The feeling in the streets

Going to see Dracula at the Dock Street Theatre and then walking back through the darkened, gaslit streets kind of gives a flavour to Charleston.

I was more impressed, however, by the fact that the first play produced here, at America's oldest theatre, was George Farquhar's The Recruiting Officer. I read this on a sign further up Church Street the next day.

It says here (second paragraph) that one of the earliest occupants of this house had written the prologue for that Dock Street Theatre production.

Coincidentally, The Recruiting Officer was the first play produced (by a cast of convicts and guards) at Sydney Cove in 1789. How interesting that this play, a satire on authority, was such a favourite in both early colonies.

Does it say something about our common attitudes to authority? In both countries I think people would agree we have a common disrespect for power. But the circumstances suggest subtle differences too. Australia's production took place in the context of a penal colony, arguably a precarious situation for those in charge. Yet the governor, Capt. Phillip, was comfortable enough to let it take place. And to this day, Australia's leaders tolerate a very knockabout sort of, well, 'knocking'. Perhaps while Americans fear government (you get the impression sometimes that tyranny is only a president away; despotism always a possiblity; gotta keep a hold on our guns), Australians have a rougher, more familial disrespect for their leaders. Australian politicians will never be tyrants; but they'll always be 'slackarses who don't do what we pay 'em to do'.