Unleashing Britain, Theatre Museum, London
Unleashing Britain: Ten Years that Shaped the Nation 1955-1964 has it all - sex, race, class, religion, language and censorship. The exhibition charts the transformation of British theatre from the suffocating and, sometimes, sanctimonious constraints of the 1950s postwar establishment to the innovative, radical and uninhibited 1960s.
This is the era of Angry Young Men, kitchen sink dramas and avant-garde European experimental theatre. Influential imports included Waiting for Godot (1955), the Threepenny Opera (1956), and Marat/Sade (1964). Home-grown dramas included Look Back in Anger (1956), The Entertainer (1957), The Birthday Party (1958), A Taste of Honey (1958), Oh! What a Lovely War (1963) and Entertaining Mr Sloane (1964).
Such milestones challenged the restrained sensibilities typical of the time and confronted audiences with the bleak austerity of social and economic life in Britain.
The story presented in Unleashing Britain relies on interviews with a number of surviving protagonists, including a particularly loquacious Peter Hall. There are historic recordings of others, among them John Osborne and members of the emerging Fringe - Alan Bennett, Jonathan Miller, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore.
The exhibition also contains a wealth of photographs of the likes of Harold Pinter, Peter Brook, Laurence Olivier and Joan Littlewood. And, as might be expected, the institutions that they established or were associated with are a major focus: the Arts Theatre; the new National Theatre, which opened at the Old Vic in 1963; the Theatre Workshop, based in the East End; and the English Stage Company, based at the Royal Court.
While its primary interest is what was happening in the theatre, Unleashing Britain embraces the wider worlds of politics, entertainment and leisure in an attempt to capture the zeitgeist. Significant events represented include the advent of the teenage consumer, American imports of rock'n'roll (Elvis, Bill Hayley), and a new generation of Broadway musicals.
West Side Story, for one, innovatively combined youth culture, gang rivalry and racial conflict. What was being generated at home was a lot tamer: Lonnie Donegan, the Beverley Sisters (striking a blow for feminism as the first all-girl band to have a Number 1 hit), and Cliff Richard.
While there's no doubting the extraordinary richness of Unleashing Britain's subject matter, the way that it's conceived, designed and installed converts the radical excitement of those 'ten years that shaped the nation' into deadweight.
The show is enormously wordy - a mass of information panels and talking heads. That partly reflects the literary nature of theatre: the texts of all the key plays are here (chained to columns), and there are any number of prompt books and reproductions of newspaper reviews.
Given that it's about something that was essentially live, transient and vital, what's so striking about the exhibition is just how sedentary it is. The photographs freeze what were fleeting moments, while the set designs are vacant - silent and devoid of action.
By virtue of being animated, the talking heads are among the most engaging aspects of the exhibition. Quite apart from describing what it was like to be there at the time, they raise interesting issues about the role that government intervention played in the reshaping of British theatre, if not the nation.
The youthful radicalism of those interviewed was, of course, largely to do with opposing the Lord Chamberlain's censorship powers. Conversely, their ascendancy into the establishment related to the abolition of that authority.
Peter Hall's staging of Waiting for Godot, for instance, relied on the Arts Theatre being a private members' club, which put it beyond the Lord Chamberlain's jurisdiction. Even the Royal Court assumed club status as and when it required.
It could be argued that the most important objects in the exhibition are what at first glance look like insignificant typed lists. These are the Stage Play Licences issued by the Lord Chamberlain's Office before productions could be performed, and which specified changes that would have to be made.
Its powers of censorship extended to nudity, obscenity, blasphemy, homosexuality, portraying members of the Royal family and living or recently deceased people, and anything seen as likely to impair relations with foreign powers.
Given how central censorship appears to be in the unfolding of Unleashing Britain's narrative, it's surprising that more isn't made of the removal of the Lord Chamberlain's powers over the British stage by the Theatres Act 1968. But, perhaps somewhat inconveniently for the exhibition's creators, it happened after the end of the decade that they set out to cover.
There are relatively few original objects among the various reproductions that make up most of the exhibition. Some are of secondary importance - such as paintings that represent events on stage. The primary objects carry the weight of introducing authenticity to the proceedings and of summoning up the moment.
But items such as the gloves that Olivier wore in The Entertainer (1957) aren't magically imbued with an aura. At best, they're a curiosity. The full brutality of Olivier's performance is captured on film. There's no doubt that more contemporary footage would have transformed the exhibition.
It could, of course, be argued that it wasn't so much the theatre that shaped the nation so much as the plays themselves, and the film versions of them. Look Back in Anger (1958), The Entertainer (1960) and A Taste of Honey (1961) were all produced by Woodfall Films, a company set up by Tony Richardson and John Osborne. Filmed on location, these products of 'New British Cinema', were even grittier than the theatrical productions that had spawned them, and influenced many who never went to the theatre.
The installation of Unleashing Britain relies on too many cliches. It provides visitors with interactive opportunities: dressing up in a 1950s ra-ra skirt; trying on a hat, just like Archie Rice's; playing skiffle on a washboard; tapping out sheet music on a piano.
Presumably, these are intended to give audiences a feel for how things were 50 years ago. Suspending disbelief is difficult at the best of times, but particularly so in the cramped and claustrophobic basement of the Theatre Museum, where the sound of tapes spills out from one section of the exhibition to another, and where the spaces of the exhibition bleed off into other displays.
It's a pity that the Theatre Museum's recent bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund for redevelopment funding was unsuccessful. Its future now looks uncertain and if it is to survive, it's going to have to find better ways of putting on a show.
Sara Selwood is head of the department of cultural policy and management, City University, and the editor of Cultural Trends
Project data
Exhibition design: Peter Brooks
Unleashing Britain: Ten Years that Shaped the Nation 1955-1964 has it all - sex, race, class, religion, language and censorship. The exhibition charts the transformation of British theatre from the suffocating and, sometimes, sanctimonious constraints of the 1950s postwar establishment to the innovative, radical and uninhibited 1960s.
This is the era of Angry Young Men, kitchen sink dramas and avant-garde European experimental theatre. Influential imports included Waiting for Godot (1955), the Threepenny Opera (1956), and Marat/Sade (1964). Home-grown dramas included Look Back in Anger (1956), The Entertainer (1957), The Birthday Party (1958), A Taste of Honey (1958), Oh! What a Lovely War (1963) and Entertaining Mr Sloane (1964).
Such milestones challenged the restrained sensibilities typical of the time and confronted audiences with the bleak austerity of social and economic life in Britain.
The story presented in Unleashing Britain relies on interviews with a number of surviving protagonists, including a particularly loquacious Peter Hall. There are historic recordings of others, among them John Osborne and members of the emerging Fringe - Alan Bennett, Jonathan Miller, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore.
The exhibition also contains a wealth of photographs of the likes of Harold Pinter, Peter Brook, Laurence Olivier and Joan Littlewood. And, as might be expected, the institutions that they established or were associated with are a major focus: the Arts Theatre; the new National Theatre, which opened at the Old Vic in 1963; the Theatre Workshop, based in the East End; and the English Stage Company, based at the Royal Court.
While its primary interest is what was happening in the theatre, Unleashing Britain embraces the wider worlds of politics, entertainment and leisure in an attempt to capture the zeitgeist. Significant events represented include the advent of the teenage consumer, American imports of rock'n'roll (Elvis, Bill Hayley), and a new generation of Broadway musicals.
West Side Story, for one, innovatively combined youth culture, gang rivalry and racial conflict. What was being generated at home was a lot tamer: Lonnie Donegan, the Beverley Sisters (striking a blow for feminism as the first all-girl band to have a Number 1 hit), and Cliff Richard.
While there's no doubting the extraordinary richness of Unleashing Britain's subject matter, the way that it's conceived, designed and installed converts the radical excitement of those 'ten years that shaped the nation' into deadweight.
The show is enormously wordy - a mass of information panels and talking heads. That partly reflects the literary nature of theatre: the texts of all the key plays are here (chained to columns), and there are any number of prompt books and reproductions of newspaper reviews.
Given that it's about something that was essentially live, transient and vital, what's so striking about the exhibition is just how sedentary it is. The photographs freeze what were fleeting moments, while the set designs are vacant - silent and devoid of action.
By virtue of being animated, the talking heads are among the most engaging aspects of the exhibition. Quite apart from describing what it was like to be there at the time, they raise interesting issues about the role that government intervention played in the reshaping of British theatre, if not the nation.
The youthful radicalism of those interviewed was, of course, largely to do with opposing the Lord Chamberlain's censorship powers. Conversely, their ascendancy into the establishment related to the abolition of that authority.
Peter Hall's staging of Waiting for Godot, for instance, relied on the Arts Theatre being a private members' club, which put it beyond the Lord Chamberlain's jurisdiction. Even the Royal Court assumed club status as and when it required.
It could be argued that the most important objects in the exhibition are what at first glance look like insignificant typed lists. These are the Stage Play Licences issued by the Lord Chamberlain's Office before productions could be performed, and which specified changes that would have to be made.
Its powers of censorship extended to nudity, obscenity, blasphemy, homosexuality, portraying members of the Royal family and living or recently deceased people, and anything seen as likely to impair relations with foreign powers.
Given how central censorship appears to be in the unfolding of Unleashing Britain's narrative, it's surprising that more isn't made of the removal of the Lord Chamberlain's powers over the British stage by the Theatres Act 1968. But, perhaps somewhat inconveniently for the exhibition's creators, it happened after the end of the decade that they set out to cover.
There are relatively few original objects among the various reproductions that make up most of the exhibition. Some are of secondary importance - such as paintings that represent events on stage. The primary objects carry the weight of introducing authenticity to the proceedings and of summoning up the moment.
But items such as the gloves that Olivier wore in The Entertainer (1957) aren't magically imbued with an aura. At best, they're a curiosity. The full brutality of Olivier's performance is captured on film. There's no doubt that more contemporary footage would have transformed the exhibition.
It could, of course, be argued that it wasn't so much the theatre that shaped the nation so much as the plays themselves, and the film versions of them. Look Back in Anger (1958), The Entertainer (1960) and A Taste of Honey (1961) were all produced by Woodfall Films, a company set up by Tony Richardson and John Osborne. Filmed on location, these products of 'New British Cinema', were even grittier than the theatrical productions that had spawned them, and influenced many who never went to the theatre.
The installation of Unleashing Britain relies on too many cliches. It provides visitors with interactive opportunities: dressing up in a 1950s ra-ra skirt; trying on a hat, just like Archie Rice's; playing skiffle on a washboard; tapping out sheet music on a piano.
Presumably, these are intended to give audiences a feel for how things were 50 years ago. Suspending disbelief is difficult at the best of times, but particularly so in the cramped and claustrophobic basement of the Theatre Museum, where the sound of tapes spills out from one section of the exhibition to another, and where the spaces of the exhibition bleed off into other displays.
It's a pity that the Theatre Museum's recent bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund for redevelopment funding was unsuccessful. Its future now looks uncertain and if it is to survive, it's going to have to find better ways of putting on a show.
Sara Selwood is head of the department of cultural policy and management, City University, and the editor of Cultural Trends
Project data
Exhibition design: Peter Brooks
