Creative Person; 43; Eric Bentley
- Series
- Creative Person
- Episode Number
- 43
- Episode
- Eric Bentley
- Producing Organization
- National Educational Television and Radio Center
- Columbia University. Press. Center for Mass Communication
- Contributing Organization
- Library of Congress (Washington, District of Columbia)
- AAPB ID
- cpb-aacip/512-qf8jd4qq5z
- NOLA Code
- CRPN
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- Description
- Episode Description
- Eric Bentley, a versatile man of the musical theater, is a writer, editor, musician, teacher, drama critic, director, adapter, and an important interpreter of Bertolt Brecht. He was born in England on September 14, 1916, received a bachelor of arts and a bachelor of letters degree from Oxford University and a Ph.D. from Yale University. He taught poetry at Harvard and currently serves as professor of dramatic literature at Columbia University. Bentley is the author of A Century of Hero Worship, The Playwright as Thinker, In Search of Theatre, and The Dramatic Event, and editor of The Modern Theatre, From the Modern Repertoire, and The Classical Theatre. He has also adapted the plays A Mans a Man and Mother Courage. The program opens with Bentley in his apartment at the piano playing and singing Lied der Tankbrigaden by Weinert and Eisler followed by Poplar tree on Karlsplatz by Brecht and Eisler. He then begins an uninterrupted commentary which continues for the entire length of the program in which he discusses how he first become interested in music it was not through the study of music as a child, he recalls, but through his later development interest in musical theatre. The program moves around New York City by a combination of cuts, pans, and dissolves in which Bentley, without interruption in his commentary, is seen in his office at Columbia, at Lincoln Center, standing before the Vivian Beaumont Theatre, in Shubert Alley, in a bookstore at Columbia, on Riverside Drive, and finally back at his apartment at the piano playing and singing Are You Saving Up Your Courage? by Wolf Bierman. His discussion ranges from his first meeting with Bertolt Brecht, whose works he has been translating for the past 20 years, to his experience as a drama critic for the New Republic. He also talks about off-Broadway producers, the regional theatre and its place in American theatre, the differences between writing an original musical drama and adapting a work by another writer, his books, and how translations differ from adaptations. The Creative Person: Eric Bentley is a 1967 production of National Educational Television, produced in association with the Center of Mass Communication, Columbia University Press. (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
- Series Description
- This series focuses on the private vision of the creative person. Each program is devoted to a 20th century artist whose special qualities of imagination, taste, originality, intelligence, craftsmanship, and individuality have marked him as a pace-setter in his field. These artists --- whose fields span the entire gamut of the art world --- include filmmaker Jean Renoir, poet John Ciardi, industrial designer Raymond Loewy, Hollywood producer-director King Vidor, noted Broadway couple Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee, artist Leonard Baskin, humorist James Thurber, satirist Robert Osborn, Indian musician Ravi Shankar, poet P. G. Wodehouse, painter Georges Braque, former ballet star Olga Spessivtzeva, Rudolf Bing, and Marni Nixon. The format for each program has been geared to the individual featured; Performance, interview, and documentary technique are employed interchangeably. The Creative Person is a 1965 production of National Educational Television. The N.E.T. producers are Jack Sameth, Jac Venza, Lane Slate, Thomas Slevin, Brice Howard, Craig Gilbert, and Jim Perrin. (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
- Broadcast Date
- 1967-04-02
- Asset type
- Episode
- Genres
- Documentary
- Topics
- Music
- Performing Arts
- Literature
- Theater
- Rights
- Copyright Columbia University Press May 1, 1967
- Media type
- Moving Image
- Credits
-
-
Director: Sharff, Stefan
Executive Producer: Howard, Brice
Executive Producer: Barnouw, Erik, 1908-2001
Guest: Bentley, Eric
Performer: Bentley, Eric
Producer: Sharff, Stefan
Producer: Glimcher, Sumner
Producing Organization: National Educational Television and Radio Center
Producing Organization: Columbia University. Press. Center for Mass Communication
- AAPB Contributor Holdings
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2000492-1 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Copy: Access
Color: B&W
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2000492-2 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Copy: Access
Color: B&W
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- Citations
- Chicago: “Creative Person; 43; Eric Bentley,” 1967-04-02, Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed July 6, 2025, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-qf8jd4qq5z.
- MLA: “Creative Person; 43; Eric Bentley.” 1967-04-02. Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. July 6, 2025. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-qf8jd4qq5z>.
- APA: Creative Person; 43; Eric Bentley. Boston, MA: Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-qf8jd4qq5z