A Taste of Honey Explore the likely similarities and differences between the audience reactions of 1958 and 2003. What was particularly shocking for an audience in 1958?How might an audience in 2003 react to the play?
A Taste of Honey
Explore the likely similarities and differences between the audience reactions of 1958 and 2003.
What was particularly shocking for an audience in 1958?
How might an audience in 2003 react to the play?
What are the dramatic qualities?
How were theatrical conventions challenged when this play was first performed?
Joan Littlewood first accepted Shelagh Delaney's "A Taste of Honey" in 1958 for production by the Theatre Workshop Company. At this time, Britain was finally beginning to emerge from the shortages and restrictions on life caused by World War Two.
The 1950's were a big time of change, and saw the birth of the "teenager", a culture that had previously not been recognised. People were beginning to refuse to accept things the way they were, and films such as, "A Rebel Without a Cause" staring James Dean, showed new rebellious characters, in a way that was innovative and scandalous. "A Taste of Honey" was part of this shocking new rebellion and appealed especially to this new strata in society. It belonged to a period in drama known as the "angry" theatre, started by John Osborne's "Look Back in Anger".
Until this time, the majority of plays had been set in London, and were generally about the upper class in society. Delaney had decided to defy this convention, and set her play in Manchester. She said,
'North County people are shown as gormless, whereas in actual fact they are very alive and cynical'
Furthermore, her play is certainly not about the upper class in society, both of these factors would have been very surprising for audiences in 1958.
The opening scene shows us immediately into an unpleasant flat. Helen soon comments that, "Everything in it is falling apart" and that the view out of the window is of the "gasworks". This is not the sort of setting that one would expect, for a mother and daughter to be moving into, in 1958, or in 2003. In 1958 a mother and daughter living together, without a father was very rare. Single parents were only a tiny majority of the population. We soon find out that Jo has never really had a father. He is a person that Helen seems keen to forget about. In 1958 this would have been outrageous, but it is not so surprising now. The audience at the time would have undoubtedly have been shocked.
Helen isn't portrayed to be a good mother throughout the play. Several references are made to her drinking habits. These are made by Jo, to whom Helen offers drink in the first scene. She refuses on the grounds that she doesn't "like the smell of it". This makes the audience wonder what situations she has experienced while her mother has been drunk. It also makes Jo seem more responsible than Helen, both unconventional ideas. Although in 2003 it is more common to have alcoholics, it is still strange for a mother to be so open with her excessive ...
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Helen isn't portrayed to be a good mother throughout the play. Several references are made to her drinking habits. These are made by Jo, to whom Helen offers drink in the first scene. She refuses on the grounds that she doesn't "like the smell of it". This makes the audience wonder what situations she has experienced while her mother has been drunk. It also makes Jo seem more responsible than Helen, both unconventional ideas. Although in 2003 it is more common to have alcoholics, it is still strange for a mother to be so open with her excessive drinking, and would certainly have horrified audiences in 1958. It is never actually said that Helen is an alcoholic in the play, and we only have references to her habitual drinking. Delaney is very vigilant right through the play that no taboo subjects are dealt with directly; otherwise her play wouldn't have made it to the stage, due to licensing laws of the time. She insinuates many inviolable matters, but none are explicate.
Helen's irresponsibility is endorsed further with her encouragement of stealing. When her 15-year-old daughter admits to her that she has stolen bulbs from the local park, the expectations of the audience are naturally of punishment for Jo. On the contrary Helen supports her daughter's actions and professes that it is "the way to do things. If you see something you want, take it". Many would see this as a farcical decision for a mother to make. Parents are generally supposed to be paradigms to their children, however Helen sees it to be perfectly tolerable for her daughter to steal! This is one of the subjects that I think would have very similar reactions with audiences in 1958 and 2003. Stealing is still a serious matter that in society is deemed as wrong. To think that a mother is promoting it is absurd!
From the drama we can conclude that Jo hasn't had a terrific upbringing. Helen is a semi-whore who seems to have a very limited interest in her daughter. The education of Jo is of a mere passing interest to Helen, and she is unaware of any of her daughter's talents, in particular her artistic abilities. This again is not the kind of attitude that would have been expected when this play was first performed, or indeed now. In attempts to get the attention off her mother, Jo makes some shocking decisions about her life.
In the second scene we are introduced to a black boy who Jo is having a relationship with. Delaney has chosen not to give the boy a name, but refer to him purely as "boy". This may be to show the audience how insignificant the character is in Jo's life. Even though it is such a controversial thing for Jo to do, to Jo, it is nothing. The fact that he is a black actor in the first place is unprecedented. Black actors were not a usual part of a 1950's theatre cast. Black communities were only known of in London, Bristol, Cardiff and Liverpool. They were not common anywhere else. The dramatic entrance of a black actor at this time would have certainly have made a huge impact on the audience, and undeniably got their attention. She then carries on the scandal by revealing to him that she is 18, an obvious lie.
The "boy" is not the only black character in the play; we are also told that Jo is to have a black midwife to deliver her baby.
As the play goes on, Jo reveals that she is pregnant with the baby of this black sailor. Her pregnancy towards the end becomes very obvious, and would have appalled audiences. It was not thought of as proper to have pregnant women on stage, by no means would they have expected the woman carrying the baby to be 15 and carrying a black child! It was unheard of! Even in 2003 society would be very shocked to see a 15-year-old girl pregnant. Delaney has tackled sexual scandal in a new way like nothing before it.
At the time this was written, it was possible to leave school at 15. This is what Jo intended to do. She explains this to Helen in the play when she is asked. The manor in which she asks the question sounds like she could be asking if she wanted a cup of coffee, she is totally blasé and unconcerned by the whole issue. She doesn't even realise the talents of her daughter, which are made clear by the artwork that both Helen and Geof look at. Jo explains to her mother that she is "never at school long enough" to get her work appreciated. This line should shock the audience. For a mother to be continually moving her daughter's school around, it will obviously result in an unsettled learning, and she will probably not have many friends. Jo's aim seems to want to be to get out of school as soon as possible and get some money.
The idea of Jo dropping out of school isn't so unconventional; it is her reason for it that is concerning. In 1958 it would certainly not have been unknown for young girls to leave school at this age, in fact it was rather common, but the way in which Delaney portrays the situation to us, it seems a shame that her talents have to go to so much waste. Helen however seems to have no commitment to her daughter's future. This is one of the situations in the play that is possibly more disreputable now than it would have been in 1958, as we are now not used to education being so lackadaisical, and would certainly expect parents to express concern.
The whole of the relationship between Jo and Helen is like this. There is a lot of inner concealed hostility between the two, and indisputably no respect. Jo is the daughter, but acts like the more responsible. For example she is the first to find where things are in the flat, the first to notice a leak in the ceiling and likes to show her maturity throughout. She calls her mother by her first name and talks to her without any of the admiration or respect between a mother and daughter. This is one of the first times in history that this would have happened, and is a prime example of the new influence and supremacy that the "teenager" had in 1950's Britain. At first she comes across as very streetwise, but there are definite parts where here naivety shines through. Her insecurity and self-reliance both come directly from Helen's neglect. She is reluctant to get close to anyone in the play and at one point says to Geof, " You're nothing to me. I'm everything to myself"
The audience of 1958 may feel some empathy with Jo, in a way that they hadn't been able to do in theatre before, as these subjects, although they may have been part of some peoples everyday lives, were never brought up. In either 1958 or 2003 we would be shocked to see that a 15-year-old girl is being allowed to live her life like this. She seems to be missing out on her childhood and forced into an adult environment from a very young age. It does not help her that she falls pregnant at 15.
By the beginning of act two we are introduced to Jo's new friend, Geof. Insinuations and clues are given to us to suggest that Geof is homosexual. This is possibly the most contentious issue that Delaney decided to include, as at the time this was written male homosexuality was a criminal offence and it was generally not safe for homosexuals to appear in public. Jo would have known this, but like so many other of these taboo subjects included, she did not appear to care about it. Geof was the character that she needed to keep her life on track. He is a natural nurturer and perhaps the only one who showed true responsibility for Jo and her baby. However it was not considered to be right that a man and woman should live together before they were married and would have absolutely have been looked down upon in 1958. They would have been horrified to think that not only were Jo and Geof not married, but also Geof was gay.
In order to help teach Jo about the baby Geof buys her a life size doll. Her reaction to the doll is very extreme. She suddenly looses all control and breaks down, because she knows that her baby is going to be black. I think at this at this instant the audience feels a lot of sympathy with Jo. Although what she is doing is deemed to be deviant and dreadful, the audience realises that she too is just a person with feelings. She is really just a young girl living in an adult world. To an audience in 2003 having a black baby wouldn't seem a surprising situation for someone to be in, and perhaps the reaction of Jo may seem to them to be peculiar, but even without this understanding Delaney definitely wants the audience to feel compassion.
The way in which this play is meant to be staged is very simply. There is not much scenery, and there are only two backdrops.
In an era of turmoil and uncertainty, the issues depicted in the play were precisely the ones that dominated lower class Britain, but, ironically, they were not the ones that were shown by the media, for they were considered to be too lowly to be worthy of depiction
