Sylva Stuart Watson

Sylva Stuart Watson0:00

This download is the only extract the BBC has of this edition of Desert Island Discs. The presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:08

Are you a Londoner, misses Stewart Watt?

Sylva Stuart Watson0:09

Yes

Presenter0:10

I f

Sylva Stuart Watson0:10

Yeah.

Presenter0:10

Is there a theatrical background in your family?

Sylva Stuart Watson0:13

Um, not exactly. A musical background,'cause I was brought up to be a singer and I was a singer.

Presenter0:19

You made your first professional appearance when you were very young indeed.

Sylva Stuart Watson0:22

Yes, I think I was about four. Oh. And I sang Oh, it's nice to be a boy sometimes.

Presenter0:28

Where was that?

Sylva Stuart Watson0:30

Um, oh no. Uh, a hall in I think it was in the Euston Road. There used to be a a large piano shop there and there was a hall o over it. It's a long time ago to remember when you bought

Presenter0:39

Yeah.

Presenter0:42

And after that, what did that lead to?

Sylva Stuart Watson0:44

Uh after that

Sylva Stuart Watson0:46

I sung uh with um David Glegg, uh the organist and the king's trumpeter, and I sung at the Crystal Palace in this enormous building. I think I was about eight.

Sylva Stuart Watson0:59

And I sung Let the Bride Said of Him.

Sylva Stuart Watson1:02

With the trumpet obligato and the organ.

Presenter1:05

Nope.

Sylva Stuart Watson1:05

No microphone.

Presenter1:06

And you have told us of singing in the season at the Palace Theatre with Pavlova. Did you sing in opera?

Sylva Stuart Watson1:12

Yes, I sung um in the Fairbairn Opera. I sang Juliet.

Sylva Stuart Watson1:16

in the back with Romeo and Juliet. And I sung in the American opera Robin Hood. I was a year in America with most of the Metropolitan Opera stars.

Presenter1:19

Uh

Presenter1:26

Mm-hmm.

Sylva Stuart Watson1:27

Turning round.

Presenter1:28

Yes.

Presenter1:29

Now singing in the music hall um must have been very demanding, singing serious songs, it was not very long to get established, you just had your your drinks.

Sylva Stuart Watson1:37

Well, the war came, you see, and uh

Sylva Stuart Watson1:40

No opera, so I wanted to go on singing, so I sung in the great music halls, the Coliseum and the great music halls in the provinces, and some small ones too, the stole tours.

Presenter1:50

Is

Sylva Stuart Watson1:52

They were very exhilarating. The audience all yelling for who got on. You've just got to stand there and say it's you or me, and it's going to be me, and you sing.

Presenter1:59

What are you saying?

Presenter2:01

You are a straight actress as well.

Sylva Stuart Watson2:02

Yes, I played at Ervic um with um um Sybil Thorndike and Matt Beth and other small parts. But mostly a singer.

Presenter2:13

Yes. You were an early broadcaster.

Sylva Stuart Watson2:15

Yes, I did Savoy Hill with Stuart Hibbert. Oh, I I um broadcast there quite a lot.

Presenter2:21

mister Stuart Walton, when did your association with the Theatre Royal Haymarket begin?

Sylva Stuart Watson2:26

I think when I was about fourteen years old, because my future husband w we were boy and girl together, and of course his father, as you know, was manager.

Presenter2:36

Yeah.

Sylva Stuart Watson2:36

Other theatre royal hair markets, I suppose, began then?

Presenter2:39

And your father-in-law, um Horace Watson.

Sylva Stuart Watson2:41

Yeah.

Presenter2:42

uh had been at the hay market since the days of Bierbohm Tree, that is in the eighteen nineties.

Sylva Stuart Watson2:45

That is so.

Sylva Stuart Watson2:48

And it's rather interesting when he was with Tree because they had Oliver Twist as a play, and Tree of course played Fagan. And he made so much money with this one play at the Hay Market that he built a Magisters because he didn't have to pay taxes like we do now.

Presenter3:04

Yes. The mattress is immediately opposite.

Sylva Stuart Watson3:07

Uh

Presenter3:07

Uh

Sylva Stuart Watson3:07

Yeah.

Presenter3:08

Uh

Sylva Stuart Watson3:08

Uh

Presenter3:08

The the Theatre Royal Haymarket is London's second oldest theatre, second only to the Theatre Royal Drury Lane. It dates back to when?

Sylva Stuart Watson3:16

Um seventeen twenty one, or seventeen twenty, I think it is wrong.

Presenter3:20

That was the first theater on the site.

Sylva Stuart Watson3:20

That was the first little theatre in the Hay.

Presenter3:23

Yes.

Sylva Stuart Watson3:25

And in the hay it was, the hay carts came down.

Presenter3:27

Yes. Henry Fielding ran it for a while, didn't he?

Sylva Stuart Watson3:30

Yes, he did, and he wrote a play that so offended Walpole.

Sylva Stuart Watson3:36

And that he um established the censorship, but of course it wasn't for morals, it was for political reasons.

Presenter3:44

Mm-hmm.

Sylva Stuart Watson3:44

And rather so they've abolished it actually.

Presenter3:48

Now eventually the Haymarket became one of the three patent houses, one of the three theatres royal, and entitled to put on on straight plays.

Sylva Stuart Watson3:56

Yes, that is so. But the pattern theatres were very greedy, and it was only when they were shut that the little theatre in the hay was able to put on a play.

Presenter4:05

Yes. When was the present building put up?

Sylva Stuart Watson4:08

The present building was built in 1821.

Presenter4:11

Designed by Nash.

Sylva Stuart Watson4:12

Designed by Mesh.

Presenter4:13

Yes.

Sylva Stuart Watson4:14

and he said it was his masterpiece, and he built it so that the view from St James's Square it would look right down to this lovely finish to one of his designs.

Presenter4:25

It is one of the most beautiful architectural pleasures in London to see the façade of the Haymarket.

Sylva Stuart Watson4:28

I think it is, especially when it's lit at night. It's like a fairy palace.

Presenter4:32

Yes. Is there an archivist attached to the theatre collecting the playbills and relics of of the old age?

Sylva Stuart Watson4:38

Yes, we have all the play bills. At least I have piles. I haven't gone through them all. I haven't lived as long as that.

Presenter4:44

How long have you been in personal control of the Theatre Royal Haymarket?

Sylva Stuart Watson4:49

Eight years now.

Presenter4:51

Are you the only woman theatre licensee in London?

Sylva Stuart Watson4:53

I think I am now. There was one um at another theatre, but I don't think she does it any more.

Presenter4:59

Now the Haymarket has a great tradition of of English comedy.

Presenter5:03

Going a long way back, hasn't it?

Sylva Stuart Watson5:05

Yes, it's true.

Presenter5:07

What have you put on there since you've been in charge of the changes?

Sylva Stuart Watson5:09

Well, we had um rather special company which I formed, which was um the Theatre Royal Haymarket Company. Uh with Sir Ralph Richardson and Flora Robson and very well known players and we did a revival in conjunction with HM Talent of the Rivals and School Scandal.

Sylva Stuart Watson5:32

And um you never can tell.

Presenter5:34

Yes.

Sylva Stuart Watson5:35

and imports of being honest.

Presenter5:37

Do you like to work with a permanent company at the theatre?

Sylva Stuart Watson5:40

Well, of course that would be ideal, but practically impossible nowadays.

Presenter5:44

Yes.

Sylva Stuart Watson5:45

Unfortunately.

Presenter5:46

And what else have you had then?

Sylva Stuart Watson5:47

And then we had um we haven't had so many because they've all been such enormous successes, they've lasted a long time, but we did have a transfer, and that was Hadron.

Presenter5:57

Hadrian the Seventh. Yes. An excellent play.

Sylva Stuart Watson5:57

Yes.

Sylva Stuart Watson5:59

That is marvel. I love that play.

Presenter6:01

And a new play has opened recently, hasn't it?

Sylva Stuart Watson6:04

Oh yes, um before I draw my father.

Presenter6:06

John Mortimer's pleasure.

Sylva Stuart Watson6:07

Yes, that is a beautiful play. At least I think it is. Um I love it because a play of the nicest thing you could possibly have, courage.

Presenter6:17

Now, like all good theatres, the Haymarket has a ghost.

Sylva Stuart Watson6:22

Oh yes, he he's a dear person, very lovable. I think he loves the theatre so much he never wants to leave.

Presenter6:29

Buxteth.

Sylva Stuart Watson6:30

Buxton?

Presenter6:30

Who was manager of the theater for about 25 years?

Sylva Stuart Watson6:32

Yeah.

Sylva Stuart Watson6:34

Oh yes, he was. He made a fortune there.

Presenter6:36

Mm-hmm.

Sylva Stuart Watson6:37

Very fortunate, Dan.

Presenter6:38

Have you ever seen him?

Sylva Stuart Watson6:40

You don't see him?

Sylva Stuart Watson6:42

You just know he's there. He'll open the door.

Sylva Stuart Watson6:45

Or you see a shadow, but I did.

Sylva Stuart Watson6:47

um, go into my box, and I thought it was this very odd, and went back, and the shadow didn't go, and all alone in the theatre I was very brave.

Presenter6:55

Yes, but he is a very gentle man.

Sylva Stuart Watson6:56

There, sweetie. He opens the door of my office and um we say, Oh, come in.

Sylva Stuart Watson7:02

And I suppose he does really.

Presenter7:02

Is that nice boozy?

Presenter7:03

Well it was his office before it was yours.

Sylva Stuart Watson7:05

It's his office, yeah, great.