The Hooligan
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The Hooligan, A Character Study is a one-act play by W. S. Gilbert. It opened at the Coliseum Music Hall on February 27, 1911.
The Hooligan was Gilbert's last play, produced just over three months before his death. It is a study of a young condemned murderer in a prison cell awaiting execution. Gilbert was inspired by the celebrated Crippen murder trial of 1910.[1] Gilbert paints a three-dimensional, surprisingly believeable portrait of the man with all his flaws and humanity. Aside from the clever surprise ending, there is no plot mechanism to interfere with the delineation of character, and as in Gilbert's earlier character piece Sweethearts (1874), the result shows Gilbert to be successful at such pure character-writing.[2]
As usual, Gilbert was thorough in his research, touring the Pentonville Prison and questioning its governor about procedures, and also bringing the scenic designer to see it.[3] The piece was so grim and powerful that, according to Mrs. Alec Tweedie, "women [in the audience] had gone out fainting". The Hooligan was one of Gilbert's most successful serious dramas, and experts conclude that, in those last months of Gilbert's life, he was developing a new style, a "mixture of irony, of social theme, and of grubby realism,"[4] to replace the old "Gilbertianism" that he had grown weary of.[5]
Into the 20th century, the Theatre Managers' Association had prohibited dramas from being presented in music halls. Oswald Stoll, manager of the Coliseum, challenged this ban and finally the Association agreed that plays of up to thirty minutes and not more than six speaking characters could be performed.[6] With The Hooligan, Gilbert was the first important dramatist to write for a music hall. Gilbert, who directed his own plays almost cancelled the production when the leading actor, James Welch, took liberties with the script, until Welch wrote a letter of apology.[7] In The Hooligan, Gilbert revisited his old theme from Charity and some of his other works, by pointing out "that the punishment of a man who never had been given a chance to rise out of the gutter should not be the same as the punishment of a man who had thrown away his chances."[8]
Contents |
[edit] Roles
- Nat Solly
- 1st Warder
- 2nd Warder
- Chief Warder
- 1st New Warder Mathers
- 2nd New Warder
- Governor
- Chaplain
- Doctor
- Two Under-sheriffs
[edit] Synopsis
Nat Solly, a young cockney hooligan, has been condemned to death by hanging for murdering his former girlfriend. He wakes up on the morning of his execution hysterical, self-pitying, angry at the judge, and self-justifying. However, Solly is not wholly unsympathetic, as his predicament is intolerable. He pleads for leniency on account of his weak heart, and because he didn't mean to kill the girl, only to "cut" her to teach her a lesson. His warders try to hearten him. A step is heard outside the door. He thinks they are coming to take him to his execution, but it is the Governor, the chaplain and the others arriving to tell him that his sentence has been commuted to penal servitude for life, or twenty years, with good behavior. Solly, unable to bear the shock of this news, dies of a heart attack.
[edit] Notes
- ^ Article about Gilbert and corporate law. See also Stedman (1996), p. 341.
- ^ Introduction to The Hooligan by Andrew Crowther
- ^ Ibid.
- ^ Stedman, Jane W. (1996), quoted by Crowther here
- ^ Crowther, Andrew, Notes on the Hooligan
- ^ Stedman (1996), p. 341.
- ^ Stedman (1996), p. 342.
- ^ Stedman (1996), p. 343.
[edit] References
- Crowther, Andrew (2000). Contradiction Contradicted – The Plays of W. S. Gilbert. Associated University Presses. ISBN 0-8386-3839-2.
- Stedman, Jane W. (1996). W. S. Gilbert, A Classic Victorian & His Theatre. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-816174-3.
