The Guardian from London, Greater London, England • 12

12 THE GUARDIAN MANCHESTER Monday January 1 1973 In the first of two extracts from his new book, 'The Modern Actor, MICHAEL BILLINGTON looks at the problems of training actors School for shambles Into Europe, andante ployment has been worse than at any time since the" war, and the balance of payments has recently showed signs of dipping into the same old trough from which only Labour's painful post-devaluation squeeze temporarily rescued it And can we remember that all this happened before we entered Europe Can we remember also that it was partly in the hope of rescuing Britain from growing political aimlessness and economic lassitude that governments of the two parties have in turn sought membership of the' Community Labour is entitled, if it regains power, to seek changes, particularly with the benefit of experience. The Community is, and needs to be, an evolving institution. Even the Common Agricultural Policy may not be written on tablets of stone. One temptation should be avoided, however to prepare a future Labour Government's negotiating position by seeking, month after month, to prove that membership of the Community has created all Britain's ills. We enter Europe with the reputation of being a nation of shopkeepers we would be unwise to present ourselves as a nation of second-hand-car dealers.

Above all we should avoid creating a new, semi-permanent rift in British society, between pro and anti Europeans Britain has much to contribute to the new Europe's main need for effective democratic control of a bureaucracy that grows in power all the time. In making that contribution we may even give our own parliamentary institutions a new injection of vigour and some relief from the staleness that long unsolved problems have created at Westminster. If the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle Well, it's a pity that the Fanfare for Europe is not more harmonious, but in polities as in music dissonance has always been inevitable if the Second Fiddles play a different tune. In this case it must be acknowledged that a large part of the country is not ecstatic about the score. The journey into Europe will be bumpy and discordant.

That is sad. but not disastrous. What will be disastrous is if Britain devotes the next two. three, or four years to introspective champing over the issue Who went wrong when Among the mot human and least attractive phrases in the English language is I told you so." There will be much scope for such a Great Recriminative Debate. The transition period will not be all Beau-jolais and boules.

Change is always painful, and although the change arising from membership of the European Community will not be as sudden or all-pervasive as either its zealots or its most fiery critics believe, there will be enough change to cause trouble if people are determined. Surely enough inconclusive balance sheets have now been drawn up, worried over, and discarded. If every change in prices, costs, wages, taxation, growth, and unemployment is to be put under the microscope to separate its European from its non-European elements, the effect on British politics and possibly on Britain's role in Europe and the world will be corrosive. Can we remember the next few years that the past few years prices have been rising sharply, unem actors should allowed to act just as writers should be allowed to write is full of logical flaws. For one thing a writer does not undergo an expensive, three-year subsidised training programme before being launched into his profession; for another no one could say, with publishers still putting out upwards of 20,000 titles a year, that the opportunities to get into print are as severely limited as an actor's opportunities for appearing on the boards or in front of a camera; and a writer can practise his craft in isolation whereas an actor must necessarily be part of a group.

Admittedly Professor Johnson's thesis "that a restriction in the number of actors would lead to a raising of the minimum fees and a consequent rise in ticket prices is economically accurate. Eut to argue from this that vou should have a large pool of unemployed actors to keep prices and wages artificially low is to return to a nineteenth century' cheap labour principle that surely went out when children stopped sweeping chimneys and working fourteen hours a day in blacking factories. If entry into the acting profession is to be operated rationally and sensibly, the onlv possible solution is severely to restrict the number of' students accepted for formal training; and that means rationing the number of drama schools. At the moment the situation is appalling. Anyone can set up a drama school provided the building has enough lavatories and fire escapes to get planning permission.

There is no one to deter-nvne whether or not such a school is necessary no one to say whether standards are adequate no one to determine whether or not the training is in any way related to the needs of the acting profession. There is even a terrifying shortage of facts about the number of schools in existence. In December 1969 the. Equity Council invited representatives of a number of interested parties (including the Department of Education and Science, the Arts Council, the Council of Repertory Theatres) to their Ilarley Street headquarters to discuss the situation. It emerged that no one.

including the Government, had any precise facts about the number of schools claiming to provide training or about the number of stud.ents pouring out every year. TOMORROW: Sex and acting "The Modern Actor," by Michael Bilhngton, is published on Thursday by Hamish Hamilton, price 3.75. HPHE problem of preparation for the acting profession is a complex one. Too obsessive a concern with vocational training leads to a battery-hen system too minimal a concern puts the student at a commercial disadvantage. But what amazes me is the relative indifference of drama school teachers to some of the specialised demands of the profession in particular, camera acting.

A recent Equity survey suggested that the average actor spends 17 weeks a year working in the theatre and 19 days in front of a camera sufficient, I should have thought, to lead to courses in television and cinema work. Yet at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Hugh Crutt-well told me they were forced to abandon television work because of the cost. "We used to get the students into the studio as a career exercise. We would have a play directed for the stage and get a TV director in and convert it into a television production. We stopped doing this because the cost is prohibitive.

A day at the studios cost 300. We abandoned it for those reasons. It seemed a minimal gesture anyway. As it is. actors are thrown in at the deep end with a TV studio and have to digest things quickly.

If an actor knows how to use his body properly, he'll be all right. Ideally more time would be devoted to television and films but this is onlv a marginal extension of the basic work The second question as to whether drama schools are turning out too many students is still more serious. It is also perennially topical In 1924 Constantin Stanislavski wrote Without talent or ability one must not go on the stage. In our organised schools of dramatic art today it is not so. What they need is a certain quantity of paying pupils And not everyone who can pay has talent or can hope to become an artist." Rluch the same situation applies in Britain today.

At RAD A. Cruttwell admitted that he's fighting the idea that the academy is a wealthy institution that in fact the staff have to subsidise the school by accepting low salaries and that in every intake of 27 people there are bound to be some who are there just to make up the numbers (' There just aren't 27 really first-rate actors everv two terms. Olivier says there is plenty of talent about but not enough skill I would say there is too much competence but not enough And if RADA, with it 1.000 applicants a year, has to take in a certain num- Our owners the Seott Trust wanted to act had the right to pursue his chosen profession, then these islands would soon be populated largely by actors whose only possible audience would be unemployed actors. On the other side Professor H. G.

Johnson of the London School of Econmics argued that restriction of entry into the profession would bolster the efforts of its members to raise their wages at the expense of the theatregoing public, restrict the freedom of opportunity of aspiring actors and actresses and give undue power to whoever controlled entry." And Richard O'Donogliue, administration registrar of RADA. put what is basically the drama school case very clearly and cogently. He claimed that the stage had now become respectable that the use of drama in education was officially advocated and that therefore there was a positive encouragement during the formative years of a mimetic "impulse which in the past might not have been allowed to survive. Has then." he inquired. the individual actor a right to pursue hib art as a means of livelihood It has never been suggested that there are too many writers or that thoe who do not belong to the of Authors should not be allowed to write books.

Similarly no actor should be barred from drawing an audi-enc; or finding employment if he can The O'Donoghue line that ber of students to help balance the books, one can well imagine what the situation is in lefcb distinguished academies Not surprisingly, therefore, drama schools almost invariably oppose any restriction of entrv into the acting profession" in order to protect their own future However Equity, the actors" trade union, wants severely to limit the number of people coming into acting every year and simply on numerical grounds it has a very strong' case. In 1969 alone some 2,300 new members joined 'the Union Yet net membership went up by onlv 1.000 which means that 1.300 actors must have given up th3 profession. Public money is obviously being wasted on training people for work that stmply does not exist. And talent is also being wasted in that nothing saps an actor's self-confidence more surely than long and futile periods of unemployment. The argument? for some restriction on entry, advanced by the president and general secretary of Equity and several members nf the union in letters to the press in 1970 were basically these that there was currently far too little work and far ton many actors: that the situation was getting worse rather than better that as long as the acting profession had such a large labour force there would be low wages and appalling backstage conditions that if everyone who financial benefit and much of their political control.

That is why the biggest popular papers are never likely to come under trust ownership they are too profitable and have too often been vehicles for their proprietors' political ambitions. The late Lord Beaverbrook made the Daily Express a sizzling publication, worth millions of pounds, but he did it chiefly for propaganda purposes (as he himelf said) Even newspapers whose life has seemed done, as recently the Daily Mail and the Sun, have regenerated themselves with, new management or new proprietors. That again shows the strength to be found in the diversity of the British press. While our society is based on a mixed economy which it probably will be for generations to come it seems appropriate that some newspapers should be under chiefly commercial ownership and some under public service ownership. Even a public service trust, however, must organise its papers so that together they make a profit.

The Scott Trust has done so by running the Guardian and the Manchester Evening News together as a partnership. The losses of one can be offset by the profits of the other, and each has had its periods of prosperity. That a group must pay its way commercially, whatever its form of ownership, is an essential condition of survival. The Scott Trust has brought one other benefit to the Guardian that of an exceptional editorial freedom. The only instruction given to the editor on appointment is to carry on the paper' in the same spirit as before.

While he holds office he is free from political or personal interference by trustees or directors. It is an enviable position, though also one that carries a serious responsibility. In the words of C. the newspaper is an instrument of government," playing on the minds and consciences of men: That today it has more readers than ever before is some comfort and, in keeping with its spirit It ma sound incestuous or immodest if the Guardian gives thanks for the Scott Trust. But the fact that the paper is owned by a trust one whose sole object is public service remains the reason why the Guardian exists today.

It could have been sold, merged, or converted to Conservatism at high profit to its owners manv times in its history. It has been kept alive, vigorous, and independent because C. P. Scott wanted it so and because his descendants created a trust, renouncing their own personal benefit from ownership, in order to cairy on the paper in the same spirit as heretofore." The Scott Trust is unique in British newspaper ow nership. No other trust involves renunciation of beneficial ownership Its origins are described on page 17 today the centenary of C.

P. Scott's appointment as editor, leading to his purchase of the paper, and so eventually to creation of the Trust. Trust ownership is not a device that all newspapers can or should adopt. Part of the strength of the British press lies in the wide variety of its control and character. Nowhere else in the world notwithstanding Mr Wilson's criticism of unanimity and uniformity does the reader have such a range of choice among styles and viewpoints in daily newspapers.

But the choice has narrowed in recent years, and economic forces could make it narrower still. Rising costs, stiffer competition, and the growth of television may take their toll These forces could be resisted more readily if one or two more of the national newspapers and of those outside London could come under the ownership of individual trusts. Even during Mr Wilson's own period as Prime Minister, because of the 1966-7 crisis in the newspaper, industry, various expedients for helping the press were considered but all rejected. Had more newspapers then been under trust owner-j, ship, one or other of those expedients might have "been usefully adopted. Instead, it was suspected BARRY NORMAN Jest a minute it is created through a constant process of infor that even the most politically impartial interven- mal consultation with its staff.

All newspapers holics, compulsive gamblers, and even murderers his, surely, poses ticklish problems for the New-Yorker who. say, has an important appointment and whose watch has stopped. If he then approaches a policeman and inquires of him the time he may, if he is lucky, find one who says, courteousl Sir, it is five after three and you'd better hurry." If, however, he is less lucky he could apparently find himself confronting a belligerent drunk who. by way of response, beats him savagely "with his nightstick a gambler who bets him 10 to one that his own rough estimate of the time is nearer than that of the inquirer a pusher who offers to sell him up to 3001b of heroin that fell out of the back of police headquarters a blackmailer who accuses him of cheating on his wife and he'd better pay up or else an extortioner wh0 threatens to break both his legs unless he hands over his wallet or, in truly desperate circumstances, a straightforward murderer who promptly shoots him dead and rifles his pockets. In such circumstances your honest citizen is better advised to accost his friendly neighbourhood mugger, who may possibly take the 10 dollars he keeps for mugging purposes in his breast pocket but will probably leave him the cash stashed in his shoe and may even, as a gesture of goodwill, tell him the correct time.

MR BOB HOPE, a fellow of infinite jest, has offended the people of Thailand with the following witicism, delivered to American troops nar Bangkok "When I came out of a temple recently I found two Thai families in my shoes who refused to evacuate." You might imagine it was the fractured grammar that upset the cultivated Thais. Not, however, so. It was the spirit of the sally that hit them where they lived or, accommodation in Thailand being what it is. where they 'didn't, live and such was their indignation that the bewildered jester never realised the Thai people so sensitive about feet." Now he mentions "neither had I. 1 might, I suppo.

hue resumed like most races, they were probably uptight about something but I should neer have guessed it was feet. Overcrowding, es feet. no. Clearly, it was Mr Hope's ill-luck to unload that particular wisecrack in that particular land. Had he picked on some nation where the inhabitants were less obsessive about feet where, as it were, thy could take feet or leave them alone he might have got away with it.

Anyway, he apologised, or, at least his ambassador apologised saying that Mr Hope, though a good friend of Thailand, was ignorant of Thai customs like, presum- tion would turn out merely to have sustained strong commercial interests. To create an effective trust means a major sacrifice by the owners. They hae to renounce are corporate products, and none more so than this. If it is being carried on in the same spirit as before, that is enough of an achievement. ably, squatting in people's shoes and refusing to leave.

However, the most interesting revelation to emerge from this storm in a toecap was that -Mr Hope has been the self-appointed court jester to American Presidents since the days of Eisenhower. I used to pull John Kennedy's leg about his rocking chair, Ike's about his golf and painting and Richard Nixon's well, about he confessed images this conjures up. What horror must have struck at two decades of American Presidents as, gazing abstractedly out of the White House window, they spied the cheery, remorseless figure of Mr Hope ambling up the drive. What frantic summoning of aides, what despairing cries "Salinger, that wasn't really Bob Hope I saw at the tradesmen's entrance, was it 7 "I'm afraid it was, Mr President." Oh, my God! Not with another joke about the rocking chair Well, yeah, Mr President. He's rehearsing it right now in the anteroom." For Pete's sake.

Pierre, don't I have enough on my mind without this "If it's any consolation, Mr President, lice had the same problem for eight solid "Poor devil! No wonder his golf was all shot to pieces. Okay, I guess there's no avoiding it. Bring him in." Enter Mr Hope in cap and bells. "I say, I say, I say, Mr President "Hi. Bob, how ya doing, feller? Listen, if it's a gag about the rocking chair could you come to the punchline kinda fast? I mean, this business with the Bay of Pigs is preying on my mind a little and there's Khrushchev shipping atom bombs all over the world.

It's kind of busy round here." Relax. Mr President. Take the hot line off the hook and grab a load of this. Boy, is this one a lulu 1" ACCORDING to the report of the Knapp Commission, New York policemen are guilty of blackmail, extortion, heroin peddling, and stealing from the dead. Other surveys of the same noble force indicate that its members include alco Words in place of bombs comes.

On the assumption that the US ends all direct military support for the South, this agreement will decide the size of President Thieu's handicaps when he stands alone. A settlement will hardly bring peace to Vietnam, but the negotiations should be aiming to bring closer the day when fighting really ends. On the size and scope of the ceasefire supervisory commission, on the extent of the withdrawal of Hanoi's troops, on the structure of the interim Council of National Reconciliation and Concord, and on the shape of all Vietnam itself on all these issues there is room for compromise. Perhaps only on the question of prisoners held in the South does no compromise seem probable. The humorist Russel Baker has observed of Vietnam that There is a tunnel at the end of the tunnel." But Vietnam and the world ought not to be disappointed again.

North Vietnamese in the shattered cities of Hanoi and Haiphong can take some new year relief from President Nixon's decision to call off his B-52s. The bombing has not brought a settlement closer. It has harmed Mr Nixon's relations with Congress and those of the United States with most of the world. It should not be used again. The bombing which continues, up to the 20th parallel, should also be stopped.

A second cause for relief is that the US and North Vietnam are returning to full negotiations. The basis of an agreement must be that both sides get over the mutual misunderstanding about concessions in the near-agreement hammered out last month. The talking will, indirectly, be about who is the victor in the long Vietnamese war. This will be reflected in the shape the main sucking-points assume in a settlement if it ever Crime and he gun How much longer? Sir, It is indeed far from easy to choose between the livelihood of one group of people and the rest and recreation of another though it should be remembered that the two groups are not necessarily composed of entirely different people. However.

Mrs S. L. Gravetfs letter about Cumberland (Dec. 28) indicates clearly why we awful dilemma, vwtn pathos that was perhaps not intended, she writes Trains, after all, no longer come to the northern part of the Lake District. Soon, if rumour is to be believed, trains will not come to West Cum-berland either." How much longer is this madness going to continue, of closing essential rail routes to save money, and then spending millions tearing beautiful country apart in order to create roads which can only be described as ugly monstrosi, ties Yours faithfully, (Mrs) Nellie Ings Furness Vale, Stockport.

Cheshire. Who's Hughes? Sir, But who wants to sea Howard Hughes, anyway George Mikes. Garrick Club, London WC2. Rent rebates on the parish Sir, Martin Walker rightly emphasises the likelihood that the means test will deter the private tenant from applying for a rent allowance in spite of massive advertising expenditure (December 28). There are other reasons for criticism of this scheme.

After 1976 the local community will have to bear some of the costs of allowances. The poorer the area the greater will be this cost. This partial return to the ancient principle of parish responsibility is scarcely wise. Then, many older tenanted houses will have been purchased bv speculators who may benefit from the 75 per cent improvement grants available in assisted areas. This grant may represent more than half the value of the house.

When a fair rent is registered it reflects that value but takes no account of the public contribution. The tenant pays twice, in taxes and in rent If he then has to pay through his rates to contribute towards his neighbour's rent, as well as to his landlord's profits, then there is likely to be an embittering effect. There is much to be said for a rebate system. However, that provided in the Housing Finance Act is very complex and expensive to administer. Peter Hardy.

House of Commons. Quakers Have always been a smallish movement. So why do they crop up so frequently in history founding Pennsylvania reforming prisons abolishing slavery organising relief work abroad and social work at home. These are some of the things Quakers have though important. But not many Quakers lead glamorous Lives in great causes.

The Quaker's greatest delight is just sitting still for an hour on Sunday morning, in the Friends' meeting. This silence is where seeds can grow. They may be seeds of recognisable religious insight; they may be seeds of action, to be shared with others whether religious or not. The Quaker sees no real distinction between sacred and secular the whole of life is to be lived as a unity. This may explain the part Quakers play In the life of society.

It doesn't explain why there aren't more Quakers. Is it too tough a discipline, influence who jib at the thought of a policeman, armed for another purpose, intervening in a robbery and killing armed robbers. What should he have done Telephone for help Yours faithfully, Thomas N. Burkinshaw. Brodsworth, Doncaster.

Sir, Your article Arms and the Policeman (December 29) gives rise to a thought. The arguments against the arming of all policemen are very strong. But, what if some policemen were armed And if the bank robbers and other villains did not know which Might it not throw a salutary cloud over their happy certainty of going about their daily work comparatively unmolested M. Lewty (Mrs). Leamington Spa, Warwickshire.

Happy New Year Sir, Along with Christmas cards posted from December 13 to 19 in nearby counties, today (December 28) the Philatelic Bulletin has arrived. It says "The Post Office wishes all readers of the Philatelic Bulletin a Happy Christmas." Mark Bourne. Garth, Machynlleth, Montgomeryshire. TO THE EDITOR Sir, I am disturbed, although not surprised, to read in your report of the bank shooting in Kensington that questions are being raised again about the arming of police, and that the police are expecting a flood of protests." Granted that we, as a society, must give careful and continuous consideration to the circumstances under which our police may be armed and use their weapons, I still find it unbelievable that anyone should seriously doubt the Tightness of the officer's decision to take prompt action against the bank robbers. The rising incidence of the use of guns in such raids cannot be blamed on a commensurate increase in gun-carrying by the police.

So one can only assume that the fault lies with the criminals. The police are already hedged about by restrictions, but criminals enjoy freedom to act by whatever rules they see fit to invent. They are callously contemptuous of organised society and will exploit ruthlessly any advantage they enjoy. In their professional capacity they seek to defy those forces of law and order which give the law-abiding the only protection they have against criminals; yet there are peopleoften in positions of COUNTRY DIARY KESWICK: An old year is going, a new one is coming and though this is, perhaps, an unreal watershed one wonders, almost instinctively, what the new one will bring for good or ill. This new year is to be a Tree Planting Year, the Royal Forestry Society and local bodies offer help and advice and, to give another instance, the Sand and Gravel Association will award certificates of merit to firms who plant fifty trees or more under a landscaping arrangement with the Town and Country Planning Association.

This is all to the good, but what about those small, often overlooked, scraps of woodland which already exist on poor land in field corners, on fells and along country roads? They, to me, are just as important to keep as new woods are to plant. They have established communities from the near-invisible life of the woodland floor up through the scrubby thickets to the crowns of the trees. This was borne in on me strongly a few days ago when I sat on the edge of a thin, straggly wood on the Pennine slope beyond the Eden valley. A cold south-east wind rattled through the bare trees, swaying a last year's nest in a fir and unsettling the feeding fieldfares in the hawthorns. There is little green about now, but even from the wood's edge one could see where roe-deer had been lying-up and, as I watched, a sparrow hawk slashed down into an ash, narrowly missing a blackbird.

Indeed, so narrow was the miss that, for seconds, the hawk's head and neck continued to jerk with its impetus. Two men, an axe, a power saw and a bulldozer could clear that wood in no time but how long would it take to grow and where would its life go in so bleak a countryside No quick planting could put it back. ENID J. WILSON. to all who feel drawn to Quaker ideas and attitudes We would like to put that right, by offering a book called Introducing Quakers free to anyone Interested.

Just drop us a line at 'Quaker Information Service (D). Friends House. Euston Road. London. NW1.