In the run-up to Alan Ayckbourn's 75th birthday in April 2014, a monthly feature reproduces articles by the playwright highlighting his life in theatre through the years.
Last month we looked at Alan Ayckbourn's thoughts on writing a first play to tie in with the premiere of his first professional play, The Square Cat, in 1959. This month we move forward to 1961 when Alan made his debut as a professional director with the play Gaslight. This article by Alan was written for the Gaslight programme.
During the six years of the Library Theatre's existence, it has been part of our experiment to try to discover what factors contribute towards making the ideal theatre in the round play. With what limited resources we have, we have tried to include the greatest variety open to us; besides which we have no fewer than three writers working with the company and, at the moment, tackling this very problem. For we are the first to admit that some plays work better in this medium than others; though, considering the widely contrasting number we have staged, it is surprising that more of them have not failed to adapt.
Certainly, at first sight, a Victorian thriller did not seem ideal "round" material. Here, it appeared, was the stuff that the proscenium theatre is made of and flourished on.
It took only one or two rehearsals to dispel this illusion. Here was a play that was going to thrive on the intimate atmosphere of our theatre. Patrick Hamilton's Gaslight, ever since its successful first London production in 1938, with Gwen Ffrangcon-Davies, Dennis Arundell and Milton Rosmer in the leading roles, and its subsequent record-breaking run in New York with Vincent Price, has been acclaimed as a brilliant exercise in theatrical suspense.
We feel confident that we can bring you all the thrills that this play contains in our own production, plus that extra excitement which we feel theatre in the round has to offer.
Copyright: Alan Ayckbourn. Please do not reproduce this article without permission of the copyright holder.
