Joan Littlewood

by Peter Rankin

  The chief problem in his scenes was the actress, Madeleine Vimes, who was playing his secretary, Rose Rose. Right from the first reading, she had poured false emotion into her voice and now she was pacing up and down, rehearsing her inflections and, when Wole tried to loosen her up with jokes, couldn’t be budged. A little chat in Joan’s room ensued but this little chat went on and on. When Joan emerged, she said that, sweet, sensitive, Madeleine had become surprisingly tough and insensitive:

  ‘It’s unfair,’ she said, ‘Who’s going to play my part?’

  ‘It’s none of your business,’ said Joan.

  ‘Couldn’t I sit in and watch?’

  ‘No, we don’t want you spreading your misery round the cast.’

  ‘You’re all against me. You English, you went out and plotted it last night.’

  ‘No, no dear. Look, you’re an attractive woman. Go to Jean-Louis Barrault. Go to André Perinetti [a director, despised by Joan, who worked for the French Ministry of Culture on the Ivory Coast] but don’t come to me.’

  In a way, it was unfair, as this upheaval came so late in rehearsals. Joan had known, from the off, that Madeleine was no good but had left her in the show because there were bigger problems to face. The arrival of Wole had brought her up against this particular one. However, if Madeleine had been at all sensitive, she would have felt that things weren’t going right and that she wasn’t catching on. Joan said that when she was sacked as an actress, she had thought what a stupid, talentless person the director was and simply walked out. This wrestling that Madeleine went in for, she found most ungracious. Nor did it finish there.

  The second Madeleine was out of Joan’s room, she went round stirring up the actors, Hervé Sand, Fernand Ghiot and Jean Mondain, among them. She also threatened to inform the union if Nidal was given her part as she had no card. Jean Ruaud was in a panic. It was OK to fire Gérard Essomba, but Madeleine Vimes, that was another story. The white actors knew she was no good but she had worked at the TNP before and she was one of them.

  The next day, the Sand, Ghiot and Mondain delegation demanded a meeting. In fact, they broke into the middle of a rehearsal of the black company. This was a nuisance because the black company then had to become involved, though they had nothing to do with it.

  The atmosphere was electric as they sat there waiting for it to start. Hervé began:

  ‘We don’t know whether we’re coming or going. We don’t like this atmosphere of insecurity.’

  ‘Ah yes, reign of terror,’ popped in Joan.

  ‘OK, you’re the boss but we like to be aware of decisions and not find things done behind our backs. We want an explanation.’

  Joan then launched into one of her fabulous ‘explanations’. In such situations, she never gave a straight answer. It was always the most lavish, roundabout lecture lasting at least ten minutes. Halfway through this one, Fernand Ghiot walked out, which weakened his case.

  Instead of saying that Madeleine Vimes was a bad actress, which was the basic truth, Joan wove a long story about how, at her dear little theatre in Stratford (the dear little theatre she had previously wanted to blow up), they tried things out, dropped them if they didn’t work, tried something else and nobody was upset as it was all for the good of the show. Murderous Angels was like a milky white set of teeth which was rotten inside and only recently had she discovered that the part of Rose Rose was no good and it wasn’t Madeleine’s fault that she could make nothing of it. Maybe the part wouldn’t exist at all. Maybe she would give it to an actress from the black company. That was her problem and the actors would have to leave that to her. She was not able to realise that Rose Rose was nothing before now because there had been no Lumumba.

  When she had finished, Joan turned to Hervé and said: ‘Please make her come back and she can play all the other little roles she was rehearsing. I don’t want her to leave.’

  This cleared the air but then the company had not heard her make a speech like that before. Some of her actors back home had. What a good thing they were not there.

  The company for the show was by then fixed but Madeleine still wasn’t. She wanted a rendezvous over the weekend. Joan dutifully turned up at the Chai de l’Abbaye accompanied by Gerry with the intention of persuading her to come back but, by then, wishing she wouldn’t.

  ‘Where’s Georges Wilson and Jean Ruaud?’ asked Madeleine, her eyes popping out of her head, ‘I asked for a proper meeting with everybody.’ Joan couldn’t account for Wilson’s and Ruaud’s movements, so Madeleine had to make do with just her. It didn’t go well. In the end, Joan told her that she was badly in need of a psychiatrist. Hervé Sand had previously told Joan that Madeleine was highly strung, not to say neurotic. Even he began to get fed up when she rang him at all hours of the day or night during this affair.

  That was Madeleine sort of gone but her ghost lingered on. What was to happen to the role of Rose Rose? As soon as Joan had seen that Madeleine was not going to make it, she had wanted Nidal to play it and, indeed, that is what happened, except she became Arabic, was called Salma and had some of her wetter speeches cut. In some ways, it was a relief for Nidal to drop the choreography and concentrate on a part for herself, except that she didn’t like it much.

  By then Joan and the entire company had moved out of the rehearsal room and were permanently on the stage, which was healthier but had its own problem as Joan’s ideas of time on the stage didn’t coincide with those of Philippe Mulon, the stage manager. Rehearsals were from two to six and then from eight to midnight. But if ever she should go five minutes past six o’clock, the hair tearings! The flouncing! ‘Blerdy ferking Littlewood. If she loves her Theatre Workshop so much, why does she not go back there?’ The English contingency always thought Philippe was their ally and when he first made one of these scenes, they were put out but when they saw him making them day after day: ‘I won’t be treated like a child,’ and at the same time of day, they were no longer ruffled. He never did it in front of Joan, so he was just weak. Once he did but then it was by accident. She wasn’t supposed to see and she was quite upset until someone explained to her that it happened regularly.

  Because of the technical problems with the timing of the slides and film, Joan decided to have plenty of run-throughs. Georges Wilson, who had not been seen much, apart from one flabby visit to the black company for a head-masterly handshake, let Joan know that he would like to come to one of these run-throughs. Joan’s answer was that as soon as she thought it was good enough, she would let him know. Come run-through number one and there he was sitting just behind Joan, uninvited. Joan turned round. ‘You mustn’t judge this, you know.’

  ‘No, no, I am not here to judge at all.’ And to pledge his faith, he played a solo on his saxophone before the start.

  As a run-through, it wasn’t much cop but that was to be expected as it was the first on the stage. However, what could be seen when it was over? Sitting in a corner, surrounded by some of the white actors was Georges Wilson.

  John Wells came over to Joan. ‘Do you know what Wilson said? He said: “Frankly, I didn’t understand a thing. I mean, Jean Mondain, what are you doing?”’ Jean-Pierre Aumont, Hervé Sand, Jacques David, Jean Mondain were all very depressed.

  Joan didn’t say anything at the time. She merely returned to the Louisiane and, in a white rage, spent the entire night writing a letter to Georges Wilson. It was several pages long and damning. It included such phrases as, ‘You are a dead man who shouldn’t be running this theatre; you should hand it over to a young man.’ Early in the morning, she rang Gerry who advised her not to send this letter as it would completely break off all diplomatic relations and make life utterly miserable for the rest of the rehearsals. Instead this is what went:

  Joan Littlewood to Georges Wilson:

  ENTRANCE TO MY REHEARSALS IS BY INVITATION ONLY, SIR. I SAID I WOULD SEND YOU A PLAN DE TRAVAIL [a schedule] AND INDICATE WHEN THE SHOW WOULD BE READY TO BE SEEN. EVEN AFTER 8 WEEKS IN THIS THEATRE I WAS ASTON
ISHED BY YOUR EXTRAORDINARY DISCOURTESY IN DISCUSSING AND CRITICISING THE SHOW WITH MEMBERS OF THE COMPANY AND I MUST ASK YOU NOT TO COME BACK TILL INVITED.

  By the evening of that day, Jean Ruaud was skulking trying to get Joan to go and see Wilson. She refused, saying that the only things she had to say to him were best left unsaid.

  Ruaud went through his repertoire of sad smiles, diplomatic shoulder shrugging and sympathetic but useless remarks. The poor man, you could just see him doing exactly the same with Wilson in a few minutes time. Joan kept on saying that Wilson was despicable and ‘un con’ (con means cunt, though it doesn’t have the same power in French as it does in English). Finally Ruaud left whispering: ‘There’s something I’ll tell you in secret. You’re not the first one to say that.’ Everyone went out to have something to eat. On their return, they found Joan sitting alone at her improvised desk in the auditorium. Her face was pale and she looked whacked.

  ‘I’ve just done ten rounds with Georges Wilson.’

  He had come down to her private room bringing Philippe Léotard to do the translation. Philippe hadn’t even had time to get into the room before the yelling started, so, hearing that communication was perfectly adequate, he vanished. It was a fantastic row that started in her room, went out into the corridor and ended up in the theatre. Actually, it wasn’t exactly a row as Wilson just kept crawling and moaning: ‘Ah Joan, I love you. I was only doing my job.’

  Joan, at the same time, recited to him the precise contents of the first letter she had written during the night including the ‘dead man’ bit and quite a lot else including: ‘You are corrupt.’ To which he answered: ‘I know.’

  John Wells found Wole in the lavatory. It turned out that he’d prepared the ground splendidly. Wilson had come up to him and asked for Joan.

  ‘Ah yes, you’re Wilson, aren’t you?’ said Wole, ‘You’re looking for Joan? I warn you, she’s got a hatchet in her pocket to split your head open and I’m going to help her to use it.’

  All this was said with the most charming smile. The result of both attacks wasn’t bad. There was no more chat out of Wilson for quite a while. This bust-up was coming to him for he was guilty of repeated attempts at sabotage in the past but always involving young directors who couldn’t argue back. When he wailed to Joan: ‘I have never been spoken to like this before,’ he was probably telling the truth.

  Looking forward to a quiet night and a peaceful Sunday with Gerry, Joan returned to the Louisiane. From one o’clock onwards, every half hour, a different person rang her, each with a more shocking report. ‘Pints of blood!’; ‘Internecine war!’; ‘Georges Anderson will never play the guitar again.’ ‘Will you please explain,’ Gerry asked Joan. ‘No, I can’t. I’ll get empathy.’

  Gerry rang Akonio Dolo, the coolest of the black company and soon the stories of five different people were unravelled.

  It was nearly midnight and the black company was exhausted. Someone had noticed Manuel and Georges arguing in the corner but didn’t take it seriously. In the scene they’d been rehearsing they’d been porters and an argument had arisen over a piece of business. A few minutes later, they dropped it. Rehearsals came to an end and they went out for a drink. While they were drinking they dug up the argument again, only this time becoming more and more excited. Manuel had been fed up with Georges because of a lot of other things and this was the head of the boil. They decided to finish the argument outside. Georges took a glass. At a point when they were absolutely eyeball to eyeball, Georges hit Manuel across the face with the glass. Manuel bled profusely. Everybody gathered round. The police came. An ambulance came. They all went to hospital. Manuel made a charge and dropped it. Philippe Léotard offered to give evidence but the police told him to keep out of it and that is when the telephone calls started.

  Joan sat there, saying it was all her fault.

  As by then Gerry knew the name of the hospital where Manuel was and the name of the commissariat where Georges had been taken, he was able to make a couple of calls. The nurse at L’Hôpital Ambroise Paré told him that Manuel had not been seriously injured and the commissariat told him that Georges could not be reached until after three o’clock.

  Gerry took Joan out into the sun and it was indeed a beautiful day.

  ‘This kind of energy never destroys a company,’ said Gerry as they drove through the streets of Paris, ‘It’s boredom and apathy that are really dangerous.’ And then he took Joan to the Bois de Boulogne where they sipped champagne by a lake and talked of the past, of England, of walks on the moors and anything that took their minds off what they had to do. It was time to go. They braced themselves and got into the car. Of course, the address was wrong. There they were in a quiet road in the 16th arrondissement outside the Nicaraguan embassy. There was no hospital. It was the other side of the Bois de Boulogne. However, it was still a splendid day.

  The hospital was a big new place, bare and clinical but airy and clean. Magali, the wardrobe girl, and James Campbell were already there. Magali was waiting for Joan and Gerry in the corridor. ‘Iťs nothing much.’ They went in. It was a general ward with six beds in it and a television set. Even if Manuel had not been badly injured, Joan and Gerry still had to walk past patients with gashed faces, non-existent eyes, slashes across the mouth, noses and cheeks and one man in the corner who was completely purple. But then they saw him. There he was, at the furthest end, lying like a prince in mauve pyjamas with a little pom-pom of cotton wool on his temple. His face was untouched; thank the lord because he was a good-looking bloke. He waved and smiled. He could never be less than chic anywhere.

  Joan apologised. She felt that she had overworked the company and that that was the reason for the quarrel. She and Gerry talked about money. Gérard Lorin had already been in and suggested that Manuel could claim the costs of the hospital by saying that it was an accident that had happened on the way home from work. As things did not look so bad, Joan and Gerry hurried off to find Georges Anderson who was virtually in the nick.

  Actually, his commissariat was in a posh, quiet street and looked more like a hôtel particulier (a house on its own, rare in Paris, as most people live in apartments). The desk was upstairs and a policeman told Joan and Gerry that all was well. That came as a surprise. ‘You mean the little boy who was lost, don’t you?’ No, they did not. ‘Ah.’ They got shown into a little office where a plain-clothes policeman, stern but with a hint of camp, was off-hand. ‘No, you can’t see him. What do you want?’ Somebody else came into the room. He and the plain-clothes guy whispered together. The plain-clothes guy went out leaving Joan and Gerry sitting there like idiots. Joan looked around and said that it reminded her of the prison where Nidal’s father had once been held. The man came back:

  ‘What are you to Georges Anderson?’

  ‘I’m the metteur en scène,’ answered Joan.

  ‘Oh, j’adore les metteurs en scène,’ he whooped.

  Quickly he flicked on his intercom and ordered up Georges Anderson but he used Georges Anderson’s African name, reminiscent of Vautrin’s real name, Jacques Collin, Trompe-la-Mort, in Balzac’s Le Père Goriot. Georges was brought in. His hand was bandaged. His trousers were covered in blood. The camp policeman made him sign a document and he was free. If it hadn’t been for Joan, he would have had to stay another two hours. It was all red tape. He could have left in the morning. After all, Manuel had dropped the charge. Gerry and Joan were asked to leave by one door. Georges had to leave by another.

  As Gerry drove him home, Joan maintained that lots of people must have tried to reach him but the police had put them off. She didn’t want Georges to feel less favoured than Manuel who had received a lot of attention. You couldn’t say that Georges was the aggressor and that Manuel was the victim because they were both furious with each other. Perhaps if Georges had bled more and Manuel less, it might have been Georges in hospital and Manuel in the commissariat. Still, Wole said they should have used fists and that it was bloody stupid of Georges to p
ick up a glass.

  At Georges’s flat, his wife was waiting, pale and tearful. She had been to the commissariat early in the morning where they had been extremely rude to her. Firstly, they had refused to let her see Georges and then they had asked all sorts of impertinent questions. ‘How do you earn your living? In which district do you live? How much do you earn?’ All this because they wanted to know how a white woman got on being married to a black man.

  It was evening by then but still a beautiful day. In a daze and not really appreciating it, Joan and Gerry sat down at Les Deux Magots in the rue Saint-Germain-des-Prés and ordered thé citron (lemon tea).

  Part Four

  After his first reading of Diallo, which was the best piece of work he did, James Campbell was never as good. At first he pretended to be deferential towards Jean-Pierre but, by the time they’d reached the end of eight days’ rehearsal, the knives were out.

  They were running through what was always called scene ten, though the number was subsequently changed. In it, Diallo attacked Hammarskjöld for lying to the UN and not preventing the death of Lumumba. There had been many problems in the writing of it and the shape had only just been found. For once, it seemed to be going quite well and then suddenly Jean-Pierre broke off. ‘No, no. It’s impossible. How can I act a difficult scene like this if he’s going to carry on like that? He’s had the script long enough.’ James, from his side of the stage, started shouting about how it wasn’t easy working with Monsieur Aumont.

  Joan ran up between them to act as referee. ‘My children, my chidren, don’t fight,’ and she grabbed hold of their hands. ‘It was going so well. Poor James, he’s only been rehearsing for a week.’ What had happened was that James had not come back with a line that was in the rhythm Jean-Pierre wanted. He had made a long pause or perhaps he’d even forgotten it. As a result, it left Jean-Pierre hanging in the air looking a fool. Joan pacified both of them and they started again. With pure hatred between them, it went very well. If they could have been persuaded to do the row every night, the play would have been sure to run as long as The Mousetrap.