In such theatres work appealing to a
relatively small class of cultivated persons, and therefore
attracting only from half to three-quarters as many spectators as
the more popular pastimes, could nevertheless keep going in the
hands of young adventurers who were doing it for its own sake,
and had not yet been forced by advancing age and responsibilities
to consider the commercial value of their time and energy too
closely. The war struck this foundation away in the manner I have
just described. The expenses of running the cheapest west-end
theatres rose to a sum which exceeded by twenty-five per cent the
utmost that the higher drama can, as an ascertained matter of
fact, be depended on to draw. Thus the higher drama, which has
never really been a commercially sound speculation, now became an
impossible one. Accordingly, attempts are being made to provide a
refuge for it in suburban theatres in London and repertory
theatres in the provinces. But at the moment when the army has at
last disgorged the survivors of the gallant band of dramatic
pioneers whom it swallowed, they find that the economic
conditions which formerly made their work no worse than
precarious now put it out of the question altogether, as far as
the west end of London is concerned.
Church and Theatre
I do not suppose many people care particularly.
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