Page Six ) Play (Continued from Page 1) in helpless bafflement) that tends to emphasize the redun- dantcy of the piece. His voice has me same tendency. His youth is an unfortunate handi- cap to the role, demanding more maturity than he is capable of supplying. his mother is well. played by Brenda Thomas and Howard Harned, as his father, shows the makings of a fine I: h a r a C t e r actor. Richard Schmiechen has trouble using his body gracefully on stage, but plays an intellectual pariah with a good intensity. Dale Dreyfus is one of the few mem- bers of the cast who possesses the necessary maturlty and he does well in the role of another friend of the would-be Every- man. Libby Pannwitt does nice- ly with the part of the alienated first wife. By far the treat and the star of the evening is Debora Abbott who plays Quentin‘s second wife. Clearly based on Miller’s own wife, Marilyn Monroe, Miss Abbott brilliantly manages to evoke the character of a troubled, tortured sex goddessst insecure. afraid of everything SCARLET AND BLACK MAKE-UP ASSISTANT Libby Craig appliei white shoe polish to color Howard Harned's hair, at part of the process of aging him tor the ml. of the bayou—old Ind everyone and desperately craving an affection With which no man will ever be able to adequately supply her (much less our fumbling internal hero). When she is on stage the chow comes alive and things be- gin to happen. Sometimes it ls peculiarly troubling to to see how successful she (and Miller) is in developing and delineating this unhappy Creature. Like "Sons and Lovers” by D. H' Lawrence, "After the Fall” is clearly a self exorcism for Mil- ler, and in plays this kind of cleansing is much more damag- ing and obvious. It becomes dis- turbing, not because it has its own theatrical punch, but be- cause we are all too familiar with Certain details of Mr. Mil- ler's life When Eugene O’Neill wrote about his family, he stip- fafher in After the Full. ulated that the play not be pra< duced until ten years after his death Be that as it may, Deb- orah Abbott is a superior talent and is on her way to being I fine actress. The production as a whole suffered from some opening night sloppiness (light cues missed and taken too early), and some occasional slip-shod staging by director Meyer. There is also a pacing difficulty. While some of this may be due to the inexperience of the ac- tors, Meyer's conception of the highs and lows and the rates at which scenes should go was again awfully repetitive. Of course he is working uphill against it script that is built on the leit motif of repetition, but Photo By Susan Kaesen that won't stop an audience from scratching behind the ears after an hour and twenty min- utes of first act (there are two). When all is said and done “After the Fall" ought to be seen There is some very good acting and even if you catch only one tenth of Quentin's ram- blings,’you will have food for thought. Moved you will not be, but you Will be fascinated off and again by what transpires on the stage. It may be a fail- ure, but it is not a total failure nor is it an uninteresting one. The Grinnell cast has bitten off a mighty big chunk of theatre. Whether it is good theatre is another story, but I am tempted to say they have given the play quite the production it deserves. Convention Politics By Dan Bucks The longest and closest convention in SGA history ended at 1:45 a.m,, Monday, with the withdrawal speech of Ray Horn. The two vote leaders, and only remaining candidates from an original field of four, Craig Allin and Rio Made Dowel], were thus nominated for the election on iTuesday. The one decisive factor that gave Allin and MacDowell more votes than Horn was superior floor organization All three of the candidates came into the convention with wide, and appar- ently nearly equal, popular support, The technical po< Iltical skill of the Allin and MacDowell supporters ene nbled them to pick up a few extra independent votes in the convention. Early in the balloting, the Allin organization launched a vote drive that caught the other groups somewhat by surprise. Instead of playing I cautious game and hiding votes as did the lther groups, the Allin workers revealed their candidate’s vote strength on the third ballot by lhooting Allin's total up to 69 votes from the 24 that he received on the previous ballot. By the fifth ballot, a snowball effect had lifted Allin’s final to E7. The MacDowell supporters were able to re- Ipond to the Allin initiative muchtmore rapidly News Analysis than were the Horn workers. They broke the We vole level on the sixth ballot, and on the seventh ballot MacDowell's vote total actually exceeded Allin’s. Also, on the seventh ballot, the Horn sup- porters finally rallied and managed to boost Ray's total above 91). Because the Allin and MacDowell organizaa tions were able to make their vote drives earlier than the Horn organization, they could consoli- uate their support earlier and at a slightly higher level. Both Allin and MacDowell had, in the later ballots, effective support that could keep their vote totals in the high 90‘s and above. The Horn supporters, however, had their effective support limited to the low 90’s. A clear distribution of candidate support also emerged in the later ballots. Allin's support was based on South Campus votes, while Machwell and from both relied on North Campus for their primary support. an the last four announced bola lots, Allin drew an average of 54% of his votes from South Campus and 46% from North Campus. Horn, on the same ballots, received just 43% of his support from South Campus while 57% of his votes were from the men’s halls. MacDowell's support was even more overhal- anced toward North Campus, with 59% of his votes coming from there. Allin’s strength on South Campus was later reflected in the fact that he carried the women’s halls by a slim mar- gin in Tuesday's election, but lost to MacDowell by a decisive margin on North Campus. Friday, February fl. I957 lllllllllllllllllllilllllnllllllltllllllillllltlllll A Sfudenf Opinion lillillllllllllllllllllllilllllllllllllllllllllillill A Motion to Abolish The SGA Convention By Mary Malcolm Ed Note: A motion to elimi- nate the SGA convention will be presented to the Senate next Wednesday night. The benefits of the SGA cone vention are clear. The most valuable one is that it involves a large number of students in student government, and thus increases the probability of an SGA which is in touch with the students. The convention in- volves students who serve as delegates in the process of nominating the SGA president. As an all-campus activity (and all-campus activities are rather rare) it involves another sub- stantial number of students as observers. There is also some benefit in the way in which a convention involves students. Organized groups of supporters, in order to win delegations. must not only support a candidate but know why, and be prepared to articulate their reasons. Prior to the conventions, “machines" are forced to deal with the in- formation of the campaign, and this is a very good thing. When the convention is under- way, the “machines” having wound up with actual facts and issues, however equivocal, dur- ing the campaign go into a final run which is not very informa- tional, The convention itself is the ideal arena for pressure politics, imposed not only by the “machines" on wavering delegates, but also by vehe merit hall delegations on dis- senting voters. Although a cer- tain minimum of individual in- tegrity would, in theory. render such pressure ineffective, the pressure makes the lo-hour con- Ventiun into a marathon endur- ance test. A dirty kind of poll- tics. based on negative argu- ments and group pressure, goes on in the convention which would simply not be as useful in a general primary election, where each Vote is cheaper and given only once and in secret. Unique to the convention is a low level of obscenity occasion- ally disguised as humor, and muck-raking rivalry between halls and campuses. Unique to the convention is one of the largest useless expenditures of human time and energy I have encountered on this Campus. Over 3600 man hours went into the 1967 Convention at Darby, and the actual purpose served, that of narrowing the field to two candidates, could have been accomplished neatly and clean~ ly (and, comparatively, instan- taneously) by means of a prl. mary election. The elimination of jag candi- dates, nominating speeches, and the instructed ballot has been suggested as a compromise. it is a valuable compromise inas. much as it could preserve the convention’s useful function of stimulating B wellrorganized, enthusiastic, informative cam. paignr However, such a pruning of the convention leaves its ug- liest blemish untouched: the fact that it offers a situation where high pressure politicl are peculiarly useful. While pruning the convention would lessen the waste of time and energy, and lower the obscenr lty level, (with, incidentally, n corresponding dip in the excito< ment and participation gener. ated). it would not strike at the heart of the problem, “political animalism." “Political animalism" is not something ive can entirely elim- inate, anymore than we can raise participation to a full 100 per cent. But in planning Cam- paign and election procedures, we must seriously bear in mind that some activities are mot! conducive to animalism than others. i am not going to deny that the convention achieves A high water mark in participa- tion. It is noteworthy that only 76 per cent of the campus voted in this year’s final elections. 1 will deny that this participation is either especially instructive to the individual or strengthen- ing to the student government association. lllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllillllllllllllllllltlllllllllilllllllllillllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllIIIllllllltlllIIItlllIIlillllIIIillllltlllllllillllltm MacDowell Elecfed By Pat Smith Ric MacDowell, SGA Presi- dent-Elect, said Wednesday in a statement for the 5&8, “The success of next year's student gnvemment will depend not merely upon the enthusiasm of the student leaders, but upon the enthusiasm of the students ' as well. “The year 1967-1968 will be very important in setting new precedents for - - - the role of student gov- ernment, and much t i m e will be spent working in the context of a new struc- ture for the Wllesc com— Munowell munity in the proposed abolie tion of Women’s hours, the new court system. and the South Campus resident program. Also, the newly elected leaders will need the support and the ideal of the student body." Craig Allin, who ran a close race for the sea Presidency against MacDowell, expressed his congratulations to MacDow— ell. and his desire to thank all who helped him in his Cam- paign. He added that perhapn he would apply for a position on the new community court Ray l-lom was out of town, and hence unavailable for some ment at press time, and Trip Kennedy said he would do what he could to help MacDowell, but could foresee no political plans for himself. ‘ ’