Olivier (43 page)

It was easy enough to see both sides of the argument when somebody else’s project was in question. Olivier was faced with the problem here and now in the National Theatre. He was not prepared to dispense altogether with the traditional proscenium stage – how else could he invite the Comédie Française to act in London? he asked – but was determined that this should not be the only, or even the most usual configuration. What he wanted was a single theatre that could be adapted to a variety of shapes, something that was eventually achieved on a small scale in the Cottlesloe Theatre, but which he accepted was impossible in a larger auditorium. So two theatres evolved: the traditionally designed model, to be called the Lyttelton, and the Olivier with its thrust-forward stage. Nobody really wanted the Lyttelton, said Peter Hall; he, George Devine, Peter Brook, Michel Saint-Denis, all opposed it. They were overruled, “because Larry was the boss man, and that was it”. The charge is not wholly accurate, but the contemporary National
Theatre, with its weaknesses and far greater strengths, is more the creation of Laurence Olivier than of any other individual involved.
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He was no less influential in the choice of architect. It was he who conceived the idea of getting the Royal Institute of British Architects to nominate twenty individuals competent to undertake the task and then for each one to be interviewed by an advisory panel who would recommend a name or names to the South Bank Board. Olivier was, of course, prominent on the advisory panel and it was largely his doing that, in the event, only one name was recommended to the Board, that of Denys Lasdun. All the interviewers, said Olivier, had been “impressed by his spirit of co-operation and his sense of dedication, as well as by evidence of his work”. There were to be times over the next few years when he wondered whether the panel had made the right decision, but at the end of the day he had no doubt that his opinion had been justified.
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As he had predicted from the start, one of the most difficult problems facing the National Theatre was finding the best actors and actresses and retaining them, even though suitable parts would not always be available. Olivier urged Christopher Plummer to be ready to accept a minor role; if he did so, he would “look a jolly good sport by mucking in with the company”. The trouble about this was that Plummer, like almost every other actor, was more concerned about his career than whether he appeared a “jolly good sport”. Ian McKellen refused to sign a three-year contract. “The crux of my decision,” he admitted, “is ambition. My ambition to achieve recognition as an actor … I think there is more chance of establishing my ability publicly elsewhere.” He was to come back to the National, but only after he had achieved his object of making his name elsewhere.
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Nor, even when they could be prevailed upon to stay, were many actors prepared to make the sort of financial sacrifice which Olivier was ready – and much more able – to accept. Artists’ fees were costing the theatre much more than he had expected, he told the Board: actors were not “inclined to regard work at the National Theatre as a charitable
duty”. When Peter O’Toole held out for a higher salary, Tynan declared loftily that, if an actor was not prepared to accept a lower wage in exchange for the honour of playing in the National Theatre, then “he was not the sort of actor the theatre wants”. Olivier agreed that this was an admirable sentiment, but “it’s not an entirely workable principle these days”. He knew that his success or failure as Director would be judged by the Board as much by the financial returns as by the quality of the productions. This in its turn put an additional burden on him. Box-office receipts slumped when he was not himself acting in a play. He therefore saw it as his duty to act whenever his schedule made it possible – a duty which fortunately for him coincided with his predilection for playing a leading part in every production if he could get away with doing so.
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The relationship with Stratford, too, made constant demands on Olivier’s energies and patience. By the end of 1963 Peter Hall had convinced himself that the Royal Shakespeare Company was in peril, that it could not survive the unfairly subsidised competition of the National Theatre. “We are now at the end of the road,” he told Joan Plowright. “Unless persons in high places can help we shall be finished at the beginning of 1965 and Stratford will have a new Director.” The person in a high place to whom this appeal was implicitly addressed was Olivier himself. On the whole he responded generously. He told his Board that a Co-ordinating Committee was being set up to consider how the National could help Stratford in its fight for survival. He stressed the importance of its outpost in London at the Aldwych Theatre and “pointed out that the disappearance of Stratford’s London branch would reflect adversely upon the National Theatre”. But soon the exchanges became acrimonious. In February 1964 the
Sunday Times
carried a story about the rivalry between the two theatres and reported that Hall proposed to denounce the National if it didn’t offer its rival some tangible support. Plowright felt certain that Hall himself was the origin of the story, and wrote to remonstrate. Three days later Olivier fired the second barrel. It was Stratford which had sabotaged the negotiations
for some sort of merger; it was the National which had been responsible for Stratford getting “its bloody dough … all of which history seems to me to be pretty bloody immaculate, and I think it is now time somebody said so, and I think that somebody is you … Sorry, cock, over to you.” No such public avowal was forthcoming and resentment lingered on both sides, but it was soon apparent that Hall had overstated the desperation of Stratford’s plight and that there was plenty of room for the two companies to survive in healthy competition.
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Tynan, it is hardly necessary to say, was zealous in fomenting the hostility between the National and Stratford and more specifically between Olivier and Hall. He was no less energetic when it came to making trouble within the National itself. Dexter, in particular, was his target. “At the moment I expect he would quite like to assassinate me,” he told Olivier. Were not three directors more than the National Theatre needed? He reported that he had asked the Director of the Prague National Theatre how it was that his theatre ran so smoothly. “It’s simple,” he had been told. “I decide on the repertoire with the dramaturge and then we tell the other directors what they are going to do. Is there any other way?” Was there not a lesson there for the National Theatre? asked Tynan. Olivier did not think there was and urged Tynan both to curb his tongue and to moderate his aspirations. He had no intention of dispensing with his services, though, and a large part of his already overstretched energies had to be devoted to repairing the damage which his irrepressible dramaturge had done. There was little on which Tynan did not feel qualified and entitled to express an opinion. When a filmed version was made of the National Theatre “Othello” – not a film in its own right, but a photographed record of what was happening on the stage – Tynan insisted on being present and clamoured for more close-ups of Olivier. If one took close-ups of what Olivier was doing on the stage, explained the film’s producer, Anthony Havelock-Allan, the audience would be in “gales of laughter because he’s spitting, his face is contorted. It’s an overblown performance for a big theatrical performance; the antithesis of what you can do on film.”

The trouble was that Olivier, never totally reconciled to the demands of the screen, was more than half inclined to agree with Tynan. He gave a stage performance, and made little attempt to curb his gestures or expressions to suit the different medium. The result was an uneasy compromise: much better than nothing, but still only a distorted shadow of its majestic original.
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Tynan made so much noisy mischief that it is easy to overlook the good work he did. He was particularly efficacious in opening Olivier’s eyes to Europe. Without Tynan he would never have invited the Berliner Ensemble to act in London. Even this got him into trouble with Peter Daubeny, who had brought the Ensemble to London some ten years before and appears to have thought that he had a monopoly on the importation of foreign companies. “It seems to me a betrayal of the good faith on which relations between people and great theatres are customarily based,” he complained. Olivier replied that he was baffled: “Really, dear Peter, you have invited the Moscow Art Theatre, the Comédie Française, the Habbima etc., with nothing but my blessing … Must you begrudge us our East Berliners?”
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Less controversially, it was Tynan who advocated the visit to Russia which the National Theatre made in 1965. Olivier proposed that the Company should tour with three productions: Miller’s “The Crucible”, “Othello” and Congreve’s “Love for Love”. “The Crucible” had already played in Moscow and had been a flop: would not two productions be enough? asked Humphrey Trevelyan, the Ambassador. If they confined themselves to “Othello” and “Love for Love”, he would be involved in every performance, replied Olivier, and would be exhausted before the tour was over. “Hobson’s Choice” was substituted for “The Crucible”: whether the Muscovites were likely to make much of this peculiarly homespun comedy was an open question, but at least it would be a novelty. “Love for Love” was played by the company for the first time in Moscow. It was “a smasharoo”, Olivier told Tarquin. It did not escape some adverse comment, however. One leading critic complained about the salacious content of the plot. “They are terribly easily shocked, the
Russians,” observed Olivier. “It’s a lovely comedy, delicious, it’s not yoff-yoff laughing, it just purrs over your ears.”
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But it was “Othello” that made the greatest mark. It was the first production of the tour; the Russians were known to revere it above all other plays by Shakespeare; Madame Furtseva, the powerful Minister of Culture, was in the audience; there was all to play for. The effort of getting the company to Moscow and onto the stage had been stressful; Olivier had had no time to go to the gym; he had had to cut to a few minutes the leisurely and ritualistic build-up which usually preceded every performance. Out of his exhaustion he conjured what was perhaps the greatest performance of his life. He was staggering, Billie Whitelaw said. “He was able to show what in my view had always been missing: Othello’s vulnerability.” The Russians were ecstatic. When he opened his curtain speech with the word “
Tovarishchi
”, “Comrades”, it seemed that their applause would never stop. Olivier drank too much in the celebrations that followed, was put to bed by Joan Plowright and was so hungover the following morning that he missed a pompous luncheon given in honour of the National Theatre. It did not diminish his triumph: half a century later people in Moscow still speak of Olivier’s Othello with bated breath.
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The National Theatre goes very well, Olivier told Tarquin, at the beginning of 1966, “but the brain-teasing miasma of permutations never seems to lessen or grow simpler.” The National had indeed got off to a sensationally successful start; it remained to be seen whether the burden on Olivier would grow any lighter now that it was established.
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As Lear, in a production he also directed, with Alec Guinness as the Fool. “Frankly, Lear is an easy part . . .” Olivier proclaimed boldly. It isn’t.

Olivier and Leigh as Caesar and Cleopatra in 1951. Already there were signs that their relationship was under strain.

Swashbuckling in “The Beggar’s Opera”. “I hope and pray,” Olivier wrote, “that my personal flop will be the worst that I will ever disenjoy.”