I GATE-CRASHED

Stainer & Bell Ltd, Lonodn, 1976, 1976. Hardcover. Collectible, Fine/Near Fine. SIGNED and INSCRIBED by author to "good friends", dated March 1976. Octavo, hardcover, fine in near fine red dj. The autobiography of a man who has been stage struck since the age of six when he saw his first pantomime at the Theatre Royal, Kilburn in 1897. Arriving from Vienna in 1895, 'Charley' immediately contracted diptheria and was packed off to hospital, emerging six weeks later restored to health and with a fluent Cockney and provides a memorable account of his early life. Although an avid theater goer and already writing novels in his teens, it was not until 1925, at the age of thirty four, that he gate crashed into the theatrical world and enjoyed a long career as theater manager, drama director for the Arts Council and theater critic. We are told of his encounters with Tyrone Guthrie, Marie Rambert, Lewis Casson, Sybil Thorndike, Bernard Shaw et al. 253 pp. Foreword by Huw Wheldon.