Today in History: Nov. 3, 1916

Eugene O’Neill made his New York debut – with a one-act play presented in a night of three one-acts – at the new Playwrights Theatre – on 139 Macdougal Street, in Greenwich Village. It was the first season for this new theatre. The evening of one-acts were:

The Game, by Louise Bryant (ahem)
King Arthur’s Socks, by Floyd Dell
Bound East for Cardiff, by Eugene O’Neill. (I posted an excerpt of this play here)

O’Neill was completely unknown at the time. So it’s kind of a goosebump-y moment in history, his debut … with a one-act. He went on to write some of the most influential American plays ever written – he won 4 Pulitzer Prizes – and he is the only American playwright to win the Nobel Prize. His work is untouchable, as far as I’m concerned. Nobody else even comes CLOSE.

In 1916, the Playwrights Theatre was formed by a group of young artists – they all were up in Provincetown on vacation – and they built the Playwrights Theatre on a wharf. They called themselves the Provincetown Players. They did everything, they were a true ensemble. Sets, lighting, props, costumes …

When the idyllic summer ended (and you can see Warren Beatty’s version of all of this in Reds) – the Provincetown Players relocated to Greenwich Village (where many of them lived already) – and opened up their theatre on Macdougall.

This was the beginning of Eugene O’Neill’s career. He got enough of his short plays produced over the next 4 years – that his reputation began to grow – until finally Beyond the Horizon, his first full-length, opened on Broadway in 1920.

In the premiere of Bound East for Cardiff – O’Neill played the “second mate” which is basically a walk-on. He had one line:

“Isn’t this your watch on deck., Driscoll?”

O’Neill’s father, James, had been an actor, very popular, very successful, touring about doing Shakespeare (let’s remember Long Day’s Journey Into Night) – and on Sunday, Aug. 13, 1916 – A.J. Philpot, a journalist for the Boston Globe wrote a piece about the Provincetown Players – and mentioned Eugene O’Neill – the first moment of recognition of this great great writer:

Many people will remember James O’Neill who played “Monte Cristo.” He had a son—Eugene O’Neill—who knocked about the world in tramp steamers…and saw life “in the raw,” and thought much about it…He is one of the Players, and he has written some little plays which have made a very deep impression on those who have seen them produced here.

“some little plays”. Amazing, right?? Knowing what was coming? Knowing the impact that O’Neill would eventually have?

Here’s a photograph of O’Neill at Sea Island Bend (photographer: Carl van Vechten)

O’Neill, due to ill health, was unable to attend the Nobel Prize banquet in honor of him (in 1936) … but he wrote his speech out, and had James E. Brown read it for him. Here it is in its entirety, but I liked this part especially:

This thought of original inspiration brings me to what is, for me, the greatest happiness this occasion affords, and that is the opportunity it gives me to acknowledge, with gratitude and pride, to you and to the people of Sweden, the debt my work owes to that greatest genius of all modern dramatists, your August Strindberg.

It was reading his plays when I first started to write back in the winter of 1913-14 that, above all else, first gave me the vision of what modern drama could be, and first inspired me with the urge to write for the theatre myself. If there is anything of lasting worth in my work, it is due to that original impulse from him, which has continued as my inspiration down all the years since then – to the ambition I received then to follow in the footsteps of his genius as worthily as my talent might permit, and with the same integrity of purpose.

Of course, it will be no news to you in Sweden that my work owes much to the influence of Strindberg. That influence runs clearly through more than a few of my plays and is plain for everyone to see. Neither will it be news for anyone who has ever known me, for I have always stressed it myself. I have never been one of those who are so timidly uncertain of their own contribution that they feel they cannot afford to admit ever having been influenced, lest they be discovered as lacking all originality.

No, I am only too proud of my debt to Strindberg, only too happy to have this opportunity of proclaiming it to his people. For me, he remains, as Nietzsche remains in his sphere, the Master, still to this day more modern than any of us, still our leader. And it is my pride to imagine that perhaps his spirit, musing over this year’s Nobel award for literature, may smile with a little satisfaction, and find the follower not too unworthy of his Master.