Letters from Alvina Krause: October 6, 1981

Context
Krause had been told to stop working because of the possibility of heart failure. She had refused. "What's the point of living if you're not doing," she said.
"My heart!" she said to me once. "I thought if would be this [pointing to her head], but not my heart [palms to chest]".

Letter
David, I have been hospitalized again. Recuperating, but not able to do biography now. [I had been asked to write a brief bio for a reference work -- DD]
But I am angry with you, very angry! Why didn't you tell me the Dean had threatened you with dismissal if I spoke what they did not want spoken. What are they afraid of? That school was my life -- My life! I brought distinction to it during a rotten regime -- At home and abroad -- My work was recognized with distinction. What are they afraid of? I would never have appeared on that platform if I had known of that threat to you. I shall never appear there again. Such a dirty, low down deed! What are they afraid of?

Footnote
AK, Lucy told me later, said the next time she would go into the hospital, she wouldn't be leaving alive.

Letters from Alvina Krause: November 1980

Note to DGO Subscribers
If you read Krause's letters via the email sent to you by Feedburner, please check the actual blog post of Friday January 18 for a video of Krause's remarks accepting the President's medal.

Letter of November 1, 1980
Congratulations on Candida. Tell your cast I am proud for them. Now they can move on to even greater achievements. Bravo!
Doll's House was a success too. Good houses of people new to our theatre. Julie did a terrific performance of Nora. She is a true actress. And how the audience loved Ibsen! They were spellbound for three hours. One man said -- mind you: a man -- "that wasn't written 100 years ago! That's today!" Do you think Ibsen heard that?
I have a group coming today for a three hour session on acting -- Next weekend we go to NY for the dedication of a little off-off Broadway theatre which will bear the name "The Alvina Krause Theatre" -- two more days of celebration of my name in light in NY!
On your next visit to the Dean could you just subtly insert the words that we are working, striving, begging for $25,000 down payment on our theatre. The irony of it! I witnessed all that money thousands, millions tossed about at NU and BTE is begging for $25,000 down payment.
You are on the crest of a wave: ride it!
A.K.

****

Letter of November 21, 1980
Is NU Speech restored to normalcy?
I spent a weekend in NY for the dedication of Neal Weaver's The Alvina Krause Theatre. A tiny little theatre on a top floor, but oh, the love! They had invited former students of mine -- I couldn't believe it! There was Priscilla Weaver, one of the three original founders of E.M.! [Summers at The Playhouse, Eagles Mere, Pennsylvania, started in 1945. Patricia Neal was among the original group -- DD] I had not seen her since she left EM in 1946. And there we stood holding hands and saying over and over "Oh, Priscilla, Priscilla!" "Miss Krause"! And George Furth broke in -- George Schweinfurth who couldn't act "but you can write, George. Write." And "Twiggy" made him rich -- and there was the fabric of my life -- Norm Larson [Not sure of either the spelling or the identification -- DD] came up from Washington -- You know the real story that should be written about me? "AK actors who became writers, teachers, leaders." They are every bit as important as Charlton Heston, Patricia Neal, etc etc. It was a wonderful two days I had with them.
Thank you for the clippings. I especially appreciated the Evanston Review article and picture. Or isn't it called "Evanston Review" any more?
BTE has accumulated $15,000 toward the down payment on the Columbia Theatre. They have a few days left to collect the rest of the down payment. Did Dean Wood mean it when he said "I can do something about it"? By the way, is he going to pay my plane fare? I have not heard from him --
We are deep in Christmas Carol --
Beautiful letter from one of your students --
A.K.

Letters from Alvina Krause: October 1980

Context
October 11, 1980. The gala celebrating the opening of the Theatre/Interpretation Center. (Sometime during the summer, Krause had telephoned, wanting information ["The Dean hasn't told me anything"] -- the only time in the almost ten years of our relationship that she called me.)
Months earlier, in an effort to ease Krause's concern that she was being used by the university, the Dean had told her that the school was planning to give the President's Medal to her and to Lillian Gish and to Agnes de Mille. ("Lillian Gish," Krause said. "A has-been actress. I'm still doing things"). In the weeks after Krause (finally) agreed to attend, mention of Gish and de Mille disappeared.
I will be Alvina Krause's official university escort for the weekend.

Letter
To corroborate: We, Lucy and I, arrive Oct 9, on US Air flight 205 at 9:10 am. As I told the Dean we will stay at John Van Meter's. We depart Monday, Oct. 13 at 7:50 am -- Some BTE members insist they are driving to Evanston for the event. I am trying hard to discourage them. In this TV Spectacular [It was being taped as a television special -- DD] could they expect to meet anyone? Is there any place for Alumni in this gala? Alumni who do not have $1000? I hope Lucy is included in the Gala attendance.
I shall be wearing my strongest armor and pray to keep my cool. If you see friends who want to see me tell them Thursday night. Friday before late afternoon, or Friday evening. John Van Meter will be in Indiana until Thursday, I think.
Prayerfully,
A.K.

****

Context
The presentation of the President's Medal to Alvina Krause October 11, 1980. Charlton Heston, Dean Roy V. Wood, President Robert Strotz.

Krause's Remarks (She altered them a bit here and there)
Thank you, Mr. President. My gratitude is deep -- especially deep since Northwestern was my home...for most of my life.
But who is this Alvina Krause you honor? A myth? A legend?
A few weeks ago I loitered in the front yard of my Pennsylvania home. A car drove up -- I think you would call it a car -- with a New York license. A young man leaped out.
"Hello, Alvina!" And he kissed me!
Keep your cool! Keep your cool! This is 1980! And I grinned up at him. What did this young young man from New York say to this old old woman in Pennsylvania?
"Teach me!"
And suddenly it is 1914 -- Yes 1914! And I a stringy-haired, freckle-faced, undersized, runt of a girl am sitting -- at last -- in the auditorium of Annie May Swift. Dean Dennis is introducing -- as only Ralph Dennis can do it -- the founder of the school, Robert McLean Cumnock!
I know there were a hundred or more students in that room, but I swear the great man looked straight into my eyes as he said,
"Stand up! Tell me who you are, where you came from, what you have done."
"St. Paul, Minnesota, and I --"
"Boston, Massachusetts, and I --
"Portland, Oregon, and I --"
"Los Angeles, and I played Juliet in 'Romeo and Juliet' --"
"Tallahassee, and I played Rosalind in 'As You Like It' -- "
And I stood up and blurted out
"Alvina Krause, New Lisbon, Wisconsin" and I sat down. Nobody from Nowhere, who had done Nothing! That was my beginning in this famous school!
It is years later. I am sitting in the Dean's office in Annie May Swift. I try to tell him that first year of teaching in St. Paul, Minnesota, was not so bad. I -- and I heard the Dean's voice:
"I am inviting you to join the faculty of the School of Speech!"
Blackout! Complete blackout until I heard
"Well, Alvina Krause, do you accept?"
Did that Cumnock voice of mine ring out in jubilation? My mouth opened -- closed -- not a sound! Reflex action wagged my head up and down!
Now, fifty years later -- yes, fifty years -- I stand here holding the President's honor in my hand --
Who is this Alvina Krause?
I am a teacher!
And this teacher has a creed which must be spoken now. No, this is not the senile babbling of an octogenarian. This is the creed that has been the backbone of my teaching -- the spine that kept me erect through the long years.
I believe. I believe in Michelangelo. I believe in William Shakespeare. I believe in Bach, Brahms, Beethoven and all the great artists that preceded them -- and that followed them. And most of all I believe in that combination of the arts we call Theatre. I believe, in spite of all that has been committed in that name, I believe that Theatre can -- if we but serve it truly -- I believe the Theatre can illuminate the lives we live even in the darkness which is today.
I am a teacher. Ralph Dennis made me one, as did those students, thousands of them, who drove me, questioned me, challenged me every inch of the long road up to this moment.
And a teacher must ask questions. We are here to celebrate the dedication of this Theatre/Interpretation Center. To what -- to what do we dedicate this Center?
And deep within me there is still a faint voice which insists
I believe!

Footnote
Krause insisted that artists must learn to make the ideas of others their own thinking. She did it always. Here is a quote from Bernard Shaw's The Doctor's Dilemma:
I believe in Michael Angelo, Velasquez, and Rembrandt; in the might of design, the mystery of color, the redemption of all things by Beauty everlasting, and the message of Art that has made these hands blessed. Amen. Amen.

****

Context
The weekend came and went.

Letter
You were an heroic escort all the way. Thank you! I have not yet recovered enough to objectively view those incredible four days. Will anything ever be the same at NU? Do keep me informed of the aftermath.
If any write ups in papers come your way, do send me copies. I keep wondering how it all looked to outsiders. And besides my sane relatives like to keep track of their mad aunt. Surely such an extravaganza never was held on any other campus! How did the press view it. What did Kup [Irv Kupcinet, long-time columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times -- DD] think, I wonder. What's the Dean's viewpoint now?
The Doll's House [the next play Krause was directing with the Bloomsburg Theatre Ensemble -- DD]
seemed very promising today. Was it by contrast?
Remind your Candida cast I love them. And those two who crashed the party remind them of their promises now and then.
Will we ever be the same again?
A.K.

Letters from Alvina Krause: June 1980

Context
I was scheduled to direct the play that opened the fall 1980 season at NU -- the first production in the Louis Theatre of the new Theatre/Interpretation Center.

Letter
David,
In cleaning my desk of a month's accumulation of unanswered mail I found your last letter. In haste I write: if you are going to do Candida for the first show next year God help you! You better begin work on it now -- hard work. It is the most difficult of all Shaw's plays to direct unless you have "natural" actors for the leading roles! In all my years of teaching I found only one person capable of creating Candida and only one Marchbanks. Mind me: go to work on it now -- and hard, comprehensive intense work. I would never do it with the company I have here and they are skilled actors!
Will you please send me McBurney's address? I need to reach him --
The tumult and the shouting dies ---- thank God! Eventually I can get to work again -- perhaps --
A.K.

Footnote
I'm don't remember what "the tumult and the shouting" was about, but I think Krause and the BTE people had spent the spring wrangling over organizational issues.

****

Context
A few days after the letter, this postcard arrived. I must have said something to Krause -- perhaps on the phone -- about helping the actor playing Morell to gain more physical flexibility.
Dean Wood had invited Krause to come to the to-be-televised gala in October dedicating the new Theatre/Interpretation Center.

Postcard
Morell must have the strength and inner charm of a John Kennedy. Remember Candida loves him, Prossy loves him, his congregation loves him. He has warmth and sincerity. He has everything as human being that Marchbanks lacks -- but he is not a poet! He is open, direct, understanding. He is not stiff and he is angry only when Eugene draws blood. This fine balance of character is most important -- Dedication? I don't know.

Letters from Alvina Krause: March 1979

Context
The School gears up for a televised gala in October 1980 to celebrate the opening of the new Theater/Interpretation Center. The Dean wants Krause to agree to participate.

Letter
David,
[Discussion of an applicant for an acting teaching position in the Theatre Department -- DD]
Many things puzzle me. Why is Dean Wood suddenly courting me? A huge floral arrangement comes to me on the occasion of the film festival. [One of the Bloomsburg students had made a short film about Krause and her Bloomsburg teaching -- DD] And before that an urgent invitation to the Centennial Alumni meeting May 11. "Be my guest". Why? I have virtually been banned for years. Why this urgency now. Dean McBurney told me: "Understand, Miss Krause, alumni have no control in my administration, no influence whatsoever". And he cut all alumni ties. All contacts with Dennis-Cumnock alums were cut off. And he made a point of establishing none with graduates of his own regime, particularly theatre grads. So where would I be on alumni day? Alone? alumni days can be fearfully lonely. But what I do not understand is this sudden intimate pressure. What goes?
The film festival was a big success. I can't bear the film myself, but people seem moved by it. And so I endure it. Tony Roberts was at his best: his genuine, outgoing, sharing self. BTE did a smart job inviting him here. How much money will come in remains to be seen.
Sea Gull progresses. [Krause was directing -- DD] There are hurdles but it is promising. C is becoming a real actress -- if I can get her to make it big enough. Why do NU theatre majors fail to realize that theatre is bigger than life? But the group spirit is remarkable. Pray for us.
A.K.