Theatre Design & Technology - Winter 1975 - 36

BOOK REVIEWS

TONY COURTADE

ALL PEOPLE ARE FAMOUS
!Instead of an autobiography)
by Harold Clurman
New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1974
ISBN 0-15-104775-8
327 pp.,
$8.95 hardcover

book, I wished there were more chapters like this - moving past
the anecdotal to firm statements of belief and experience. Perhaps
Clurman will yet decide to write an autobiography and fill in the
gaps. The appendix listing all of the plays he directed from Awake
and Sing in 1935 to Uncle Vanya in 1969 makes it clear that he
has much more to tell.

About fourteen years ago at a New York AETA Convention,
a panel of noted American directors was scheduled for a midnight session in the Waldorf. Shortly after it began, Harold Clurman and Jose Quintero dominated the discussion with a memorable exhange of theatre anecdotes. Clurman's ability as a witty
raconteur makes his latest book, All People Are Famous, very
enjoyable to read. Instead of an autobiography, he has presented
sketches of the various people he has known and admired throughout his life. At its best, the book gives clear, though often brief,
flimpses into the lives and personalities of writers, actors, scene
designers, directors, and critics such as Gordon Craig, Boris Aronson, Max Reinhardt, Lillian Hellman, Constantin Stanislavsky,
and Stark Young. The book presents a continuation of the lives
of many figures in Clurman's earlier book The Fervent Years.
Clurman's first wife, the famous acting teacher, Stella Adler, is
discussed throughout the book with excellent descriptions of her
rehearsals with Reinhardt, Stanislavsky, and Brecht. The pages
about Clifford Odets and John Garfield are both moving and revealing, as is the entire discussion of the impact of the McCarthy
hearings on the theatre and Hollywood.
Clurman appreciates the rewards as well as the difficulties of
working with many really creative people, and his description
of Boris Aronson is very perceptive. He worked with Aronson on
Awake and Sing and other plays. When he asked Aronson to
design the setting for Bus Stop in 1954, he responded, "I'm so
glad you want me. I haven't had a call all year - not even a
wrong number." Aronson went on to design exciting settings
for such plays as JB, Cabaret, Company, and Fiddler on the Roof.
Clurman was particularly impressed by the fact that the designer
reached the peak of his success at the age of 70.
Clurman's ability to remember and relate the telling anecdote
is one of the strengths of this book, but its weakness is that it
often degenerates into page after page of short anecdotes about
everyone from Picasso to Jackie Onassis. Some of these are merely
unpleasant gossip, and some are quips by Clurman and others
which don't make much of an effect on the printed page. At
these points in the book, the reader may wish that Clurman had
chosen to write a straightforward autobiography instead of brief
glimpses of the people in his life. There are many sections of the
book which could have been developed in depth, such as the
difficulties for a director working in a foreign country. Clurman
gives an interesting description of the problems Copeau faced in
directing The Brothers Karamazov for the Theatre Guild, and
touches on his own experience directing The Iceman Cometh
in-Japan. It would have been valuable to have had details of the
process of directing in Japanese theatres and in the Habimah
Theatre in Tel Aviv. It would also have been interesting to hear
more about the subject matter and methods he uses in his classes
at Hunter College.
Harold Clurman has chosen not to write an autobiography,
but to reveal information about himself indirectly - by descriptions of people who influenced him and whose talent, education, and personalities he admires. He respects people who
are tolerant, honest, kind, frank, and well-educated, and these
qualities contributed to his own success as a critic, director, and
teacher. He is most personal in the chapter in which he discusses
the problems of teaching today and the difficulties created by
contrasting outlooks of teachers and students. (He quotes Bobby
Lewis as beginning a new class by quipping, "I want you to know
that anybody under thirty bores me"). Discussing his own attitudes and the effort to bridge gaps, he reveals his enthusiasm,
his sensitivity, and his continuing belief in the value of a broad
education. Because so much of Clurman's life is left out of this

WINTER,1975

Yvonne Shafer
University of Delaware
ART AND DESIGN IN TEXTILES
by Michael Ward
New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold Co., 1973
110 pages, iIIus.
Art and Design in Textiles by Michael Ward is a textbook
which tries to reconcile the differing demands of art and technology. Mr. Ward accurately analyses the dichotomous dilemma of
the textile student, who, trained by the discipline and attitudes
of art, is suddenly confronted with technological and commercial demands seemingly at odds with good design. Mr. Ward never
satisfactorily comes to grips with the problem and most of his
solutions are at best compromises. Yet, despite this shortcoming,
he does provide an exciting text describing the process of textile
manufacture. Without confusing the reader with a plethora of
industrial terms, Mr. Ward gives a lucid discussion of the physical
process of the evolution of fabric and the interdependency of the
pattern conception and yarn structure. One of the more fascinating examples is that of the parachute, "a life-saver of delicate
appearance, the embodiment of many qualities that textiles have,
and an example of a use which grew out of existing machinery.
The astronaut's glorious return is possible because of the weight
and precise ratio of yarn and air flow to control the dropping
speed of his capsule." Mr. Ward adds parenthetically, "All that
way to billet down by a few threads!"
It is Mr. Ward's enthusiastic faith in the medium that helps
convince the reader that textiles can, in fact, transcend the cruel
limitations of industry. He is equally sensitive to the purists'
viewpoint of the creative process, be it in summing up Mondrian's
artistic progression as a consolidation of "thinking with his eyes,"
or Edison's seemingly haphazard and irrational experimentation
as "lateral thinking." Ward even offers a criterion of creativity
which he feels is applicable to the textile medium: "ultimately
knowing when to recognize that an accident may be preferable
to the intended line of thought."
On the more secular side, Ward makes such homely statements as "There is a security in the unsophisticated rhythmic
beat." But his aesthetic reach also extends to remarks such as,
"Already we are being universalized so our popular images are
being reduced in number, the hot dog at one end of the food
chain must have pushed some subtle dishes out of existence at
the other; the Volkswagen Beetle must have ousted some quainter
car." Perceptions like these are refreshing in a book which also
explains professionally why knitted fabrics allow more "give"
to body movement, and why a right-angular tension of weaving
makes a fabric easier to tailor, what "mercerization" is (and that
a John Mercer actually existed), why seat belts and ropes for
mountain climbers are often made of polyester, how walking on
a carpet in which spatial patterns have been used indiscriminately
can convey the uneasiness of walking on a floor which appears to
have two or more levels, and why burly burglars in cartoons look
even burlier in black and white stripes.
The one great deficiency of the book is that the text is far
more exciting than the substandard visuals. The author even goes
so far as to provide his own apologetic rationalization: he quotes
a colleague as having once said "only you can show students
examples of bad work." He claims unconvincingly that the book
is an imperfect medium and that beautiful visuals obstruct the
explanatory process.
There is a consummate proof that the book is quite a perfect
medium once one learns ~o use its language expressively. It is

THEATRE DESIGN AND TECHNOLOGY

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Theatre Design & Technology - Winter 1975