ANNAJANSKA is frankly a bravura piece. The modern variety theatre
demands for its "turns" little plays called sketches, to last twenty
minutes or so, and to enable some favorite performer to make a brief
but dazzling appearance on some barely passable dramatic pretext. Miss
Lillah McCarthy and I, as author and actress, have helped to make one
another famous on many serious occasions, from Man and Superman to
Androcles; and Mr Charles Ricketts has not disdained to snatch moments
from his painting and sculpture to design some wonderful dresses for us.
We three unbent as Mrs Siddons, Sir Joshua Reynolds and Dr Johnson might
have unbent, to devise a turn for the Coliseum variety theatre. Not
that we would set down the art of the variety theatre as something to be
condescended to, or our own art as elephantine. We should rather crave
indulgence as three novices fresh from the awful legitimacy of the
highbrow theatre.
Well, Miss McCarthy and Mr Ricketts justified themselves easily in the
glamor of the footlights, to the strains of Tchaikovsky's 1812. I fear
I did not. I have received only one compliment on my share; and that was
from a friend who said, "It is the only one of your works that is not
too long." So I have made it a page or two longer, according to my own
precept: EMBRACE YOUR REPROACHES: THEY ARE OFTEN GLORIES IN DISGUISE.
Annajanska was first performed at the Coliseum Theatre in London on the
21st January, 1918, with Lillah McCarthy as the Grand Duchess, Henry
Miller as Schneidekind, and Randle Ayrton as General Strammfest.