|
Event
A Battle of Wits
Guilford Center Stages 3rd production is A Battle of Wits by Vermont scenic artist and showman, Charles W. Henry. This is one of only two of his plays currently known to survive, and is a classic example of the melodramas popular in the golden era of itinerant theater troupes which toured small towns before World War I. William Stearns directs a company of familiar area actors, using Broad Brook Granges own, century-old scenic curtains and flats, painted by Charles Henry for our stage.
Charles Washington Henry was born in Guilford, Vermont in 1850, and died in North Ferrisburgh, Vt. in 1918.
Charles wanted to go to art school, but his father made him apprentice at a sewing machine shop in Florence, Mass. However, his passions were music and dramatics, and he joined the Dramatic Club in Greenfield, where he met Martha Fisk, whom he married in 1873. Henry and Martha had four children: Arthur, Percy, Florence, and Grace, who died in 1987.
Henry was Vermonts most prolific and accomplished scenic artist. As well as painting at least 60 theater curtains 38 are known to remain he wrote songs and plays, produced vaudeville skits, played several instruments, acted, and managed the Henry Family traveling troupe.
In the early days, trying to survive by acting and painting theater scenery, Charles and Martha almost starved, but around the turn of the century, Charles found he could make a passable living by also providing the entertainment. Martha stitched pieces of muslin together to form the rolldrops and sewed the costumes. Henry wrote plays, and as the children grew older, they were all taught to perform. Percy played flute and horns, Arthur played violin, French horn and trumpet. Florence had a fine soprano voice and Baby Grace sang and danced.
The Henry Family Company produced theater curtains and booked shows at Town and Grange Halls throughout Vermont, in a caravan of horse-drawn wagons and then Model T Fords, carrying costumes, paints, play scripts, musical instruments and personal belongings.
In 1915, the Henrys got off the road and settled down, the troupe disbanding as the children got married. Charles and Martha settled in a house in North Ferrisburgh across the street from the Opera House, where Charles still produced entertainment. He died in November 1918. He and Martha are buried in North Ferrisburgh.
A Battle of Wits: Henry wrote a number of plays, but only two, including A Battle of Wits, are known to survive. Given the context of the work, at the outbreak of World War I (July 1914) the play was likely written between then and early 1915. A Vergennes newspaper article documents a performance at Vergennes Opera House, in April 1915. Henry was manager of City Theatre at this venue from 1915 to 1917.
The play happily exceeds the bounds of the stereotypical period melodrama. Set in a German border town at the outbreak of World War I, it features several American citizens, anxious to get into France before hostilities break out, providing something of a current events lesson to its rural audiences. Espionage and, of course, romantic intrigue are central to the plot. Comic scenes involving an American tourist couple, allow Henry to portray the classic situation of the homespun New England Yankee a type he obviously knew well in the midst of European culture.
The stage at Broad Brook Grange contains four Henry curtains, and a set of ears and flats, which will be used in our production.
Our thanks to Christine Hadsel, of Curtains Without Borders, who secured a copy of the script for this play from a collection at the University of Vermont, and for her work cataloguing and restoring scenic curtains throughout the region. Her book on the subject, Suspended Worlds: Historic Theater Scenery in Northern New England, was published by Godine in 2015.
In 2003, the Hazen Union High School Drama Club in Hardwick, Vermont gave the only known performance of the play in over 30 years, at both Hardwick Town House (which has two Henry curtains) and at the Vergennes Opera House, where the play was performed in 1915. Faculty Adviser Marc Considine assisted us with a missing page of the script!
Guilford Center Stage is a project of Broad Brook Grange, initiated by Grange members Don McLean and Laura Lawson Tucker in 2015 to make greater use of the buildings 19th century stage. Our particular goal is to present place-based plays, which have regional or local connections.
Our inaugural show, this past October, was a production of the rarely-staged comedy, Tourists Accommodated, by Vermont author Dorothy Canfield Fisher, who often visited friends in Guilford in the 1940s and 50s. Our 2016 season opened with the premiere of one-act plays by Guilford playwright, Michael Nethercott, both based on historical events from the period just before World War I, and thus in the same period as the upcoming play. In August, we inaugurated a theater camp, in collaboration with Guilford Free Library, for 4th-8th graders.
|
|
 |
LocationBroad Brook Grange, Upstairs (View)
3940 Guilford Center Road
Guilford Center, VT 05301
United States
Categories
| Kid Friendly: No |
| Dog Friendly: No |
| Non-Smoking: Yes! |
| Wheelchair Accessible: No |
|
Contact
|
