Olivier (49 page)

As far as Olivier was concerned the matter was now closed and the National Theatre could move on. Tynan was made of sterner stuff. He hinted that he and Olivier were about to resign – an idea which Olivier insisted he had never contemplated; he announced that he and Olivier hoped soon to mount a production of “Soldiers” in the West End – “I was never partner to this hope,” Olivier noted drily; he wrote to John Arden and other prominent dramatists suggesting that they should refuse to allow their plays to be produced by the National Theatre if the ban on Hochhuth was not rescinded. When Tynan eventually got “Soldiers” put on in the West End, Olivier refused to come to the first night, dreading the awkward questions that the press would put to him. Tynan pleaded that his absence would cause unfavourable comment; if he would come he could hide in Tynan’s box and, at the end, be smuggled out unmolested. “I can’t quite make sense of your wishfully comfortable assurance that I needn’t be seen,” Olivier complained, “as this isn’t consistent with your real reason for wanting me there.” When Churchill’s grandson, Winston Churchill junior, urged Olivier to state publicly what he
had told him in private – that he did not accept Hochhuth’s claim to historical authenticity – Olivier agreed but then agonised for weeks, discarding draft after draft before he finally wrote to
The Times
to say that he had never been convinced by any of Hochhuth’s allegations about the death of Sikorski.
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The most significant victim of the imbroglio was Olivier’s relationship with his Chairman. Formally, all was as it had been, but harsh enough words had been exchanged between Chandos and Olivier to mean that complete confidence in each other would never be restored. Chandos realised how much this had been the work of Tynan and deplored the influence the dramaturge exercised over his Director: “there are now a number of libel actions about,” he warned Olivier, “and I beg you to be careful, because Tynan as a controversialist is a piece of cake to his enemies, and a disaster to his friends. He is both dishonest and untruthful, and if you recognise this fact it will save you a lot of tears in the future.” Over the next few years a disproportionately large amount of Olivier’s time and energy was to be devoted to defending his dramaturge against the indignation of his Board and its Chairman.
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“The Dance of Death”, the rehearsals of which had been interrupted by Olivier’s appendicitis, was Strindberg’s partly autobiographical portrait of a doomed marriage. “I like old Strindberg,” Olivier told Ralph Richardson, “he gives you a nice clear field to work on.” The field in this case was a field of battle, waged between Olivier, playing a manic Prussian army captain, and his dejected wife. It provided a horrifyingly realist portrait of a marriage which was sustained by tedious rituals and enlivened only by explosions of mindless violence. “I love it,” Olivier told Robert Stephens. “This is the best part I’ve ever played, apart from Archie Rice. This is me. I’m the Captain.” He refused to accept that the tortured bleakness of the marriage was in any way exaggerated; he told the translator, Michael Meyer, that there was not a line in his part which he had not, at one time or another, addressed to one of his three wives. Tynan agreed. “Larry and I regard the play as a wholly realistic study
of marriage, red in tooth and claw,” he told Alan Dent. “In fact there are whole passages that take me back to dear old Notley.”
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Olivier claimed he took the play on above all because it offered a good part for Geraldine McEwan: “I didn’t give a damn if I made a success, I really didn’t; it was her success I was after.” The concept of Olivier not giving a damn whether he made a success of a part strains the reader’s credulity, but he may well have seen the play primarily as an opportunity for McEwan. If so, he was disappointed. “I have been fantastically lucky with the notices,” he told Richardson, “at the expense, I am afraid, of my partners, whose work has been very grossly underestimated.” “It was one of Olivier’s greatest performances, perhaps his greatest,” judged Penelope Mortimer, and his physical transformation – “a close-cropped Prussian head, hooded stony eyes, aggressively jutting jaw, a choleric red face that went purple in his fits” – was among the most realised of his career.
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A Mr Andrew Main wrote to Olivier to condole with him on what he felt was the inappropriate laughter that his performance had from time to time provoked. Olivier’s reply illustrates his conviction that even “Hamlet” or “Macbeth” were the more effective for a little humour. “The Dance of Death”, he said, was in his view not a tragedy. “Even if the play were to be a tragedy I would not object to laughter … I personally feel that the difference between tragedy and comedy is far more thin than by most is imagined, and it is my aim in life to make that more and more so. I wish, you see, to leave the audience in the position of the gods, to whom, after all, our most searing tragedies must be things of comedy.”
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“The Dance of Death” was for him the most taxing of the plays the National Theatre took to Canada in the autumn of 1967. Having decided not to tour in “Othello” Olivier felt bound to appear in all three plays and took over the tiny but significant role of the butler in Feydeau’s farce, “A Flea in Her Ear”. He had not played so small a part for years and, perhaps for that reason, found it peculiarly difficult to remember his lines. He kept a copy of his script on a music-stand in the wings, with his spectacles beside them, so that he could go offstage, refresh his
memory as to what came next and then come back on to resume the action. “Darling girl,” he said to Jane Lapotaire, who had just joined the company and was playing the French maid, Antoinette, “if I should dry, you will help me out, won’t you? For example, if a line begins with ‘I’, just point towards your eye.” Lapotaire thought this was the most preposterous thing she had ever heard; but then Olivier did dry. “He just spun round 360 degrees, slapping his hands that had got white-buttoned gloves … The audience thought it was the funniest thing they’d ever seen.” Lapotaire asked Geraldine McEwan what it was like to have Olivier join the cast. “Well,” said McEwan, “it used to be a play about a woman who thinks her husband is unfaithful to her; now it’s a play about a butler who works for a woman who thinks her husband is unfaithful to her.” Being Olivier, he could not resist behaving like the director if the real director was absent or even, now and again, if he was present. Once, he saw Lapotaire was having trouble working out how she ought to play her role. “Now, darling Jane,” said Olivier, “the maid should be like this.” He took an imaginary feather duster, bent over and stuck his bottom out, glanced around him with the wickedest, most sexually alluring look and said, “You see, she’s like that.” “And within about ten seconds,” remembered Lapotaire gratefully, “there was my Antoinette.”
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Everyone who knew him well realised that, medically speaking, he should not have been on the tour at all. He remained ebullient, contriving to get a great deal of fun out of his activities and to make it fun for other people. In Montreal he saw some actors from the company getting ready to go to hear a group of black singers called The Supremes. He asked if he could join them. “Who are The Supremes?” he enquired in the taxi on the way to the concert. He was given a few facts. The Supremes heard that he was in the auditorium and, before the concert started, the lead singer announced how privileged they were to have “the greatest actor the world has ever known” in their midst. Olivier promptly went on stage and delivered an eloquent eulogy to The Supremes and their achievements. “And he’d never even heard of
them half an hour before!” said one of his party in wonder. “God!” said Olivier afterwards. “I’ve fallen in love.” He invited The Supremes to the next day’s matinée and, in his curtain speech, made them stand up and introduced them to the audience. They then went back stage and had a riotous time. “It was such fun,” said Edward Hardwicke. “Can you imagine Peter Hall doing it?”
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But he himself felt that he was beginning to lose his grip on things. Back in London, he found that he was facing what seemed to him a critical challenge. He had invited Peter Brook to direct Seneca’s “Oedipus”. His relationship with Brook had never recovered from the near-debacle of “The Beggar’s Opera” and it may have been the recollection of that contretemps that led Brook to introduce into the production some features that he knew Olivier would find offensive. At the end of the play the cast were to dance up and down the aisles to the tune of a jazzed-up version of “God Save the Queen”; meanwhile a vast phallus was to be displayed on the stage, first wrapped in swaddling clothes, then displayed to the world in proud erection. Olivier believed these to be vulgar and pointless extravagances which would destroy the effect of an otherwise impressive production. Brook refused to give way: John Gielgud, who was playing Oedipus, agreed with Olivier – “I understand why Larry was so upset; he thought they’d close the theatre.” He felt it was not his place to intervene, however, and when a fearful row broke out in his dressing room after the dress rehearsal, he fled the scene. He returned to find that the full-length mirror had been shattered – “I never discovered which of them had thrown the ashtray.” In fact, according to Frank Dunlop, who was also there, it was not an ashtray but Peter Brook himself, who tried to storm out and, in his rage, walked into the mirror instead.
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A compromise was eventually reached: the jazzed-up national anthem was dropped, but only on condition that “God Save the Queen” was not played at all; the phallus was retained. Tynan and Dunlop both took Brook’s side: Tynan relished the offending elements; Dunlop was less enthusiastic, but thought the director’s wishes should prevail. Olivier believed that he had been defeated: “I felt weak; I was weak; and weakly I gave in.” In Dunlop’s view he got the whole thing out of proportion; nobody paid any attention to the phallus and the bacchanalian riot amounted to very little. Olivier, though, felt that a crushing blow had been dealt to his authority. His relationship with Brook remained sour. A few months later he invited him back to direct “Antony and Cleopatra”. Possibly with some relish, he explained that the pay would have to be less than it had been in the case of “Oedipus”; the National Theatre was short of money. Brook took offence and accused Olivier of making him an insulting offer with the intention that it should be rejected. “Oh God, Peter,” Olivier replied. “I sometimes think you take a delight … in missing no opportunity of reminding me of the wretched level I hold in your estimation. It is hard to have to keep having to pluck up the courage to make continual efforts to settle our quarrel against a wall so obviously determined to keep things in this unhappy state.” In the end a reconciliation was achieved, but Brook never worked with Olivier again.
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What caused Olivier the greatest chagrin at this period, however, was not a production that did not turn out to his satisfaction but one which did not take place at all. He had set his heart on doing the American musical “Guys and Dolls”, reserving for himself the role of the crap-game impresario, Nathan Detroit. He believed “Guys and Dolls” to be a masterpiece, an Everest towering above the foothills of traditional musicals; he also longed to show that the National Theatre was up to any challenge. Nothing is taboo, he pronounced: “There may be some types of play that it is felt need to be represented with varying degrees of frequency or infrequency, but there is nothing against our producing a musical.” Robert Stephens did not agree. He canvassed opinion among
the actors – “which perhaps I should not have done,” he later admitted – and reported that the general view was that, if the National put on “Guys and Dolls” without professional American singers and dancers, the production would be no better than the work of “some local amateur operatic society”. Worse still, he infected the Board with his doubts. Chandos in particular was sceptical. He thought it would cost too much, he questioned whether “Guys and Dolls” could be considered a classic, he even doubted whether it came within “the terms of reference for which they received public subsidies”. The Board always preferred to leave the choice of plays to the Director, but, said Chandos, they would be shirking their duty if they did not consider these points. They duly considered these points and Olivier’s eloquence won the day; everyone except the Chairman either supported the project or felt that the decision should be left to the Director. “After great battle won Board meeting this morning,” Olivier cabled triumphantly to Garson Kanin, the American whom he planned should direct the musical. To Noël Coward he stressed how important for the
amour propre
of the company it was that they should show themselves capable of mounting such a production out of their own resources. “Of course we’re not going to do musicals every bloody year. This escapade is just to freshen up our dreary old image a bit.”
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Victory proved fleeting. Olivier’s health broke down and the Board ruled that, without him, it would be folly to press on. Don’t be so precipitant, urged Olivier. “Surely you wouldn’t turn down Paul Scofield, Richard Attenborough or Johnnie Mills, if I could get them?” He couldn’t get them, though, and the day seemed lost; but by the end of 1970 he had made an unexpectedly complete recovery. He returned to the charge and thought that he had once more prevailed; the long-term forecast which he prepared for Chandos envisaged the opening of “Guys and Dolls” in November 1971. “They proceed apace with ‘Guys’,” he told Kanin. “I shall start my own private preliminary dancing course in a couple of months.” Quite what happened next is obscure, but it seems that Paddy Donnell, the company manager, took fright at the expense of the production and
threatened to resign unless it was abandoned. Olivier could not afford the resignation of someone of such stature on the business side, and so gave way. “I was really betrayed by that,” Olivier remembered some years later. “This man was really responsible for my quitting the job, because when that happened, I thought, if I’m going to have to put up with treachery from my partners, I’m going.”
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