Theatre World found this immeasurably Dodie Smith's best play, expressing admiration for her vivid sense of character and situation.
“Review of Dodie Smith Dear OctopusTheatre World, Oct. 1938.
(October 1938)
James Agate
wrote a flattering review that even compared some of her characters to...
Occupation
Hélène Barcynska
As well as devoting steady time and effort to her writing, HB
founded a theatre company which she called Rogues and Vagabonds Repertory Players
, because she discovered the Welsh theatre culture and thought they...
Occupation
Clemence Dane
The posters, she later wrote, made her nice pocket-money.
Dane, Clemence. London Has a Garden. Michael Joseph, 1964.
108
Her portrait of Ivor Novello
(the playwright, composer, and actor best-known for his music to the World War I song Keep the Home Fires...
Occupation
Viola Tree
VT
continued to act throughout the twenties and thirties. On a tour of the USA in 1930-1 she played Lady Joan in Ivor Novello
's The Truth Game at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre
in New...
Textual Production
Dodie Smith
Autumn Crocus launched what theatre critic Ernest Short
called [a] Dodie Smith boom; in only six years, DS
had collected earnings of £60,000 from her plays.
Short, Ernest. Theatrical Cavalcade. Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1942.
202
In 1934, Autumn Crocus was made into...
Textual Production
Elizabeth Jenkins
EJ
wrote a play as a vehicle for her friend Baliol Holloway
, in which he collaborated with her, supplying the theatrical expertise and especially his sense of stage timing. He played Charles II
in...
Textual Production
Clemence Dane
After she finished this adaptation, G. B. Stern
introduced her to Max Beerbohm. At this meeting the idea of casting Ivor Novello
in The Happy Hypocrite first came up, suggested by Beerbohm's niece Viola Tree
Travel
Maria Grey
Both MG
and Emily Shirreff addressed the decline in their health by means of frequent travel. Between 1874 and 1888, they stayed in Italy nearly every winter (where they became friends with the Novello
family)...