‘Noises off’: The Kleine Bühne Production of J.B. Priestley’s They Came to a City (1944-45)

Richard Dove

The author J.B. Priestley wrote They Came to a City during 1942. The play’s utopian theme corresponded to a growing hope that victory in the war would introduce a new society: the play’s composition ran parallel to the compilation of the Beveridge Report which proposed the social transformation of post-war Britain. This article considers the specific appeal of Priestley’s visionary play to a German refugee theatre, placing the Kleine Bühne production in the perspective of the political hopes and aspirations of German refugees, asking why the play was chosen, how it was received and what inspired its actors to reportedly outstanding performances.

Wer das deutsche Theater liebt und es vermisst, hat jetzt Gelegenheit, auf der Kleinen Bühne des Freien Deutschen Kulturbundes eine Vorstellung zu sehen, die an beste deutsche Theaterzeiten erinnert. Gespielt wird Priestleys utopisches Spiel Sie kamen in eine Stadt in der wirkungsvollen Übersetzung von Dr. Lutz Weltmann, das bei seiner englischen Erstaufführung im Globe Theatre hier ausführlich besprochen wurde. Unter der gepflegten Regie Wolfgang Littens wird ganz ausgezeichnet gespielt.1

So ran the opening lines of a theatre review, under the rubric Priestley auf deutsch, in the German-language newspaper Die Zeitung, published during the war in London under the auspices of the British government. The Kleine Bühne of the Free German League of Culture (FGLC) had opened its new production of J.B. Priestley’s play They Came to a City on Saturday, 9 December 1944. The performance was billed as a ‘deutsche Uraufführung’ – which, given that Britain and Germany were at war, it undoubtedly was. This essay will consider the significance of Priestley’s long- forgotten play in wartime Britain, not least its appeal to a German refugee theatre. It will place the Kleine Bühne production in the 196 Richard Dove perspective of the political hopes and aspirations of German refugees, asking why the play was chosen, how it was received and what inspired its actors to such outstanding performances. The writer and broadcaster J.B. Priestley had established his popular reputation with the publication of his first novel The Good Companions in 1929, consolidating his success throughout the 1930s. Priestley’s novels contained a dimension of social criticism which was more fully realised in English Journey (1934), his now-classic account ‘of what one man saw and heard and thought and felt’ while travelling throughout England in the autumn of 1933. Priestley had soon become equally well-known as a dramatist, establishing his name with Dangerous Corner (1932), before coming to dominate the London stage with a stream of plays throughout the 1930s. Like his novels, the plays made frequent reference to Socialism, helping to earn him a more radical reputation then he perhaps deserved. Priestley wrote They Came to a City in the summer of 1942, at a time when the outcome of the Second World War still hung in the balance.2 It was nonetheless also a time of optimism and great hope – based on the belief that victory in the war would usher in a new society. Priestley wrote a play corresponding to this historical moment of hope: hope is the quality most frequently evoked in the play. The time of the play’s composition ran parallel to the compilation of the Beveridge Report which was to make proposals for the social transformation of post-war Britain. The official report, which laid the foundations for the Welfare State, was finally published in December 1942, a few weeks before Priestley’s play was first staged. They Came to a City was first performed in Priestley’s home town of Bradford on 26 January 1943, a provincial premiere that excited more than local interest, as can be inferred, for example, from the long review in The Stage and the two-page photo spread in Picture Post.3 The play was transferred to London with the entire original cast, opening at the Globe Theatre on 21 April 1943.