The Brustein Affair

ROBERT BRUSTEIN'S possible appointment to head the Loeb Drama Center should be hailed as a major opportunity for the improvement of performing arts at Harvard, despite understandable student concern over Brustein's commitment to undergraduate drama. The negotiations between Harvard's administration and Brustein may have more to do with Brustein's stature in the academic and professional community than with any great desire on the administration's part for a more vigorous theater program. But whatever the reason, Brustein could provide an exciting antidote for the Loeb blahs of the past few decades--and the repertory company he will bring with him could revitalize both academic and professional drama in the area in a big way.

Despite Brustein's brilliant record with the Yale Rep. and School of Drama, he has aquired a reputation for ignoring undergraduates. This is understandable; after all, his job at Yale was to run a Graduate School and a professional company. Students in theater fear Brustein will likewise devote his energies here to running his company, and will have no time left for undergraduates.

But the status of both the professional actors of the Rep. and Brustein himself will be different at Harvard. Under Brustein's plan, the members of the company would draw half-salaries both from the Rep. and from the University--both "do" and "teach" simultaneously. Nevertheless, the University should demand rigid contractual agreements from Brustein and his staff to pay equal, if not more than equal, attention to undergraduates. One proposal worth closer attention is for each professional to serve as a House tutor in drama.

Another objection to Brustein's plan students have voiced is that the professional company would pre-empt undergraduate use of Loeb facilities. The agreement between Harvard and the repertory company should guarantee that House drama groups will continue to have access to the Loeb shop and technical advice from its staff. Brustein proposes reducing the number of undergraduate productions at the Loeb from four to seven a year--but House drama societies, as well as other groups like the Radcliffe Grant-in-Aid Society and the Gilbert and Sullivan Society, would continue to provide the lion's share of student drama at Harvard as they have in the past.

The present faculty advisory committee on the Loeb should be retained, if only to re-assure students and provide a check on Brustein's power over scheduling Rep. and undergraduate productions.

Brustein should also consider opening his proposed non-credit courses in such areas as Acting, Directing and Drama Criticism to all qualified undergraduates, not merely to juniors and seniors as he has stated. Nonetheless, what Brustein proposes is considerably more substantial than what the Loeb presently offers.

If there are risks in appointing Brustein, risks which can be considerably reduced by careful contractual negotiations--they are far outweighed by the potential benefits to the Harvard community. In the area of admissions, for example, Yale has traditionally lured many arts-oriented undergraduates away from Harvard on the reputation of Brustein and the Rep. alone. With expanded opportunities for undergraduate training, Harvard may be able to attract more talented and committed students interested in theater.

As Brustein has suggested, the influence of the Rep. combined with more professional training could filter down to House drama societies and improve the quality of Harvard theater in general, without excluding those whose commitment to drama is more tentative and just for fun.

Brustein has also expressed a laudable desire to work to make drama if not a department in itself, at least a concentration within one of the existing departments. He no doubt underestimates the deep-set, highly impressive forces of resistence on the Faculty--who view the performing arts as fluff. But if anyone can champion the cause of theater at Harvard, and open the doors for future recognition of the performing arts (and maybe no one can) it is Robert Brustein.