Volume VIII, Issue II October, 2010

RUTHERFORD & SON

Next at the Mint...Rutherford & SonBy Githa Soweby

EnrichMINT Events

Coming soon...Love Goes to PressBy Virgina Cowles & Martha Gellhorn

Spring Benetfit: April 23rd Save the Date!

FPC Box Office (212) 315-0231www.minttheater.org

By Githa SowerbyDirected By Richard Corley

Next at the Mint...

performances begin feb. 4th!

THE STORYJohn Rutherford rules home and business with an iron fist, a tyrant who inspires fear in his workers and hatred in his grown children. Now rebellion is brewing. His eldest son, working in secret has discovered a process that could save the firm, cut-ting costs by one third—but he refuses to share it with his father unless he “gets his price.”

Written 100 years ago by Githa Sowerby, “this acute play shows how by striking hard bargains and always winning, a man may lose everything. The play is as skillful as blown glass. It is a subtle meditation on ownership, justice, and loyalty” wrote Kate Kellaway in The Observer, reviewing the National Theater’s revelatory 1994 production. Reviewing the same production, Charles Spencer wrote in the Daily Telegraph, “It is far better than most of Shaw and easily stands comparison with another Edwardian masterpiece, Harley Granville Barker’s The Voysey Inheritance…A great play has been reclaimed.”

Rutherford & Son, set in the industrial north of England, tells the story of a father determined to do whatever it takes to ensure the success and succession of the family glassworks, started by his own father, but now in danger of shattering.

HISTORYRutherford & Son was scheduled for only four performances when it opened at London’s Royal Court Theatre on January 31, 1912. Critical response was so enthusiastic the play quickly transferred to the West End. “One of the very best, strongest, deftest, and al-together most masterly family dramas that we have had for a long time from any one, however famous,” wrote one London critic. Productions were soon slated across Europe and America.

The New York premiere in 1912 stunned American critics: “A play that carries conviction in every line—that leaves no doubt that it was written out of a fullness of knowledge of the life and people with which it deals,” wrote The New York Times.

David Van Pelt and Robert Hogan from Mint's 2001 production of Rutherford & Son. Both actors will be returning in 2012.

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The power of Sowerby’s writing wasn’t the only sensation surrounding Rutherford & Son. People were astounded when this first-time playwright—K.G. Sowerby—was revealed to be a woman. A reporter for the Los Angeles Times observed “She is the last person in the world one would expect to find as the author of so grim, powerful, and closely thought-out drama of business.”

Few realized business ran in Sowerby’s blood. Like the characters in her play, Katherine Githa Sowerby (1870-1976)— known as Githa—came from a wealthy family that had owned a prominent Tyne-side glassworks. In the 1850’s, the Sow-erbys’ Ellison Glass Works was Europe’s leading manufacturer of pressed glass. The family had stopped at nothing to succeed. Githa’s stern grandfather, John, the prob-able inspiration for Rutherford, was par-ticularly ruthless. He swallowed up failing businesses, arranged financially gainful but loveless marriages for his children, and had no time for sentiment. His exact-ing standards inspired fear and grudging awe; yet he was just as hard on himself. Once, during a strike, he shocked everyone by stripping off his customary frock coat and top hat to shovel coal into the furnaces—one and a half times more than any of his employees could manage. The incident evolved into fami-ly legend, and lives on in Githa’s play.

Githa’s father, John George, was more interested in art than business. When John Sowerby died in 1879, John George focused his energies on developing new types of art glass, not reinvigorating the family business. Profits nosedived. The board forced him to resign. Unphased, he became a landscape painter, living off dwindling capital while his wife and chil-dren struggled to forge an existence.

By 1906, Githa and her sister Millicent had moved into their own flat in London.

Financial need, as much as artistic aspira-tion, drove them to create children books. It’s not clear why Githa suddenly decided to take up playwriting, but when she did, she did so with a vengeance. Rutherford & Son blazes with a ferocity and depth of character rarely achieved by experienced authors, much less a first time playwright with no knowledge of the theater.

After Rutherford, Githa wrote mainly comedies; none achieved critical or fi-nancial success. Her whimsical “curtain raiser,” Before Breakfast (spring 1912) was dismissed by the Guardian as something “that might have been written by any dra-matic hack of the day.” A Man and Some Women (1914), her first full-length work after Rutherford, received such lukewarm notice in Manchester it never transferred to London. Sowerby returned to the West

End with the bittersweet romantic come-dy Sheila (1917), but the play was branded a disappointment and closed early. An-other romantic comedy, The Stepmother (1924), had only one performance at London’s Play Actors Club and was never published. Her last play, Direct Action, written in 1937/8, was never produced or published.

The London Times had once predicted a brilliant theatrical future for Sowerby, but that future never arrived. They had called Rutherford & Son “a play not easily forgot-ten,” but by the time of her death in 1970, it had faded from memory. No papers carried Sowerby’s obituary.

Fame never rested easily on Githa’s shoul-ders. A private person, she disliked in-terviews and burned her personal papers shortly before she died. When interest in her work began to rekindle, people still

knew very little about her. A 1980 revival of Rutherford & Son inspired productions across England, culminating with the National’s acclaimed revival in 1994. But it wasn’t until 2009, when scholar Pa-tricia Riley published Looking for Githa, that concrete details of Githa’s life emerged. Riley interviewed Githa’s daughter and uncovered previously un-known archival materials in London and British Colum-bia, assembling the first biog-raphy of this compelling artist.

“Sowerby knew what she was talking about,” wrote Lyn Gardner in her Guard-

ian review of the 2009 Newcastle produc-tion of Rutherford & Son. “The amazing thing is that she did it so blatantly and with such flair almost 100 years ago, when women were seen but seldom heard on British stages.” The Mint is proud to re-introduce American audiences to Sow-erby’s masterpiece.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Program and tickets, signed by the author. 1912.

Githa Sowerby

Why revive a play you’ve already produced?First of all, we did this play ten years ago: September 2001. Our opening night was set for September 12th, which of course we had to cancel. When we resumed performances on the 13th, everyone had a pretty hard time concentrat-ing, audiences and actors alike. Of course the actors rose to the challenge and the play worked its magic. Audiences were transported to another place and time and taken out of themselves for a couple of hours. I do remember how grateful people were for that. But I’ve always felt that the play deserved a better opportunity. It was a very difficult time.

You said, “First of all.” Are there other reasons?We’ve made so many new friends since that time and we’ve grown so much. We’re in a position now to reach a much larger audience. Nowadays we run for eight to ten weeks and our shows are seen by 5,000 to 6,000 people. In 2001, Rutherford & Son ran for a month; about 1,700 people saw the show. We only had 82 seats at the time; this was when were still on the 5th floor. I was looking back through the old box office records, it’s kind of amazing—we had to turn people away our last four performances–in spite of every-thing. We played to 94% of capacity.

What else has changed since that time?In some ways very little has changed. For example, the set and lighting designers for Rutherford & Son ten years ago, Vicki Davis and Jeff Nellis, just did the designs for Temporal Powers. But the budgets are certainly different! In 2001 our total expenses for the production were about 15% of what they’ll be this time around.

Wow, what accounts for the huge increase?We spend more on everything, sets, costumes, programs, you name it. Lots more. But the biggest difference is that back then the actors were working for car-fare (and even that was a lot cheaper than it is today!) Now the actors are on con-tract, earning salaries—plus we contribute to their union’s pension and health fund.

So, does that mean you get much better actors now?No! That isn’t the case at all, we had a fantastic cast in 2001 and some of those actors will be back this time around. We can’t have everyone back, because after all, ten years is a long time, if you know what I mean…but we had terrific peo-ple. For example, Robert Hogan played Rutherford ten years ago and he’s coming back to rule the roost again. Bob has been a working actor for 50 years with endless stage, film and T.V. credits. Right now he’s in rehearsal at Lincoln Center for the new play Blood and Gifts by J.T. Rogers, directed by Bartlett Sher.

How did you manage to get a guy like that to do a play at the Mint ten years ago for no money?We were very lucky to have him, no doubt. And lucky to have him back, too. I think good actors are always going to be drawn to good roles in good plays. Sometimes they have to follow the money but sometimes they have to follow their hearts. They don’t always lead in the same direction! I’m happy to say that Bob has stayed in touch and been a fan and supporter. When I began thinking about bringing this play back, the first thing I did was to check on his availability–along with Richard Corley, who directed the first production. I’m thrilled to have both of these guys back and I’m looking forward to sharing this play with all of the new people who have become friends of the Mint in the last ten years.

The Mint first produced Rutherford & Son in 2001. We began perfor-mances on September 7, 2001—and in spite of marvelous reviews, this play could not possibly get the audience it deserved at that tumultu-ous time. One hundred years after it was first produced, we are thrilled to give Rutherford & Son another chance to dazzle New York theater-goers.

Q & A with JONATHAN BANK

“The Geiger counter that the Mint Theater Company waves over the-ater history in search of long-un-performed treasures has identified a still-ticking nugget. The play has emotional depth, narrative pull, and linguistic potency to retain an impact today.”

The New York Times.

Sunday, February 19 after the matineeDr. Michael Cadden, Princeton University

Michael Cadden is currently Director of the Program in Theater and Dance at Princeton University, where he has been teaching for 25 years. In 1993, Michael was awarded the University’s President’s Award for Dis-tinguished Teaching. In 2003, he helped inaugurate Princeton’s new Roger S. Berlind Theater. He began his career at Yale School of Drama, where he worked for four years as a dramaturg at the Yale Repertory Theatre under Lloyd Richards and as a lecturer in the dramaturgy, directing, and acting programs.

Sunday, February 26 after the matineeDr. Martin Meisel, Columbia University

Martin Meisel is the Brander Matthews Pro-fessor Emeritus of Dramatic Literature at Columbia. He is the author of Shaw and the Nineteenth-Century Theater (Princeton and Oxford), Realizations: Narrative, Pictorial, and Theatrical Arts in Nineteenth-Century England (Princeton), as well as numerous essays and articles on drama and the visual arts. He has been the recipient of two Gug-genheim Foundation Fellowships, an Ameri-can Council of Learned Societies Fellowship, residential fellowships at the National Hu-manities Center, the Woodrow Wilson In-ternational Center for Scholars, the Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities (Ed-inburgh); and of awards from the American

Philosophical Society and the Huntington Library among others. In 2003 he received the Presidential Award for Outstanding Teaching at Columbia.

Saturday March 3 after the matineeDr. J. Ellen Gainor, Cornell University

Soon after moving to London, Githa Sow-erby joined the Fabian Society, becoming a member of the influential group of writers, artists, and public intellectuals that included Bernard Shaw, H. G. Wells, and Sidney and Beatrice Webb. Dr. Gainor will discuss how Sowerby’s affiliation with the Fabian Social-ists profoundly affected her playwriting.

J. Ellen Gainor is Professor of Theatre and Associate Dean of the Graduate School at Cornell. A specialist in British and Ameri-can drama of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and women’s dramaturgy, she is the author of the award-winning studies Shaw’s Daughters: Dramatic and Narrative Construc-tions of Gender and Susan Glaspell in Con-text: American Theater, Culture and Politics 1915-48. Most recently, she edited The Nor-ton Anthology of Drama. She has edited two influential essay collections, Imperialism and Theatre and Performing America: Culture Na-tionalism in American Theater. With Linda Ben-Zvi, she co-edited The Complete Plays of Susan Glaspell, the first complete anthology of Glaspell’s plays. Dr. Gainor is currently editing the Collected Works of Githa Sowerby.

EnrichMINT Events

Donald J. Jonovic has been an advisor to family business owners since 1973, focus-ing on the unique issues related to manage-ment development, growth, and ownership transition, particularly ownership transition

of the successful owner-managed business. His professional consulting practice has included industrial and agricultural clients throughout North America, ranging in size from $5 million to $2 billion.

ON THE PLAY AND ITS AUTHORThree leading scholars from the Ivy League—Princeton, Columbia, and Cornell—join us for discussions on Rutherford & Son and playwright Githa Sowerby.

ON THE ISSUESDr. Donald J. Jonovic, an internationally respected family business consultant, will discuss the play’s portrayal of family business and intergenerational conflict.

Sunday March 4th, after the matineeDonald J. Jonovic, Founder, Family Business Management Services, Inc.

Saturday February 11th & Sunday February 12th (after the matinees)

Patricia RileyAuthor, Looking for Githa

Pat Riley, Leeds-based author and the world’s leading author-ity on Githa Sowerby, will share her groundbreaking insights into Sowerby’s life and work during three special EnrichMint Events.

The details of Githa Sowerby’s life were a mystery until Pat Ri-ley wrote Looking for Githa, the first Sowerby biography, in 2009. During her research, Riley uncov-ered previously unknown docu-ments in England and Canada and conducted several interviews with Sowerby’s elderly daughter Joan. The project was funded by the Arts Council of England.

Ms. Riley has degrees in law, so-cial science, and management. On retirement from a career in government, she began a degree in theatre studies, deepening her life-long love of theatre. During her coursework, she was intro-duced to a powerful play by an early twentieth century feminist playwright no one seemed to know anything about—Ruther-ford and Son by Githa Sowerby. Curious to discover what kind of a woman had been brave enough in 1912 to wrote this play, Ms. Riley began the research that end-ed with the publication of Look-ing for Githa.

**All events take place immediately after the performance and usually las about fifty minutes. They are free and open to the public. Speakers and dates subject to change without notice.

A Man and Some Women debuted in 1914 at Annie Horni-man’s influential Gaiety Theatre in Manchester. (Mint audi-ences may remember it was Horniman who first brought Ar-nold Bennett’s What the Public Wants to America in 1913). The play tells the story of a man (Richard) and the women dependent upon him—his wife (Hilda), his unmarried sisters (Rose and Elizabeth), and a family friend (Jessica).

Sowerby hoped for a London transfer. She had bad tim-ing. Britain’s escalating involvement in the First World War meant dwindling demand for thoughtful drama. The play never made it out of Manchester and was never published.

A Man and Some Women was forgotten until 1995, when a small Bristol company, Show of Strength, revived it to posi-tive notices. “So Rutherford & Son wasn’t a one-off won-der…. Sowerby’s intelligent and heartfelt examination of personal freedom makes compelling theatre,” wrote The Independent.

Nevertheless, few people paid any attention to A Man and Some Women until the Mint’s artistic director, Jonathan Bank, read the play while researching the 2001 produc-tion of Rutherford & Son . When the Shaw Festival pro-duced Rutherford in 2004 he gave a packet of Sowerby’s lost plays—including A Man and Some Women and a later work, The Stepmother, which upturns the notion of a wicked stepmother—to the Shaw Festival’s artistic director, Jackie

Maxwell. She had been search-ing for these plays herself, but the search had proven fruitless, un-til Bank, whom she dubbed “the Indiana Jones of arcane play-writing” came along. Maxwell directed The Stepmother for the Shaw in 2008 and in the summer of 2012, the Festival will present A Man and Some Women.

The Mint is pleased to share A Man and Some Women with our audience, showing you another side to the astonishing Githa Sowerby.

Join us for dinner and discussion with Patricia Riley at EtceteraEtcetera before the reading! Tickets are $60, which includes dinner, read-ing of A Man and Some Women, followed by a discussion, and a complimentary signed copy of her book, Looking for Githa!

For tickets call 212-315-0231 Or send/fax the order form to

212-977-5211

EtcEtc is located at 352 W. 44th St. (between 8th and 9th Ave.)

Looking for Githa by Patricia RileyLooking for Githa is the first and only biography of playwright Githa Sowerby. A private person, Sowerby disliked interviews and spoke little of her family’s tur-bulent history. Almost nothing was known of her life for over a century, until Leeds-based author Pat Riley began her research.

Riley uncovered previously unknown records in Eng-land and Canada to assemble this revelatory study, link-ing elements of Sowerby’s family history directly to her playwriting. The book also includes personal reminisc-es from Sowerby’s elderly daughter, Joan, whom Riley interviewed several times.

A Night Out with the Mint! A Special EnrichMINT Event

A Man and Some Women by Githa Sowerby

Featuring a discussion with Patricia Riley, author of Looking for Githa.

Love Goes to Press opened at London’s Em-bassy Theatre in 1946 to enthusiastic re-views—the Stage said “the humor rises to brilliance”—and it quickly transferred to the West End. The play was a resound-ing success—much to its authors’ surprise. Gellhorn and Cowles, seasoned journalists but newbie playwrights, had written Love Goes to Press as a lark. Theatrical workings baffled them. They did not know, for example, that playwrights were expected to attend rehearsals, or that, as writers, they were entitled to free tickets. Gellhorn recalled see-ing the play for the first time on opening night—from the balcony, in seats she and Cowles bought themselves:

After the final curtain, with the cast lined up on the stage, there were cries of ‘Author, Author!’ Ginny and I fled from the balcony into the night. We did not know that authors are supposed to make a gracious little speech when the audience is ap-plauding loudly and calling for them.

With a hit on their hands, the play’s pro-ducers fully expected Love Goes to Press to repeat its success in America. Notices on the road were good—the Washington Post deemed it “light, laughable, loqua-cious entertainment”—but Broadway was a different story. Opening on New Year’s

Day 1947, it folded after just four perfor-mances—and hasn’t been produced since.

Years later, Gellhorn speculated New York audiences simply weren’t ready to laugh at the war. She and Cowles had written their fun, frothy

romantic comedy as “an antidote to the heart-sickening cost of war. Everyone longed to laugh in the first cold winter of peace. Laughter was a life-saving escape.” London audiences, fresh from the war, understood. They felt

entitled to laugh; New York audiences did not. “Some jokes, like some white wines, don’t travel,” Gellhorn mused.Of course, some wines improve with age—and the same could be said of Gell-

horn and Cowles’ ruefully funny play. Love Goes to Press paints a delicious portrait of two smart, funny, brave, ambitious and complex women—journalists working just miles from the European front (as Cowles and Gellhorn did)— surrounded by less competent, less adven-turous men. “Sex rears its head-lines among the clat-tering overtones of war-time reporting in the field,” as everyone falls in and out of love, then back again. Pro-fessor Sandra Spanier of the University of Pennsylvania, who rescued the play from the ash-heap and was re-sponsible for its publica-tion in 1995, describes it as “part comedy of er-rors, part English-coun-try-house farce, part

Woman of the Year, a fasci-nating piece of American literary history.”

Now the Mint gives Love Goes to Press its due, with a full production directed by Jerry Ruiz. Performances begin May 26, 2012.

Martha Gellhorn (1908-1998) covered nearly every major conflict during her lifetime, from the Spanish Civil War to the U.S. invasion of Panama (when she was 81). Famously, she was one of the few reporters who witnessed D-Day; she did so by locking herself in the toilet of a hospital ship—the first ship to survive the crossing. Gellhorn published 17 books during her six-decade career as a journalist, short story writer, and novelist.

Virginia Cowles (1910-1983) served as a war correspondent for the New York Times, the London Times, and the Daily Telegraph. During World War II, she interviewed Mussolini and Chamberlain and covered the German invasion of Poland. Cowles also wrote 15 books of non-fiction, including the 1941 bestseller Looking for Trouble.

COMING UP... Love Goes To Press

save the date!

Stop the presses! This spring, the Mint presents the first revival of Love Goes to Press by Martha Gellhorn and Virginia Cowles—“the kind of comedy which mingles public relations, private lives, lines of commu-nication, tough dames, and tender passages.”

You may remember...

Our spRing benefit 2008

Linda & Lloyd AltermanSylvia AmatoHugh Baron & Carla LordFrances BauerJulia Beardwood & Jonathan WillensAl BerrEvelyn BishopZelda & Julian BlockDebra BrockwayEdgar BrownJason J. BuzasDavid CarlyonJames CaseAbraham ClottJohn ComiskeyMichael CrowleyWanda Davenport & Martin CohenStuart & Sue DavidsonDavid DayThomas DieterichNancy M. DonahueHerzl EisenstadtQuince EvansColleen FayRobert & Judy FenertySimon Fischer

Jerry Floersch & Jeffrey LonghoferDonald FoxCharlotte FrankMary GeissmanCaryl GoldsmithJoyce Gordon & Paul LubetkinBeatrice GottliebVirginia GrayLeonard GreenbergAllen & Linda GreengrassDawn GuerrieroHugh HeckmanMelanie HermanSamantha HerreraSusan HillRobert & Mary Barbara HoganHeather & Bruce HornerHarriet InselbuchSarah JonesKaren Kelly SandkeLaurie Kennedy & Keith ManoMartin Kesselman & Linda IrenegreeneGerald & Marlene Kolbert Paul LaferrierePearl & Karl LazarEllen & Roger LeedsRenee Lerner

Teresa LevineGloria & Mitchell LevitassMarlene LitwinMaristella LorchMary & Boyd LowryMary Rose MainGloria Marti & Fred T. FergusonJean MayIlse MelamidMaureen MurphyMary NelsonTerence O’NeilPatricia O’SheaRichard & Dotti OswaldJonathan ParkerSuzan And Martin PeglerAnick PlevenSheila & Irwin PolishookRobert & Carlo PrinskyJudith QuillardBetty ReardonEdith RehbeinOna Robinson & Edward StephensJames RoeMichael RubinCatherine ScaillierLouis Scheeder

Barbara SchoetzauJay M. SchwammVeronica ScutaroJohn SettelSuzanne ShaughnessyGeorge & Marjorie SheaStephen SheppardVirginia ShieldsMarian SilberMartin & Kayla SilberbergJoyce K. SimonSusan SitnerJanet & Mike SlosbergDouglas SmithDennis & Katharine SwansonSusan Tackel & Elias B. SilvermanSheila & Arthur TaubAnne TeshimaVirve TootsJacob WaldmanKurt Wissbrun

We made our match!! The Mint is a proud recipient of a $50,000 grant from Bloomberg Philanthropies. We were challeged to raise $10,000 in matching funds, and with the generosity of our loyal patrons like you, we made our match! Thank you so much to those who contributed!

Monday April 23rd, 2012

Mint Theater Company’s

Spring Benefit 2012

the Importance of BeIng... rachelCelebrating the life and works of Rachel Crothers

TERESA DEEVY RECLAIMED · TEMPORAL POWERS· KATIE ROCHE· WIFE TO JAMES WHELAN Edited by Jonathan Bank, John P. Harrington, and Christopher Morash

$15.95 *Shipping is FREE for FPC

To Order: Call us at 212- 315-0231, send in the order form, or visit www.minttheater.org

Mint's NEW book!save the date!

*This list represents donations made spe-cifically for the Bloomberg Philanthro-pies challenge grant as of 10/26/2011. Every effort is made to ensure its accu-racy. Please contact us regaurding any mistakes

Dear Friends,

November and December are planning months here at the Mint. This edition of the First-Priority Club Newsletter is filled with information about our plans for the winter and spring. I know it may be a long time to wait for our next production, but I hope it’s not too far away for you to make your plans to join us.

Those of you who have been supporting the Mint for a while may recognize both of the titles announced within. Our next production, which will begin performances in February, 2012, is a play that we first produced ten years ago. Inside you’ll find a full explanation of why we’re reviving this play—in short: it’s a great play. Are there other plays from our own past that we might bring back? It’s certainly possible. If you have a favorite, let me know—I’d love to hear from you!

The other familiar title within is the play we have scheduled for this summer with performances beginning at the end of May. This comedy is one that we did a reading of four years ago at our annual benefit. At the time, numerous people who had enjoyed the reading encouraged me to plan a full production. I promised that I would, when I felt the time was right. Hopefully my sense of timing is correct and this will turn out to be the perfect moment.

Timing plays an important role in the planning process here at the Mint. It’s not enough to have a good play (although that certainly is important). Having a good play at just the right time can make all the difference. Just think of the attention we might have received if we had been running “What the Public Wants”, Arnold Bennett’s satire about a media tycoon who doesn’t know where to draw the line at the same time that the “phone-hacking” scandal was at its height!

I hope you enjoy a peaceful and fulfilling holiday season, which will be upon us all before you know it. And I hope you enjoy reading about our plans for 2012. I look forward to seeing you back at the Mint before long.

All the best,

Jonathan

311 West 43rd Street, Suite # 307New York, NY 10036 www.minttheater.org(212) 315-0231

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