The Years Between (1939-44)

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The Years Between (1939-44) Page 25

by Cecil Beaton


  DOWNFALL OF MUSSOLINI

  July 26th, 1943, Bognor

  We were just about to go to bed on Sunday night — standing up, lingering at the door, discussing morning trains, when the telephone bell rang. ‘That’s bad,’ said Diana, the pessimist, pulling a face, as she went to answer the summons. It was Freda Casa Maury. Diana shouted, ‘Mussolini’s resigned.’

  The bombshell has really churned us up in a way that no other piece of news has since the collapse of France! (Only this time the churning is of a different kind!) I felt weak, and slightly tearful, but the others were just gay, smiling like children, and being absolutely enchanting in their happiness. Duff opened a bottle of champagne, and we sat for half an hour while the clock ticked very slowly towards the BBC midnight news. Raimund[32] exclaimed, ‘Oh, you British are so extraordinary! Here’s this wonderful piece of news — and your radio wouldn’t dream of interrupting a programme of gramophone records with it. In America the news will by now have been given over and over and over again.’ Duff beamed. He did an imitation of Mussolini meeting Hitler for the thirteenth time and saying, ‘I must have una, due, tre ... divisioni!’ We roared with laughter. Diana was like a young girl. She said this was one of the greatest moments of her life. She looked radiant. Duff said he thought the King would make Badoglio successor, then send for someone and surrender. He thought it ‘all up’ with Italy within the next week, that now we had the Mediterranean we could hammer Germany and the Balkans from Italy, and the effect on German morale would be immense. Bertram Kruger, beaming, said, ‘It’s all over.’ Duff, still beaming, said, ‘No — we mustn’t go as far as that.’

  The clock ticked, they played Debus, and an announcer made a boring commentary. At last midnight. We raised our glasses at the wonderful news. The beginning of the end! It was as Duff had anticipated — Badoglio was in Mussolini’s place. ‘The war goes on,’ he said. Bertram Kruger said, ‘Gesture!’ No. It was ‘all up’.

  The war in its final phase, almost too good to be true! Everyone lingered before going to bed. We could hardly wait for further news, and the morning papers with their headlines and ridiculous photographs of the man who had rampaged from his balcony and made such a giant mistake in stabbing France in the back, the man who had asked for the ‘privilege of bombing London’, the first dictator to go. On the jubilant phrase ‘the crack-up of fascism’ we went to bed.

  The others left for London by the earliest train. Duff had intended taking a morning off, but he would not delay here, he wanted to know all the gossip from London. Diana pulled back the blinds, and said, ‘The newspapers are wonderful!’ — a huge banner headline and a photograph of Mussolini looking just like one of the Chinese ducks that were at that moment quacking outside the window.

  She drove me to the station, and everyone seemed to be smiling. The benign little ticket-collector, with a huge buttonhole, who is by way of being a great character, was grinning from ear to ear. Diana, unconscious of her extraordinary clothes, yelled at him, ‘Isn’t it wonderful?’ The little man, who looked as if he couldn’t hurt a fly, said, ‘Yes, it’s made all the difference. Now we just need to have him die slowly. I’d like to take on the job — cut off one finger to begin with.’ He chuckled as he snipped another ticket.

  EDITH EVANS

  I was conscious of spending an afternoon that might have a certain historical interest, for it was passed in the company of Miss Edith Evans who will doubtless go down to posterity as one of England’s greatest actresses. She deserves that eminence.

  Edith had summoned me to discuss her appearance as Hesione Hushabye in the forthcoming Heartbreak House for which I am to do her costumes, wigs, etc.

  My secretary had been warned that these talks might go on for a two- or three-hour period or more — and if more, Edith and I were to dine together. I was not altogether without qualms about the meeting, for rumour had it that Edith could be rather ‘difficult’: Already one or two points had cropped up on which we were not quite in agreement. I rang up Binkie[33] to find out if he had, for instance, broken the news to Edith that, contrary to Shaw’s instructions about Hesione, we were all against her wearing a black wig. Yes, he had, Good! Then why did she want to see me at such length? Binkie laughed. ‘Oh, “The Importance” came off last Saturday night, and when Edith heard we were not going to perform to the troops in Gibraltar for another three or four days, she said, “Oh, how lovely! Now we can have lots and lots of talks and discussions about the new play!” Whereupon all the others concerned bolted.’

  Luckily I was primed with fresh energy from a country weekend, and my afternoon was empty. I was even relishing the opportunity of listening to this fine actress discourse about her art and hearing her reasons for playing in certain moods and ways. It would surely be rewarding to watch her ferreting about for the real character behind the technical performance.

  I had been a bit baffled when reading Heartbreak House (which, incidentally, reads less well than it acts), but Edith said that she now understood about three-quarters of the play although it had taken her three different productions in which to do so (originally she had played Hesione’s younger sister, Lady Utterward). Sometimes the director had asked her ‘What does this mean?’ and she’d answer, ‘Bosh! That’s pure Shaw — it’s nothing to do with the part — the character must say it — then gulp and get on with his characterization.’ She said that when G.B.S. came to rehearsals of his plays he was intelligent and quiet, but when it came to giving directions for acting his ideas were old-fashioned.

  Edith Evans lives in Albany, a suitable place for her with its collegiate dignity and somewhat dour feeling of repose. I arrived punctually at 4 o’clock. Edith answered the door and was apologetic — the fire hadn’t been lit long — part of the furnishings had been blitzed — the flat was not as she wanted it to be — and yet she burst out laughing and in a sing-song voice continued, ‘Why should I apologize for all these things — why should I be so silly?’

  Her rooms are rather empty and impersonal with a few snapshots, no books, and with unadorned walls which I said were full of promise. ‘Yes, that’s always most interesting — promise and never fulfilment.’ One wall, however, was fulfilled with a portrait of her by Sickert. Done from a photograph it was a huge head over life-size, in sepia, with a blue background. Beautiful! ‘But my family said, “Your face isn’t as crooked as that.” But it’s me! It’s me!’ and she felt an awful dog buying it! She told me of how, when she was in Robert’s Wife, she had washed her own hair for the first time and many new red glints had appeared in it. Sickert had ‘got’ these glints. (But, in fact, Sickert was painting at Bath from a newspaper cutting and certainly would never have seen these new glints.)

  Now we sat to discuss the play — its mood and atmosphere.

  Binkie had told Edith he wanted to do something to lift the play, give it a height — even in the scenery. ‘That’s right, we must heighten everything!’ Edith promised. ‘The play’s very long, and unless we can mesmerize audiences by the atmosphere they will become tired. Shaw has got such a mighty brain that he could talk or listen to discussions for eight hours on end, but if audiences are conscious of being indoors listening they soon need a sandwich. We must make them feel we’re out in a garden, in the evening, sitting doing nothing. A garden gives you patience and repose; in the twilight you can sit and do nothing sometimes for an hour even! We must create that “evening in the garden” effect, then no one can be bored! No one is bored in a garden! And we must all concentrate hard. We must listen — and think! We mustn’t just wait for our cues, we must live every moment of the play, and by that we can mesmerize the audience. If we all think hard enough it is easy to mesmerize an audience. When we are talking in this evening-garden the stillness will be suddenly stirred by a little breeze that blows this way and that; these breezes are the changes of conversation. We must remember these little breezes — they, and the out-of-door height and openness, will lighten the words.’

  Talking ab
out Hesione Hushabye, Edith said she felt she was not well-mannered or bad-mannered, but a complete ‘original’. She saw her in flowing draperies but discarding their grandeur — screwing up her arms, and going to sleep in public lying back in a huddle with legs twisted. Edith shouted, ‘She must gather up the sleeves of her lovely tea gowns, and wave!’ It is by such touches that Edith brings her characters to life.

  Edith now set about trying to convince me that H.H. must have black hair. ‘These two sisters must really be something! They’re just a little past their prime, but they must be stunning!’ For Edith, with her pale skin and irregular features — for Edith, of all people, to face up to a black wig sounded hell to me, but I was determined to keep an open mind. ‘Oh, of course if I wear a dark wig I alter my entire skin pigment. You’ll never know I’m wearing a wig — the audience will think I’ve dyed my hair, for it will look so natural. It will, in fact, be made up of all colours and there will be very little extra hair. Always when I have wigs made I say, “Remember, only half the usual amount of hair!” and when I wear a wig in a play it isn’t just something I put on like a hat: it becomes part of me. I do my own hair — dress it on myself. Sometimes in front of the audience a curl falls out of place, and it is very effective to do it up as part of my acting. No — I don’t want to have my own coloured hair — it’s mouse — mouse — mouse. Don’t let the audience associate Mrs Hushabye with Edith Evans! Let me assume beauty with your lovely dresses and a dark wig. I’ll not fail over that at any rate: if I feel satisfactory there is no limit to what I can seem to be!’ Edith was not just arguing for argument’s sake; this was the result of deep convictions.

  We sat over a fire. The day became dark. Edith boiled a kettle in the kitchenette and we enjoyed excellent tea with strawberry jam from America. I asked her many questions. Had she a good memory? Could she, like Randolph or Duff, recite poetry by the hour? No. To her poetry was generally part of her impersonation. She forgot Rosalind’s speeches at the close of the run of As You Like It. To her, learning a part was frightfully difficult. She would put off the work as long as she could, but she knew eventually she would have to drum it into herself, going over and over again — la-di-da-di-da. She described her feelings with elaborate metaphors and descriptive gestures, her hands flayed out, her head cocked this way and that like a white cockatoo.

  Her jargon is completely untouched by the usual theatrical clichés. She brought out of a drawer a book in which Agate had written about her. ‘What’s it like?’ I asked. ‘It’s a bit praisey. It makes me very hot inside, but I like it. It makes me feel a bit galumphing!’ She considered Gwen Frangcon-Davies, whose artistry she admired, needed a guy rope and that her central ‘pin’ had not found its joist.

  Apropos Edith’s performance of Millamant she said that others too often have the wrong conception of the eighteenth century. ‘It wasn’t just finicking daintinesses with little fingers raised, snuff-pinching and fluttering of fans. Why, the climate hasn’t changed! Women nowadays are seldom hot enough to want to fan themselves! A fan should be used for poking the fire or, at best, making an aside behind, but it should never be used for fanning. A parasol, too, was useful for poking people.’

  Edith talked about breathing spaces in plays: Shakespeare gave his actors plenty of breathing space before they went over their hurdles. ‘Shaw makes you take your hurdles too quickly — one after another without interval.’ She laughed at herself guiltily for using analogies about racing — ‘As if I know anything about horses!’ But nevertheless she felt that acting was like jogging along Paddy, Paddy, Paddy — and then whoop — over the hurdle — then Paddy, Paddy, Paddy again.

  She had very likely said a lot of this before — but it was good for her to air her views for this was all part of the creation of her role. This was for her the most interesting aspect of acting: ‘The mental processes that one goes through are the important things.’

  Edith also talked of her private life. She owned a small farm in Kent which is ‘ideal for an actress’. Edith is an actress in the sense of ‘theatre artisan’, but she remains untouched by the ‘stagey’ stigma that the word has come to acquire. ‘Do you work on the farm?’ I asked incredulously. ‘I do a bit of haymaking, and chopping wood.’ But as Edith said this she looked shamefacedly childish, for she knew one knew she was really no good as a country girl. But Edith did get a ‘kick’ out of being in the country and using rustic similes, e.g. (back to the wig) ‘There’s a type of hair that is silky and you can tie it up to become a walnut — a veritable walnut!’ About her husband dying very suddenly when she was acting in America she mused, ‘How did I go through the return trip? My husband had been there on the dock to say goodbye to me. Six weeks later, here I was coming back after his death; there was my father to greet me. I said to myself, “You’ve got to do this alone. You’ve got to accustom yourself to being alone!” These solitary experiences are the things that count in life. When I was here in this apartment during the blitzkrieg I was all alone; I knew, of course, I could go out with other people, but I wanted to face up to it by myself. Now I’m continuously setting myself disciplinary tasks — going on long tours with a cast that is not particularly congenial — and making myself take it calmly. Then I do ENSA tours — very rough and uncomfortable. But these things take one out of one’s safety rut and give one confidence to stand alone. I always say to be an actor one must know how to stand naked, physically and spiritually. Growing old is merely a question of gaining experience. What one has gone through is the interesting part of life.’ Edith told me that she was not going out anywhere tonight but would wallow in being alone and think about the forthcoming trip to Gibraltar and her next part.

  I went off to work on costume designs — bearing in mind that Mrs Hushabye would probably wear a dark wig.

  Working with Edith Evans will be an interesting experience. However tiresome and full of hot air she may become, one must give her the respect that is due to someone who has succeeded in maintaining her position on the pinnacle by dint of continually renewing her attitude towards her art.

  I left Brighton, where I was recuperating from a stone in the gall bladder, for one day in London to fit dresses for Heartbreak and to see Edith Evans about her bloody black wig. I arrived for the first stage rehearsal. Edith was in a great state of subdued, pent-up thrill at being, at last, able to get going on this new production. In her excitement at jumping the next hurdle, Edith had forgotten all about Gibraltar, from whence she has just returned after appearing in a revue for the troops.

  It was tremendously interesting to watch her looks of complete concentration when, wearing spectacles and appearing particularly plain, she listened to the director’s instructions while keeping an eye on Isobel Jeans (who plays the sister) rehearsing by herself in a corner. (Isobel never relaxes — she is like a peahen, with the over-nervousness of a greyhound.)

  John Burrell, the director, conducted the rehearsal for five hours on end. Burrell seems very sure of getting the effects he wishes, but today it seemed to me that the leading actors are such definite personalities that they were merely playing themselves. Maybe their characterizations will appear later. Only the minor actors seemed to become characters and not just personalities.

  Edith said that a few of the things she was doing were right — that, by degrees, Hesione was appearing, but that she did not realize that she was going to be at all like this: the character was beginning to appear so strongly that Hesione already got up and did something for which Edith was not ready. ‘Don’t do that yet! I find Hesione doing all sorts of unexpected things — some are right, some are not.’ Yet to me, a mere onlooker, it seemed as if Edith was just exploiting her own ego. Edith, as if reading my thoughts, said, ‘We can’t get rid of our own egos — they have to be dragged along with us wherever we go.’

  By the end of the afternoon, the other actors were a bit dishevelled as, walking like sore bears in their solitary purgatories, they tried to memorize their lines. But Edith wa
s as fresh as a dewdrop and eager, when the rehearsal was over, to go off to have her wig fitted. ‘Aren’t you tired, Edith?’ ‘Not a bit of it. If I’m interested I can continue for forty-eight hours without a nap!’

  At Nathans, Edith’s gluttony for acting asserted itself while waiting for samples of hair to be brought. She spied some 1840-60 fashion plates and sang mellifluously, ‘I’d like to appear in a play in which I could wear a bonnet with plenty of ruchings.’ Later, when Dolly, the wigmaker, fitted a toile on her head and she looked quite bald, Edith said, ‘This is how I’d like to appear sometimes, looking like a Flemish Madonna. When I went to the Dutch exhibition my friends said, “These are all you — bald — with gooseberry eyes.”’

  At last a few wisps of black hair were produced. Edith held these up against her forehead and cheek. The effect of light on her was most harsh and unbecoming. Her eyes suddenly appeared like ping-pong balls covered with lids of chicken flesh, and one eye seemed so much lower in her face than the other. Even her complexion seemed to be coarse, with wide pores, and with alternately shiny or dry-flaked patches. Any other woman would have been horrified to see the effect in the mirror, but no — Edith was delighted. ‘Ra-ther nice!’ she drawled. ‘I can see that it’s very becoming to my skin...!’

  Edith absorbs herself entirely in her work. She could not have any other interest while rehearsing a part. To Dolly and Gus, she said, ‘I’d like to fit this wig twenty times; call on me anytime you want me to come in. I’d love to work hard on it.’ To me she said, ‘How is it that you manage to keep your unbruised, shrewd point of view when you see so many people? You manage society so well — how is it? I’m scared of it. Those people all wanted to take me up — George Moore and the lot, but I couldn’t say witty things, I couldn’t compete. I became breathless and exhausted. I had to preserve myself. But you manage to see people as if for the first time. I can’t do that — I can only do that with a part; I can recognize a part for the first time.’

 

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