Merrill Dennison
With the possible exception of Harvey J. O’Higgins and Willard Mack, both of whom
have achieved international reputations, Canada has produced no dramatist or
playwright of especial note. During the past year, however, the work of a young
Canadian author, Merrill Dennison of Toronto, has made the literary and theatrical
world of the east “sit up and take notice” of the fact that a new star is rapidly arising.
Mr Dennison has produced a book of plays of singular originality and power, entitled
“The Unheroic North.” In a former article I briefly mentioned this book and
it was my intention later to give an extended review.
Plays are not, as a general rule, as easy or as interesting to read as are stories.
The playwright is intent upon working out the dramatic technique of his play, or
getting his values and effects across the footlights, rather than to charm the reader
with literary sentences.
Two of the one-act plays in this volume have been put on with great success by
university and community players in the east, and there is a likelihood that “Marsh
Hay,” a play in three acts, will be put on this season by the Provincetown
Players of New York City. It is said that the plays in “The Unheroic North” act
much better than they read, when the characterizations have been ably done. This has
not always been the case, as on a couple of occasions the plays were produced with
actors who had been trained in the English diction, and the result was absurd, since
the characters in Dennison’s plays are of the type peculiar to the small town, the
back woods and the poor farm regions of Ontario.
“The literary quality of my plays mean less than nothing to me,” writes Merill
Dennison. “The only important thing about them is—how they act.”
This is, of course, a good point of view for one who intends to write plays.
Nevertheless these plays have not only an acting value, but a literary flavor. They
are piercing, photographic studies, done with a sharpened pen and the keenest kind of
a gift for getting under the skin of things. Mr. Dennison possesses an uncanny and
intuitive knowledge of human nature. He shows us weak, strong, erring, loving, hating
men and women, all more or less affected by their environment.
The lines brim over with wit; a strain of ironic humor runs throughout, and always we
are conscious of the eternal pathos of life in a small, drab, shut-in community.
Often this immense pathos trembles upon the verge of dire tragedy. “The Weather
Breeder” is, in a way, a masterpiece. “Brothers in Arms,” a humorous
sketch with remarkable characterization; but the best of the plays is the last, and
the longest in the book, “Marsh Hay.” Here we have a study of shiftless, lazy
adolescent youth which finds its outlet in seduction and perjury. Dispassionately,
yet dramatically, the sordid drama is unfolded. Strangely enough though the scene is
laid in a backwoods community, we all know and have met the types.
The action is swift, the climaxes come at the right time, and there are tensely drawn
moments of real drama.
When Wilson MacDonald was in Calgary, I told him that I had
“discovered” a Canadian dramatist of great talent. I had never heard of him
before. When I mentioned the name, MacDonald looked up in surprise and said
instantly:
“Merrill Dennison! The most original genius in Toronto.”
I was pleased to have my judgement confirmed, and also pleased to learn more about
this clever writer, who is a friend of Mr. MacDonald. Mr. Dennison is 30 years of
age. He was educated at Toronto public and high schools and the universities of
Toronto, Pennsylvania and in Paris, as an architect. After the war, in which he
served in three armies, at one time or another, he became associated with Roy
Mitchell of the Hart theater, Toronto, as art director. They had advertised a bill of
three Canadian plays, and could only find two tragedies. (This gives an idea of the
shortage of original dramatic material in Canada) There were no comedies available,
and the exigencies of the situation demanded that they should find one or write one.
It had to be Canadian, played inside two other sets, cast three men and women, last
10 minutes and be funny. It was up to the “art director,” and he accordingly sat
down and wrote “Brothers in Arms.” The play went across with a whoop, much to
the astonishment of the author, who thereupon decided that his forte was writing and
not art “directing” or architecture.
Mr. Dennison writes swiftly. His “Marah Hay,” a play in three acts, was written
in 17 hours. He finds playwriting much easier than novel writing, though at the
present time he is engaged upon the writing of a novel in collaboration with Arthur
Heming, another Canadian writer of deserve fame. The two authors are
“hibernating” as they call it, at Bon Echo, where Mr. Dennison owns a large
estate and inn.
The author of “The Unheroic North” declares that his mother has been the
“stimulating influence” in his life. “A brilliant and forceful woman with a
fine intelligence and the soul of a crusading radical. She belonged to the
pioneers of the feminist movement and fought a valiant battle in Canada at a time
when it was the stagnant backwater of the world’s ideas—although it is no Niagara
even yet. It was she who bought Bon Echo, and dedicated its tremendous rock as a
monument to Walt Whitman, and it was during the 20 summers I spent”
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“here, that I came to know the back countrymen.”
This is the tribute Merrill Dennison pays to his mother. If fame comes to him, he wishes her to have a share in the credit.
During the last few weeks, we have been contemplating the possibility of beginning the little theater movement here in Calgary, and I have been asking to undertake something in that direction. We may in the not for distant future find ourselves started with a company of community players. There is undoubtedly dramatic talent in this city, and we should be able to produce sufficient original plays by Canadian authors to make the thing interesting and worth while. The one act plays of Merrill Dennison offer a fascinating opportunity for the community players to put on something new and of typically Canadian interest. Perhaps we shall see them done yet in Calgary--by Calgary players.
