From time to time, we’ll be posting information and photos from some of the most noteworthy shows in Long Wharf Theatre’s history. So, for our first posting, lets start at the beginning.
Forty-five years ago, Long Wharf Theatre kicked off its first season with a production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible.
Jon Jory, Long Wharf’s first artistic director, wrote about the motivation for starting the nation’s 28th regional theatre in The Crucible playbill. It is a manifesto of sorts, worth reprinting here.
A NOTE FROM THE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
Welcome to your theatre. It is an amazing act of faith on the part of the community that accounts for the Long Wharf Theatre being alight this evening. I think the money, the time and the welcome accorded this company when it existed only as concept charge the atmosphere now that it is fact. Our production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible is the first tangible.
We have often said during the last few months that there is no excuse for the professional theatre that is satisfied with shoddy or inept work. Boredom is the unpardonable sin in this business. If the stage isn’t the place for excitement, stimulation, contention and joy, then to hell with it …
Personally, I have long had a sneaking suspicion that theatre is the art of common sense. I think intelligence, a sense of self, and a sense of humor are the basic ingredients of talent. After all, it must take those qualities to leaven the strangeness of grown men and women playing dress-up for a living.
And so, this is a dream fulfilled that leaves us with the brick of a building waiting to be quickened. We are here because the theatre has too often become a stodgy, callow, unimaginative and lifeless act. We believe this is not the nature of the beast, but its deformity. We know that with care and tending it needn’t be so.
The actors in this company know how very difficult it is to produce something fine in this business, and they are hoping with the hope that springs eternal that Long Wharf will turn out to be something other than just another job. We are going to see that it does.
Welcome to the first step.
Here is a picture of the original production’s famous trial sequence.
Long Wharf Theatre's first production, Arthur Miller's The Cruicible