“Would You Help a Convict to Escape - Galsworthy Puts Question Very Pointedly in Drama Group Play,” The Kingston Whig-Standard. April 8, 1933. Page 02. --- "Escape", by John Galsworthy, which is to be presented by the Kingston Drama Group in the Vocational School Auditorium on April 19, is an interesting experiment in the technique of play writing which should appeal to Kingston audiences. In it Galsworthy has adapted the fast-moving episodic technique of the movies to the stage, and the play consists of a series of short episodes, disconnected except in their relation to the fortunes of the principal character, a convict who has escaped from Dartmoor prison.
"Escape" should be of special interest to the Kingston public as it deals with the reactions of a number of people who meet a convict who has escaped from a penitentiary. Galsworthy has presented with equal skill and clearness of character-delineation the response of a retired judge, an average man and his wife, two maiden ladies of opposed views, a Devonshire farmer, two farm labourers, a parson and a party of holiday-makers, to the appeal of the convict for help in his attempt to escape. Galsworthy never slips into a vein of sentimentalism, but presents the case of the escaped convict with fairness. The play cannot fall to grip its audience, which is torn between a desire to see justice done and to see a man fighting against his fate given a sporting chance.
Through the medium of this thrilling drama Galsworthy asks every member of the audience "What would you do if an escaping convict appealed to you to help him in his escape? No one can see "Escape" and still answer this question without wavering.
The production is a most elaborate one, involving the changes of scene and the use of more than thirty actors. In order that the play may move with the rapidity necessary to give its fullest effect, an experiment is being made with a more modern technique in scenic presentation than is usual in Drama Group productions. The play is being produced by Mrs. James Miller.
