Notes CHAPTER 1 1. Simon Trussler, 'General Editor's Introduction', in Virginia Cooke and Malcolm Page (eds), File on Shaffer (London: Methuen, 1987), p.6. 2. Peter Shaffer, quoted in Oleg Kerensky, The New British Drama: Fourteen Playwrights Since Osborne and Pinter (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1977), p.58. 3. Peter Shaffer, 'A Personal Essay', The Royal Hunt of the Sun, ed. Peter Cairns (London: Longman, 1983), p.vii. 4. Walter Kerr, quoted in Virginia Cooke and Malcolm Page, 1987, p.16. 5. Peter Shaffer, interview with the author, 22 November 1996, Chichester Festival Theatre. 6. John Russell Taylor, Peter Shaffer (London: Longman, 1974), p.32. 7. John Dexter himself was fully aware that the success of Shaffer's plays had often been attributed to his directorial skills. He was obviously re­ sponding to this claim when, as Peter Hall reports, he demanded a share of Shaffer's receipts for Amadeus if he agreed to direct it. Since this was unprecedented and unreasonable, Shaffer refused and Hall directed the play at the National Theatre in his place. Dexter had, in short, believed the critics who argued that, without him, Shaffer's dramas would undoubtedly fail. The success of Amadeus in front of worldwide audiences (achieved without Dexter's input) suggests the spuriousness of this claim. See John Goodwin (ed.), Peter Hall's Diaries: The Story of a Dramatic Battle (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1983), p.445. 8. The whole debate revolving around Shaffer's supposed habit of taking liberties with historical fact is largely an irrelevant smoke­ screen. Critics who quibble with Shaffer's historical accuracy (see James Fenton's attacks on Amadeus, for example) are actually object­ ing not to inaccuracy in itself, but to the uncomfortable sensation of having preconceptions questioned. In relation to this issue, Shaffer himself comments that the play­ wright has to be 'faithful to a vision of some kind which does consort with historical fact'; he adds that he had 'read almost everything that was published about Mozart before I started Amadeus', and that 'every scene in the play has its basis in truth except for the final confrontation between them' (which arose from the need to provide a dramatic con­ clusion). He finally interprets much of the hostility that greeted this de-mythologized creature as emanating from a communal desire for 'sentimental mythology in our creators', a desire which resisted the essential truth of Shaffer's representation of the musical genius. Peter Shaffer, interview with the author, 22 November 1996. 9. It is worth pointing out that Tom Stoppard (like Shaffer, a skilled and popular wordsmith and dramatic craftsman) is similarly prone to this split between audience approval and critical hostility. 168 Notes 169 10. Peter Shaffer, interview with the author, 22 November 1996. 11. Peter Shaffer, interview with the author, 22 November 1996. 12. Peter Shaffer quoted in Virginia Cooke and Malcolm Page (eds), 1987, p.42. 13. Peter Shaffer, quoted in Virginia Cooke and Malcolm Page (eds), 1987, pp.41-2. 14. Peter Shaffer, interview with the author, 22 November 1996. 15. Peter Shaffer, interviewed by Brian Connell, 'The Two Sides of Theatre's Agonized Perfectionist', The Times, 28 April 1980, p.7. 16. Peter Shaffer, quoted by Gene A. Plunka, Peter Shaffer: Roles, Rites and Rituals in the Theater (London: Associated University Press, 1988), p.209. 17. Peter Shaffer, quoted by Oleg Kerensky, 1977, p.57. 18. Peter Shaffer, interviewed by Brian Connell, 1980, p.7. 19. Peter Shaffer, interviewed by Brian Connell, 1980, p.7. 20. Martin Esslin, 'Drama and the Media in Britain', Modern Drama, 28 (1985),99-109, p.109. 21. Oleg Kerensky, 1977, p.32. 22. Peter Shaffer quoted in Oleg Kerensky, 1977, p.58. 23. Peter Shaffer, 'Labels Aren't for Playwrights', Theatre Arts, February 1960,20-1, p.20. 24. Shaffer is himself an extremely gifted pianist and music plays a significant part in his dramas in both theatrical and dramatic terms. This point will be returned to in later discussions. 25. Alan Brien, review of The Royal Hunt of the Sun, quoted in Gareth Lloyd-Evans and Barbara Lloyd-Evans (eds), Plays in Review 1956-1980: British Drama and the Critics (London: Batsford Academic and Educational, 1985), p.127. 26. Bernard Levin, 'Yes, It's the Greatest Play in My Lifetime', Daily Mail, 10 December 1964, p.18. 27. Shaffer adds that similar 'blocks' have occurred throughout his career, and readily admits that a recent problem has been 'finding a subject that really engaged my attention to the degree of devoting two or three creative years' work to it'. Peter Shaffer, interview with the author, 22 November 1996. 28. Christopher Ford, 'The Equus Stampede', The Guardian, 20 April 1976, p.8. 29. Shaffer was also awarded the CBE in 1987, together with the Hamburg Shakespeare Prize. 30. To complete this overview of Shaffer's writing career, it should be noted that, in 1994, he succeeded the producer Michael Codron as Cameron Mackintosh Professor of Contemporary Theatre at St Catherine's College, Oxford. Professors, who are leading members of the professional theatre, are appointed for one year. In early 1995, a heavily revised version of Yonadab was presented by Oxford University Dramatic Society in a highly successful run at the Oxford Playhouse with students taught by Shaffer during his tenure at the University. 31. Since 1965, Shaffer has divided his time equally between New York and London, spending half the year living in each city. 170 Notes 32. John Russell Taylor, Anger and After: A Guide to the New British Drama (London: Methuen, 1962), p.178. Taylor also raises the interesting point that Shaffer, being born in 1926, is 'three or four years older than John Osborne, Harold Pinter and John Arden, two or three years younger than Robert Bolt, Brendan Behan and John Mortimer'. As a result, Taylor argues, Shaffer belongs fully to neither 'camp'. John Russell Taylor, Peter Shaffer (London: Longman, 1974), p.3. 33. John Russell Taylor, 1974, p.3. 34. c.J. Gianakaris, Peter Shaffer (London: Macmillan, 1992), p.106. 35. Gareth Lloyd-Evans and Barbara Lloyd-Evans (eds), 1985, p.188. 36. Peter Hall, in John Goodwin (ed.), 1983, p.473. 37. Simon Callow, Being an Actor (London: Penguin, 1984), pp.118-19. 38. Peter Hall, in John Goodwin (ed.), 1983, p.448. In response to Hall's de­ scription of Amadeus as a 'sincere right-wing play' in its celebration of the individuality of talent, Shaffer comments: 'Don't left-wing people celebrate the individuality of talent? Is it necessarily 'right-wing' to do so? Maybe what Hall means is that left-wing minds might raise the proposition that we're all equal in all fields of endeavour, and that's pal­ pably untrue. We're all equal in no fields of endeavour, actually, except perhaps in our disappointment, rights, and somewhat in our needs'. In relation to the whole issue of his political affiliation and to the glib la­ belling of him as an 'Establishment playwright', Shaffer continues: 'I hardly think that The Gift of the Gorgon is a play written by an Establishment figure, nor for that matter Equus, or The Royal Hunt of the Sun. But critics have fixed mind-sets about issues like this and they have gone on for such a long time that they have actually set very hard in this case'. Peter Shaffer, interview with the author, 22 November 1996. 39. Peter Shaffer, The Public Eye, in Peter Shaffer, Four Plays: The Private Ear, The Public Eye, White Liars, Black Comedy (London: Penguin, 1981), p.86. CHAPTER 2 1. Peter Shaffer, quoted in c.J. Gianakaris, Peter Shaffer (London: Macmillan, 1992), p.77 2. Peter Shaffer, quoted in Virginia Cooke and Malcolm Page (eds), File on Shaffer (London: Methuen, 1987), p.24. 3. John Russell Taylor, Peter Shaffer (London: Longman, 1974), p.32. Taylor's comment is also used as the title for this chapter. 4. Jack Kroll, 'Mozart and his Nemesis', Newsweek, 29 December 1980, p.58. 5. Peter Shaffer, The Gift of the Gorgon (London: Viking, 1993), p.5t. 6. Peter Shaffer quoted in Gene A. Plunka, Peter Shaffer: Roles, Rites and Rituals in the Theater (London: Associated University Press, 1988), p.38. 7. Peter Shaffer, in Philip Oakes, 'Shaffer Gallops to Glory and Explains what Makes Him Run'. Sunday Times, 29 July 1973, p.33. Notes 171 8. Peter Shaffer, quoted in Gene A. Plunka, 1988, p.40. 9. Peter Shaffer, Black Comedy, in Peter Shaffer, Four Plays: The Private Ear, The Public Eye, White Liars, Black Comedy (London: Penguin, 1981), p.196. 10. Peter Shaffer, The Gift of the Gorgon, 1993, p.22. 11. Peter Shaffer, in Peter Adam, 'Peter Shaffer on Faith, Farce and Masks', The Listener, 14 October 1976, pp.476-7. Commenting on this phenomenon 20 years later, Shaffer recalls that the audiences had asked: "'How do you get them to move, to change expression?" It sounded so pretentious to say "well, whose expression do you think it is?" It's projection: the audiences were hoping so much that Atahuallpa would rise that they were imbuing their own hope into whatever material those masks were made of. And this was done so passionately'. A form of transubstantiation, of a quasi-religious nature, resulted. Peter Shaffer, interview with the author, 22 November 1996, Chichester Festival Theatre. 12. Peter Shaffer, quoted in Gene A. Plunka, 1988, p.4l. 13. These ideas are presented in Peter Shaffer's essay, 'The Cannibal Theatre', Atlantic Monthly, CCVI (October 1960), pp.48-50. 14. Peter Shaffer, quoted in c.J. Gianakaris, 1992, p.29.