The Barretts of Wimpole Street

US Army Special Service The American Theater Wing Brian Aherne

At the first production, the army's fears seemed to be validated. At the start of the play, which takes place in damp, chilly London, the doctor advises that Elizabeth go to Italy for rest. The audience, G.I.s fighting in war-torn Italy, exploded in laughter, hooting, yelling and stamping. According to actress Margalo Gillmore, "It was true, then, we thought, they would go on laughing and it would never stop and the Barretts would go under a tidal wave of derision. But we were wrong. Kit and Guthrie were holding the laugh, just as if they had heard it a hundred times, not showing any alarm, not even seeming to wait for it, but handling it, controlling it, ready to take over at the first sign of its getting out of hand. It rose and fell and before it could rise again, Kit spoke."

The play continued, and outbreaks of an occasional catcall, guffaw or heckling were quickly shushed by others. Gillmore continues: "Kit had a shining light in her. With that strange sixth sense of the actor that functions unexplainably in complete independence of lines spoken and emotions projected, she had been aware of the gradual change out front from a dubious indifference to the complete absorption of interest. At first they hung back, keeping themselves separate from us, a little self-consciously, a little defiantly, and then line by line, scene by scene, she had felt them relax and respond and give themselves up to the play and the story, til at last they were that magic indivisible thing, an audience. 'We must never forget this, never,' said Kit. 'We've seen an audience born.'"

The tour opened in Santa Maria, a small town 15 miles north of Naples, in 1944. G.I.s lined up three hours ahead of time and profusely thanked the cast afterwards. Brian Aherne wrote that after one show in Italy, the manager overheard a tough burly paratrooper say to his buddy, "Well, what I tell ya? Told ya it would be better than going to a cat house."[31] Convinced of its success, the Army brass sanctioned two more weeks. The company eventually played for six months, from August 1944 to January 1945, throughout Italy, including stops in Rome, Florence and Siena. From there, the company was transferred under the aegis of General Dwight D. Eisenhower and played in France, including Dijon, Marseilles and Versailles. In Paris, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas wanted to see the play, but found that performances were strictly limited to enlisted personnel. They were nonetheless given disguises and were able to see the play. Additionally, the cast made a point of visiting hospitals every day throughout the entire tour.[32]

Now aged 51, Cornell was then told by the Army that she had done enough for the effort and to remain in Paris. Her response was to be taken as close to the front as possible. The company performed in Maastricht and Heerlen in the Netherlands, just eight miles from the front. The tour concluded in London amid exploding German V-2 bombs.

Upon her return to New York, Cornell found mail piled up from the G.I.s who had seen the show. They thanked her for "the most nerve-soothing remedy for a weary G.I.," for having brought "yearned-for femininity," reminding them that, unlike other USO shows, "a woman is not all leg," and for "the awakening of something that I thought died with the passing of routine military life in the foreign service."

Long after the tour was finished, Cornell continued to receive letters, not just from servicemen who had seen the show, but from wives, mothers and even school teachers from the home front. Their letters say that the first letter they received from their boy came after he had seen her show, or it was the first time they had heard from them in two years. Fellow actors reported that G.I.s in the South Pacific were heard to talk about the show.

After the war, Cornell co-chaired the Community Players, a successor to the American Theatre Wing, to assist war veterans and their families on their return home.

Cornell was featured for the second time on the cover of Time magazine on December 21, 1942, with Judith Anderson and Ruth Gordon.

Candida, revived

After the war, American theater was experiencing a change in style with the new generation. Cornell revived Candida for the fifth and last time in April 1946, with Marlon Brando playing the role of the young Marchbanks. Whereas Cornell represented an older, exuberant romantic style, Brando heralded the newer style of Method Acting, with its reliance upon psychological insights and personal experience. Although reviews were as good as ever, audiences and some critics had difficulty with the play itself, as the Edwardian drama had little relevance to post-war American life.

Now in her mid-50s, appropriate roles became harder to find. The plays that had earned her such an exceptional reputation—young Elizabeth Barrett, Juliet, St. Joan, various sexually charged women—were no longer playable by her. The newer roles were simply not her style.

Shakespeare and Anouilh

In 1946, Cornell chose Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, which opened at the Hanna Theater in Cleveland, a difficult role for which she was ideally suited. Critic Ward Morrison praised Cornell's "beauty and power and grandeur and I do not hesitate to proclaim it one of the finest achievements of her career." Again, Cornell's presence insured that this play would have its longest run ever, at 251 performances.

She followed that with Jean Anouilh's adaptation of the Greek tragedy Antigone. Sir Cedric Hardwicke played King Creon, and Marlon Brando was cast as The Messenger. After the opening, Cornell's friend Helen Keller told her, "This play is a parable of humanity. It has no time or space." One critic said, "if the world and the theatre had more courageous spirits like [Cornell], our cumulative dreams would be greater, our thoughts, nobler."

Alternating with Antony, Cornell produced another revival of Barretts of Wimpole Street, for an eight-week tour to the West Coast, with Tony Randall in both plays, and Maureen Stapleton as Iras in Antony.[9] Other cast members included Eli Wallach, Joseph Wiseman, Douglas Watson, Charles Nolte, and Charlton Heston