A mighty bust-up: John Arden and Margaretta D'Arcy's The Island of the Mighty at the Aldwych theatre, December 1972

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article attempts to explain what happened when The Island of the Mighty was staged by the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) at the Aldwych Theatre, London in December 1972. The Island of the Mighty is a trilogy on an Arthurian theme. Its sources are both mythical and historical, but the authors give it urgency by relating it to the third-world struggles of the time, most notably in India. It was Indian folk drama that provided the authors with a dramaturgical model. When the RSC agreed to produce the trilogy, they did so in ignorance of this background, and on condition that the three plays be compressed into a single evening's drama. The authors agreed, but after some weeks of rehearsal they and the director (and his company) were at irreconcilable loggerheads about how it should be presented. Arden and D'Arcy went on strike, and the ensuing conflict reached the front page of the Sun, led to the formation of a Theatre Writers Union and ensured that Arden and D'Arcy would never again be part of the British theatre.