Shakespeare in Paris
Sylvia Beach - Claire Deromelaere, Ernest Hemingway - Dan Browne, and Adrienne Monnier - Renata Earnshaw
PARIS 1919
In World War One, Sylvia Beach volunteered for service with the American Red Cross. She then moved to Paris, where in November 1919 she opened up a bookstore-lending library, Christening the store Shakespeare & Company., this feminist daughter of a Princeton clergyman enjoyed strong backing from radical French Writers and above all from her French partner and fellow feminist Adrienne Monnier. Her regular American visitors included, Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.
PARIS 1941
The Nazis close down Sylvia Beach’s Shakespeare & Company bookstore in la rue de l’odeon. Officially Miss Beach is being charged for her refusal to sell her last copy of James Joyce's experimental novel “Finnegan’s Wake” to a Nazi officer. But the main reason for the closure of the bookstore?
My nationality added to Jewish affiliations, finished Shakesepeare & Company in Nazi Eyes.
- Sylvia Beach
The formidable Gertrude Stein hosted key Salons for both the artistic
avant-garde and the lesbian community. Miss Beach and Miss Stein both played key
roles in establishing American literature on the global literary stage. Whereas
Gertrude Stein had a decisive influence on the career of Picasso, Sylvia Beach
was equally, instrumental, in launching the literary career of James Joyce. Both
of these prominent women were raised in well-established American families, but
adopted Paris as their permanent homes. Gertrude Stein is best known for her
autobiographical novel The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas and her experimental
novel Tender Buttons.
| Left to Right Gertrude Stein - Cindy Halbert Seger Sylvia Beach and James Joyce - John Doyle |
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The Great Modernist Experiment?
Picasso was leading the movement
towards abstract painting, Stravinsky was at the forefront of a drive to release
music from the constraints of conventional melody. James Joyce’s great novel
Ulysses replaced coventional story lines with abstract association and
psychological rythms, as opposed to linear narrative. In 1924 the flowing sexual
imagery in one section of the novel led to the work being banned in Ireland,
Great Britain, and North America. Sylvia Beach spent much of her life and a
great deal of money publishing Joyce’s experimental work. The fact that he
simply dropped her once he had found a bigger publisher, damaged his reputation,
and led many people to question his integrity.
1920s Paris & The Jazz Age
"Paris was where the twentieth century was”, Gertrude Stein once remarked. American émigrés in particular, fleeing various conflicts and puritanical restrictions stateside, had a key influence on the Parisian cultural scene. Gertrude Stein labeled the radical misfits she both promoted and identified with, the ‘Lost Generation’. This so called ‘generation’ was made up of American, British and Irish avant garde writers, who were shocked by the trauma of the Great War and caught up in the torrents of political events.
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“The 1918 Sedition Act prohibits disloyal, profane, scurrilous or abusive remarks about the form of our government." - Julius Taft |
| The story of the play is told in 1929, through the eyes of a certain
Julius Taft. You don’t have to believe all he tells you. Or do you? If
you are not sure, you could go on-line and check out the career of his
famous boss, Mr J Edgar Hoover. The play is haunted by the scandal of
the Sacco and Vanzetti controversy. (See extra notes) The fear of
Anarchists in the America of the 1920s has strong echoes of the fear of
terrorism today. |
Djuna Barnes. One of the greatest writers of the -20's Paris Montparnasse circle?
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And who outraged Julius Taft the most? It was most probably Djuna Barnes, author of a radical poetry collection The Book of Repulsive Women . She is best known for Nightwood, a poetic psychological novel based on Djuna Barnes’ own obsessive love for the Amercian artist Thelma Wood. |
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| First but not least; John Dos Passos, a young left wing World War One veteran was a close friend of both Hemingway and Sylvia Beach. In 1925 he was the first of the Paris circle to publish a bestselling experimental novel. His Manhattan Transfer provided a dynamic impressionist portrait of working class life in New York’s immigrant communities. |
| Cast in Order of Appearance | |
| Julius Taft | Kenneth Dimmick |
| John Dos Passos | Michael Murphy |
| Sylvia Beach | Claire Deromelaere |
| Adrienne Monnier | Renata Earnshaw |
| Thelma Wood | Renata Earnshaw |
| Gertrude Stein | Cindy Halbert Seger |
| Djuna Barnes | Rose Heidenreich |
| Ernest Hemingway | Dan Browne |
| James Joyce | John Doyle |
| Additional Film Actors | |
| Tristan Brice, Andrew Carey Yard, Tiffany Estrada, Laurence de Olivera, Jim Palik | |
| Production Crew | |
| Audio-Visual Design & Production | Jan Stegmaier |
| Jennifer Schmidt-Rüdt | |
| Lighting | Stefan Müller |
| Sound | Nadja Weber |
| Actor Training | Sylvia Toone |
| Written & Produced by | Stuart Marlow |