In the opening of the Act One, there is a happy mood on stage as the audience learn that the Birlings are celebrating the engagement of Sheila Birling to Gerald Croft. The characters are shown to us very quickly and we can straight away get an idea of what the people are like. The characters come across as a together family where everyone looks out for one another and each person knows their roles in the family. For example, Mr Birling is the man of the house, nonchalantly ordering people about, whereas Eric is treated as the child and very innocently. However, straight away the audience would get a sense of unease as they feel the tension between Shelia and Gerald as Sheila feels hostile because she says to Gerald ‘Yes – except for all last summer when you never came near me, and I wondered what had happened to you’. This tension arouses interest in the audience because we want to find out where Gerald really was.
In addition, although it is an engagement party, Mr Birling appears more concerned with business than love as we can see when he keeps referring to business matters in his speeches, ‘though Crofts Limited are both older and bigger than Birling and Company’. This shows Mr Birling is very concerned with money and social standing. Plus, Priestley uses dramatic irony to ridicule Mr Birling as we can see when Mr Birling gives his long speech in which he acts like he knows everything and predicts the Titanic will be unsinkable and that war will never happen. This is ironic because the Titanic did sink and the war did happen. This ridiculing makes the audience understand that Mr Birling is an ignorant man who speaks with a very closed mind. This may then cause the audience to automatically disregard what he says in the future and feel that Mr Birling’s opinion may be the leading one in the house but it is complete rubbish to everyone else.
J. B. Priestly uses his entrances and exits of the characters well because whenever people leave the room a major topic is suddenly discussed or something major occurs causing some people to miss things that, in fact, they should have heard or that may have made things different if they had been there to hear them. An example of this is when Sheila, Eric and Mrs. Birling exit and leave Gerald and Mr. Birling in the room alone. They start to discuss how Gerald's mother feels that he should have done better for himself rather then married Sheila. This shows that Gerald is considered being in a higher social class then the Birlings, and has actually gone for someone who is not as high in society as himself, which is quite extraordinary for this to occur in those days.
Also, once Eric enters you feel a great deal of tension in which Mr. Birling almost feels that he isn’t trusted to be around whilst they are talking about the more important issues. This will show the audience that Mr. Birling does in fact have a few ‘skeletons in his closet’ and things that he would prefer to keep quiet from other people and thus feels he can’t share them with Eric as he is an alcoholic and may blurt out these little secrets that Mr. Birling may have.
In addition, minutes after Mr. Birling has finished jokingly saying ‘so long as we behave ourselves, don’t get into the police court or start a scandal’ and just as he says that ‘a man has to mind his own business and look after himself’, the doorbell rings. The use of the doorbell as a sound effect will create some form of tension with the audience as once they hear this sound they all of a sudden start to enquire ‘Who is it?’ ‘What could they want?’ This will, in turn, draw the viewers into the plot and get them more involved in the play. Plus, the timing of the doorbell in connection to Mr Birling’s speech has a dramatic impact on the scene because Priestly has, once more, used irony as it is the police and the start of a scandal and the inspector will soon show Mr Birling that it is not right for everyman to look after just himself. Therefore, Priestley has used the doorbell as a dramatic device to draw the audience into the plot and build tension.
When Inspector Goole enters the stage, he is there with Mr Birling, Eric and Gerarld Croft. The inspector informs them of the suicide of Eva Smith and the plot starts to unfold. The significance of the name Eva Smith is important because as the inspector says at the end of the play, ‘But remember this. One Eva Smith has gone – but there are millions and millions and millions of Eva Smiths and John Smiths still left with us’. This shows us that Eva Smith is being used as a sample of the common person. In addition, the Inspector has a specific interviewing techniques, in which he only talks to one person at a time about the death. This shows the inspector is in charge of the situation and is in control.
Firstly, the inspector interviews Mr Birling and begins by showing Mr Birling a photography of Eva Smith. Eric and Gerald both try to look at the photo but the inspector only shows it to Mr Birling. This interviewing technique and handling of the photography causes tension and suspense in the scene and highlights, from the very beginning, everyone is a suspect. By using the photography as a prompt Priestley also advances the plot and Mr Birling acknowledges the fact that he knew Eva Smith because she was an employee of his. However, Mr Birling leads us to believe he has nothing to do with the girl’s suicide, as he is confident he has done nothing wrong as he states, ‘obviously it has nothing whatever to do with the wretched girl’s suicide. Er, Inspector’. But, the Inspector makes us realise that Mr Birlings is involved in the suicide and he may be one of the causes in which she committed suicide. When the inspector points out that Mr Birling is one of the causes, Mr Birling reacts by justifying what he done because that is how businesses should be run. By using Mr Birling as a character, Priestley highlights the deadly sin of greed because Mr Birlings puts making money before the good of a fellow human being as we seen when he sacked Eva Smith for asking for a pay-rise.
Secondly, Sheila gets interviewed and she seems quite stuck up. The inspector again uses the photography to prompt memory. Again, the photography causes tension as only Sheila is allowed to see it. When Shelia recognizes the girl in the photography, she cries out because she realises she may be involved. Shelia is very upset and immediately tells the Inspector everything she knows. She also urges other people to do the same as her. Shelia caused Eva Smith to get the sack from her job because she was jealous of Eva’s beauty. This may cause Shelia to be seen as shallow and petty as Priestley highlights the deadly sin of envy in Shelia. However, as she tells the truth, this causes the audience to feel that she is the honest person in the family. Therefore, Sheila will be ‘the favourite’ out of all the characters because of her straight out confession of what she did. She is also very sorry for her actions and she is willing to take responsibility for her part in the death. This brings Act One to its climax and Priestley uses Shelia as a contrast to Mr Birling. Mr Birling is unwilling to take responsibility for his part in the death while Sheila is willing to take responsibility for her part. This shows that young people can be right and understand the importance of collective responsibility, while old people can be wrong and are unwilling to share responsibility.
As Act One comes to a close, we are shown that Gerald Croft also had a part to play in the girl’s suicide as he startles when the inspector says the name ‘Daisy Renton’, which is the name Eva Smith used when she left Milards. Here, Priestley builds tension as he allows the inspector to exit to find Mr Birling and this leaves Shelia and Gerald to discuss the dead girl. Gerald then explains to Sheila how he is involved and admits that the summer before he had been up to more then just business. Gerald’s deadly sin is lust because as we find out Gerald used Daisy/Eva as a sexual plaything then dropped her when he felt like it. However, Gerald wants to hide these facts from the inspector as he says to Shelia, ‘Yes, we can keep it from him’. Yet, Shelia shows that it is right to tell the truth.
The fall of the curtain at the end of Act One is done fantastically well because with what has just happened the few seconds before the curtain has fallen will leave the audience on a cliff hanger and wanting to stay around and find out more on what is going to happen. We have just seen Gerald admit his little antics to Sheila about him and Daisy Renton. Then the inspector has walked in and says ‘Well?’. This creates massive amounts of suspense and tension because we, as the audience, feel that the inspector knows something has happened with him and Eva Smith due to Gerald’s reaction when the name Daisy Renton was mentioned. The audience has already seen two people collapse under the huge amount of pressure exerted onto them by the inspector so we straight away feel that Gerald with be no different to the rest of them.
In addition, Inspector Goole himself adds dramatic impact in this play because the timing of his entrance into the play was rather uncanny as we have seen when it interrupted Mr Birling’s look after yourself speech. Also, he seems to know everything the characters have done. His name is also significant because Goole sounds like ghoul which has an eerily, supernatural connection. Plus, at the end of the play there is definitely unexplainable things occurring as when Gerald phones the hospital we learn no girl has been admitted, yet minutes later a telephone call comes telling the Birlings a police inspector will be calling. Therefore, as well as a whodunit and morality play, we can also see the there are some supernatural elements in this play. Nevertheless, I do not think this uncanny, supernatural element is very important. It is a bit like Charles Dickens ‘Ghost of Christmas Past’. I think that the morals Priestley is expressing about responsibility for your actions is the main point and that is the part we should focus on.
In conclusion, Priestley does extremely well in the opening of this play in order to hook the audience. He straight away uses the lighting to convey a certain mood and then controls the mood by changing the lighting at a precise time. He uses the conventions of a whodunit to keep the audience guessing and build suspense. Then, Priestley heightens this suspense by adding a supernatural element. He uses the sound-effect of a doorbell to create tension and make an ironic situation. Priestley also uses irony to ridicule certain characters. The character’s exits and entrances are used for dramatic impact and Priestley uses the character of Inspector Goole as a dramatic device that conveys his opinion on morals. Therefore, we can see that Priestley uses many dramatic devices to convey his concerns and ideas to the audience. Furthermore, Priestley highlights how the Birlings and Gerald Croft are guilt of the seven deadly sins. But, Priestley also shows how people can change and become more responsible. He shows this in Shelia’s transformation from guilt to responsibility. I feel that the audiences viewing the play in 1945 would have been a very mixed crowd of feelings towards the play, some of who would have been disgusted at how their social class was portrayed. But, I feel that mostly people would have come out the play and taken a long hard look at themselves in order to see if they are like the people shown in the play. I still think the Priestley’s ideas are somewhat relevant in 2006 because we still have this social divides. One is between the southern half of the country and the northern half of the country; another is between the celebrity rich and the unemployed poor. I think that once people see this play that a few of them will realise that 60 years on, we have changed a great deal, yet, we still haven’t abolished the ways that make a big divide between people. And we still have not learnt to be …
Morally responsible …