Arts and Manners

A Parable of the Actor’s Vocation

I suppose, by now, most of the people associated with the New York theater have been downtown to see a play called Career by a young man named James Lee, and that those who invest money, or persuade others to do so, have been reconsidering a homely fact which the Broadway stage too frequently ignores: the paying customer can be just as entertained by sense as by nonsense; by seriousness as by inanity; by a few grains of truth as by a clutter of lies. At least he can, if all other factors are equal: if the playwright has done a responsible, uncondescending job; if the actors are capable of holding down a stage; if the subject matter is more than merely someone’s lyric leakage.

RP

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Robert Phelps

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A Parable of the Actor’s Vocation

I suppose, by now, most of the people associated with the New York theater have been downtown to see a play called Career by a young man named James Lee, and that those who invest money, or persuade others to do so, have been reconsidering a homely fact which the Broadway stage too frequently ignores: the paying customer can be just as entertained by sense as by nonsense; by seriousness as by inanity; by a few grains of truth as by a clutter of lies. At least he can, if all other factors are equal: if the playwright has done a responsible, uncondescending job; if the actors are capable of holding down a stage; if the subject matter is more than merely someone’s lyric leakage.