Maltese productions of Classical theatre in the post-WWII period

Abstract

In this short survey of Maltese post-War theatre productions of works by the great dramatists of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome, I shall say but a few words on what was produced in the first years following the end of WWII, since Carmel Serracino has published two fine studies of this period. I shall only say that it was two members of the newly set-up branch of Britain's Virgil Society, Frank and George Mifsud Montanaro, who persuaded the Society to produce Plautus's Captivi in 1947 and the Orestes of Euripides in the same year. The productions received encouraging reviews in The Times, but clearly had shortcoming especially in many of the actors' English intonation and pronunciation. What was clearly a much better production was that of Euripides' Iphigenia at Aulis, performed in 1948 by the fairly new theatre group, B.I. Players, and directed by Alec Cathcart Bruce, director of the British Institute, who had had experience of classical drama in performance when a student in Britain. [excerpt]