REVIEWS

The media on Grenada

THE BIG LIE, by Glen Ford. Pub-
lished by the International Or-
ganization of Journalists in co-
operation with the National Al-
liance of Third World Journal-
ist. Prague, 1985. Available from
progressive book stores or the
Canadian Tribune. 44 pages,
paper. $1 plus postage.

Glen Ford is the former host
and producer for the syndicated

H.D. Lawrence:
a class stand

CLASS, POLITICS AND THE
INDIVIDUAL: A Study of Major
Works by D.H. Lawrence. By
Peter Scheckner. Fairleigh
Dickinson University Press,
Cranbury, N.J. 176 pages. Cloth
$24.95.

D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930),
the English author, produced
volumes of short stories, plays
and essays. He is best known,
however for his novels, especially
Sons and Lovers, the three Lady
Chatterley books and Women in
Love.

These very influential works
have produced a vast critical lit-
erature but, with the partial ex-
ception of Scott Sanders’ study,
published in 1973, none develops
the significance of class in Law-
rence’s work (he was himself of
workingclass origin and never
forgot it). He is also one of the few
critics to observe that Lady Chat-
terley’s lover was a Communist
Party organizer!

The book under review, whose
author is a young professor at
Ramapo College, insists that
**Lawrence’s novels reveal more
about class, society, and the in-
dividual than critics acknowl-
edge.’ He certainly proves that
point in this detailed study of
Lawrence's major works. Those
interested in the critically il-
luminating power of a_ stance
heavily influenced by George Lu-
kac’s historical-materialist ap-
proach, will find Scheckner’s
work worthy of careful study.

—Herbert Apetheker
Daily World

television news program Ameri-
ca’s Black Forum and.the syndi-
cated radio feature Black Agenda
Reports. He has been a bureau
chief and reporter for Mutual
Black Network News and various
radio stations and is currently
head of Creative Broadcasters
which is involved in purchasing
radio stations in the United
States.

In The Big Lie, Ford provides
facts, quotations and commen-
taries to show how the U.S.
media manipulated public opinion
around the invasion of Grenada.

‘For the first 48 hours the press
was kept out of the action. Re-
porters were barred from their
traditional places aboard military

air and sea craft, and the few who :

managed to reach the island on
their own were placed under de
facto house arrest on offshore
warships. In a few cases these
U.S. military quarantines were
placed on reporters who had pre-
viously been befriended by Peo-
ple’s Revolutionary Army sol-
diers. Even after the blanket ban
was lifted, severe restrictions
were imposed on journalists in
Grenada.” .

Why these measures, unusual
in any case, were adopted and
what was to be concealed are
questions to which The Big Lie
supplies convincing answers.
The publication illustrates the
rale played by the American press
in defending the official policy of
the government, even in cases
that it abandons the otherwise
much proclaimed principle of
freedom of the press, the free flow
of information and the rights of
journalists.

Using the Grenadian example,
Ford demonstrates the current
practice of the U.S. press, its dis-
information. methods, ‘silent lies
and grey propaganda.

The book also warns against
the danger of war propaganda
which is being given even greater
scope in the U.S. mass media,
and shows that the defence of
“local wars’” is the first step to
propaganda for nuclear war:

—IOJ News

DESERT HEARTS, directed by Donna Deitch.
MY BEAUTIFUL sietinar ie directed by
Stephen Frears.

Homosexuality is not a new subject for film- -

makers to tackle, but the films are usually about
homosexuality itself, not about people who among
other things happen to be homosexuals. It is the
departure from this norm which makes these two
films unique. The audience and gays are spared the
stereotypes of tortured relationships which in-
evitably end in tragedy or conversion to hetero-
sexuality. Even the eccentric behavior which has
marked many of the more sympathetic treatments
in Victor/Victoria, La Cage aux Folles or Personal
Best has been bypassed.

My Beautiful Laundrette focuses on racial,
class, political and family conflicts in a mixed
ethnic, working class London neighborhood.
Omar is the son of Pakistani immigrants. His father
is a socialist; his uncle a capitalist who makes his
money through organized crime. Inan effort to win
acceptance Omar gradually adopts his uncle’s op-
tion. With assistance from his lover Johnny, a
skinhead and former member of the racist National
Front, he takes over a rundown washhouse from
his uncle and turns it into the Ritz of Laundrettes.

Johnny and Omar’s affair is only a subplot to the
film’s treatment of the relationship between the
Pakistanis and their impoverished white working
class neighbors.

It’s not a flawless examination, satire and racial
stereotyping combine to leave a somewhat dis-

torted picture of the complexities of race and class .

relationships. The Pakistanis are shrewd and
sexist. Their wealth is derived from a combination
of hard work, family ties, and racketeering. As
dope dealers and slum landlords they have nothing
but contempt for the impoverished whites. In this
context there is almost a sympathy generated for
the unemployed, young thugs who vent their rage
through racism.

The eminently decent Johnny is torn apart by

Patricia Charbonneau and Helen Shaver in Desert Hearts.

Films avoid gay stereotype

As conflict. “The Pakis came here to
* one of his old gang members screams
“Why are you working for them?”’
The answer is found in his love for Omar,
by no means is a fair or liberated relationship: F’
is an answer the viewer will understand-

Desert Hearts

When Deitch began work on Desert ‘Hea
was moved by the fact that there hadn’t be
about a love relationship between two
which hadn’t ended in suicide or a bisé
angle.

Hearts is a romance with a fairly veil
the intense intellectual meets a young, T
learns to live life more freely. The time » vel
Vivian Bell, (Canadian actress Helen Shave

English professor, comes to Reno to get@”
and begin to live ‘‘an honest life’’. There She

Cay Rivers (Patricia Charbonneau), a pottet ef
supports herself working in a casino fob

In Vivian, Cay thinks she has finally
someone ‘‘who counts’. Vivian is at ”
trigued, then in spite of herself, passio™
attracted. ;

Hearts is a pleasant alternative to what !
dustry tries to pass off as romantic come ve
extremely entertaining, erotic — without
pornographic, and devoid of the usual chauvit
chest beating. ,

The two principals are a delight: ye “it
sprinkled with wicked one-liners; the sO uf
is solid gold 50s pop and country (Elvis 4% 10
Cline) and the landscape is from a picture pra

Interéstingly both films are low budget Z i
dependently made. Laundrette which rf
$350,000 was intended for British TV ©
blown up into 35 mm. Deitch spent foul ?
raising $1.5-million from the women’s mov"
After meeting with immense success at
vals they were picked up by mainstrea™
butors. They are now yours to enjoy.

od
Ol

xu

Soviet play views Jewish

emigration —

By ALEXANDER TOVSTONOGOV
Director Stanislavsky Drama Theatre

When ‘40 Sholem Aleichem Street” is
on at the Moscow Stanislavsky Drama
Theatre patrons line up welli in advance if
they want tickets.

The play deals with Jews who want to
emigrate from the Soviet Union. Two
brothers, Boris and Leonid, leave Mos-
cow for Odessa to pick up their elderly
parents and leave for Israel. Their
mother decides to go along, though it
takes her a long time to make up her
mind. Their father, ‘ta Bolshevik,
though not a Party member’ ’, as he calls
himself, is in favor of leaving also. How-
ever at the end of the play he commits
suicide.

That’s the plot essentially. Actually, it
is a tragedy in the classical sense of the
word. It is always extremely painful to
try and pull up roots.

As a stage director, I have an interest
in people who find themselves in extreme

situations, whether in the trenches, in
conflicts of world proportions or in per-
sonal relationships.

The playwright, Arkadi Stavitsky
used to live in Odessa and knows the
prototypes of his characters. Though
I’ve never been to Odessa, I accepted
Stavitsky’s idea of it. When I undertook
to stage the play, the main thing for me

-was to express the spirit, mentality and

humor of the city’s residents.

I am an advocate of an emotional the-
atre, as its purpose is to bring the idea
home to the audience through compas-
sion. Perhaps, it is a self-limitation, but
I'm truly sick ong tired of sophisticated
dramas.

Rehearsing 40 Sholem Aleichem
Street’’, I confirmed my old belief that
improvisation in acting is based on an
ideal. Our actors are professionals, they
have mastered every gesture, movement

-and expression to perfection, but each ~

time they appear on stage, it is as if they
are doing it for the first time. As for im-

Theatre

provisation, | think it is a trend which can
only result in low-standard, careless act-
ing.

Some critics have rejected our method
complaining it involves excessive detail.
Yet, I believe that it’s the detail that
makes it possible to play the scene of the
mother saying goodbye to her old cup-
board, a friend that has always been by
her side — when her son died, during the
war when the Nazis shot her family.

Incidentally, it is this episode which
received almost universal praise by the
reviewers. The character’s relationships
with the objects make up the material
aspects of our performance and build on
the image of the difficulty of forever leav-
ing things that are dear to you.

The actors and I actually lived the en-
tire life of our stage characters. As for
me, I was haunted by the memory of a

ages, ethnic groups and social §

colleague of mine who emigrated ro!
U.S. leaving his blind mother be?
How can one understand or for? J
something like that? yet |
Our viewers are people of differ

Still, every time the play is on I ee
sically aware that the audience fi
centrated on problems common 10
us. They are not ashamed to wee,
when the leave they can not swit¢
to their daily routines at once. ,
It is fitting that the play begins W
following introduction: ‘‘ The st
are going to tell you took place in the
1970s. Yet, it is the theatre’s duty
neglect human sorrow and paid
everything in this disquiet world h@
ready repeated itself, or might
peated in future. That is why before
ing you about the events that too
on 40 Aleichem Street, we would li
point out something that does not d¢
on time, one’s mood or the place of 0
origin.”

10 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, MAY 7, 1986