Will Waspe
It is amusing that there is so much concern among entrepreneurs of the arts to avoid February 28 as an opening night, since all such activities are likely to be over long before the hour at which the populace can begin taking an interest in the election returns. Nevertheless, the first night of David Hare's play, Knuckles, originally set for the Comedy on the 28th, has been postponed for a few days. Whether the Serpentine Gallery's new exhibition, scheduled for a private view on that date, will also be postponed seems in doubt. Waspe suggests it should go ahead, on the grounds that the Serpentine's public is probably not old enough to vote anyway.
Papered house
Theatres are not as a rule short of applications for first-night seats, but the word had evidently got around about David Mercer's Duck Song. Waspe learns that large batches of complimentary tickets for the first night at the Aldwych last week were sent out (apart from those to the press and the usual friends of cast and management) to avoid the chance of dispiriting wide open spaces in the stalls.
Not in disfavour
My paragraph last week about television critic Elizabeth Cowley's impending departure from the London Evening Standard was not intended to be wounding to that lady; rather as an expression of sympathy in a situation beyond her control. I am glad to learn, anyway, that the Standard features department holds her in no disfavour, and that the anticipated change in the paper's television coverage in the spring is "a matter of regular policy" unconnected with Miss Cowley's highly regarded contributions.
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