Production History of

THE HAIRY APE

"The Hairy Ape could easily lend itself to radical propaganda, and it is somewhat surprising that it has not already been used for this purpose."
-FBI REPORT ON EUGENE O'NEILL, 1922

THE CREATION.
     Eugene O'Neill wrote THE HAIRY APE (under the full title The Hairy Ape: A Comedy of Ancient and Modern Life in Eight Scenes) in three feverish weeks in December of 1921 -- notably just three months after the stage adaptation of Edgar Rice Burrough's best-selling Novel TARZAN OF THE APES made its high-profile debut at New York's Broadhurst Theatre.
     At this point in his career, O'Neill was already established as one of America's greatest playwright having twice won the Pulitzer Prize.
     But THE HAIRY APE was a noticeable departure from O'Neill's usual artistic approach. World-renown for his masterful use of realism, here was a play filled with intense symbolism mixing his naturalistic dialogue with more surreal elements of German Expressionism that were widely accepted in Europe but far from commonplace on the American stage.
     The play's subject matter was also a unique turn. Never before (or after) did O'Neill's work deal so overtly with political subjects -- vividly depicting the horrors of the exploitation of working people and their hatred for the capitalist class. THE HAIRY APE even contained a very sympathetic portrayal of the radical labor organization The Industrial Workers of the World -- a group that was being very actively persecuted and demonized by both the FBI and the Justice Department at that time.
     Written just four years before the famous showdown between Creationists and Evolutionists at the "Scopes Monkey Trial" of 1925, the play's plotline touched on controversial issues of anthropology and Darwinisms as well as alienation, industrialization, racial chauvinism, etc.
     In his own journals, O'Neill summed up THE HAIRY APE as a play about a man who "has lost his old harmony with nature, the harmony which he used to have as an animal and has not yet acquired in a spiritual way." Later he would add, "The subject here is the same ancient one that always was and always will be the one subject for drama, and that is man and his struggle with his own fate. The struggle used to be with the gods, but it is now with himself, his own past, his attempt 'to belong.'"

THE WORLD DEBUT.
     THE HAIRY APE was originally produced by The Provincetown Players, a troupe that was perhaps the most significant theatre company in America at that time bringing together radicals such as Max Eastman and John Reed with the Nation's most promising new playwrights such as Susan Glaspell, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and, of course, O'Neill himself.
     The rehearsal period for THE HAIRY APE -- late 1921 to early 1922 -- came at a time when major differences were beginning to emerge within The Provincetown Players over the direction of the group. George Cram Cook -- then head of The Players -- originally undertook to direct O'Neill's production. But after repeated clashes, O'Neill fired Cook and Cook left the company once and for all.
     Who ultimately directed that first production of THE HAIRY APE is the subject of some debate, but it seems it was a team effort involving Anthony Hopkins, James Light, Robert Edmond Jones, and O'Neill himself. The show at last made its World Debut at their company's own theatre -- the Provincetown Playhouse in Greenwich Village -- on March 9, 1922 with Actor Louis Wolheim in the lead role and sets designed by Robert Edmond Jones -- considered one of the most prominent designers of the 'New Stagecraft' techniques emerging at that time.
     After a successful opening, THE HAIRY APE transferred in April to Broadway's Plymouth Theater for 127 performances.
     Unsure what to make of this unusual turn in O'Neill's writing, critics responded with cautiously supportive reviews. New York Times Critic Alexander Woollcot summed up the work as "a bitter, brutal, wildly fantastic play of nightmare hue and nightmare distortion." Woollcot concluded his review by declaring THE HAIRY APE to be "a turbulent and tremendous play, so full of blemishes that the merest fledgling among the critics could point out a dozen, yet so vital and interesting and teeming with life that those playgoers who let it escape them will be missing one of the real events of the year."

THE CONTROVERSY BEGINS.
     America at the time of THE HAIRY APE's debut was embroiled in a maelstrom of political and social turmoil. The struggles of Organized Labor had reached new heights -- throughout the late 19-teens and early '20s, industry was shaken by the Seattle General Strike, the Boston Police Strike, the shockingly bloody Mingo County Coal Field Wars, and the Great Steel Strike, to name only a few. The Russian Revolution of 1917 provided inspiration to a whole generation of American radicals and the Communist Party of the United States of America was founded (by John Reed, the husband of Eugene O'Neill's lover Louise Bryant!) in 1921.
     Government repression was at an all-time high with the Alien and Sedition Acts of World War One, the Red Scare, and the Justice Department's "Palmer Raids" in full swing. Race relations were at an all-time low with the so-called "Red Summer of 1919" bringing ultra-violent race riots to many American cities.
     In this extremely politically-charged atmosphere, it should come as no surprise that the explicitly labor-oriented subject matter of THE HAIRY APE was considered sensitive material by the authorities.
     The play's strong condemnation of the dehumanizing effects of industrialization made it appealing to many labor groups and unions, who seized upon its concepts to further their cause for better working conditions. It also attracted the attention of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which had kept a file on O'Neill. The Bureau's report on the playwright stated that "The Hairy Ape could easily lend itself to radical propaganda, and it is somewhat surprising that it has not already been used for this purpose."
     New York City Mayor John F. Hylan agreed and threatened to have the play shut down for fear that it would incite labor riots. Chief City Magistrate Bernard McAdoo declared the play "impure, obscene, and indecent" . . . and that was before he had even read it! After he DID read it, however, he silenced his objections and returned the script "without comment." Even Owen Davis, Chairman of the Censorship Committee of the Author's League, ultimately came to the defense of the play declaring in a letter to the New York Telegraph on May 19, 1922 that "No one would condemn 'The Hairy Ape' excepting a fanatic. If they were to suppress the play it would be a calamity to the theater."
     Thankfully, said calamity never came to pass and the first production of THE HAIRY APE ran its course without interruption.

AND SO THE REINTERPRETATIONS BEGAN.
     Even as one of O'Neill's lesser known plays, THE HAIRY APE has enjoyed a wealth of productions all over the World. But unlike most O'Neill plays that are typically presented in a manner very faithful to the author's original conception, theatres have repeatedly chosen to be very inventive with their renditions of THE HAIRY APE reinterpreting it in a number of experimental ways. It seems there's something about this story -- perhaps because of it's larger-than-life imagery or it's mixture of realism and surrealism, or maybe because of it's unabashed discussion of controversial issues -- that tempts theatre artists to add their own creative twists.
     One of the earliest reinterpretations came in Alexander Tairov's 1925 production for the Kamerny ("Chamber") Theater in Moscow which incorporated the new Soviet Government's Constructivist art styles into the play's sets, costumes, and movement techniques and -- not surprisingly -- went to great lengths to highlight the script's discussion of class conflict.
     The 1931 London Debut at the Ambassador Theater added another twist as Black activist actor Paul Robeson took on the leading role. Robeson had already appeared in O'Neill's plays THE EMPEROR JONES and ALL GOD'S CHILLUN GOT WINGS. But THE HAIRY APE was the first time Robeson played a role that was not specifically written for a Black actor. Casting a Black man as the story's dehumanized and debased main character drew a whole new round of criticism -- from both opponents AND supporters -- to an already contentious project.
     Nonetheless, the London Times review proclaimed enthusiastically: "We need not hope to see the part played better than Mr. Robeson plays it. Nobody will watch [his] progress from the stokehold to the gorilla's cage . . . without thinking better of the play."
     Ironically, Robeson was less enthusiastic about his rendition saying that his earlier portrayal of Jim Harris in ALL GOD'S CHILLUN GOT WINGS "provided the greatest scope for expressing intrinsic dignity, unlike the brutish stoker in The Hairy Ape who was . . . a 'symbol of primitive humanity.'"

THE BIG SCREEN.
Hollywood got into the act in 1944. United Artist Studios released a very low-budget screen adaptation of THE HAIRY APE produced by Jules Levey starring William Bendix opposite Susan Hayward, Dorothy Comingore, and John Loder. But this film was not a box office success and is today all but forgotten.

AND ON INTO MORE MODERN TIMES...
     This off-beat One Act play that O'Neill wrote frantically in less than three weeks over eighty years ago continues to enjoy revivals -- both of the experimental and more conventional variety -- to this day.
     Some more notable experimental versions in recent decades include notorious German leftist director Peter Stein's highly expressionist adaptation by the Schaubuhne Theatre Company that debuted in West Berlin in 1986 and traveled to London's National Theatre in 1987 as well as a truly unique post-modern multi-media rendition by New York City's Wooster Group in 1996 that starred Willem Dafoe in the leading role.
     The Twenty-First Century has already seen some significant -- albeit more traditionally-minded -- versions of THE HAIRY APE. In 2006, the Irish Repertory Theatre once again brought the play to life with a critically-acclaimed production in the city where it first debuted. The publication The Irish Voice jubilantly declared: "O'Neill's spirit still resonates. The Irish Repertory Theatre's new production of The Hairy Ape reminds us why O'Neill is considered the first Irish American playwright."
     Most recently, Director Sean Graney of the Hypocrites Theatre Company brought his own version to Chicago's Goodman Theatre in February of 2009.

OUR PRODUCTION.
We at Subversive Theatre are very excited to have this opportunity to present our own irreverent take on the play that has intrigued, outraged, inspired, and perplexed so many for so long. Back in 1922 the FBI reported that "The Hairy Ape could easily lend itself to radical propaganda." We couldn't agree more and we're doing our best to live up to the FBI's expectations!