During the winter, Sunday night at Summerhill is acting night.
The plays are always well attended. I have seen six successive
Sunday nights with a full dramatic program. But sometimes
after a wave of dramatics there will not be a performance for
a few weeks.

The audience is not too critical. It behaves well--much better
than most London audiences do. We seldom have catcalls or feet
thumping or whistling.

The Summerhill theater is a converted squash-rackets court,
which holds about a hundred people. It has a movable stage;
that is, it is made of boxes that can be piled up into steps and
platforms. It has proper lighting with elaborate dimming de-
vices and spotlights. There is no scenery--only gray curtains.
When the cue is Enter villagers through gap in hedge, the actors
push the curtain aside.

The tradition of the school is that only plays written in Sum-
merhill are performed. And the unwritten code is that a play
written by a teacher is performed only if there is a dearth of
children's plays. The cast makes its own costumes, too, and these
are usually exceptionally well done. Our school dramas tend to-
ward comedy and farce rather than tragedy; but when we
have a tragedy, it is well done--sometimes beautifully done.

Girls write plays more than boys do. Small boys often pro-
duce their own plays; but usually the parts are not written
out. They hardly need to be, for the main line of each character
is always "Stick 'em up!" In these plays the curtain is always
rung down on a set of corpses, for small boys are by nature
thorough and uncompromising.

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