Extravaganza and Society

You may get the impression that Extravaganzas are hastily thrown together and thrown on stage, plus the cast and liberal quantities of alcohol. This impression has not been achieved without years of careful cultivation and planning. If you think that the last scene was written while the first scene was being played then you are quite wrong—actually the first scene was being written while the last was being played.

This year, as usual, an international contest sponsored by U.N.E.S.C.O. and V.U.C.S.A was held to select a script. The results, to say the least, were both disappointing and disheartening, particularly in view of the standing this contest has now achieved. The following entries were eliminated early in the piece because they lacked that essential aesthetic integrity so necessary for a work of this genre: "A Sid for Two Farthings" or "The Absurd Man" (Carol Reed), "The Trouble with Wally" (Alfred Hitchcock), "Will Success Spoil Sid Holland" (George Axelrod), "Eden of the East" (John Steinbeck), "A Cablecar Named Desire" (Elia Kazan), "Moby Sid" (John Huston.

The panel of judges consisted of Ernest Hemingway, Thomas Steams Eliot, Esq. (by kind arrangement with Faber and Faber), Arthur Miller (by kind arrangement with Marilyn Monroe Productions Inc. President: M. Monroe), Jean Paul Sartre and Guthrie Wilson (by kind arrangement with "The Manawatu Times"). The selected script was, however, rejected by the V.U.C.S.A. executive whose knowledge in these matters, as in all others, is so much greater. They then commissioned the following to collaborate: Igor Stravinsky (musical score), with assistance from Cole Porter; Joshua Logan and Tyrone Guthrie (Production), supervised by Richard Campion; Salvador Dali (Decor); Cecil Beaton (Costumes); Huddy Williamson (stage manager); Michael Kidd (Choreography); Nikita Kruschev (Plot); Arnold Toynbee (Lyrics); Burt Lancaster, John Foster Dulles and Yul Brynner (Call Boys). Make up by Helena Frankenstein. All these people said they were honoured to accept these positions and with one exception insisted that they should appear in the programme under an assumed name.

At this point it is customary to relate the plot—but no! If we were to do this we would be offending our artistic conscience. This year's plot is laden with social significances. If you discover the plot or the social significances then let the authors into the secret by entering the Monster Extravaganza Plot-Finding Jingle Competition.