Sir Alan Ayckbourn,Two Interviews by Stacey Morley..page9

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Two Interviews:Sir Alan Ayckbourn...page9

^{written by:} Stacey Morley

Interview of April 2, 1998:

A.A.continued-I can observe my own requirements and the requirements of the theatre but I find it very hard. He did encourage me, he encouraged me for instance when I wrote a play called "Standing Room Only", he certainly put that idea into my head. Perhaps the difference between Stephen and me is demonstrated by the fact he wanted me to write about, he wanted to set the play on Venus, the planet Venus, with the pretext that the world had become totally over- populated. I thought that was carrying it into the 23rd century, so at this time late 1950's I set it about this year, 1999 - in Shaftesbury Avenue (which had stopped dead with traffic). Now that had two things, one was that it made it a much more commercial play (of course Shaftesbury Avenue was very attractive for theatre managers). So that was the difference, yes he did suggest it but in the end I think he saw me going my own way and he was quite content then to be an advisor and editor. He'd talk but was not a good writer of plays I don't think. He did write a lot but he'd stopped really writing by the time I knew him. I don't think any of them were marvellous but he knew more about play writing than anyone I'd ever met. He was like a teacher, he was a great, great teacher and yet he was more than that in his vision and his concept of theatre which was very original. He talked about acting very intelligently and wasn't a very good director but he talked about directing very intelligently and he certainly wasn't a very good actor. All these subjects he was greatly involved in and you could learn an enormous amount. He simplified play writing to the slightly unfashionable basics - I think the passion to address content to the exclusion of everything else, which happens these days, is certainly something he wouldn't approve of. He certainly believed a play should have content and you should start with that content but not when it became more important than the shape and the structure and over-rode that.

S.M.- The plays today have a huge violent streak in them especially the contemporary plays like 'Trainspotting'. It seems to me this is how our society is choosing to express itself, what do you think about that?

A.A.- I don't like it very much. What I don't like about it is, it's like someone getting hold of a symphony orchestra and just has the brass section going all the time. Violence, yes, I mean Shakespeare used violence. Most of the great dramatists used violence, they also used a violin section and used all sorts of other colours, and just occasionally it's like watching a guy with an axe chopping up a house in the middle of the stage for about an hour and a half and you think I'm not getting much out of this unless, you get high on violence. Some people do but I don't think it's a very, well I think it's a misuse of theatre.

S.M.- And you think Stephen would think this as well?

A.A.- Yes he would, he was quite a sentimental man, he liked a gentle side of theatre too.

S.M.-. I'm asking because when you talk about Stephen in terms of architecture he wanted to draw people into theatre, it's quite interesting that he didn't - in terms of the play, contemporise themes and issues for a younger audience.

A.A.- He did what I did which was, you see I think the whole history of theatre has been streaming with people attempting to draw in the audience by trying to second guess what the audience want. I mean, it's like saying we won't use language too much because that might be difficult for them to follow and we will make it very graphic because that doesn't require any effort. And I think it's like a painter saying -I won't use too much colour as people might not be able to understand what its about. I think you have to make a journey to theatre, I don't think that it excludes, it is not exclusively a middle classed, white collar occupation but it does mean it does require an intellect, as well as an emotion. Theatre can be all sorts of things but if you try to divorce intellect from it, to try to take real ideas and real arguments out of theatre and you just replace that with raw emotion, you are not using theatre to its full and I think Stephen would say that as well! The arguments of theatre which don't have to be dry and nasty or are presented quite emotionally through the medium of the characters. How can you face dilemmas of the nature of being human if its just one note?

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