Editor’s note: Noted Orson Welles scholar Richard France (The Theatre of Orson Welles and Orson Welles on Shakespeare) recently wrote to The New York Times to express his outrage over the characterizations of Welles and John Houseman in its review of the James Shapiro book The Playbook. Mr. France has graciously allowed Wellesnet to share his letter.
By RICHARD FRANCE
The review of James Shapiro’s “The Playbook” states that, “ever after” the 1936 landmark production of the “Voodoo Macbeth” in Harlem, Houseman and Welles would recall “their Black collaborators in grotesquely debased terms.” As the author of “The Theatre of Orson Welles” and “Orson Welles on Shakespeare,” none of my research revealed anything of the sort. Furthermore, “ever after” for Welles and Houseman was a scant five years, during which their ever-increasing animosity resulted in vastly more shouting matches than anything resembling “witty anecdotes.”
Both of my books are based almost exclusively on such primary documentation as taped interviews with as many of Welles’ W.P.A. and Mercury Theatre collaborators as I could locate. During my interview with Edna Thomas, who played Lady Macbeth, she kindly made me a present of Welles’ rehearsal notes for the production. Yes, his frustration in molding several of the performances to his liking was often bluntly stated – but never to debasing the actors involved. (His most hostile criticism in these notes was directed at his lighting designer, Abe Feder, who was white.) And according to Ms. Thomas, Welles indulged her and her co-star, Jack Carter, who played Macbeth – and who Welles would subsequently cast as Mephistopheles in his 1937 production of “Doctor Faustus.”
A decade later, the N.A.A.C.P. would rely on Welles’ sense of social justice to assist them in holding accountable the Southern sheriff who gouged out the eyes of the Black veteran, Isaac Woodard. Welles used his nationally syndicated radio program not only to identify Lynwood Shull but also to force a reluctant Truman Administration into indicting him. (It took an all-white jury of his South Carolina peers less than half-an-hour to acquit Shull of this heinous crime.) For his efforts in the Woodard matter, Welles attracted the wrath of the House Un-American Activities Committee and, in November 1947, he was forced into exile – one step ahead of a H.U.A.C. subpoena.
Between these two experiences, Welles spearheaded such crusades for social justice as the Sleepy Lagoon Defense Fund, which resulted in overturning the wrongful murder convictions against 20 Chicano youngsters. How, I’d like to know, does this verifiable history square with the vile allegations being made against Welles – and Houseman, for that matter, who was hired to manage the Negro Theatre Project by a Black woman – in the Shapiro book ?
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