So the whole theater was filled with waving fans, as this poor audience almost died in the heat - and we were dying on the stage - in that terrible heat that can happen in Adelaide, as you know. And what I knew about them - and I think, Felicity, here we get to the heart of what turned out not to be such a good thing. Peter asked me to come over and do Ben Jolson's The Alchemist, and I did it with Dennis Olsen and Teddy Hodgeman and various other people - the rest were an Adelaide cast - and we had a lot of fun doing to do that play.
John Hargreaves, and using some actors from Adelaide and some other people – who I can give you all their names – and I did a production of the three Jugglers. Another question – this is something I've drawn, actually, from your book – and in your memoir, and I'm paraphrasing, you say that in Sydney the actor is primary; in Melbourne it is the text considered the most important; while in Adelaide there were audiences who were your masters, and you were there to serve them, but knew not how. So we shouldn't do those shows?' And before the first season was over, I thought, 'I think I'm up against something so ingrained that I won't survive it.'
I invited them – and in fact I started workshops and wrote to all the amateur associations saying: 'Please come and do a workshop with me. Look, it's one of those things, Felicity – I get the feeling, you see, that of course I was invited to Adelaide through Don, for which I'll be forever grateful, but everyone else around him – and I think , I could have used it in the book – but they really believed that Adelaide was the poetic center of Australia in more ways than one. I realized that they don't want an intellect to go in, you know, and 'let's do things that we shouldn't do' and all that, because they have to learn all that kind of stuff; they just wanted good acting.
So in the end—and it took me quite a while to do it—in the end—one play, if I may say so, one play that I did that the audience loved, they stood and called, I and I thought, 'If I had known that 18 months ago, then it would have been a different world for me because they produced The Winslow boy, Rattigan. What are you doing?’ And at one point he said something in the paper that was very much against the professional company that we had, and so the TV people called me to say would I do a little debate with Wal on TV. We don't need it.' And they want to control that, just like the university here wants to control NIDA, which they don't, but they get there, they get there.
I remember towards the end of four years when I had some not-so-nice meetings with the Board and I was very happy to think I was leaving – a lot to do with Kevin Palmer in those days, but I can explain that – and I remember I went into Wayne's office one day and his secretary said, 'Oh, George!' Kevin's a very good man, he's brilliant, he knows exactly what he's doing and all that,' and I said, 'Oh, really?' And I said to the board, 'Does that mean you don't think so?' Well, you know, George, you're fine, just go ahead and – – –.” And suddenly, because of the theater, Felicity, you know, I suddenly realized – and it immediately turns into a theater company without a theater.
And by and by the board kept saying to me, 'You can't do that kind of play anymore; you have to make plays that are going to pull the audience in, and suddenly I realized that we were narrowing ourselves down. And it has everything to do with the planning in the new theater, Felicity, you know—and it happens everywhere, I think: that once the new theater rises from the ashes, and it kind of takes on a whole different kind of identity, know, it somehow did not belong to the theater company, although we entered it; it belonged to the people who can control it and do things with it. I think his opponents really would have said, 'Look at all this money that's been wasted and it's failing,' and so on and so forth.
John Sumner, your old friend, the force behind the Melbourne Theater Company, he said – and I'm just wondering, I want to talk a little bit about his advice when you were talking about running a theater company.
No, and from what you say all that kind of construction, the physics of that new house, even though it was well equipped and all, actually seemed to constrict you, it did, it alienated you to the point. where you felt scared, almost. Since then I have often thought, 'God, I could have run a company as long as we didn't have a theater.' Every now and then I would go up and see Colin at his little house in North Adelaide, but that was it. laugh).
Okay, so you're gone, exhausted and—as you say in your book—drinking too much and all. It was kind of a Christmas special, wasn't it. I'm flipping through photos) Sorry, I'll show you a photo just for you. Well, there were rows of four- and five-year-olds at the booths who screamed with laughter when I got all the words wrong and said everything wrong, but the song they knew.
The next time I came around to Adelaide I was never near the theater because I was with the South Australian Film Company, that's where I did The Shiralee, that's where I started doing film work in the 80s, and then it was a completely different society. And it was interesting just going back to the theater and doing stuff like that where, you know, nice people all around and us just. And you mentioned on November 5th: just for the record, just say what you've been invited to go over and do.
I think that's all the questions I have for you, George, unless there's something you want to add that you don't think we've covered sufficiently. I think the whole incident with Kevin Palmer was very unfortunate, especially—and he wouldn't mind me saying this—that my colleague, Rodney Fisher, and Kevin became great enemies. I mean, I could have said as much in the book, but I really didn't - there's always reasons for that, you know.
Kevin, when I later knew him as. officer, he was a very nice man and he had his reasons for it, and so did Rodney, and so did I. And it was actually a very unfortunate conclusion for Adelaide. But you should also be very proud of what you have achieved – Oh, that's me, that's me. and bringing together that group of actors, and having that ensemble, if you will. I mean, what I really can't wait for is that on Tuesday night I'm going to – (flicking through photos) I'm sorry, I'm looking for another photo, but it's a very real photo.
