Word: druids
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Philco Television Playhouse (Sun. 9 p.m., NBC-TV). The Druid Circle, with Leo G. Carroll...
...Druid Circle (by John van Druten; produced by Alfred de Liagre Jr.) deals with life-or rather the awful lack of it-in a wormy provincial British university "near the borders of England and Wales." The leading spirits there are all husks and cinders, all genteel pedants dead from the neck down. Worst of all is 53-year-old Professor White (beautifully played by Leo G. Carroll), whose thin blood has turned to bile, and who hates youth pathologically, not just as something that has vanished, but as something that never came...
...Druid Circle is an understanding and very often interesting play, but not quite a success. It is too full of clashing moods and shifting pressures. Between the university and the professor is more difference than at first appears-all the difference between the stuff of satire and the stuff of drama. With fluttering spinsters and tea-table gossip constantly cutting in on the professor's story, The Druid Circle seems too intense at moments, yet not intense enough as a whole. Playwright van Druten, who as a young man taught for a time at the sort of college...
...good simple play; "The Mermaids Sing" was a love story with complications; but in his newest achievement, John Van Druten has allowed the complications to overpower the story, and the result is not a good play. He is still just as good a technician as ever, and "The Druid Circle" moves forward with an oiled speed that is sure to keep you awake and lively for the full two and a half hours. Though threadss are dropped aimlessly all over the last two acts, they are line, colored, interesting threads, spun by an expert, if careless, craftsman...
Excellent acting keeps "The Druid Circle" amusing and alive. Leo G. Carroll succeeds in the difficult task of keeping a bitter and disillusioned old man sympathetic even when he tries to destroy the love of two young people. But the most spectacular playing last night was done by Ethel Griffies, in the role of the professor's mother. The part has little relation to the story, but the comedy of this ancient hypochondriac is almost worth the price of orchestra seats. The other actors fill in smoothly, except perhaps for the one playing the young girl in love, whose stylized...