Smith College - Smith College Yearbook (Northampton, MA)

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n n m ra Sramattrfi The class of 1925 has proved itself beyond question a patron of the arts, if only in its devotion to the drama. Not content to trust our reputation for histrionic merit, as have other classes, to a gifted but jaded few, we have rallied in numbers to assist in the fashioning of our dramatic history. Names have shown with meteoric brilliance from time to time, only to drop into oblivion ; as if, content with hav- ing given their share of talent to our stage, their owners had chosen other less temperamental paths. Class presidents, athletes, Phi Betes have trodden our boards under obscurer names, wherein they have not only shown their versatility, but given us the spectacle of a practical application of the arts as a preparation for life. But, in addition to this loyal support from other fields, we can claim as many and as brilliant extra-curricular professionals in the drama as in any of our other pre-eminent interests. When the spring of our freshman year gave us an opportunity to develop our latent talents, we early showed ourselves eager for the- atrical fame. In the first production of the spring, the success of The Dragon rested largely on members of our class. The names of Anna Dallinger and Elinor Loeb, since familiar to campus theatregoers, appeared in the cast. Virginia McCalmont, besides presaging our brilliant future in her excellent performance, gave still another illus- tration of the native strength of the class backbone in her determina- tion to go through with the part, though she was borne to the infirm- ary from the stage door at the close of the play ! Our first mark in the history of producing was here set faintly in the persons of Fran- ces Bolton and Jessie Lloyd, who served on committees, obscurely of course, — but still an achievement for freshmen. The size of the cast for Were King gave twenty-nine more freshmen an intimate connection with the smell of grease paint and the nervous thrill of apprehension that precedes the entrance of a mob. It is significant that the names of Blake, Crawford. Tester, Foss, Wanamaker and Rannev thus early appeared on college play bills. But it was in the following year that our distinct acting person- alities began to emerge from the mobs of our dramatic infancy. The first production of the fall gave prominence to Kathleen Tildsley and Ruth Tester in a charmingly performed scene from the Romancers. On the same evening, Lucy Barnard, Grania Knott and Adelaide Avery made their successful debuts as characters in Masefield ' s Locked Chest. Large casts have for four years favored the ambition of our class. Several more of us skipped and sighed and sang ourselves before the footlights in the Workshop production of Scorpio. And we felt that we were growing up indeed, when Grania Knott, a mere sophomore, held the stage alone with a member of the Faculty in Li mo Hen us. n ol 16]

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n i CT D [J Sramatira Aaaflnatton (ftnmtril Senior Year Cheryl Crawford . Producing Director Margaret Barnes Chairmen of Committees Business Manager Margaret Linley . Staging Emma Heap . . Costumes Grania Knott . Dramaturgy Kathleen Tildsley Lighting Justine Entz Publicity Elsie Butler Junior Year . Properties Anna Dallinger . . . Secretary Frances Wilson . ...... Head of Publicity n Q 160

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n 11® cr D cr Having created a reputation of a sort, we found it impossible to let pass an opportunity for presuming on it. So we duly appeared, a trifle perfunctorily it must be admitted, in The Scarecrow. But we were merely reserving our forces for the successes of the spring. Our parts in the Chinese Lantern showed a growing maturity and confi- dence which found a sustained level in the acting of Cheryl Crawford, as the hero of one of the most popularly received plays the Association has ever produced, The Marriage of Convenience. It was during this spring that Gloria Mundi, of psychopathic fame, proved Grania Knott ' s versatility, — among other things. Up to this moment of our dramatic career our role had been one of pleasant dependence. No one had expected too much of us. If we achieved distinction, we were greeted with the lollypops of a delight- ed applause and were patted on the heads for being good girls. If we attained something less than mediocrity, it was put down to the score of our inexperience. But from the start of our junior year, we were expected to stand or fall on our own merits. We had, until now, ap- peared for the sake of appearing. The first plays of the small pro- duction found Anna Dallinger, Grania Knott and Cheryl Crawford assuming this harsh responsibility as the respective coaches of Deir- dre, The Knave of Hearts, and Beauty and the Jacobin. Our novitiate over, and the task before us of fashioning a dramatic tradition for others, less experienced than ourselves, we found mere personal achievement losing its importance in the larger scope of artistic excel- lence. We were proud of our share in the brave experiment of Jeanne D ' Arc, as we showed by recklessly swelling the numbers of its un- wieldy cast. Foremost among its elements of success, was the acting of Grania Knott as D ' Alencon in which she showed her appreciation of the high level of the theme by a subtle commingling of reality and idealism as at once lover and champion of an idea. We were trained to an ideal and innured to probable disappoint- ment, when, in the spring of our junior year, we received from 1924 the sole responsibility for the dramatic excellence of the college. Not quite sure of our ground, we tested our footing in the first set of plays which included a successful attempt at sophistication with Grania Knott as the leading lady, in Molnar ' s A Matter of Husbands; and a venture upon the more difficult ground of Kemp ' s Boccaccio ' s Untold Tale, which was sincere if not quite convincing. In Shakuntalah we tried our first independent experiment. In an attempt to transcend the narrower type of drama which merely offers a vehicle for the good acting of individuals, we tried to make this an expression of a more comprehensive art, in which the action of the characters should be only in proportion to a pattern of theme, sound and color, so that the completed production should form an aesthetic unity. To this end we departed from the tradition of a pro- fessionally set stage, for the spring production, to the precincts of the President ' s garden, which afforded an appropriate setting for the rich and fantastic grouping of the play. Barbara Grant, as King Dushyanta, moved powerfully as a romantic and colorful center through its exotic scenes. Dorothy Pickard, Eunice Blake, and Doro- n EL 162