 1968: 33. 69 "Workshop Theatre Threat," The Telegram 18 February 1969: 46. 70 June Faulkner, letter to George M. Foster, 28 February 1968. 71 Fratti had a doctorate in languages and literature, had written 31 plays and was internationally known for his success with Ihe...suici!1~, Th~ Cage and RefusaI. 72 Christopher Dafoe, "legend Overwhelms the Man Che Guevara," The Vancouver Sun 26 November 1969: 41. • 73 Don Rubin, "A lack of Focus, That's the Trouble With the Che Play," Toronto Daily Star 18 Oecember 1968: 42. 74 Nathan Cohen, "Che, the Best Play locally in a Year," Toronto Daily Star 31 Oecember 1968: 32. 75 Cohen, "Che" 32. 76 Martin Stone, "Portrayal of Guevara," The Canadian Tribune 2 January 1969: 10. 77 Cohen, "Che" 32. 78 Martin Stone, "Schweik Again--Only More 50," The Canadian Tribune 20 June 1973: 8. 79 Joseph Erdelyi, "Schweik Adaptation Winner at Workshop," Peterborough Examiner 15 June 1973: 22. 80 Martin Stone, "Spirit of Schweik Captured," The Canadian Tribune • 5 March 1969: 10 . D'Ermo 103 81 Herbert Whittaker, "Soldler Schweik Saga Splendidly Staged," The • Globe and Mail 27 February 1969: 11. 82 Whlttaker, "Soldler Schwelk" 11. 83 Don Rubln, rev. of Mr. Bones, CBC, Ontario, 3 April 1969. 84 Dean Walker, "Toronto and the Arts Dollar," Board of Trade Journal September 1968: 7. 86 June Faulkner, letter ta the Secretary of the Board of Control of City Hall, 13 February 1969. 86 June Faulkner, personal interview, 5 May 1988. 87 Nathan Cohen, letter ta Whom It May Concern, 31 July 1969 . • • D'Ermo 104 • Chapter V The Beginning of the End: 1969 to 1989 Sy 1969 TWP had won acceptance by the local and national cultural establishment, and funding increased substantially. For the 1969-70 season, grants exceed"tj those of the prevlous year by $35,000, and constituted 47% of the company's $180,000 spent on operatlng costs. The outstanding capital debt of nearly $25,000 continued to be cnppling until an outraged Nathan Cohen came to Luscombe's aid. "If, by vlrtue Of dedication, selflessness and purpose, Il he wrote, any performing arts organization in Toronto deserves special attention from the various governmental agencles maklng grants, it is Toronto Workshop Productions. Surely between them the Ontario Council for the Performing Arts and the Canadian (sic) Council can find the means to relleve the • company of sorne of the punishing economic pressure. 1 The Councils listened, and, shortly after, provided capital expendlture funding. A relieved and triumphant Luscombe left for New York on August 17 to begin a three-week rehearsal for his $40,000-$44,000 off-Broadway production of Faces, now titled The American Hamburger Lea1l!m7. The play opened at the New Theatre on September 16, 1969, and closed the same night. The show had been completely changed from its Toronto version. At the insistence of its author Norman Kline, materlal created by TWP was replaced with his awn, which wasn't as effective. Worse still, because Luscombe's own actors had to remain at home to rehearse for their upcoming engagement ln Venlce, he was forced to wark wlth a local company unaccustomed to his methods. Ta compound the problems, Leonard Sillman interfered with Luscombe's direction throughout • rehearsals. Disaster was inevitable. D'Ermo 105 By September 17 Luscombe was back in Toronto to prepare the • company for its trip to Venice. The Venice Biennale, a major European artistic showcase, was by far the most important cultural event to which a Canadian theatre had yet been invited. This 28th International Theatre Festival would feature altogether 15 companies fram ail over Europe, Including the dlstingUished English Stage Society (which discovered John Osborne) and the Teatro Piccolo of Milan.3 TWP was scheduled to present two of its original plays, Mr. Bones and Che Guevara, for four performances at the Teatro di Palazzo Grassi from September 24 to 27. The nationality of Che Guevara's author, Mario Fratti, and the controverslal nature of the play's subject lent this production partlcular interest. Twenty-three cntics fram ail over the world attended Che Guevara's opemng, Including Nathan Cohen, whose trip the Canada Councii had sponsored. "Prior to the production," reports Cohen, and indeed during the first half of it, excitement ran high. The 300-seat house was full, and people stood along the aisles • and at the rear. According to one source, about 15 per cent of the people in the house were plainclothesmen, there to observe and make arrests, if necessary .... There were indications that partisans of various Left wing persuasions, each clalming Che Guevara as their own, were ready to take action if necessary for and against the play. At intermission, applause was interrupted by some loud boos from the Vancouver group. After intermission, however, the tension within the play disappeared, and with it the audience atmosphere changed, too. 4 Throughout its two-day run, Che Guevara elicited whistles, applause, and a fair share of tongue-Iashing; but "the explosion that many expected, and sorne festival officiais hoped for, didn't matenalize. ,,5 At the end of the run, Luscombe and his wife Mona left for Barcelona for a short • vacation, and then stopped off in London to visit Littlewood and other old D'Ermo 106 friends--Shirley Dynevor, George Cooper, Howard and Stella Goorney--sorne • 30 people sang "The Maple Leaf Forever" on Luscombe's arrivai On October 8, he returr.ed to Toronto. His 11th season was launched on November 25 with a second try at a classic, this time Shakespeare's The Tempest. The production was chiefly memorable for its strange and beautiful electronlc sounds, and Nancy Jowsey's brilliant set--a huge ground cloth that could be pushed mto any shape by the actors, who remained under It, creating rocks and dunes, until their cues came up. Visually, The Tempest won cntlcal pralse, especially from Whittaker who halled It as "art theatre of the hlghest level."a Nevertheless, houses remained small. The TWP actors were once more inept at handling the language, and Luscombe's fallure to update tne play did nothing to compensate. "One sat there most of the evening," said Don Rubin, "waiting for TWP to 'nappen', waltmg for the play to be Luscombe-ized, waiting for the script's immediate relevance to come pounding out. It never did."7 • A few weeks later Luscombe abandoned Shakespeare 111 favour of a promising new dramatlst, Carol Boit, who launched her professlonal wnting career at TWP on January 13, 1970 with a play tltled Daganawl.QQ. The tale, set in 17th century New France, featured an early abonglnal figure who created a constitution for the five Iroquois Nations, and later was sent to Québec to bargain with the French for peace. "It IS [wasl her IBolt'sl intention," reported Whlttaker, to confront ln her play "the advanced culture which Daganawida stood for agalnst the equally sophlstlcated but less passionate culture brought by France.,,8 DaJl.anawida did not fare weil: box office recelpts totalled less than $1,000. In the course of rehearsals, Luscomue chopped 801t's SCript, rearranged her patchwork of legend and history, and Interspersed song with story; but, in the end, time was insufficlent to allow proper Integration • of the rich but disparate materia!. 9 Notwithstandmg, concluded Kendrick D'Ermo 107 Crossley, Daganawida was na play of far greater importance to Canadians, • their Iife and history, than Hair. "10 During Daganaw!.d..a's run, June Faulkner procured transcripts of the Chicago Seven trial, which was going on at that time. Luscombe had al ways fancied writmg a play based on an ongoing event, that could be adapted nightly to suit new developments, and to which audiences might regularly return for updating. Chicago '70 was developed on this principle. It premiered on March 10, and was based on the land mark Chicago conspiracy trials that saw five men sent to jail during the Chicago 1968 Democratlc National Convention for defying the Rap Brown Amendment--or Anti-Riot Act--which condemned them not for inciting a riot, but for an apparent "Intention" to incite one. The preposterous trial lasted 4 1/2 months, and left a trail of more than 20,000 pages of testimony from 193 witnesses.ll John V. Lindsay, the mayor of New York, ca lied the proceedings a "tawdry parody of our judicial system, "12 and a Newsweek reporter denounced the ordeal as "the • longest running psychodrama in the history of the Chicago theatre and very possibly the most disorderly major Federal trial in American history. "13 With the aid of underground Chicago newspapers, reports from an actor sent to Chicago to attend the hearings, and trial transcripts, the TWP company set out to expose the .ial for what it really was--theatre rather than politics. On opening night, the Alexc)nder theatre was packed. When the play ended, the audience exploded "in a highly-charged emotional outburst, If and rewarded the company with a standing ovation.14 By the end of the run, on May 9, almost 12,000 people had seen Chicago '70, and TWP .lad made nearly $28,000. "The latest luscombe creation," wrote Whittaker, is "one long excitement, wrested out of yesterday's headlines and today's concern. . . . It is indeed a remarkable piece of propaganda."15 Luscombe's decision to integrate passages trom Lewis Carroll's c/assic • mistrial espec1ally delighted Whittaker who ca lied it "a stroke of George D' Ermo 108 Luscombe genius to see that the Chicago conspiracy triai matc~ed in pure • historical absurdity that conducted by the King of Hearts ln Alice's Wonderland. "16 "Here is TWP at its mspired best," proclaimed Stone. "For this is its forte--to improvise, to invent, to embelllsh, to seek out reallty, to enrich through fantasy, to anger, to involve and to inspire. "11 June had invited Ted Mann and Paul Libin--two old fnends by now- to visit Toronto and see the show. They did, and Immediately booked it to play off-Broadway at the Martinique Theatre. By the tlme the group got to New York in May, however, the trial was already old news, the revolution had started to fizzle, and public interest in the play was dlsappointlllg. 18 Monitor Productions in Toronto also picked up the TWP show, turned it into a full length color motion plcture, and distnbuted It throughout Canada and the United States. Desplte sorne deflciencies, the film was weil received. Luscombe was predictably angry, though, with Kerry Feltham, the film's director, who "went and changed the goddam name of the show without even askmg me," he says. "Chicago Clrcus he • called il. 1 could have killed hlm. ,,19 On June 19, the St. Lawrence Centre began a run of Chicago '70, playing to excellent reviews? . full houses until June 27. From July 16 to 19, the production was staged in Nova Scotia at Wolfvllle's Theatre Arts Festival International where its elght shows were seen by 4,500 people. When the company returned to thelr Alexander Street home, Luscornbe went through the dressing rooms and flred everyone. Tension had been buiiding in the company for some tlme. The backstage area was bedaubed with graffiti, and pro-Luscombe and anti Luscombe groups were shaping up. Open confl,ct had been eVldent since ~ Guevara: many of the actors who joined the company between 1967 and 1970 were "hippies", but creative and talented people nonetheless. Luscombe's drama and politics struck them as outdated, and his fixation on Laban movement, constricting. Some TWP mernbers wanted to direct, and • luscombe wouldn't permit it. The anti-L.uscombe group, headed by Cedric D'Ermo 109 Smith, finally decided to take over the theatre and convert it into a • worker's co-operative, but luscombe's coup brought the scheme to an abrupt hait. Of the 12-member troupe only Ray Whelan remained. lus combe opened his 1970-71 season with a new company and an original script- The Piper, written by TWP's own Nancy Jowsey. As her point of departure, Jowsey took Robert Browning's The Pied Piper, which, reviewers contended, dealt with power structures. The Piper was a sorry beginning to TWP's new season. The concept of the play "was wonderful, "20 remembers actor Geoff Bronstein, with the actors creating an entire society of rats through improvisations beginning with a sound, then a word, a phrase, and finally a complete language. But Jowsey's responsibilities as writer, designer and costumer were more than she could be expected to handle adequately. To open a season with an original script and an untried company was to invite tailure, and the Inevitable result followed. • Cohen concluded that TWP's problems ran deeper than the mere botching of a play: luscombe "set out to form a company of actors, writers and designers," he wrote, "united by a common belief in joint activity and the democratic princlple. No trace of these purposes remains in the organizatlon's work. Whatever Toronto Workshop Productions may say it is, it is a one-man institution. "21 Indeed, throughout the company's 11 years of operation, Luscombe had been its only director. In response to Cohen's reproach, and government pressure to hire another director, luscombe turned over the directorial helm for the first time on January 19, 1971 to actor Geoffrey Read, who staged Brendan Behan's The Hostage. However, Luscombe offered no assistance to the inexperienced Read, who tried desperately to equal his master, and, in the end, turned most of the company against him. In the last week of rehearsal, luscombe was obliged • to take over. After The Hostage, several actors resigned . D'Ermo 110 The company was reduced to eight for their next production, Ann • Jellicoe's Shelley or The Idealist, which opened on March 9 "Rarely ha!'. Toronto Workshop Productions so effectlvely comblned ItS impresslonlstlc flair \/Vith solid character portrayal as in Shelley," wrote Martll! Stone. "The production is smooth, sympathetlc and mdeed insplnng, one of T'NP's most satisfying. ,,22 Cohen agreed. "Luscombe and hls company have approached the play with respect for its theme and concern for Its development," he noted. "As this presentation demonstrates, hls [Luscombe'sJ capacities are not as limited as he has been telling us ail these years. "23 Seventeen days after ShelillY.'s opening, on March 26, Cohen died after undergoing heart surgery, and left a vOId ln the world of Canadian theatre criticism that has never since been filled. Though Shelley regained for TWP its artlst,G status, attendance was only average, and, for the first time in 2 1/2 years, June was forced to appeal to TWP patrons and subscribers ta raise $17,000 for their upcoming season, TWP's thirteenth. In formulating his season, Luscombe hired three • writers-in-residence--Rick Salutin, Carol Boit and Len Peterson. He opened, on November 11, with an adaptation of Brecht's World War Il satire, TJ19 Resistible Rise of ArturQ Ui, companng Hitler' s ri se to power in Germany with the rise of AI Caponl~ (in the form of an Amerlcan hoodlum named Arturo Ui). Luscombe's contemporary bête noire was Richard Nixon. The play ran for a total of 27 performances including previews, and reallzed $8,063.50. While the company ran Arturo UI, rehearsals began for Bolt's ~ffalo Jump, but contractual disagreements between Luscombe and Boit led her ta withdraw her script just weeks before ItS openlng. Luscombe was obliged at the last minute ta seek a replacement. Jack Winter had recently returned ta TWP, and Luscombe immediately asked him to replace Boit as wnter-In-resldence. DUrlng Winter's five-year absence, he had written a number of successful plays, poems and monologues, and a filmscnpt called Selling Out, nomlnated for • an Academy Award ln 1973 for best short subject. Ta mark hls return he D'Ermo 111 embarked on a TWP project titled Mr. Pickwick, based on Charles Dickens' • episodic novel The Pickwick Papers. The Winter-Luscombe-TWP team developed the script in less than three weeks, and it was an immediate success. Mr. PickwlCk, Urjo Kareda remarked, "combines the opportunity to develop and embroider a variety of picturesque situations--V"ith their [the actors' ] exceptional gifts for mime and movement--while grasping a firm hand onto social consciousness. "24 Under Luscombe's capable directorial hand, stunning scenes were created: "the mad rides in make-believe cut out carriages; a high horse (imaginary) and a scared would-be rider; a hilanous duel ... the cricket match; the lovely skating party which escalates to include an ancien1 lady in a wheelchair, an inept novice and Pickwick hlmself"; and "the brilliant court scene when Plckwick is sued for breach of promise by hls landlady," ail of which demonstrated Dickens' "devastating contempt for the legal system of the time. ,,25 That year Luscombe launched the career of another young playwright. Rick Salutin was in search of a theatre to produce his play--a • dramatlzation of William Hlnton's novel Fanshen, which featured the struggles of a Cj;}~m:se vl!lage (the Low Bow) to cope with life in the New - • r China. Luscombe agreed to workshop the drama. Fanshen was Salutin's first original, professlonally-produced stage work. His script desperately needed rewnting and reshaping, and the TWP company set about it, with Salutin objecting to Luscombe's treatment of his work fram first rehearsal until openmg night on February 1 7. Those who saw the play enjoyed it, but the box office results were disappointing. The play closed on March 5 after 19 performances, with receipts of only $2,781.50. June hoped to recoup the company's loss on Fanshen with the next production, Mr. Bones and Ali That $cat--the third play of the season, and thlrd rewrite of thelr 1969 hit, Mr. Bones. Since its last outing at the Venice Biennale Festival, the minstrel-type show had been refurbished and updated, and, according to Whittaker, was "vastly Improved. "26 The play • ran from March 30 to April 23, and earned an encouraging $9,931.75. D'Ermo 112 Len Peterson contributed the season closer, and the third new work • commissioned by luscombe that year. The Working Man, sponsored by the Ontario Federation of Labour and Workers Education Association, chronicled the history of the working class throughout the centunes, from the early slave systems to feudalism, capitallsm and modern-day strikes, picket lines and anti-striker propaganda. Peterson's grasp of relatlvely unknown details delighted Luscombe, and provided hls actors wlth ample material for improvisation. Despite excellent reVlews, however, the show brought in only $4,323.25. By now most theatres were experiencing financlal difflculty as the Councils found themselves with less financial aid to dispense. In 1972, Whittaker reported that many underground theatres were "In danger of going under. The Studio Lab Theatre," he ':vrote, "never survlved the loss of its Queen Street home. Now both Theatre Passe Muraille and Global Village are threatened."27 The OAC allocated $37,000 for TWP's 1972-73 season, only $7,000 over the previous year's award, and the Canada • Council offered $67,000 with an additional $5,000 for ItS playwnghts-In residence program. After reviewlng the company's fmancial statements, Metro Toronto cut TWP's grant from $13,000 to $10,000,28 Simultaneously operating costs contlnued to nse. In 1972, TWP lost its technical director, John Faulkner, and had to hlre two new members to replace him, one professional and one apprentice. On average, the company maintained about 14 actors on its payroll, each at approximately $115 a week. Part-time personnel were employed for costumes and sound. Overall, TWP hired up to 24 people a year. When June reahzcd that her subscription campaign had not met ItS objective of $17,000, she cut back on promotion and rehearsal time, and from thls pOint onwards, TWP's fight for survival was ceaseless. The smaller Toronto theatres looked upon TWP as Establishment, when companng ItS grants to thelr own, but the financlal and social support TWP recelved fram government • agencies fell far short of the largesse offered re910nal and festival theatres. D'Ermo 113 To promote his 1972-73 season, luscombe announced five pla ys for • the priee of four, in a package which included two revivais, two Canadian premieres, and an original creation. Audiences were delighted to see Hey Rube! kick off the season, and The Good Soldier Schweik close it. The 1973 Schweik, which in 1969 had played for seven weeks to sellout crowds, in Stone's opinion, "most certainly surpasse[d] the inspired 1969 version.,,29 Hey Rube!, hailed by critics as the best play to emerge in a decade of Canadian theatre, was equally successful when updated with new improvisational scenes and better-integrated clown acts. This latest version became a TWP staple, and perhaps the only one for which a script survives. The revival generated $12,873.69 for the company before it was transferred, on January 11, to Brock University in St. Catharines, where it played for three nights to full houst:s On January 25 Luscombe premiered Nikolai Gogol's satire, The Inspecter General, the tale of a penniless mountebank who, after being mistaken for a government inspector, exploits a town's small-time • bureaucrats and socialites, and escapes just before the real inspector general arrives. The production was judged by Joseph Erdelyi "pleasantly even-tempered and perfectly paced, ,,30 but Kareda considered it marred by a satire that had Il grown wheezy and unmanageable. ,,31 For the first time in three years, for the night of February 14, 1973, the show was cancelled due ta a poor house. Barry Wasman, the second persan other than luscombe ta dirE.ct for TWP, opened on March 15 Arthur Kopit's Indians to favourable reviews. Meantime, luscombe rehearsed letters From the Earth, a free adaptation by Winter of Twain's essays, which premiered at TWP on May 3. In Winter's version, Satan is banished from Heaven for one celestial day (which equals 2,000 earth years), and agrees ta spend his time on Earth, and report back to God on man's development. When he returns ta Heaven he discovers that Gad has forgotten who man is, and why He • created him in the first place. In the second act, Winter expands Twain's D'Ermo 114 account to include President Nixon and the Watergate affair. "There we • are at the White House service," related Whittaker, "with Richard Nixon citing his pal, an evangelist named Billy, when Satan lays the thunderbolt on him and the truth breaks out of Billy about everything from Vietnam to Laos to Cambodia. He is dragged away when he gets to Watergate. "31 Letters From The Earth received adulatory reviews, played from May 3 to 26, and made $10,261.83. The artistic success of the play bore eloquent testimony to the magic of the Winter-Luscombe team. ln the fall of 1973, TWP began a tour of Letters, starting at the National Arts Centre Studio in Ottawa, from November 13 to December 1. From there, the company travelled to Kingston, then Rochester, New York, and London, Ontario. Meanwhile, TWP actors Steven Bush and Rick McKenna had premiered an original play, Richard Third Time, directed by Luscombe. Based on Shakespeare's Richard III, but probing Nixon's rise to power, the production received mostly commendatory reviews. While TWP toured • Letters, Peter Faulkner, a long-standing company member, dlrected Jean Anouilh's Thieves' Carnival. Faulkner was the third actor to direct at TWP. When he returned from Thunder Bay in 1973, after a sabbatic leave, he demanded that Luscombe let him direct, and was astounded when permission was granted. "1 didn't have a play 1 wanted to do, 1 just wanted to direct," he remembers. "Actually what 1 really wanted was for him [Luscombe1 to take me under his wing as a master wlth hls apprentic8, because in George's sensibility that's trammg your successor. ,,'\1 Instead, Luscombe left him entirely to his own devices, and Faulkner spent a fralltic few months trying to decide on a play, stumbllng through the rehearsal period, and never achieving what he had set out to accompllsh. On February 7, 1974, TWP astounded Toronto audiences wlth a new original play. Ten Lost Years, dramatized by Jack Wlnter and Cedric Smith, with songs by Cedric Smith, and directed by Luscombe, was a tnbute to • the survivors of Canada's Depression years. The play was an immedlate D'Ermo 115 hit, and ran for a record-breaking 17 weeks. "Simply, it is a beautiful • play," raved Jack Kapica, "perfectly designed, beautifully written, aCled VIIith excellent taste and ability by an ensemble company of ten men and women. Moreover, it packs an emotlonal wallop long unmatched in the annals of Canadian theatre ... 34 "George Luscombe's production," wrote Urjo Kareda, "IS most beautiful indeed ... a spellbinding human document ... The company is very, very strong, with not a weak link. They are ail totally credible and breathtaklngly versatile."35 Robin Phillips, Stratford Festival's Artistlc Director, found Ten Lost Years "absolutely marvellous, everything about It. . .. 1 cried buckets and 1 laughed a lot. ,,36 Ten Lost Years was based on Barry Broadfoot's best selling oral history of the same name. The TWP ensemble selected anecdotes from the book and set images to them. The production owed its success to the fact that the actors' words came straight from the lips of those who expenenced and narrated them on Broadfoot's tape recorder . Though the show lasted 3 1/2 hours, people "not only stayed • through the who le thing," remembers Klanfer, "but they gave us standing ovations at the end of both acts." The ensemble work, enhanced by innovatory lighting and novel mime and sound effects, "would have the audience on its feet applauding often at the end of scenes. "37 Critics and spectators found themselves spellbound by depictions of "unemployed men in search of work," jumping trains, and "Iurching back and forth as they attempt to gain their balance on the roof of the boxcars. In the background," relates Irene Gessler, "the click of the rails and the howl of the train whistle are simulated by other actors us mg makeshift household implements as sound effect devices."38 "One had no difficulty at ail believing that a large freight train was passing through the theatre," Randi Spires tells us, "and as the box car doors were openad the rattle of the wheels grew predictably louder and louder. "39 Ten Lost Years happened almost by accident. Luscombe and his • group were working on a new play by Milton Acorn, until author and D'Ermo 116 director began to disagree. Cedric Smith brought in Broadfoot's novel, • and, with June's help, acquired its exclusive North American stage rights, and proposed its dramatization to luscombe as an interim project. Luscombe wasn't interested, so the actors went ahead independently and created a three-hour show which fell short of perfection. June persuaded Luscombe to lend a hand; and in time it became .. son.ething quite splerldid, and very much a company effort ... 40 On May 11, TWP brought the stage production to the Ontario Theatre Festival '74, for a special performance attended by Governor General Jules Léger. That year, Ten lost Vears was selected as one of four finalists for the Floyd Chalmers Award. News of the production's success spread rapidly, and proposais for tours were constant. On September 16, 1975, with the assistance of the Touring Office of the Canada Council, TWP embarked on a cross-country jaunt that lasted 78 days, during which 77 performances were given in 41 Canadian villages, towns and cities from Ottawa to Vancouver. T~!L!-yS! • Years played to capa city audiences almost everywhere, and by November 30, the end of the circuit, some 42,000 people had seen the drama.41 The play's overwhelming success convinced CBC-TV executive Robert Allan to mount a one-ho ur version of the show, which aired nationally on Oecember 2, 1974. However, the truncated form of the production rendered the action shapeless and aimless; nor could the cameras capture the total-environ ment-type theatre on which the play depended. Two days before the play closed in Toronto on May 25, 1974, Luscombe disbanded his permanent company, and never formed another. The rising costs of maintaining a full-time Equity company had become prohibitive. Henceforth, he determined to hire performers, preferably those who had been trained by him, on a per-production basis. Luscombe included in his '74-75 season, a revival of Carl • Zuckmayer's The Captain of Kopenick, first produced by TWP in 1967, and D'Errno 117 a revival of Winter's Mr. Pickwick. The season opened with an original play by the Steven Bush-Rick McKenna team, who had brought Richard • Third Time to TWP 10 1973. From The Boyne to the Batoche, directed by Steven Bush, was a dramatic study of Thomas Scott and the Orangemen in a 1869 attempt to overthrow Louis Riel's Government. The piece was a box-office dlsappointment, and left TWP in a precarious financial position. On November 5, Wlnter's ninth original play for the company, You Can't Get Here from There, was scheduled to open. At approximately 3 a.m. that morning, Luscombe received a cali from the Fire Department. The Alexander theatre was ablaze. Luscombe suspected the RCMP or some hostile group to have torched his theatre as a response to You Can't Get Here From There. Set in the Canadian embassy ln Santiago, the latest TWP creation examined Canada's reaction ta the 1973 coup in Chile that saw the overthrow of President Salvadore Allenc/a's government, and thousands of Latin Amencans seeking refuge in foreign embassies in its aftermath. The drama • focused on the RCMP's collaboration with the CIA in Chile in denying the refugees political asylum. Flrefighters speculated that the blaze had been caused by a careless smoker. The arson squad, on the other hand, agreed that Luscombe's suspicion mlght not be entirely groundless. !n the four days before the tire, there had been two attempted break-ins at the TWP premises, and Luscombe dldn't "believe in coincidences. "42 But proot was not easy to come by. Damage to the theatre was estimated at $103,000. 43 The fire, which had started in a backstage corridor, had caused no structural damage, but destroyed backstage facilities, parts of the stage and auditorium, hghting and sound eqUipment, and films and musical instruments. Astrid Janson's plexiglass set for Vou Can't Get Here From Thf'l1! was destroyed along with the play's costumes, and those for Mr . • Pickwick. D'Ermo 118 Response from the community to the TWP tragedy was immediate and generous. Toronto Arts Productions gave TWP a benefit performance of The Rivais at the St. Lawrence Centre, and The Toronto Dance Theatre held a benefit concert. Gino Empry and Rogers and Metro Cable T. V. organized a 24-hour telethon for the company, with Jane Mallett, the Toronto Dance Theatre, Sylvia Thome, and many others appearing. Robin Phillips, in Stratford, started a contribution campaign within the Festival company. The Toronto Free Theatre offered to alternate TWP performances with its own show. The Firehall T~ea(re offered its premises, and the St. Lawrence Centre volunteered rehearsal space. The Shaw Festival's Tom Burroughs lent his workshops, tools and equipment, and The National Ballet, space to remake costumes. June recalls that every theatre, except the Royal Alexandra and the Q'Keefe Centre, extended some assistance.44 While pessimists wrote TWP's obituary, Luscombe resuscitated the operation on three fronts, mounting three plays simultaneously within 19 • days. Ft'. Pickwick opened at the St. Lawrence Centre for a two-week run starting December 17, while Ten Lost Vears played at the Bayview Playhouse from December 12 for four weeks. Then, on New Vear's Eve, the Alexander Street theatre reopened in record time with Winter's VOl! Can't Get Hel e From There, celebrating an important date--the seventh anniversary of the christening of the house. Luscombe worked twelve-hour days to meet his schedule, and in the process increased his company from 10 to 32. When Ten Lost Years closed at the Playhouse Theatre on January 4, the box office was turning people away. Mr. Pickwick proved as popular as ever, and VOl,d~ar:Ll~.!tl Here From There played to healthy houses until January 26. "Toronto Workshop Productions celebra tes its return ... with a production [of Vou Can't Get Here From There] so visually impressive," wrote Whittaker, "that it might have been designed especially to show off 1 the refurbished building and its equipment." Janson's !:et consisted of a D'Ermo 119 white box, "composed of lucite panels and white rug, ear~to-ear", giving an • "antiseptic and blank,,46 look, and figuratively representing the partition between diplomatic rituals (which remained in the cube) and the real world of desperation (which was locked outt;ide the box). The spare, elegant set and fetching acting and directing, however, barely managed to save the script which never "resolved into a dramatically viable form. ,,46 Critics found the same faults in Winter's second original play for the year, and TWP's last show of the season, Summer '76. "Neither the first nor the second part," wrote Joseph Erdelyi, otis up to Winter's usual standards and it seems tl1at while 100 king for the political he sadly neglected the dramatic ... 47 The play, an account of the Olympics from its earliest beginnings in Greece to the present day, started "off like a Ripley 8elieve It Or Not," noted Whittaker, "a living book of records, and winds up totally aghast that so many noble athletes should have been so often exploited by such cold, heartless politicians and ru le makers. ,,48 The production's flaw, Kareda concluded, is that the story "burps itself forward • in four-year intervals, so that by the time we get to things that m~ttered, we have been so battered with trivia that we hardly care.,,49 After opl~ming night reviews, luscombe and Winter smoothed a few rough edges in the script, but luscombe's direction and the actors' eloquent movements continued to constitute the production's major interest. Oemands for tours of Ten lost Vears continued unabated. On September 8, 1975, with the renewed support of the Canada Council Touring Office, TWP launched its second national tour of the play. Travelling eastward from Ottawa through Québec, the Atlantic Provinces, across Newfoundland and back to Northern, Central and Southern Ontario, the TWP cast performed in 39 cities for a total of 72 performances in 70 days, to average houses of 82.6%. Over a two-year period, more than 66,000 Canadians saw the play in the course of 42 weeks of touring in ail 10 provinces. Ten lost Vears had become one of Canada's longest • running plays, and at its 300~performance mark joined Anne of Green D'Ermo 120 Gables, Gratien Gélinas' Ti-Coq and Michel Tremblay's les Belle-Soeurs as • a Canadian dramatic "classic". When Luscombe and his company returned from their cross-country jaunt, they began preparations for a European tour of the play, scheduled for the upcoming spring. Meantime, Ray Whelan, who had left the company and founded Open Circle Theatre, returned t0 launch the '75-76 season with a new play by Martin Lavut and Arme Gelbart, The Llfe and Times of Grey Owl. Francois-Régis Klanfer also directed that year, an adaptation of Dickens' A Christmas Carol, which played over the holiday season, while Len Peterson premiered A Woman in the AWc, adapted from his 1967 CBC radio play and direct~d by Frank Norris. That year, luscombe directed only one production--a reworking of Winter's The Golem Ot Venice, which opened on February 12, and met with limited success. luscombe and his 21-member team left for thelr nine-vveek European tour on April 29 with two productions of original playsn Ten Lost Years and Olympics '76 (Summer '76). Funded by the Department of External Affairs • ta the tune of $99,000, the company found itself playlng the unaccustomed role of Canada's ambassador abroad. The group performed at the Young Vic Theatre in London from May 3 to 29, then moved on to the Holland Festival from June 4 to 9, and returned for further dates ln England and Wales. They appeared at the Cruclble Theatre ln Sheffield trom June 14 to 19, at the Arts Theatre in Cambridge trom June 21 to 26. and at Theatre Clwyd in North Wales from June 28 to July 3. Though the critical response to the plays was generally favourable, attendance throughout the tour was only passable, mostly due to poor marketing. In London, patrons preferred Olymplcs '76 to Ten Lost Years, which they found "too domestic".50 By the tlme commendatory notices appeared on BBC Radio and in the Fmancial Times, the company was preparing to move on. In Holland, at the Stadsschouwburg, Amsterdam's venerable red brick opera house, both shows played to small houses, and • some spectators had difficulty following the text. Nevertheless, the D'Ermo 121 company was rewarded with a standing ovation. In Sheffield, Cambridge • and North Wales, TWP was weil received, but, once again, the "witt y, serious and dynamic production from Canada failed to drag more than a handful of spectators from their deckchairs and gardening ... 51 TWP lost $11,000 on the 3-month tour. By July 9, the company was back in Toronto, and Jack Winter had moved on. June Faulkner also considered reslgning. Th~ season's uneven success-rate left the company once more financially strapped. Wlth less than 50% of its projected box office sales realized, the season had to be trimmed by 12 1\2 weeks. David Fennario's On The Job, the last show of the year, was cancelled. June fmally agreed to stay on condition that Luscombe take a sabbatic leave. Critics attnbuted the company's patchy season to the artistic exhaustion of its director, and June agreed. Luscombe needed time to pause and take stock. After 20 years, Luscombe's approach was beginning to show its age. "1 wanted time to think," he says, "time to go out and see what other theatres were doing. Regulations were eating into • my time of creativf. work. The very nature of teaching and improvising ... had changed. "52 With the financial support of government bodies, Luscombe was te have a year without directorial duties. His goal was to train a new company and work with young writers in preparation for TWP's '77-78 season. The sabbaticalleave failed to materialize. On November 26, Luscombe was served notice to vacate the Alexander theatre by June 29, 1977: the bUIlding had been sold, and the new owners were planning to demolish It to make way for townhouses. Luscombe and June spent the year lobbying, and once again the community came to their aid. A "yellow ticket" campaign, which asked patrons to fill out yellow cards protesting the demolition, saw 5,000 cards, accompanied by indignant letters from theatre boards across the country, dumped on Mayor Dave Crombie's desk. More than 50 actors, theatre personalities and patrons of the arts • descended on City Hall. Speaker after speaker praised Luscombe and D/Ermo 122 TWP's work. "This building is known not only across this nation, but • internationally as weil," asserted playwright-director Mavor Moore to loud éipplause. "It must be saved. "53 Ten days before the deadline, Alderman John Bosley contrived a political solution: the city would sell the building's air nghts and allow the developer, Penaloza, to build a 1 O-storey, 120-unit apartment block above the theatre (granting greater density rights than the city bylaw permitted) on the condition that he let the theatre stand and sign a $1-a-year lease with TWP. Bosley's plan was accepted unanimously by the Toronto City Council and Penaloza, and TWP was assured a home until at least 1999. Out of gratitude for the city's concern, Luscombe promlsed to produce 10 shows in the upcoming year, doubling the company's regular bill. June Faulkner dubbed the 1977-78 year TWP's "Champagne Season". She estimated operating costs at $514,000, and expected to receive $195,000 from government bodies and $200,000 from box office. "We really have to get people in here," she Gontended. "This IS really a make or • break year. ,,54 June's request to the Canada Council for $120,000 was snubbed, and she received $95,000 instead. The Ontario Arts Council also appeared Sk6;:>tical about TWP's upcoming season, and awarded them $60,000 wlth another $10,000 if the company managed to raise $30,000 pnvately. The grants were "a slap in the face" June told Gma Mallet, and an Insult to Toronto's oldest alternate theatre. "1 was told 1 was irresponslble."bb TWP's Champagne Season, despite the skepticism of the CounclIs, turned out to be cl colm:sal hlt. Luscombe's only produc.tion, the season opener, was Rick Salutin's Les Canadiens, which equated the hlstory of the hockey team "Les Canadiens" with the history of Québec. It was Astrid Janson who suggested the play to Luscombe. Unlike Fanshen, Les Canadiens needed no workshoPPlng, although Luscombe eut about 20 minutes from the tirst act and 15 minutes from the second, and • added visual effects. The actors were one moment on roller skates, and D'Ermo 123 the next on skateboards or fiat heels. As mise-en-scène, Janson provided • a superb ice rink--a miniature version of the Montréal Forum--which extended to the back of the theatre, where benches accommodated the occasional stuffed spectator, in the form of lifesize puppets. On opening nlght Salutin threatened to sue the company for cutting too much out of hls play and shifting its focus fram the hlstory of Québec to the staged hockey game. Today he admits that "Astrid's design and George's absolute artistry in the theatre made it an outstanding production in many ways."56 Les Canadiens played fram October 20 to November 19 to full houses. On week-ends people jammed even the aisles, and, by the last week of performances, ticket-scalpers were active. At one point, Salutin tried to convince Luscombe to extend the play's run, and even offered to pay up to $10,000 to cover any losses, but June already had advance bookings for TWP's next production, and there was nowhere to move the play. Already the company was running its second play of the season--a • successful studio production of Sharon Pollock's The Komagata Maru Incident at Factory Theatre Lab, directed by Alex Dmitriev. On the heels of Les Canadiens at the Alexander theatre, on December 1, TWP opened Eve Miriam's award-winning musical, The Club. Pam Brighton, former associate director of London's prestigious Royal Court Theatre, who was spending sorne time in Toronto, was responsible for the season's second smash hlt. The Club, a musical collage of songs and jokes heard in ali-maie hangouts circa 1900, was staged by Brighton with an all-female cast dressed in top hats and tails. The production's run was extended tWlce, from December 31 to January Î 4, and then to February 18. Meanwhile, Guy Sprung directed TWP's fourth offering of the season, David Fennario's Nothing To Lose, which opened on January 17 at Toronto Free, produced by TWP in association with the Centaur Touring • Company. The play made $8,387.50. On February 28, a studio D'Ermo 124 production of Athol Fugard's The IslaJl!'! premiered, directed by Calvin Butler, a TWP actor from the ' 68-70 company. • Still there was more to come. . Prepare yourself for two spellbinding hours of shock, passion, homosexuality, eroticism and ambiguous religious ardour, .. 67 warned Daryl Pipa of TWP' s next production. And audiences were not disappointed. On March 24, TWP, in association with Julie Chanova and James Goldie, opened Lindsay Kemp's Flow_er~, a pantomime based on Jean Genet's autobiographical nover Our LadY-QLth_~ FIQw~r~, published in 1943. British creator-actor-dancer Lindsay Kemp directed, designed, lighted and performed in the production. Kemp's movements were "so anaesthetizing," said Lawrence O'Toole, "that vou became lulled into the dream world, into the fantasy and the sordidness. ,,58 Eloyvers ran until April 15, and returned on May 12 by popular demand It played to an average audience of 77%, a .' 1 vfllJoht in $40,748. From April 19 to May 7, the company staged the more psychologically-complex S!!.tQflle, featuring "grand ballet master Anton Dolin as Herod and Lindsay Kemp as the hideously beautiful Lady of the Seven Veils ... 59 Salome was sold out on opening night, and by the end of its run had made $34,471. On April 27, TWP opened a studio production of Rick Oavidson's W.eslmounJJ3J!J~~ at Toronto Free Theatre, directed by the company's own Milo Ringham. The extended runs of TWP's successes left it unable to offer two of the shows originally scheduled. TWP's Champagne Season was a year "of big-Ieague theatre," reported Bryan Johnson. "This has likely been the best year in artistic director George Luscombe's long and extraordinary career ,,00 While most of the alternative hou ses struggled "with creeping middle age" ,61 the Alexander theatre was packed almost every night. That year TWP emerged as Toronto's most dazzling cultural institution: luscombe picked up prizes for Les Canadiens for" Best New Canadian Production"; Pam Brighton was chosen "Best Director" for her work on The Club and Ash~~ (another play • she directed that year); Astrid Janson won as "Best Designer" for bes O'Ermo 125 Canadiens; Linda Thorson earned "Best Performance by an Actress" for • The Club, and Henry Gomez was runner-up for "Best Performer" for The Island. The Most Exciting Theatre Season award was given to TWP "hands down. "62 On December 2, 1 978, Luscombe received the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters from York University. Luscombe was the first to acknowledge his debt to June, who created most of the Champagne Season. She had suggested Lindsay Kemp and The Club, and she brough l Athol Fugard to Toronto. She estimated that the season needed to play to 70% houses to break even. Attendance figures averaged 82%.63 June envisloned another triumphant season for the next year 1 but Luscombe refused: his hard-cor d patrons hadn't approved of his new-found popularity, slnce polltical comment was being downplayed. Martin Stone of the Canadian Tribune walked out of the first night of Flowers with a grim face. Paul Thompson of Theatre Passe Muraille was spotted in TWP's lobby questloning the social significance of some of the company's work.64 • A devitalized June remained with the company one more year 1 and then left. "1 just got fed up, " she says. "It would have helped him [LuscombeJ a lot to be able to say, '1 need some help'. He always said he didn't need anything ... and, you know, the theatre is one place that you need everybody. "65 June's departure left the company with a profound void. June knew TWP, understood Luscombe, and knew how to handle him. And he trusted her. "They were two theatre architects who complemented each other like bread and water,"66 says Geoff Bronstein. With June gone, Luscombe was forced once more to burden himself with administrative details to the detriment of the company's artistic development. Luscombe announced his '78-79 season with a flourish. It included a month-Iong dance festival, a Brecht production, several Canadian premieres and an original creation. But, as always, the horizon was • clouded. "TWP which romped away with ail the attention during the past D'Ermo 126 season. may come to a hait after only three plays," reported Gina Mallet . The DAC, unimpressed with TWP's success, put them "Iow man on the • totem pole among such theatres as Passe Muraille, Factory Theatre lab, Toronto Free Theatre and the Tarragon. ,,67 TWP received only $70,000 trom the DAC, while Toronto Free Theatre was awarded $90,000, and the Tarragon Theatre, $87,000. The Canada Council gave TWP a more generous $100,000. TWP launched its season with an original work--a company adaptation of Victor Hugo's classic The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Esmeralda and the Hunchback of Notre Dame, scripted by Andrew Piotrowski and luscombe, and described by Gordon Vogt as "shoe-string spectacle,,,68 premiered on December 14, 1978. "George luscombe, that old slyboots socialist, has done it again," ran a CJRT Radio review, noting with satisfaction "another slap at entrenched, arrogant, political, military, religious leaders and their repressive attitudes and policies. ,,69 Jowsey' s extravagant set gave "the illusion of great depth through the use of a huge • gothic mirror centered on the back wall of the stage," noted Cheryl Meyers. "long ramps lead up ta the mirror, forming a V-shape that lengthens the audience's perception of the stage area, and recreates the cavernous quality of the cathedral. ,,70 Over 40 fullsize puppets and masks were built for the show, token replacements for a "cast of thousands. " Esmeralda and the Hunchback of Notre Dame, judged "an admirable tailure of a production" /' played until January 6, and drew revenues of $7,895.40. Next, TWP staged Brecht's St. Joan of the Stockyards, directed by Pam Brighton; but, unwarranted negative reviews devastated its box-office sales. Word of mouth eventually increased audience numbers--in fact, on the eve of its closing night, St. Joan played to a near capacity crowd--but recognition of the production's quality came too late. The losses incurred forced luscombe to cancel the rest of the year's • schedule. D'Ermo 127 Luscombe's 1979-80 season was indeed unusual. It included a 2- • week concert, a pantomime and a Video Cabaret Production, in addition to five plays, three of which were directed by Luscombe. On October 18, Luscombe premiered Refugees, an innovative "theatre opera" (a play with operatic segments) by Ontario-born Raymond Pannell--Artistic Director of the Co-Opera Theat, e--and his wife, Beverly Pannel!. The drama, directed by Luscombe, told the story of the reallife experiences of two Jewish families: the first, refugees from 1938 Nazi Europe, and the second, refugees from 1967 anti-Semitic Russia, both fleeing from oppression to settle in Canada. Refugees was an extravagant and expensive project for TWP, combinlng music and theatre, and featuring leadlng Canadian actress Marilyn Lightstone. The piece had "the basic ingredients to be a monumentally touching drama, ,,72 claimed Thérèse Beaupré; but the "brilliant" production, Vogt maintained, "was killed by a combination of a blind and tone-deaf press reaction and a lack of funding with which to keep • the show runnlng until it found its aud ience. "73 Theatre critics generally disliked the show, while music critics and patrons loved it. "If you send a 'play' critic to review an opera," argued one theatregoer, the resulting madequaLies are entirely predictable. Ray Conlogue's efforts to cover Refugees was a prime example. He admits to being musically unqualified, a fact pathetically evident throughout his critique which erroneously emphasized play acting to the entire exclusion of musical virtues. . . . The reaction fram the audience at intermission was nothing short of electrifying. The response at the conclusion was equally so, with a spontilneous, excited, stand-up and lasting ovation. To us the marriage of operatic composition and theatre, though unusual, was obviously delightfully good. "74 Refugees ran until November 3. Despite its marked artistic success, • the production did not attract slzeable houses early enough in its run, and D'Ermo 128 TWP lost money on the project. In December, Pam Brighton returned to direct her third play for the company, Michael Hasting's Carnival War A Go • Hot, which closed prematurely. Eric Donkin starred in the one-man show, Wonderful World of Sarah Binks in January for five nights, directed by John Banks. When Luscombe premiered The Mac-Paps on January 31, it was in hope of putting his company back on safe financial ground. The Mac-Paps dramatized the oral history collected by former CBC executive Mac Reynolds dealing with Canadian volunteers in the Spanish Civil War who fought Franco's fascists and lost. Of the 1,239 Canadians who went to war, only 649 returned. Luscombe had been thinking of doing The Mac-Paps (the Mackenzie Papineau Battalion) for quite sorne time. He tirst became aware of the Spanish Civil War in littlewood's apartment in London when he browsed through a scrapbook she had made to honour friends who died there. Once he discovered Reynolds' CBC tapes, he immediately acquired them, and invited Reynolds to collaborate on a script. • Luscombe wanted to do with The Mac-Paps what TWP had done with Ten lost Years--to bring oral history to life on stage by using transcripts of interviews that Mac Reynolds had assembled in 1965 with Canadian veterans. Luscombe hired Larry Cox to edit the tapes, and chose approximately 40 stories, upon which the actors improvised. Opening night on January 31 was a benefit performance for the veterans of the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion. At least 28 veterans with their families attended and responded enthusiastically. At the end of the show they shook hands and cried with the TWP cast. On February 1 The Mac-Paps played to a packed house. "1 think it is one of his [Luscombe'sJ best productions," applauded Martin Stone, "a fine example of inventiveness, of beauty, strength and profound emotions generated through controlled artistic statement." ln sorne group scenes, the "movement by the actors ... is as beautiful as a ballet," he continued. • "Battle scenes, with a few deft touches--smoke, light, sound and D'Ermo 129 movement--are spectacular. . .. For only seven people ta recreate so • much history is indeed remarkable. "75 Yet, deC\pite stretches of powerful drama, The Mac-Paps too often lapsed into political rhetoric and the recitation of facts. "Reminiscences and oral histories of war rarely give us the passion and tragedy of war itself," Anton Wagner noted. "We are provlded with endless details of who fought what and died when, where and how but are rarely allowed to imaginatively participate in the action. "76 The Mac-Paps' box-office returns were disappointing. It earned laudatory reviews and a 1980 Chalmers Award, but it failed to charm audiences. On May 29 Luscombe resurfaced with a second original creation, Am't Lookin', which turned out ta be a box-office hit. Based on the novel Chappie and Me by John Craig, the production was an account of Chappie Johnson's Colored Ali-Stars, and of Joe Griffin, a young white man from Trenton, Ontario, who, with the aid of black shoe polish, played first base with the team ln the summer of 1939, and learned what it was to be black. Craig and Luscombe collaborated on the stage adaptation. • "What unfolds ... is, in a phrase, a little gem about the black diamond, "77 wrote Kevin Boland. "On stage," Vogt noted, "is a set of drums which is used to give irnmediacy ta recorded jazz and to suggest anything from thunder to the rattle of the bus droning through the night . . Time adrift is counterpointed by wild routines in the bail park" and "the climax is in an aet of retaliation against a sadistic pitcher that leads into a car chase which will amaze anyone who thmks that the stage won't handle any physlcal action that can't be contained in a Feydeau farce ... 78 II' Ain't Lookin'," concluded Stone, "is TWP, and its director George Luscombe, in top form. Once agam they achieve new color, Inventiveness, satire and comedy, new intelligence and inspiration, new artistry and superb entertainment ... 79 The Alexander theatre was full for the opening of the play. At the end of the show, the company received a standing ovation. Ain't Lookin' • ran for elght weeks, and won a second Chalmers Award for TWP that year- D'Errno 130 -the only company ever to have do ne so. Reports of Luscombe's faillng • artistry had been clearly exaggerated, Vogt thought. "The pall1staklng care that Luscombe takes to reflect the subiect matter ln hls style--and that style happens to be one of extraordinary flexiblllty, sublety and power- should put in their places those cotton-mouthed yammerers who love to shed crocodile tears over Luscombe's alleged stylistlc cul-de-sac. "HO Nevertheless, after Ain't Look,n' Luscombe's box-office successes were rare. Many TWP actors had tralned elsewhere and lacked interest in either Luscombe's movement theories or the collaboratlve format Audiences too had changed. Now more conservative and bourgeoIs, they preferred a relaxing night out with convenient parking, comfortable seats and uncomplicated entertainment. Wor"e still, fundlng bodies were unresponsive to Luscombe's financlal stress, and the press offered scant moral support. "The Toronto Dailies," wrote Oscar Ryan, "were never enamored with the TWP style of production or thlnking. Soured cnlles wrote soured reviews, echoing the sneers and snarls of outraged • establishment opinion-makers. "81 More and more, critlcs treated Luscombe's work exclusively as left-wing propaganda, whlch they discredited as a relic of the previous decade. "The trend," maintalned Vogt, "was partly due to the death of Nathan Cohen" and the subsequent detertoration of theatrical comment and debate in the Toronto papers. It was partly a question of a highly talented and prtckly IIldlvldual worklllg steadlly for twenty years and th us ma king more enemies than anyone el!:.p. in the volatile theatre community. And It was partly a question of an artlst pursuing his own Itghts and Ignonng the question of what IS fashlonable, a pursUit whlch 15 an implled affront to the journallst who5e secret functlon IS ta reflect fashion. 82 ln 1980, Luscombe found hlmself once agaln ln the unenvlable • position of fighting for the life of hiCi theatre. Due to the bankruptcy of the D/Ermo 131 developer Penaloza, the Alexander Street property reverted to the original • owners, and a new six-month notice was sent to Luscombe. Once again he went to City Hall with the same people who helped him fight for his theatre in 1976. "The point was that we were fighting the same battle," says Luscombe. "What was wrong with the city? How many times dld we have to repeat thls exercise?"83 Finally, after 25 years of struggle for TWP' s existence against eviction and demolition, Luscombe won his battle in 1984. The Toronto City Council unanimously passed a bylaw ensuring TWP a permanent home by zoning the space for theatre. The new agreement again awarded the owners special air density rights, and now they were allowed to build behind the theatre as weil. In exchange, TWP recelved title to the land for one dollar, together with an mterest-free loan of $100,000 to be used towards renovations, provided by the Ontario Ministry of Citizenship and Culture. The company's obligation to renovate, however, created an additional dram on its finances. With the help of its Board of Directors, set • up in 1981, TWP launched a deficit reduction programme that included a fund raiser to repay the $100,000 that was promised to soon come--50% of which would be provided through matchin] grants fram the Provincial and Federal governments. An architectural feasibility study of proposed TWP renovations was undertaken by Karl Steven Associates, but was put on hold when TWP ran out of money to pay their fees. Whlle Luscombe haggled with the Board over proposed administrative changes, a successful run of Athol Fugard's A Lesson From ~, presented by the Centaur Theatre Company, inaugurated TWP's 1980-81 season. On October 9, Luscombe revived Ain't Lookin' for 25 performances, bringlng m $16,327.50. On January 10, he presented a play by Kurt Tucholsky and Walter Hasenclever, adapted :lnd directed by Luscombe. Christopher Columbus was a "series of sketches parodying what America has come to mean,"84 says Klanfer. Unfortunately, its the me • was too obscured by arnusing parodies of television, movies and D'Ermo 132 vaudevïlle, to have much impact. Christopher Columbus made only $3,305.35 in box-office sales. • ln February John Van Burek din' ",ed Eduardo Manet's Madame Strauss. On April 2, 1981, Ten Lost Years returned to TWP, playing, once again, ta sold-out crowds; and. on May 12, it participated in Onstage '81- the Toronto Theatre Festival--until May 31, then continued its run at the Alexander theatre until June 21. In March 1981, on Civic Honors Day, held in conjunction with Toronto's 147th birthday, Luscombe received an Award of Merit for his contribution to theatre. That year he was also made a Member of the Order of Canada, a tribute ta his lifelong commitment to the Canadian stage. ln an attempt to rectify TWP's increasingly critical financial situation, Luscombe, in 1981-82, hosted productions by Rising Tide Theatre, Theatre Passe Muraille and Adams Castle, ail of which met with reasonable success. He also revived Winter's Mr. Pickwick. The season opened with Shouting for Joy, a play by Walter Bruno based on his experiences in • Vancouver as a postal worker, which closed ahead of schedule due to poor audiences. February 25 brought a world premiere of Brendan Behan's Richard's Cork Leg, adapted jointly by Jim Sheridan and Luscombe, but the play's material proved to be outdated, and the script, windy. TWP capped a modestly successful season with Betty Jane Wylie's A Place on__ Earth, a one-woman show depicting a single day in the life of a vital 72-year-old waman. ln 1982-83, Luscombe launched five premieres including two new Canadian plays and a world premiere. TWP secured the rights to one of the most provocative off-Broadway hits of the previous season, How.l_Got That Story by Amlin Gray, an account of a reporter who "got lost" while covering The Vietnam War. The play opened on October 14 under the direction of Ken Gass, founder of Factory Theatre labo A production of the whimsical one-man show Altman's last Stand by Charles Dennis followed • in December; and in February, Factory Theatre Lab produced at TWP a D/Ermo 133 George F. Walker play--The Art of War. That year, TWP also took over the • Dario Fo industry in the wake of Open Circle's demise, and produced its newest play Female Parts, written by Fo and his wife Franca Rame, and directed by Luscombe. That season Luscombe directed only one original Canadian play. On January 20, 1983, TWP premiered The Wobbly, a folk opera about the ri se and fal! of the turn-of-the-century labor union called The Industrial Workers of the World, better known as the Wobblles. "It was inevitable that George Luscombe ... would sorne day do a playon "Wobblies" to cap his list of productions about rebels and radicals," noted Ben Rose in The Canadian Jewish News. 85 Co-written by Ronald Weihs of Vancouver and Luscombe, and directed by Luscombe, The Wobbly was a fitting successor to TWP's Jen Lost Years, Chicago '70 and The Mac-Paps. Most critics rated The Wobbly one of the best productions TWP had mounted in several years. Production highlights included "unemployed men crashing a society ladies' charity luncheon: the rumbling, tumbling motion of a noisy freight • train charging through the night with its jobless stowaways: the shooting and bayoneting of striking textile women."86 Larry Cox, promoted by then to assistant to the Artistic Director, did most of the research for the play, including sorting through nearly 250 slides whlch were projected on the walls during the show. The play, despite its cntical success, drew only average crowds. "The trouble is clear very quickly," suggested Terry Doran. "Although a lot of interesting material has been assembled, it's still basically in a raw state. Too little of it is theatrically effective. 1187 ln 1983-84, TWP celebrated its silver jubilee with a six-play season. It opened on October 20 with Names, co-written by Luscombe and Larry Cox--by now an accomplished team. The play, which explored the phenomenon of McCarthyism that gripped America in the early fifties, was essentially testimony lifted from the transcripts of actors and writers • summoned before the House Un-American Activities Committee to name D'Ermo 134 current or former Communist Party members within the Hollywood film • community. Luscombe re-created the 2 1 /2-hour interrogation on a bare bones set of tables and microphones. Names was a healthy box-office hit: its magic lay in its ablllty to tread on disturbing and controversial ground with sublety and precision. "With this production," wrote Kar'i:!n Shook, "George Luscombe continues TWP's tradition of exposing the side of hlstory that rarely appears in glossy films or made-for-T. V. movies .... The play is not merely an energetlc left-liberal harangue. In its best moments, its examination of the betrayal of the self cornes close to brilliance. "88 A 2-week revival of The Wobbly followed Names in November ta entertain union troops at the Annual Ontario Convention of Labour. On December 29, Robert Rooney directed The Jail Dlary of Albie Sachs, adapted by David Edgar, and starring the celebrated actor R.H. Thomson. The play was based on a true story about a white lawyer ln South Africa in the late '60s who was jailed, tortured and eXlled because of hls sympathies • for the Black cause. It was TWP's third artistic success of the season. ln February, Luscombe collaborated with Ross Skene. a veteran TWP actor, to write The Medicine Show, an attempt ta recapture the magic and high spirits of the "Medicine Shows" of the early 1900s. "The show IS an affectionate tribute to a bygone era," wrote Ray Conlogue, "and the material is sprightly and theatrical. . .. But even the wonderful bits Quickly pail as it becomes clear that no plot is developlng. ,,89 With a Iittle trimming, The Medicine Show might have done better bUSiness. The production's artistic weakness was exacerbated by snowstorms which kept patrons at home. ln March 1984, Ken Gass returned to direct hls own Victor Jara, a project which met with moderate S'Jccess. And on April 26, Chapple's boys were back for the third time in four years, playlng for 25 performances, "and what a Zip-a-dee-doo-da show it is!, .. 90 cheered • Stewart Brown. D'Erme 135 Despite significant successes that season, TWP's deficit remained intractable. By May 27, 1984, it stood at $125,000. Rapidly rising • production costs and interest charges, furnace repairs, and a much-needed interior facelift ail contributed their share. TWP's Board instituted fund raising fJrograms to reduce the deficit, control costs, and renovate the building (sin ce the awaited $100,000 interest-free loan from the Ontario Ministry of Citizenship and Culture still hadn't materialized); and, though the fundraisers met with reasonable success, continued financial setbacks short-circuited their efforts. Luscombe's dream was to renovate his theatre, and replace it with a 600-seat playhouse, a project estimated at more than two million dollars, but funding bodies were reluctant to help until the company's current debt was retired. ln 1985, the OAC warned TWP's Board that the t:ompany's finances would be monitered to ensure that income from both box-office and private funding was increased. luscombe included in his 1984-85 season a profitable revival of Hey Rube!; "5" Portrait of a Spy by Rick Salutin and • lan Adams; Two Foolish to Talk, a guest production by Theatre Grottesco; When the Wind Blows by Raymond Briggs; Fighting Days by Wendy Lill; and Einstein by Gabriel Emmanuel. In May 1985, the luscombe-Cox team picked up where The Mac-Paps left off with the better-structured The last Hero. This piece, which also dealt with the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion, synthesized its predecessor's "hundreds of characters" into four fictional figures--composites of real soldiers--which worked weil. As luscombe prepared to open The Last Hero, rumors circulated of his impending resignation. Most of the pioneering directors of Toronto's alternative playhouses had already gone: Paul Thompson left Theatre Passe Muraille, Bob White had taken over from Ken Gass at Factory Theatre lab, Urjo Kareda was Bill Glassco's replacement at The Tarragon, and Guy Sprung had succeeded Tom Hendry at Toronto Free Theatre. Robert Rooney, who had directed The Jail Diary Cd Albie Sachs at • TWP in December 1983, returned that year with a proposai to stage When D'Ermo 136 The Wind Blows, a piece about nuclear holocaust. By June 1985, • Luscombe had invited him to run the theatre. "The only reason he [Luscombe] chose Rooney as Artistic Director," says Larry Cox, "was that he was asked [by the Board] to step down, and Rooney was the least of ail evils. "91 Rooney, who arrived in Canada from Britain in 1975, had worked for more than 10 years as a freelance actor and director, Including two years as a visiting director at Banff Playwrights Colony.92 HIs afflnlty with Luscombe was largely political; but Luscombe was intent on preservlOg TWP's political mandate at any cost. As an experiment, Rooney was hired for one year as resident director, while Luscombe remalOed Artlstic Director. The soft-spoken Rooney shrugged aside any talk of hls being graomed to take over the company. Luscombe launched the 1985-86 season wlth Edward .qadzinsky's Theatre in th(~ Time of Nera and Seneca on September 24, dlrected by Robert Rooney; followed on October 9 with a guest production by Theatre Grottesco titled The Insomniacs; and, in November, a North American • premiere of the pravocative drama, Ghetto, Ly Israell playwright Yehoshua Sobol. Directed by Alexander Hausvater, Ghetto deplcted events ln the Jewish ghetto of Vilna where 70,000 people were murdered by the Nazis. TWP's production probed unflinchingly the psychology of Jewish collaboration with the oppressors. Ghetto was an extremely expensive production to mount. Salaries cost over $45,000 and technical expenses ran to nearly $20,000. The set was a bona fide replica of a German schmizer with floorboards and real fences; and Janson had covered it with 3,000 pounds of clothlOg. The TWP team was sure it had a box-office winner, but vocal opposition from a sector of the Toronto Jewish community, which objected to the company's insinuation that Jews collaborated in the Holocaust, robbed the play of success. Ghetto opened on November 7, 1985 and played to average • houses, for a short four weeks (as TWP couldn't afford to run the play D'Ermo 137 longer). Overall the production made $19,417.50, and cost TWP • $60,000.93 The company' s losses on Ghetto forced it to cancel the rest of its season and launch an intensive financial campaign. On April 28, 1986, The Globe and Mail's Robert Crew announced that Luscombe had resigned. Robert Rooney was made Artistic Director of TWP on July 1, 1986, with Luscombe named Artistic Director Emeritus. A Board of Trustees was set up ta deal with a deficit which had escalated to $245,000. 94 When "Rooney was appointed," according to Tom Patterson, then a TWP board member, "he made it absolutely clear that he was Artistic Director and that George was no longer necessary. "95 For 1987-88, his second year as Artistic Director of TWP, Rooney proposed ta the Board an expensive season of plays--and was immediately refused. He was eventually asked to reslgn. On April 30, 1987, Luscombe opened the last play he would direct at TWP. Jelly Roll Morton was a George Luscombe-Larry Cox creation • inspired by the Jazz-player Ferdinand (Jelly Roll) Morton. "Toronto Workshop Productions' latest stage show brims over with fine theatricality," wrote Oscar Ryan, "astute inventiveness, a down-to-earth humanity, freshness and humor and sheer exuberance evoking repeated bursts of applause .... 1 like to think of this exhilarating stage show as a tribute to Luscombe, TWP's 30-odd-years-ago fo~ rider whose work has stirred thousands. "96 That September, at a TWP Board meeting, some members of its committee were ousted, including its president, George Luscombe. Without Luscombe, or, mdeed, any artistic director, the Board was left to decide TWP's future. The stifling deficit was never far from their minds. Eventually they turned to developers for a solution, and the theatre promptly became a hostage in a fight for the land whose commercial value was estimated at over two million dollars. Wh en the theatre community • discovered TWP's plight they once again came to Luscombe's aid and D'Ermo ]38 formed a "Committee of Concern", chaired by Ken Gass. Other rnembers • of the Committee included dancer Danny Grossman; actors R.H. Thomson, Miles Potter, Seana McKenna, Maja Ardel, Tom Butler and Sandi Ross; playwrights David and Carol Boit and Rick Salutin, Mira Fnedlander; directors Jackie Maxwell, Sky Gilbert and Richard Greenblatt; theatre administrators June Faulkner and Mallory Gilbert; and former OAC director Walter Pitman. Mostly, the group was worned that the Board would forfeit TWP's political mandate in its anxiety to pay off its accumulated deflclt, and so planned to challenge the legality of the company's Board of Directors; to seek an mjunction to block any sale of the theatre; and to have the TWP premises declared a historicallandmark. Luscombe launched a lawsuit for wrongful dismissal as Artistic Director of his company. "1 didn't quit," he announced, "1 was got rid of ... 97 "For the record," comments Oscar Ryan, "it is surprismg that to date the Toronto theatre community has been so egregiously sllent about TWP's fate, in view of the critical problems of a threatened colleague and the • outspoken theatre he has led .... "98 Indeed, talk of TWP over the next year fizzled as sales deals and opposition campaigns slowly crumbled, and Luscombe's theatre was taken away from hlm for good. After fT.ore than a quarter-century spent developing Canadian theatre, Luscombe turned hls unique artistic talents to teaching at the University of Guelph, where he has earned the respect, admiration and acclaim of a new generation of Canadian talent. As one student put it, in 1989, in a teachmg evaluatlon: "George is a dude extraordinaire. "99 • D'Ermo 139 • NOTES 1 Nathan Cohen, "Company Rates Special Attention," Toronto Daily .s..tar 15 May 1969: 28. 2 For the New York performance, TWP changed the name of Faces to The Amencan Hamburger League so as not to confuse it with the John Cassavetes film. The new tltle was based on a party Luscombe gave for a group of Amer/can draft dodgers while Faces ran in Toronto. 3 Nathan Cohen, "Workshop Accepts Venlce Invitation," Toronto Daily Star 29 May 1969: 32. 4 Nathan Cohen, "Movles Overshadow Drama at Venice," Toronto Daily Star 30 September 1969: 26. 5 Cohen, "Movies Overshadow" 26. 6 Herbert Whlttaker, personal interview, 26 May 1988. 7 Don Rubin, "Workshop's Tempest Bodes Weil for the Future," Toronto Dally Star 26 November 1969: 48. • 8 Herbert Whlttaker, "Daganawida: Patchwork but Admirable," The Globe and Mali 14 January 1970: 13. 9 Carol Boit, personal Interview, 12 May 1988. 10 Kendrick Crossley, "Daganawlda," rev. of Daganawida, CKEY, Toronto, 14 January 1970. 11 J. Anthony Lucas, "Incredible End to an Incredible Trial," The New York Times 15 January 1970: 14. 12 Undated TWP Press Release, circa 1970. 13 Robert S. Stokes, ed. Kenneth Auchincloss, "Who Is on Trial in Chicago," Newsweek 16 Feb. 1970: 26. 14 Martin Stone, "Chicago 'Lynch' Trial on Toronto Stage," The Canadlan Tribune 18 March 1970: 10. 15 Herbert Whlttaker, "Chicago '70: Weil Matched Absurdities," The Globe and Mail 11 March 1970: 13 . • 16 Whittaker, "Chicago '70" 13. D'Ermo 140 17 Stone, "Chicago 'Lynch'" 10 . • 18 François-Régis Klanfer, personal interview, 10 May 1988. 19 George Luscombe, personal Interview, 16 October 1987. 20 Geoff Bronstem, personal interview, 13 August 1988. 21 Nathan Cohen, "A Look at Theatre in Toronto: The Pace-Setters Fall Behind," Toronto Daily Star 5 December 1970: 60. 22 Martin Stone, "Shelley, Rebel in 1811," The Canadlan Tribune 17 March 1971: 11. 23 Nathan Cohen, "Toronto Workshop Shows Capacitles Aren't Limited," Toronto Daily Star 10 March 1971: 30. 24 Urjo Kareda, "Good Cheer to Mr. Pickwlck," Toronto Daily Star 27 December 1971: 62. 25 Oscar Ryan, "High Spirits and Humanity," The Canadlan Tnbu.M 14 December 1981: 10. 26 Herbert Whittaker, "Mr. Bones' Return Dazz"ng," The Globe and Mail 31 March 1972: 19. • 27 Herbert Whittaker, "A Warning From the Pioneer in Underground Theatre," The Globe and Mail 2 December 1972: 31. 28 TWP Financial Statement as at 31 August 1973. 29 Martin Stone, "Schweik Again--Only More 50," The Canadlan Tribune 20 June 1973: 8. 30 Joseph Erdelyi, "Workshop Presents Colorful 'Inspector'," Peterborough Examiner 27 January 1973: 16. 31 Urjo Kareda, "Inspector General Should Be Given Leave of Abscence," The Toronto Star 26 January 1973: 26. 32 Herbert Whittaker, "Luscombe and Wmter Update Mr. Twain," The Globe and Mail 4 May 1973: 14. 33 Peter Faulkner, personal interView, 16 May 1988. 34 Jack Kaplca, "Ten Lost Years: Beautiful Play 15 a Mllestone of • Excellence," The Gazette [Montreal) 16 September 1975: 20 . D'Ermo 141 36 Urjo Kareda, "Ten Lost Years Beautiful Theatre," The Toronto Star 7 February 1974: E9. • 36 Undated TWP Press Release, "Ten Lost Years: Second National Tour," Release # 5, circa 1975. 37 François-Régis Klanfer, personal interview, 10 May 1988. 38 Irene Gessler, "Depression Years Brought To Life," The Moose Jaws Times Herald 23 October 1974: 17. 39 Randi Spires, "Play Provides Human Look at the Depression," The Gazette [University of Western Ontario] 15 February 1974: 13. 40 June Faulkner, personal interview, 5 May 1988. 41 TWP Press Release, 21 November 1974. 42 George Luscombe, personal interview, 16 October 1987. 43 Alan F. Buffin, letter to June Faulkner, 19 November 1974. 44 Herbert Whittaker, "Emerging From Ashes, Toronto Workshop Back on Three Fronts," The Globe and Mail 30 September 1974: 34 . 45 Herbert Whittaker, "Focus on Refugees Sparks TWP Return," The • Globe and Mail 2 January 1975: 12. 46 Urjo Kareda, "Theatre Rises from the Ashes with an Elegant Set," The Toronto Star 3 January 1975: 05. 47 Joseph Erdelyi, "New Play by Winter Lacks Force, Finesse," Ottawa Citizen 28 April 1975: 54. 48 Herbert Whittaker, "Summer '76 More Social Tract Than Drama," The Globe and Mali 25 April 1975: 13. 49 Urjo Kareda, "Ol,lmpic Drama Flexes Its Muscles on the Wrong Topic," The Toronto Star 25 April 1975: E4. 50 Robert McDonald, "U.K. Critics Favor Metro Theatre's Second Play," The Toronto Star 12 May 1976: E22. 51 "'3potlight on the Olympics," Evening Leader 29 June 1976: 4. 52 George Luscombe, personal interview, 11 August 1988. 53 David Miller, "City is Asked to Save Workshop Theatre by • Purchasmg the Site," The Toronto Star 3 February 1977: F1. D'Ermo 142 64 Bruce Kirkland, "Theatre Taking a Gambie to Pay Back a Moral Debt," The Toronto Star 24 August 1977: F1. • 65 Gina Mallet, "A Miracle Scenario: The Little Theatre That Could-- and Oid," The Toro.1to Star 22 April 1978: 01. 66 Rick Salutin, personal interview, 13 May 1988. 67 Daryl Pipa, "Flowers Blossom," Varsity 29 March 1978: 14. 68 Lawrence O'Toole, "A Dance of Superlatives, Il The Globe and Mail [Fanfare] 29 March 1978: 12. 69 "Alive & ln Town: British Fantasy Startles at Toronto Workshop," Toronto Calendar Magazine April 1978: 9. 60 Bryan Johnson, "Hope and Despair for Toronto Theatre: This Year's Winners and Sinners," The Globe and Mail 13 May 1978: 35. 61 "Luscombe is Top Banana--Again," Saturday Night July-August 1978: 5. 62 Johnson 35 . 63 Mallet 01. • 64 Mallet 01 . 66 June Faulkner, personal interview, 5 May 1988. 66 Geoff Bronstein, personal interview, 13 August 1988. 67 Gina Mallet, Il Robin Phillips Directs his First Toronto Show, Il The Toronto Star 7 July 1978: 01. 68 Gordon Vogt, "The Politics of Entertainment: George Luscombe and TWP," The Human Elements, ed. David H~lwig (Canada: Oberon Press, 1981) 146. 69 "In the Arts," rev. of The Hunchback of Notre Dame CJRT FM Radio, 15 December 1978. 70 Cheryl Meyers, Il Puppets Provide Key to Play," Eye 7 Oecember 1978: 22. 71 Vogt 145. 72 Thérèse Beaupré, "On the Arts," rev. of Refugees and October' s • Soldiers, CJRT FM, Ontario, 8 October 1979. D'Ermo 143 73 Vogt 143. • 74 H.E. Roseboom, letter to the editor of The Globe and Mail, 19 October 1979. 76 Martin Stone, "The Mac-Paps, Their Story, " The Canadian Tribune 11 February 1980: 10. 76 Anton Wagner, "Mac-Paps Hit and Miss," Varsity 8 February 1980: 13. 77 Kevin Boland, "Ain't Lookin' Hits Home Run," The TQrontQ Star 30 May 1980: 01. 78 Gordon Vogt, "Ain't Lookin'," rev. of Ain't Lookin', CBC Stereo Morning, 1980. 79 Martin Stone, "Jim Crow as Umpire," The Canadian Tribune 9 June 1980: 10. 80 Vogt, "Ain't Lookin". 81 Oscar Ryan, "In Praise of Toronto Workshop," The Canadian Tribune 12 May 1986: 11. • 82 Vogt, The Human Elements 140. 83 George Luscombe, personal interview, 3 August 1988. 84 François-Régis Klanfer, personal interview, 10 May 1988. 86 Ben Rose, "Rousing Playon the Labor Movement," The Canadian Jewish News 3 February 1983: 24. 86 Oscar Ryan, "The Wobblies 'We Have Paid It in Full'," The Canadian Tribune 31 January 1983: 10. 87 Terry Doran, "Shaky Drama in 'The Wobbly'," Gusto 28 January 1983: 14. 88 Karen Shook, "Naming Names," Varsity 4 November 1983: 8. 89 Ray Conlogue, "A Sleepy and Slow Medicine Show," The Globe and Mail 18 February 1984: E7. 90 Stewart Brown, "Ain't Lookin'? Weil You Oughta Be," The SpectatQr 27 April 1984: 010 . • 91 Larry Cox, personal interview, 15 Al'gust 1988. D'Ermo 144 92 Robert Crew, "Theatre Oirector Luscombe Resigns," The Toronto • S12r 28 April 1 986: 01. 93 Undated TWP Box Office Reconciliation. 94 Ray Conlogue, "Rooney Named TWP Head, n The Globe and Mail 27 May 1986: 07. 95 Tom Patterson, personal interview, 10 August 1988. 96 Oscar Ryan, n Jelly Roll and Ali That Jazz," The Canadian Tribune 11 May 1987: 10. 97 Ray Conlogue, "Theatre Sells Its Land to Foundation," The Globe and Mail 30 June 1988: C4. 99 Ryan, "In Praise" 11. 99 Inter-Department Merno fram Sharon to Drama Faculty, UniverSity of Guelph, 23 Fobruary 1990 . • • D'Ermo 145 • CONCLUSION When ail is said and done, what constitutes the Luscombe legacy? Most striking are the scope and originality of his accomplishments. Luscombe bUilt Toronto's flrst alternate theatre at a time when Canadian playhouses were trapped producing mainstream, imported drama. He was the father of the collective form 10 years before Theatre Passe Muraille and the Farm Show were credited with the invention. He pioneered the work in-progress m Toronto, and developed the first "ensemble" company to work as a Group Theatre. He introduced to Canada the Laban technique, and brought to staging the most imaginative theatre available based on the principles of "total theatre". This theatre closely assimilated modern European modes of production which placed responsibility for play-making on the actor as much as on the director, designer and production personnel . Luscombe was the first Toronto dire~tor to foster a theatre operating • for 52 weeks a year with both a training and production thrust. To sustain it, he created Toronto's flrst permanent company of actors, and, in Jack Winter, Toronto's first dramaturge; the fact that at TWP writers and actors collaborated in a workshop environ ment enhanced the company's uniqueness. Although based in Toronto, Luscombe's commit ment went beyond the metropolitan area. He seized every opportunity to showcase his work outside Toronto: toured to most of the major universities in Ontario, played four summer seasons under a tent in Stratford, (anticipating the now thriving Thlrd Stage), and another four years at Nathan Phillips Square; he represented Canada at International theatre festivals, travelled to Europe, took Ten Lost Years on two cross-country tours, and saw two TWP plays produced off-Broadway. HIs mfluence on the evolution of Canadian theatre is wellnigh • incalculable. At TWP, he trained over 250 actors, introduced at least 17 D/Ermo 146 new writers to the Canadian scene, produced over 100 plays, 50 of them • original works and adaptations. Jack Winter, Carol Boit, Rick Salutin, Nancy Jowsey, Rick McKenna and Steven Bush, to name only a few, were given their first opportunity to write for the stage through Luscombe. Milo Ringham, Neil Walsh, Peter Millard, Alan Royal, Len Donchef, Rosemary Dunsmore, Marilyn Lightstone, and other proven actors flounshed through their training at the company. Barry Flatman, Steven Bush, Ray Whelan, Sylvia Tucker and Geoff Bronstein started thelr own theatres after leavmg TWP. Luscombe' s gift for recognizing and nurturing talent has left the Canadian stage profoundly in his debt. While his theatrical achievements are legion and lasting, the fact remains that TWP ultimately came to grief. And it must be acknowledged that Luscombe bears considerable responsiblllty for the outcome. Dunng the '80s, when Canadian drama was marketing subversive and sensatlonal material, when alternate theatres and their audiences embraced • psychological and sociological themes, Luscombe stubbornly continued to champion political drama. TWP's political mandate, however, was not the source of Its undoing--the theatre of social activism is never outdated. Rather TWP's downfall is attributable to the tailure of Luscombe's political and artistic vision to keep pace with the times. In a sense, Luscombe became a vlctlm of a society he had grown out of. Unt!! the '70s, the perennlal struggle of the working class for better wages and worklng conditions was a subject that appealed to artists and audiences allke; but by the '80s, the worklng class had become the middle class. Somehow Luscombe refused ta notice. "The complexities of social democracy," suggests Ray Conlogue, "or the mixed economy, or the world's abandonlng of the Soviet model as a source of inspiration are [were] opaque to him ILuscombeJ, III and, thus, his work • became increasingly irrelevant . D'Ermo 147 Moreover, his theatrical technique over the years became as dated as his political outlook. Deviees that were startlingly new in the '60s became • clichés in the '80s. Theatregoers now wanted to see plays with a begmning, mlddle and end, with realistic dialogue and lifelike characters. They wanted to feel and be emotionally involved. And Luscombe didn't belteve in realtsm. While audiences at other alternate theatres revelled in the rtch dIalogue of Ryga or Walker, Luscombe continued to treat language as merely one feature of the total theatre experience. To focus on the words of a play would have been, however, to work against the strength of his theatre, in whlch movement, sound, music, dialogue, costumes, lightmg and visual effects were given equal weight: Luscombe's goal was to never indulge audiences with an "uncomplicated" drama, but to take theatre as far outslde the periphery of reality as possible, into his realm, which, though reflected society, laboured to be larger-than-life and non realistic . While Luscombe's commitment to an outworn theatrical vision was • partlally responsible for TWP's demlse, other forces were also at work. The economics of culture had changed. Grant-glvlng bodies which in the '70s encouraged the growth of the cultural pIe became in the '80s obsessed wlth shrtnktng it. Budgetary restrictions challenged every alternate theatre's capacity to survive. At the same time, the nature of Toronto theatre was changing: a new conservatism was in the air. Ticket priees sky-rocketed, and production organizations and ô' iiences found Les MIsérables and The Phantom of the Opera more fetching than any new Canadlan play. Economlcs ultlmately undermined TWP's very foundations. Luscombe's commltment to an Intensive and lengthy rehearsal process and the Board of Dlrectors' insistence on financial viabillty left IIHle room for compromIse, Luscombe's Group ideal, demanding a heavy drain on time and human resources for relatively short runs and meagre box-office • returns could no longer be eost-efficient. Increased operating and payroll D'Ermo 148 expenditures denied luscombe the time he needed to train actors and to • create plays and sustain them until they found an audience. His teachlng mission, 50 essential to the theatre's raison d'être, deteriorated, until he found himself rehearsing actors rather than educating them, whlle pressure for speed and productivity inevitably compromised the ensemble work. Had luscombe been willing to train a successor more responslve to changing times, the theatre's history might have been different. And luscombe might have taken the time, as he should have, to extend hls talents into more theatres, and use every resour~e aval/able ta cultlvate and carry-on his unique style of play-making. As eal.y as 1968, he promlsed ta develop at least one member of hls company Into a director, but never did, though many actors eagerly volunteered for the pnvllege. Though it is true that luscombe's dominant personallty was in great part responslble for the company's long survival, It must be admitted that hls mabliity to delegate responsibility considerably vitiated hls achlevement. To atternpt singlehandedly to create plays, train a company and direct almost every • production, while fighting to keep the theatre financlally afloat would have destroyed a lesser man. It is hardly surpnsing that the superhuman workload eventually drained luscombe's energies and left hlm on the verge of burn-out. Ultimately TWP was a one-man show animated by one commandlng personality and theatrical vision. The success of any Luscombe production had Jess to do with the quality of the scnpt than the images he was able to extract fram the playwright' s words--images that were partlcular to hlm, and that, inevitably, vanished with the production, and most endured only indirectly through memory. The fact that TWP was the celebration of one man's artistic vision and talents was at once ItS strength and its Achilles heel. To remark Luscombe's shortcomings is ln no way to dlminlsh his • achievement. As a Canadian theatre figure, he stands alone: hls style of D/Ermo 149 presentation is his personal signature. He has been hailed, and rightly, as • Canada's ma st resourceful director, and TWP, as its most artistically adventurous company.2 What he did for Canadian theatre was ta put his passion, "his talent and his heart and soul into moment after moment of stage time. 113 • • D'Ermo 150 • NOTES 1 Ray Conlogue, "Luscombe's Talent Surfaces in Names," The Globe and Mail 26 October 1983: 16. 2 Luscombe hinted during a last vislt in December 1992, that he was considering, as he had 33 years ago, launchmg a new training centre, this time for his university students and other would-be actors. 3 Gordon Vogt, "The Politics of Entertainment: George Luscombe and TWP," The Human Elements, ed. David Helwig (Canada: Oberon Press, 1981) 160 . • • D'Ermo 151 APPENDIX A • Stage, Television and Film Roles: 1956-1960 (Stage Plays are UnderlinedJ OPENINGI AIRING DATE TITLE ROLE .m2 Jul. 30 Dear Charles Bruno Centre Island Playhouse [Principal] Zone. Iby Marcel Dubé) Passe- Partout [Pr.] Dec. 1 1 Every Bed is Narrow Iby Mary Jukes) Frank Crest Theatre Verhoff [Pr.] .lill. Mar. 10 CBC TV Theatre: To live in Peaee Maso [Pr.] Apr. 21 CBC TV Theatre: Course for Collision 5gt. Baiden • [Bit] May 26 CBC TV Theatre: A Friend of the People Paco [Pr.] Sep. 2 On Camera: The Swamp Andy [Pr.] Nov. 26 GM Theatre Series: Lost in a Crowd Johnny [Pr.] 1958 Jan. 7 G.M. Theatre Series: Maiden Voyage Jackson [Pr.] Feb. 8 The Golden Age (NFB Educational Show) [Pr.] Feb. 18 G.M. Theatre Series: Soundings Carlson [Pr .] June 23 Solid Gold Cadillac (by George S. Kaufman and Howard Teichmann) Garden Centr'" Theatre July 7 Mr. Roberts Ensign Garden Centre Theatre Pulver [Pr.] Nov. CBC The Unforeseen: The Three 3rd stranger Strangers [Pr.] • D'Ermo 152 OPENINGI AI RING • DATE TITLE ROLE 1959 Jan. 26 Fallout (Normandie Productions Ltd.) Counterman Mar. 5 The Master Builder (by Henrik Ibsen) Kirt 8rovich Lombard Theatre May 10 G.M. Theatre Series: The Killing at Son (Pr.1 Bentley Corner May 27 CBC The Unforeseen: Vengeance June 3 Battle of Mississipi (Pr.1 (Northstar Picture Ltd.) June 19 The Rustler (Crawley Films Ltd.) Red Kessie [Prol July 22 CBC The Unforeseen: The Three Marked (PLI Pennies Oct. 14 The Marked Man (Film) Louis (Pr.] Deco 19 G. M. Theatre Series: Here T oday (Pr.1 1960 Jan. 3 G.M. Theatre Series: Reunion Paul (PLI Mar. 6 G. M. Theatre Series: The Death Dr. Avery • Around Us Gordon [PLI Apr. 10 The Queen' s Peaee (Pro] Oct. 2 The Night They Killed Joe Howe (TV Play) [PLI Oct. 5 Explorations: The Hero on Horseback (Pro] Oct. 1 1 Long Da~'s Journeï into Night (by Eugene O'Neill) Crest Theatre Nov. 26 G.M. Theatre Series: Collision (PLI Dec . 4 G.M. Theatre Series: The Boarding House [Pro ] • D'Ermo 153 • APPENDIX B Award~ and Distinctions Conferred to Luscombe 1942 Royal Canadian Humane Association Certificate from the City of Toronto for saving life. Honourary Life Member of the Ontario Federation of Labour Recipient of the Queens' Sllver Jubilee Medal Doctor of Letters, Honoris Causa, York University 1976 Drama 8ench Award for Olltstanding Contribution to Canadian Theatre 1981 Award of Merit fram the City of Toronto 1981 Member of the Order of Canada--a tribute to Luscombe's lifelong commitment to the Canadian stage. • Recipient of the Toronto Theatre Alliance's third Silver Ticket Award--a hfetime pass to Toronto theatres . • D'Ermo 154 APPENDIX C • Chronological Handlist of TWP Productions: 1959-1987 (Preview dates are italicized) (Unless otherwise indicated, plays were performed at the Fraser street (1959-1967) and Alexander street (1967-1987) theatres.) DATES TITLE AND AUTHQR DIRECTQR 1959 - 1960 Dec. 14- The Boor by Anton Chekhov George Luscombe Dec. 19 Don Perlimplin by Federigo George Luscombe Garcia Lorca May 6- Burlap Bags by Len Peterson George Luscombe May 21 The Marriage Proposai by George Luscombe Anton Chekhov • 1960 - 1961 Jan. 21- Hey Rubel Collective Creation George Luscombe (six wks.) 1961 - 1962 Dec. 26-27 Dec. 28- And They'lI Make Peace by George Luscombe Feb. 3 Jack Winter August - Theatre 35: Summer tour of George Luscombe (5 wks.) The Boorl Marriage Proposall The Evil Eye • D' Ermo 155 • DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1962 - 1963 Sep. 13- Cantrast in Comedy: George Luscombe Oct. 6 The Boor! Marriage ProposaI! The Evil Eye Nov. 8- When We Oead Awaken by George Luscombe (th ru Nav.) Henrik Ibsen Mar. 29- Wayzeck by George Büchner, George Luscombe May 30 adapted by Jack Winter 1963 - 1964 Nov. 6 Dec. 13- Before Compiegne ay Jack Winter George Luscombe Jan. 12 Colonnade Theatre Apr. 3- Before Compiegne by Jack Winter George Luscombe Apr. 30 Waterloo University July 20- Befare Compiegne by Jack Winter George Luscombe July 25 • Wa terloo University July 27- The Mechanic Collective Creation George Luscombe Aug. 3 Stratford Festival July 30- Theatre in the Park (2 wks.) Befare Compiegne by Jack Winter George Luscombe 1964 - 1965 Waterloo University Oct. 16 Befare Compiegne by Jack Winter George Luscombe Jan. 9- Jan. 12- The Death af Woyzeck by Jack George Luscombe Winter (adaptation of Woyzeck) Waterloo University Feb. 5 The Death af Woyzeck by Jack George Luscombe Winter (adaptation of Woyzeck) Stratford Festival July 27- Theatre in the Park George Luscombe Aug. 8 Befare Compiegne! The Mechanic! • New Play D/Ermo 156 • DATE~ TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1965 - 1966 Oct. 14- The Mechanic Collective Creation George Luscombe (5 mnths.) Ten Centuries Concert Series (Edward Johnson BIg.) Nov. 7 The Mechanic Collective Creation George Luscombe York University (Burton Auditorium) Feb. 11- The Mechanic Collective Creation George Luscombe Feb. 12 Stratford Festival July 15- Theatre in the Park George Luscombe Aug. 14 Before Compiegne! Hey Rube!/ The Mechanicl The Golem of Venice Nathan Phillips Square Aug. 21, Hey Rube! Collective Creation George Luscombe Aug. 25 Hey Rube! Collective Creation George Luscombe 1966 - 1967 Nov. 22-23 • Nov. 25- Hey Rube! Collective Creation George Luscombe Jan. 22 Centennial Tour--Canadian Forum Program Queens University Mar. 2- Hey Rube! Collective Creation George Luscombe Mar. 4 and The Golem of Venice by George Luscombe Jack Winter University of Western Ontario Mar. 10 Hey Rube! Collective Creation George Luscombe Mar. 17- The Golem of Venice by George Luscombe Apr. 23 Jack Winter EXPO '67 (Youth Pavilion) Apr. 28- The Mechanic Collective Creation George Luscombe May 4 Stratford Festival July 1- Hey Rube!1 The Mechanicl George Luscombe Aug. 13 The Captain of Kopenick Nathan Phillips Square Aug. 18, The Mechanic Collective Creation George Luscombe • Aug. 20 D'Ermo 157 1 DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1967 - 1968 Nov. 8- The Captain of Kopenick by Carl George Luscombe Dec. 23 von Zuchmayer Dec. 31, Gentleman Be Seated by Jan George Luscombe Jan. 10- Carew & TWP Company Feb. 10 Feb. 16- The Alchemist by Ben Jonson George Luscombe March 3 May 1- The Travellers by Ewan McCoII George Luscombe May 11 May 28- Faces by Norman Kline George Luscombe July 27 8randeis University: International Festival of Experimental Theatres (Waltham, Massachusetts) July 31- Faces by Norman Kline George Luscombe Aug. 4 Nathan Phillips Square Aug . 8, Faces by Norman Kline George Luscombe Aug. 11 • 1968 - 1969 Nov. 5- Flood by Gunther Grass George Luscombe Dec. 7 Dec. 17- Che Guevara by Mario Fratti George Luscombe Jan. 18, Feb. 7 & 8. Niagara Arts Centre Theatre (St. Catharines) Jan. 20- Che Guevara by Mario Frattl George Luscombe (2 wks.) Macmaster University Feb. 3 Che Guevara by Mario Fratti George Luscombe Waterloo University Feb. 16 Che Guevara by Mano Fratti George Luscombe Feb. 25- The Good Soldier Schweik by George Luscombe Apr. 12 Jaroslav Hasek, adapted by Michael John Nimchuk 1 D'Ermo 158 1 DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTQR Apr. 17- Apr. 22- Mr. Bones Collective Creation George Luscombe June 7 by Jan Carew and TWP Company Nathan Phil/ips Square Aug. 21, Mr. Bones Collective Creation George Luscombe Aug. 24 by Jan Carew and TWP Company 1969 - 1970 New Theatre (New York, N.Y.) Sep. 16 The American Hamburger League George Luscombe by Norman Kline Venice Biennale Sep. 24- Che Guevara and Mr. Bones George Luscombe Sep. 27 University of Western Ontario Oct. 23- Mr. Bones Collective Creation George LusGombe by Jan Carew and TWP Company Nov. 25- The Tempest by William George LusGombe Dec. 14 Shakespeare 1 Jan. 13- Daganawida by Carol Boit George Luscombe Feb. 1 Mar. 3-8 Mar. 10- Chicago '70 Collective Creation George Luscombe May 9 Martinique Theatre (New York, N.Y.) May 15 May 25- Chicago '70 Collective Creation George Luscombe Cannes Theatre Festival Chicago Circus (film adaptation Kerry Feltham of Chicago '70) St. Lawrence Centre For the Arts June 19- Chicago '70 Collective Creation George Luscombe June 27 Theatre Arts Festival International (Wolfville, N.S.) July 16- Chicago '70 Collective Creation George Luscombe July 19 • D' Ermo 159 • DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1970 - 1971 Baronet Theatre--Festival of Premieres Sep. 19 Chicago Circus (film adaptation Kerry Feltham of Chicago '70) Nov. 20-22 Nov. 24- The Piper by Nancy Jowsey George Luscombe Dec. 13 Jan. 12- Jan. 19- The Hostage by Brendan Behan Geoffrey Read Feb. 14 Mar. 7-8 Mar. 9- Shelley by Ann Jellicoe George Luscombe Apr. 7 Apr. 16- Apr. 20- The Visit of an Old Lady by George Luscombe May 16 Friedrich Dürrenmatt 1971 - 1972 • Nov. 9-10 Nov. 11- The Resistible Rise of Arturi Ui George Luscombe Dec. 5 by Bertolt Brecht, adapted by George Tabori Dec.21-22 Dec. 23- Mr. Pickwick by Jack Winter George Luscombe Jan. 25 Feb. 15-16 Feb. 17- Fanshen by Rick Salutin George Luscombe Mar. 5 Mar. 28-29 Mar. 30- Mr. Bones and Ali That Scat George Luscombe Apr. 23 Collective Creation Mav 23-24 May 25- The Working Man by Len Peterson George Luscombe June 18 • D'Ermo 160 , DATES TITlE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1972 - 1973 Dec. 5-6 Dec. 7- Hey Rube! Collective Creation George luscombe Jan. 14 Brock University-- Thistle Theatre (St. Catharines) Jan. 11- Hey Rube! Collective Creation George Luscombe Jan. 13 Jan. 23-24 Jan. 25- Inspector General by Nlkolal George Luscombe Feb. 17 Gogol Mar. 13-14 Mar. 15- Indians by Arthur Kopit Barry Wasman April 1 May 1-2 May 3- Letters trom the Earth by George Luscombe May 26 Jack Wlnter June 5- June 12- Good Soldier Schweik by George LusGombe June 30 Jaroslav Hasek, adapted by Michael John Nimchuk Theatre Arts Festival International (Wolfvllle, N.S.) • July 11- Hey Rube! Collective Creation George Luscornbe July 15 1973 - 1974 Oct. 20-21 Oct. 23- Richard Third Time by Rick George Luscombe Nov. 10 McKenna and Steven Bush National Arts Centre Studio (Ottawa) Nov. 13- Letters tram the Earth by George Luscornbe Dec. 1 Jack Winter Nov. 20-21 Nov. 22- Thieves' Carnival by Jean Peter Faulkner Dec. 1 Anouilh Queens University--Duncan McArthur Hall (KlnÇJston) Dec. 5 Letters From the Earth by Georue Luscombe Jack Winter Nazareth Art Centre (Rochester, New York) Dec. 7 Letters From the Earth by George Luscombe • Jack Wmter D'Ermo 161 • DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR University of Western Ontario--Talbot Theatre Dec. 8 letters From the Earth by George Luscombe Jack Winter Dec. 18- Richard Third Time by Rick George Luscombe Jan. 12 McKenna and Steven Bush Feb. 5-6 Feb. 7- Ten Lost Vears dramatized by George Luscombe May 25 Jack Winter and Cednc Smith 1974 - 1975 First National Tour Sep. 16- Ten Lost Vears dramatized by George Luscombe Nov. 30 Jack Winter and Cedric Smith Sep. 17-18 Sep. 19- From the Boyne to the Batoche by Steven Bush Oct. 6 Steven Bush and Rick McKenna Dec. 31- Vou Can't Get Here From There George Luscombe Jan. 24 by Jack Wlnter • Playhouse Theatre Dec. 12- Ten Lost Vears dramatlzed by George Luscombe Jan. 4 Jack Winter and Cedric Smith St. Lawrence Centre For the Arts Dec. 17- Mr. Pickwick by Jack Winter George Luscombe Dec. 28 Feb. 25-26 Feb. 27- The Captain of Kopenick by George Luscombe Mar. 22 Carl von Zuckmayer Apr. 22-23 Apr. 24- Summer '76 by Jack Winter George Luscombe May 17 • D'Ermo 162 1 DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1975 - 1976 St. Lawrence Centre For the Arts Aug. 25- Ten lost Years dramatized by George Luscolllbe Sep. 6 Jack Wmter and Cedric Smith Second National Tour Sep. 8- Ten lost Years dramatlzed by George Luscombe Nov. 15 Jack Wlnter and Cedric Smith Oct. 28-29 Oct. 30- The life and Times of Grey Owl Ray Whelan Nov. 15 by Rod Langley An Open Circle Presentation Nov. 20-21 Nov. 22- Women ln the Attie by Len Frank Norris Dec. 6 Peterson Dec. 26- A Christmas Carol adapted by F.-R. Kianfer Jan. 4 François-Régis Klanfer Feb. 11 Feb. 12- The Golem of Veniee by George Luscombe 1 Feb. 21 Jack Wmter European Tour Young Vlc--(London) May 3- Ten lost Years and Olympics '76. George Luscombe May 29 Hol/and Festival June 4- Ten lost Years and Olympies '76. George Luscombe June 9 Crucible Theatre (Sheffield) June 14- Ten lost Years and Olympies '76. George Luscombe June 19 Arts Theatre (Cambridge) •June 21- Ten lost Years and Olympics '76 . George Luscombe June 26 Theatre C.'wyd (North Wales) June 28- Ten lost Years and Olympies '76. George Luscombe July 3 St. Lawrence Centre For the Arts Aug. 2 Summer '76 by Jack Winter George Luscombe Aug . 7 •• D'Ermo 163 1 TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1976 - 1977 TWP Sabbatic Year 1977 - 1978 Oct. 18-19 Oct. 20- les Canadiens by Rick Salutin George Luscombe Nov. 19 Oct. 20-21 Oct. 22- The Komagata Maru Incident Alex Dmitriev Oct. 30 by Sharon Pollock A TWP Studio Production at Factcry Theatre lab Nov. 29-30 Dec. 1- The Club by Eve Memam Pam Brighton Feb. 18 Jan . 17- Nothing to Lose by Guy Sprung Feb 10 David Fennano A TWP production of the Centaur tourrng Company at Toronto Free. • Feb. 26-27 Feb. 28- The Island by Athol Fugard Calvin Butler Mar. 18 Mar. 24-26 Mar. 28- Flowers adapted by Lindsay Kemp Apnl 15 Lindsay Kemp Reopened May 12- June 10 Apr 18 Apr. 19- Salome by Oscar Wilde, adapted Lindsay Kemp May 7 by David Haughton Apr.25-26 Apr. 27- Westmount Blues by Milo Ringham May 6 Rick Davidson A TWP Studio Production at Toronto Free . • D/Ermo 164 1 DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1978 - 1979 Dec. 12-13 Dec. 14- Esmeralda and the Hunchback George Luscombe Jan. 6 of Notre Dame adapted by George Luscombe and Andrew Piotrowskl Feb. 12-13 Feb. 14- St. Joan of the Stockyards by Pam Bnghton Mar. 4 Bertolt Brecht 1979 - 1980 Sep. 19- Anne Mortifee in Concert (2 wks.) Oct. 16-17 Oct. 18- The Refugees by Beverly and George Luscombe Nov . 3 Raymond Pannell Nov. 13- Theatre Sans Fils' pantomime (1 week) "Tales From The Smokehouse" Nov. 27-30 • Dec. 1- Carnival War A Go Hot by Pam Bnghton Dec. 15 Michael Hastings Jan. 15- Wonderful World of Sarah Binks John Banks Jan. 19 Jan. 29-30 Jan. 31- The Mac-Paps by Mac Reynolds, George Luscombe Mar. 15 George Luscombe, Larry Cox Mar. 19-20 Mar. 21- 1984 - Video Cabaret by Michael Apr. 26 George Orwell, adapted by Holllngsworth Michael Holllllgsworth May 29- Ain't Lookin' adapted by John George Luscombe July 19 Craig and George Luscombe. • D' Ermo 165 • DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1980 - 1981 Sep. 2-3 Sep. 4- A Lesson From Aloes by Athol Fugard Sep. 27 Athol Fugard A Centaur Theatre Company Presentation Oct. 7-8 Oct. 9- Ain't Lookin' adapted by John George Luscombe Nov. 1 Craig and George Luscombe. Nov. a- Valentine Browne by Susan Cox Brian Tree Jan. 8-9 Jan. 10- Christopher Columbus bv Kurt George Luscombe Jan. 25 Tucholsky and Walter Hasenclever, adapted by George Luscombe Feb. 3-4 Feb. 5- Madame Strass by Eduardo Manet John Van Burek Feb. 22 Mar. 31- Apr. 2- Ten Lost Vears dramatized by George Luscombe May 11 Jack Winter and Cedric Smith • Onstage '81--Toronto Theatre Festival May 12- Ten Lost Vears dramatized by George Luscombe May 31 Jack Winter and Cedric Smith June 1- Ten Lost Vears dramatized by George Luscombe June 21 Jack Winter and Cedric Smith 1981 - 1982 Oct. 15- Shouting for Joy by George Luscombe Oct. 25 Walter Bruno Nov. 26- Dec. 3- Mr. Pickwick by Jack Winter George Luscombe Jan. 3 Jan. 12- Joey created by Rising Tide Company Jan. 31 Theatre in collaboration with Rick Salutin Feb.23-24 Feb. 25- Richard's Cork Leg by George Luscombe Mar. 21 Brendan Behan, adapted by • Jim Sheridan and George Luscombe D'Ermo 166 DATES TITlE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR • Apr. 6- The Crackwalker by Clarke Rogers Apr. 25 Judith Thompson A Theatre Passe Muraille and Centaur Theatre Comp~ny presen- tation ln association wlth TWP May 13 May 14- The Tempest by Jeremy Brett June 6 William Shakespeare An Adams Castle presentation June 8- Tom Kneebone--A Musical Cabaret June 20 July 1- A Place on Earth by George Luscambe July 11 Betty Jane Wylle 1982 - 1983 Oct. 14- How 1 Got that Story by Ken Gass Nov . 21 Amlin Gray Dec. 10-12 Dec. 14- Altman's last Stand by John Banks • Jan. 2 Charles Dennis Jan. 20- The Wobbly by Ronald Weihs George Luscombe Feb. 13 and George Luscambe Jan. 27-29 Endgame by Samuel Beckett Paul Bettls Feb. 4-6 Feb. 23- The Art of War by George F. Walker Mar. 20 George F. Walker Produced by Factory Theatre Lab Apr. 6-7 Apr. 8- Female Parts by Daria Fa George Luscambe May 15 and Franca Rame 1 D'Ermo 167 1 DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTOR 1983 - 1984 Oct. 18-19 Oct. 20- Names by Larry Cox and George Luscombe Nov. 12 George Luscombe Nov. 15-16 Nov. 17- The Wobbly by Ronald Weihs George luscombe Dec. 3 and George Luscombe Dec. 7- tan Wallace NtON returns by Richard Dec. 18 lan Wallace Pochinko Dec. 29- The Jail Diary of Atbie Sachs Robert Rooney Feb. 5 adapted by David Edgar Feb. 14-15 Feb. 16- The Medicine Show by Ross Skene George luscombe Mar. 11 and George Luscombe Mar. 20-25 Mar. 27- V!ctor Jara by Ken Gass and Ken Gass Apr. 15 John Mills-Cockeli Apr 24-25 Apr. 26- Ain't Lookin' adapted by John George Luscombe 1 May 20 Craig and George Luscombe. 1984 - 1985 Oct. 18- "S" Portrait of a Spy by Rick Ken Livingston Nov. 11 Salutin and lan Adams Oct. 23- Two Foolish to Talk by Codco Oct. 28 A guest Production by Theatre Grottesco Nov. 27-28 Nov. 29- Hey Rube! Collective Creation George Luscombe Dec. 23 Jan. 10- When the Wind Blows by Raymond Robert Rooney Feb. 4 Bnggs Feb. 14- Fighting Days by Wendy Lili Kim McCaw J\~élr . 10 Mar. 21- Einstein by Gabnel Emmanuel Jack Blum Apr. 28 May 17- The Last Hero by Larry Cox George Luscombe June 9 Al/g. 14-15 Aug. 16- The Mums by Albie Selznick, Nathan David Johnstone • Sep. 1 Stelll, Roy Johns, David Johnstone D'Ermo 168 • DATES TITLE AND AUTHOR DIRECTION 1985 - 1986 Sep. 24- Theatre in the Time of Nero and Robert Rooney Oct. 20 Seneea by Edward Radzinsky Oct. 9- The Insomniaes Oct. 19 A guest Production by Theatre Grottesco Nov. 6 Nov. 7- Ghetto by Joshua Sobol Alexander Dec. 1 Hausvater Feb. 26- Caesar by William Shakespeare Vinetta Mar. 23 Strombergs May 27- Asinamali by Mbongeni Ngema Mbongenl Ngema June 1 1986 - 1987 Oct. 29- Breaking the Silence by Marti Maraden Stephen Poliakoff Dec. 4- Woza Albert by Percy Mtwa, Mbongeni Ngema and Barney Simon • Jan. 21- B Movie, The Play by Tom Wood Bob Baker Mar. 24-25 Mar. 26- Gone the Burning Sun by Ken Robert Rooney Apr. 19 Mitchell Apr.28-29 Apr. 30- Jelly Roll Morton by George George Luscombe May 24 Luscombe and Larry Cox • D'Ermo 169 • BIBUOGRAPHY Archivai Materials at the University of Guelph: Architectural Drawings Box Office Reports Corr 3spondence Directorial Notes Fmancial Statements Journals Mlscellaneous Archivai Material Press Cuttmgs Programs Publlclty Material Personal Interviews Luscombe, George. Personal Interview. 16 October 1987. 17 May 1988. • 18 May 1988. 24 May 1988. 26 May 1988. 27 May 1988. 3 August 1988. 9 August 1988. 11 August 1988. 15 August 1988. 22 August 1988. 9 March 1990. Amos, Janet. 18 August 1988; Boit, Carol. 12 May 1988; Broker, Lee. 18 August 1988; Bronstem, Geoff. 13 August 1988; Butler, Tom. 16 August 1988; Couture, Suzette. 17 August 1988; Cox, Larry. 15 August 1988: Dlmson, Theo. 4 August 1988; Donchef, Len. 27 May 1988; Douglass, Diane. 16 May 1988; Faulkner, June. 5 May 1988; Faulkner, Peter 11 May 1988; Gass, Ken. 16 August 1988; Flatman, Barry. 16 August 1988; Greene, Bob. 25 May 1988; Janson, Astrid. 6 May 1988; Klanfer, FrançOIs-Régis. 10 May 1988. 19 August 1988. 20 August 1988, Kneebone, Tom 19 August 1988. Livingston, Doug and Sonya. 6 May 1988; Luscombe, Mona. 19 August 1988; Patterson, • Tom. 10 August 1988; Peterson, Len. 4 May 1988; Rooney, Robert. D'Ermo 170 20 May 1988; Salutin, Rick. 13 May 1988; Skene, Ross. 26 May 1988; • Sperdakos, George. 12 August 1988; Whittaker, Herbert. 26 May 1988. Interviews in Typesc.ript: Luscombe, George. Unpublished interview. The Ontario Historical Studies Series. Sy Don Rubin. 7 Feb. 1979. Canadian History - General Abella, Irving Martin. The Canadian Worker in the Twentieth Century. Ed. Irving and David Miller. Canada: Oxford University Press, 1978. Nationalism, Communism and Canadlan Labour. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1975. Avakumonic, Ivan. Socialism in Canada: A Study of th~g-NDp_l!} Federal and Provincial Polltlcs. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1978. Freeman, Bill. 1005: A Political Life in a Union Local. Toronto: James • Lorimer and Company, 1982. Garner, Hubert. "Toronto's Cabbagetown. Il Canadian Forum June 1936: 13-15. Morley, J.T. Se~ular Socialists: The CCF/NDP ln O.ll1.illIO-L- A BloilllWllY. Montréal-Kingston: McGill-Queens UniverSity Press, 1984. Schull, Joseph. Ontario Slnce 1867.. Ontario Historicai Studies Ser. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart Llmlted, 1978. Sperdakos, Paula. "Dora Mavor Moore Before The New Play Society." Theatre History in Canada 10.1 ISprlng 1989): 43-64 Stamp, Robert M. The Schools of Ontarlo--1876-1976. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982. Young, Walter D. The Anatomy of a Party.. The National CCF 1932-61. Canada: University of Toronto Press, 1969. • D'Ermo 171 Theatre History - General 1 André, Marion. "Theatre in Canada: A Toy or a Tool?" Canadian Theatre Review 26 (Spring 1980): 10-39. Ashley, Leonard R.N. Canada: History of the Theatre. Eds. George Freedly & John A. Reeves. 3rd ed. New York: Crown r-. ," ,hF;r~ 'flC., 1968. Benson, Eugene, and Conol/y, l.W. Fnglish-Cana~ Oxford University Press, 1981' Bessai, Diane. "The Regionalism of L " 'Id. ' Canadian literature 85 (1980): 7-20. Buck, Douglas. "Federal Advocacy for the Theatre." Canadian Theatre Review 44 (FaU 1985): 8-11. Bul/ock-Webster, Major lIewelyn. "The Development of Canadian Drama." Asides 5 (1946): 22-27. Cook, Michael. "Culture as Caricature." Canadian Literature 100 (1984): 72-78. 1 "The Painful Struggle for the Creation of a Canadian Repertory." Performing Arts in Canada 13.4 (Win ter 1976): 32-40. "Under Assault," Canadian Theatre Review 7 (Summer 1975): 136- 138. Coren, Michael. Theatre Royal: 100 Years of Stratford East. Great Britain: Mackays of Chatham Ltd., 1984. Davies, Robertson. "A Dialogue on the State of Theatre in Canada." Canadia~JJheatre Review 5 (Winter 1975): 16-37. Ferry, Joan. "Experiences of a Pioneer in Canadian Experimentai Theatre." Theatre History in Canada 8 (Spring 1987): 59-63. Filewod, Alan. CollecJive Encounters: Documentary Theatre in English Canada. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1987. Friedlander, Mira. "Risk Before Se cu rit y on the Alternative Stage." Performin 9 Arts Win ter 1981: 39-42 . •• D'Ermo 172 Fulford, Robert. "The Yearning for Professionalism." Tamarack Revle_yy 13 • (1959): 80-85. Gass, Ken. "Toronto's Alternates: Changing Realltles." Canadlan Theatr~ Review 21 (Winter 1979): 127-135. Goorney, Howard. The Theatre Workshop Storv. Great Bntam. Eyre Methuen Ltd., 1981. Hay, Peter. "Cultural Politlcs." Canadian Theatre Revlevy 3 (Summer 1974): 11-17. Hendry, Tom. "Theatre in Canada: A Reluctant Citizen." AcsLls Newsletter 2 (Autumn 1972): 79-99. "The Canadlan Theatre's Sudden Explosion." Saturday Nlght 87 (January 1972): 23-28. Laban, Rudolf. Choreutlcs. Ed. Lisa Ullmann. London' MacDonald & Evans, 1966. A Life for Dance. London: MacDonald & Evans, 1975 . The Mastery of Movement. Revised by Lisa Ullman. 2nd ed. New • York: OBS Publications, 1967. Lee, Betty. "Theatre Tried, Trad and Tribal." The Globe Magazme 21 February 1970: 3, 6-7. Lister, Rota. "The Study and Criticism of Canadlan Orama ln Enghsh." Canadian Drama 1.2 (1975): 38-52. Lucas, J. Anthony. "Incredlble End to an Incredlble Tnal." TI1~r-Ü.~.w York Times 15 January 1970: 14. Luscombe, George. "Playwnght or Propagandlst." George Ryga Retrospective. Playwnght's Workshop. Montréal, 9 March 1989 Moore, Mavor. "The Answer to a Dllemma: The Master Bullder, Il The Telegram 5 March 1959: 50. "Cultural Myths and Realitles." Canadlan Theatre RevIPY.Y 34 (Spnng 1982): 23-28. "Hlstory of Enghsh Canadian Amateur and Professional Theatre." • Canadlan Drama 1.2 (1975): 60-67. D'Ermo 173 Parker, Brian. "Is There a Canadian Drama?" The Canadian Imagination: • Dimensions of a Literary Culture. Ed. David Staines. Cambridge, Massachussetts: Harvard University Press, 1977: 152-187. Ripley, John. "Drama and Theatre, 1960-1973." Literary History of Canada. Ed. Carl F. Klinck. 2nd ed. Vol. 3. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1976: 212-232. Rubln, Don, ed. Canada on Stage. Toronto: Canadian Theatre Review Publications, 1974-1987. "Celebratlng the Nation: History and the Canadian Theatre." Canadian Theatre Revle~ 34 (Spnng 1982): 12-22. "Creeplng Towards a Culture." Canadlan Theatre Review 1 (Winter 1974): 6-21 Ryan, Toby Gordon ~~ Left: Canadlan Theatre ln the Thlrties. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1981. Ryga, George. "Theatre ln Canada: A Viewpoint on its Development and Future" Çanadlan Theatre Review 1 (Winter 1974): 28-32. • Scholar, Michael. "Confrontmg Cutbacks: The Economlc Impact of the Arts" Canadian Theatre Review 44 (Fall 1985): 8-11. Special Correspondent. "What MIss Littlewood Oemands of the Theatre." The 1.lmes (London). 12 July 1961: 5. Stokes, Robert S. "Who Is on Triai in Chicago." Newsweek. Ed. Kenneth Auchmcloss. 16 Feb. 1970: 26-27. Stuart, Ross. "Theatre ln Canada: an Historical Perspective." Canadian Theatre Revlew 5 (Winter 1975): 6-15. Tait, Michael. "Drama and Theatre." Literary Hlstory of Canada. Ed. Carl F. Kllnck. 2nd ed. Vol. 2. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1976: 143-167. "Theatre Abroad: Strasberg-on-Avon." Tlme 31 October 1960: 62. Wagner, Anton, ed. Contemporary Canadian Theatre: New World Visions. • Toronto: Simon & Pierre, 1985 . D'Ermo 174 Wallace, Robert, ed. "Confronting Cutbacks: 1/The Economlc Impact of • the Arts 2/Federal Advocacy for Theatre. Il CanaQlalJ_ TheatreJ.~()Y!~\L't 44 (Fall 1985): 4-10. Wardle, Irving. "Joan Littlewood." The TIIJN!2 [London). 3 December 1970: 13. Whittaker, Herbert. "The Alternate Theatre ln Toronto." The Slç,19J.L[O Canada September 1972: 6-9. "Ibsen in Miniature." The Globe and Mali 5 March 1959: 42. "Mr. Roberts IS Lively, Funny." The Globe and Mali 1 0 July 1958: 11. Toronto Workshop Productions - Hlstory Adilman, Sid. "Cella Franca Leavmg Ballet on the Weekend." The TQIQfllQ Star 26 September 1975' E4. "Pioneer Theatre Takes Season Off." Ibe '"(QrontQ_ Star 31 August 1976: F8 . Alaton, Salem. "Money Problems Threaten TWP." Th.!LGloQ.J:Larl_Q 1\1111.!1 11 • January 1986: D13. "Alive & ln Town: Bntlsh Fantasy Startles at Toronto Workshop." IQLQ!112 Calendar Magazine Apnl 1978: 9-21. Balay, Billyann. "Astnd Janson. Strong Words From a Young Lady of Design." Performlng Arts m Canada 12 3 (1975)' 40-41. Beaupré, Thérèse. "On the Arts." Rev. of B~full-Qg5 and OÇ19J,H;(S Soldlers. CJRT FM. Ontario, 8 October 1979 Boland, Kevin. "Am't Lookm' Hlts Home Run " ItH~_ TQrQ!U9 S1ft~ 30 May 1980:01. Braithwalte, Dennis. "Purely Canadlan: New Theatre Group Il TQ_LQI!to ~Star 21 March 1959: 27. Brown, Stewart. If AIn't Lookln' -;> Weil You Oughta Be." IlliLSQeGtatQr 27 Apnl 1984' D10. Cherry, Zena. "CIVIC Honors Scheduled at City Hall." The Globe a nQJv1a Il • 16 March 1981: 16. D' Ermo 175 Cohen, Nathan. "Alchemist: Its Physical Solemnity Comes as a Jolt." • Toronto Daily Star 18 February 1968: 18. "Bright Faces Invites a Comparison with Feiffer." Toronto Daily Star 29 May 1968: 68. "Che, the Best Play Locally in a Year." Toronto Daily Star 31 December 1968: 32. "Company Rates Special Attention." Toronto Dally Star 15 May 1969: 28. "Fittlng Finale to Fraser Ave. Theatre." Toronto Dally Star 9 November 1967 25. "Ibsen's Valedictory." Toronto Dally Star 10 November 1962: 22. "Into the Depths." Toronto Dally Star 15 October 1964: 38. "A Look at Theatre in Toronto: The Pace-Setters Fall Behind." Toronto Dally Star 5 December 1970: 60. "Movles Overshadow Drama at Venlce." Toronto Daily Star 30 September 1969: 26. • "Much to Admire ln 'Mechanlc', Nothlng to Feel." Toronto Daily Star 16 October 1965: 19. "No Madness to the Method." Toronto Dally Star 24 April 1959: 28. "Reachmg a Play's Core." Toronto Dally Star 17 May 1960: 32. "A Remarkable Achlevement" Toronto Dally Star 17 Apnl 1963: 36. "Stereophonlc Sound and 'Lysistrata'." Toronto Daily Star 29 December 1961: 14. "Toronto Workshop Shows Capacities Aren't Llmlted." Toronto Daily Star 10 Malch 1971: 30. "Traveliers PrQ(juctlon Fine, Play Bad." Toronto Dally Star 2 May 1968: 28. "What Will Success Do to George Luscombe's Theatre Dream." Toronto_Daili' _Star 13 September 1969: 31. "Workshop Accepts Venice Invitation." Toronto Daily Star 29 May • 1969: 32. D'Ermo 176 "Workshop Theatre ... It's a Godsend." Toronto Daily Star 19 March • 1968: 22. Conlogue, Ray. "Rooney Named TWP Head." The Globe and Mill! 27 May 1986: 07. "A Sleepy and Slow Medicine Show." The Globe and Mail 18 February 1984: E7. "Theatre Se Ils Its Land to Foundatlon." The Globe and Mali 30 June 1988: C4. Corbeil, Carole. "Hopeful Slgns on the Boards." The Globe and Mélll 2 October 1982: E5. Crew, Robert. "Dlrector Hlred for City's Dldest Alternate Theatre. Il TM Toronto Star 21 June 1985: 022. "Risky Season for New TWP Partner." IJl~TQ.LQJlliL~t9! 27 September 1985: 020. "Strapped Theatre Cancels Plays." The TQronto_StQ[ 10 Januôry 1986: 018. • "Theatre Director Luscombe Reslgns." The TorQnl~S1ill: 28 Apnl 1986: 01. "Toronto Workshop Company Wms Loan for Permanent Home." TtlC Toronto Star. 20 September 1984: E3. Crossley, Kendrick "Daganaw,da." Rev. of Oaganawlda CKEY. Toronto. 14 January 1970. Czarneckl, Mark. "Workshop Grows Up." yarslty 11 Novernber 1965: 4. Dafoe, Chnstopher. "Legend Overwhelms the Man Che Guevara." IJle Vancouver SUr} 26 November 1969: 41. "Don't Thlnk' Dlrector, Students Test Acting Ways anu Means. Il Toronto Daily Star 18 June 1960: 27. Doran, Terry. "Shaky Drama ln 'The Wobbly'. Il Gusto 28 January 1983: 14. Ennght, Michael. "Luscombe, Mysterlous Keeper of the Flame." Globe • Magazine [The Globe and Mali) 16 January 1971: 6-9. D'Ermo 177 ErdelYI, Joseph. "New Play by Winter Lacks Force, Finesse." Ottawa • Citizen 28 April 1975: 54. "Schwelk Adaptation Wmner at Workshop." Peterborough Examiner 15 June 1973: 22. "Twam's 'Letters' a Hlt at the Workshop." Peterborough Examiner 5 May 1973: 18. "Workshop Presents Colorful 'Inspector'." Peterborough Examiner 27 January 1973: 16. Evans, Ronald. "A Depressing Trio." The Telegram 27 September 1962: 58. "Mechanlc Bnngs Back Bounce," The Telegram 15 October 1965: 43. "The Stage by Ronald Evans." The Telegram 14 December 1963: 17. "The Theatre by Ronald Evans." The Telegram 4 April 1964: 7. "The Theatre by Ronald Evans." The Telegram 13 January 1965: 56. Ferry, Anthony. "Ten Good People and an Idea." Toronto Dally Star 5 Dec. 1959: 31. • Fraser, John "Demolition Threatens TWP Theatre." The Globe and Mail 3 December 1976: 16. "Luscombe High Agam on TWP Hopes. If The Globe and Mail 24 July 1976. 29. Fnedlander, Mira. "Survivor: George Luscombe at Toronto Workshop Productions" Canadlan Theatre Revlew 38 (1983): 44-52. Fulford, Robert. "On Canadlan Drarna: Howa Theatre in a Factory Built a CanadléHl Plü', That 's Gomg Places." Maclean's 25 January 1964: 45 Gessler, Irene "Depression Years Brought To Llfe." The Moose Jaws Jlme~j-Ierald 23 October 1974: 17. Haiven, Larry "Theatre's Not Dead ... It's Thriving in Downtown Toronto" VQL~J1Y 16 February 1968: 6-7. Horenblas, Richard. '''The Wobbly': Union Underdogs Get the Spotlight." • Itl~o\IY!lm 30 November 1983: 7. D'Ermo 178 "In the Arts. n Rev. of The Hunchback of Notre Dame. CTRT FM Radio. • 15 December 1978. Johnson, Bryan. "Hope and Despair for Toronto Theatre: This Year's Winners and Smners." The Globe and Mail 13 May 1978: 35. K., J. "Company Presents Modern Play ln Queen's Park." The Stratford Beacon-Herald 31 July 1964: 7. Kapica, Jack. "Ten Lost Years: Beautiful Play IS a Mllestone of Excellence." The Gazette [Montreal] 16 September 1975: 20. Kareda, Urjo. "George Has Done it Agaln." Toronto Dall:LSla!: 29 June 1968: 33. "Good Cheer to Mr. Plckwlck." Toronto Dally Star 27 Oecember 1971: 62. "Inspector General Should Be Glven Leave of Absence." The_T~rQntQ Star 26 January 1973: 26. "Olympie Drama Flexes Its Muscles on the Wrong Toplc." The TorQ!J1Q Star 25 April 1975: E4. • "Ten Lost Years Beautlful Theatre." The Toro!}to Sti.3--I 7 February 1974: E9. "Theatre Rlses from the Ashes Wlth an Elegant Set." Ihe _TorontQ Star 3 January 1975: 05. Kirkland, Bruce. "Theatre Taking a Gambie to Pay Back a Moral Debt." The Toronto Sta( 24 August 1977. F1. "Luscombe IS Top BananahAgain." Saturday Night July-AII~Just 1978: 5 6. Mallet, Gina. "A Miracle Scenario The Little Theatre That Could--and Dld " The Toronto Star 22 April 1978: 01 "Robin Phllilps Directs hls Flrst Toronto Show." The TQrontQ Star 7 July 1978: 01. McDonald, Robert. "U.K. CntlCS Favor Metro Theatre's Second Play." ThJJ. Toronto Star 12 May 1976: E22. McPherson, Jlm. "A New Play, a New Author, a New Theatre--A • Tnumph." The Telegram 11 January 1968: 65. D'Ermo 179 Meyers, Cheryl. "Puppets Provide Key to Play." m 7 December 1978: 22. • IS Miller, David. "City Asked to Save Workshop Theatre by Purchasing the Site." The Toronto Star 3 February 1977: Fl. Nordell, Roderiek. "Toronto Workshop at 8randeis: Experimentai Theatre Festival." The Christian SCience Monitor 3 August 1968: 11. Q'Toole, Lawrence. "A Dance of Superlatives." The Globe and Mail [Fanfare) 29 March 1978: 12. Pipa, Daryl "Flowers Blossom." Varsity 29 March 1978. 14. Rasky, Frank. "Tense Air of Uncertalnty Hangs Over the Futures of 3 HistOrie Theatres." The Toronto Star 26 March 1977: F4. Rose, Ben. "Rousmg Playon the Labor Movement." The Canadian Jewish News 3 February 1983: 24. Roseboom, H.E Letter to the edltor of The Globe and Mali. 19 October 1979 . Rubin, Don "A Laek of Focus, That's the Trouble With the Che Play." • Toronto Daliy Star 18 December 1968: 42. Rev. of ML Bones. C8C. Ontario. 3 April 1969. "Workshop's Tempest Sodes Weil for the Future." Toronto Daily Star 26 November 1969 48. Ryan, Oscar. "Hlgh SPIrits and Humamty." The Canadlan Tribune 14 December 1981. 10. "In Pralse of Toronto Workshop." The Canadwn Tribune 12 May 1986. 11. "Jelly Roll and Ali That Jazz." The Canadian Tribune 11 May 1987: la. "The Wobblles 'We Have Paid It in Full'." The Canadian TribunE: :.:s i January 1983: la. Shook, Karen "Nammg Names." Ttw Varslty 4 November 1983: 8. Spires, Rand!. "PIDY Provldes Human Look at the Depression." The • Gazette 1University of Western Ontario] 15 February 1974: 13. D'Ermo 180 "Spotlight on the Olympics." Evening Leader 29 June 1976: 4. • Stone, Martin. "Chicago 'Lynch' Tnal on Toronto Stage." The Canadian Tribune 18 March 1970: 10. "A Fascinating Play." The Canadlan Trtbune 27 November 1967' 10. "Golem of Venice--Unusual, Inventive, Thought-Provoklng." Jh~ Canadian Tribune 3 Apnl 1967: 9. "Jim Crow as Umpire." The Canadlan Tribune 9 June 1980. 10. "The Mac-Paps, Their Story." The Canadlan Trtbune 11 February 1980: 10. "Play Blows Fresh Breeze." The Canadlan Trtv_une 22 January 1968: 10. "Portrayal of Guevara." The Canadlan Tnbune 2 January 1969: 10. "Schwelk Again--Only More 50. Il The Canadian Tribune 20 June 1973: 8. "Shelley, Rebel in 1811. Il The Canadian Tribune 17 March 1971. 11 . "Spirit of Schwelk Ivaptured." The Canadian Tnb!me 5 March 1969: • 10. "Swinging Sound, Flavor." The Canadian Trtbul1~ 4 March 1968: 9. "Theatre Seene." Unpubllshed rev. of Faces. 8 June 1968. Train, Sylvia. "Lightstone Leads Donkey, Bochner Gets HIs Kicks. Il JlN Toronto Sun 15 October 1979: 44. TVVP Company. Hey Rube t • Unpubllshed play SCrtpt. Vogt, Gordon. "Am't Lookln'." Rev of Am't Lookln'. CBC Stereo Mornlng. 1980. "The Polltlcs of Entertalnment: George Luscombe and TWP." Th-.e Human Elements. Ed. David Helwlg. Canadtl· Oberon Press, 1981: 132-160. Wagner, Anton. "Mac-Paps Hit and MISS. Il Vars!1Y 8 February 1980' 13. Walker, Dean. "Toronto and the Arts Dollar" BoarlLof Trill.Je_)ournal • September 1968: 7 . D'Ermo 181 Whittaker, Herbert. "Alchemist is Commedia Dell'Arte." The Globe and • Mail 17 February 1968: 24. "Captain of Kopenick IS a Tour de Force. Il The Globe and MgJJ 9 November 1967: 15. "Chicago '70: Weil Matched Absurditles." The Globe an~LM "Comic Business is a Monkey Wrench. Il The Globe .Q!lçt MaJl 15 October 1965: 13. "Daganawida: Patchwork but Admirable." The Globe and Mail 14 January 1970: 13. "Emerging From Ashps, Toronto Workshop Back on Three Fronts." The Globe and Mail 30 September 1974: 34. "Focus on Refugees Sparks TWP Return." The Globe _Qnd Mail 2 January 1975: 12. "Luscombe's Basement Workshop Takes Off wlth a Poetlc, Bawdy Joan of Arc." The Globe and Mali 14 December 1963: 11. • "Luscombe and Winter Update Mr. Twain." The Globe and Mal! 4 May 1973: 14. "Luscombe Workshop Gets Ald From Stars." The Globe~ Mali 27 November 1967: 17. "Mr. Bones' Return Dazzling." The Globe and Mali 31 March 1972: 19. "Soldier Schweik Saga Splendidly Staged." The Globe aod_Mail 27 Febn Iry 1969: 11. "Sur,lmer '76 More Social Tract Than Drama." The Globe and Mail 25 April 1975: 13. "Theatre Union Offers Luscombe Fulfllment." The Globe and Mali 15 June 1961: 11. "A Warning From the Pioneer ln Underground Theatre." The Globe and • Mail 2 December 1972: 31 . D'Ermo 182 Wolfson, Ken. "Probing Civil War Saga Spells Intimate Theatre. n • Ryersonian 7 February 1968: 10. "Workshop Theatre Threat." The Telegram 18 February 1969: 46 . • •